Valpo Human Relations Commission works to define its mission

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Updated: March 6, 2012 8:21AM

VALPARAISO — The Valparaiso Human Relations Council continued to plan its work against discrimination at its second meeting, but the members decided they needed definition first.

That will require a mission statement and strategic plan, the members decided last month.

City Administrator Bill Oeding is checking into getting a facilitator for the next meeting, on Feb. 28.

Although cost was a concern, Oeding didn’t say how much money the city could spend on it.

Mayor Jon Costas and the City Council made the commission a formal city body by ordinance in June, upgrading the former council by making it a permanent advisory board to the mayor.

However, the members’ work on forming committees and deciding what the next diversity summit seemed stymied by the lack of direction.

“What do we want to see here,” the Rev. Jacob Williams, council member and pastor at First United Methodist Church, said.

“What is our goal? What is our commission? What do we want to accomplish?” Williams asked the other members. “Having committees without goals is useless.”

Oeding said the previous incarnation of the commission was good but lacked structure.

Zahra Nwabara said the commission needs to define diversity and find how diverse the local schools are.

City Council member Deb Butterfield is also working on something that will help define not just the commission but the city’s history of tolerance or intolerance.

The timeline would create a visual representation of relevant events in the city’s history.

Butterfield said it would give people a sense of context and a visual reference.

Having people give their personal experiences will make the context broader and give participants a sense ofone another.

Butterfield will begin talking to people to construct a timeline, but the commission’s work on it will happen at its March meeting.

The commission plans to complete it at the April meeting.