I hate to be the bearer of bad news.
But I have a rather “Inconvenient Truth” – if I can borrow that phrase from former U.S vice-president Al Gore – that I need to share with community leagues.
And that is we need to be open for business during the summer months.
Okay, I can hear it now, no one wants more community league meetings. We work long enough, from September to June. And we deserve a holiday.
And I want to say yes, to all of that.
But I also have to acknowledge the fact that our city comes alive in the summer. People emerge from their winter sleep, they want to do things and they want to do them together, whether at city-wide festivals or at barbeques with their next door neighbour.
This is a ready-made opportunity for community leagues to capitalize – but guess what – all too many of our member leagues are essentially closed in July and August. The shutters are down. The phones are turned off.
This point has become painfully clear at the federation in the past couple of years, as we have attempted to launch major initiatives with partner organizations. The first was our work with the city’s Next Gen organization, which engages young people, including young adults without children.
In this case, we were told very clearly that summer is the time to act. School is out (including university) and young people are looking for things to do. So the federation got active, we ran our community challenge throughout the month of June and then directed various young people with upbeat plans to their local community league.
You can guess what happened. No one was home. If they got a response at all, other than a telephone answering machine, they were told to come back in September.
Our second experience was with our cultural integration project, where we have hired seven part-time outreach workers who work hand in hand with a variety of cultural associations.
Once again, we were told that summer is the time to act, when newcomers (many of whom come from warm countries) are not so intimidated by the weather and want to experience our city.
No need to repeat what happened. Suffice to say it has been slow going with the leagues this summer. Painfully slow.
So what should we do about it?
Here at the EFCL, things have started to change. We have begun to get more active, first with our involvement at the annual Heritage Days Festival, followed by an entry in this year’s Capital Ex Parade. We’ve also introduced a mid-summer board meeting, which will undoubtedly become a fixture in future years.
To be fair, the federation is also in the enviable position of having staff to help keep things running in the summer. Most leagues don’t have that luxury.
But what can they do?
One thing that is becoming clear is that many leagues need to change their bylaws, so the president or executive committee can be delegated a certain amount of authority to act. If the board isn’t going to meet and make decisions in the summer, then find someone who can.
League executive members may want to take turns returning telephone calls and email inquiries. Perhaps some summer help could be hired?
No question this is thorny topic, as league executives deserve a summer break and we get precious little nice weather to enjoy as it is.
But it has become painfully obvious that community leagues are missing out on a raft of opportunities by shutting down just as the rest of the city is opening up.
Inconvenient, yes, but true.