2004
Team Westport Web Site Welcomes the World
Date: August 13, 2004
Source: Westport News (CT)
Pretend you're black, Hispanic or Asian-American. Your employer, MultiNationalWorldCorp, has just transferred you to New York. You've got a month to find some place to live, so you do what any human being does in the year 2004: You ask your friends, and you search the Web.
The same suburbs pop up regularly. You go to their Web sites, and see plenty of trees, golf courses and smiling faces. What you don't see is anyone who looks like you.
So you don't think of moving there. You'll never know that there may be a small but vibrant group of people just like you, eager for you to join them and enjoy the riches of life in their strong, friendly community.
For nearly two years, TEAM Westport has been addressing issues like that. The acronym stands for Together Effectively Achieving Multiculturalism. It is an official town committee, its members appointed by First Selectwoman Diane Farrell. (Full disclosure: I am one of those members.)
From the start, TEAM Westport has grappled with how to make Westporters more aware of the ethnic, racial, religious and sexual orientation diversity that already exists here. (Economic diversity is another issue entirely, beyond our scope). We talk regularly about how to raise the town's consciousness about the backgrounds and interests of our neighbors, so we can celebrate our differences while strengthening our bonds…
Which brings us to www.TEAMWestport.org…
Harold Bailey, TEAM Westport's chairman, calls the site "an ever-expanding window on where we have been, are and can be as a community, in terms of diversity." As part of that expansion, he looks forward to more depth and breadth in "What You Can Do," an expanded calendar, and additional information on specific events and accomplishments.
…member Nick Rudd…has produced a handsome, easy to navigate site, yet he warns: "I like the idea that the TEAM Westport Web site really isn't finished, just like the activities of TEAM Westport itself. It will take the awareness, interests and involvement of lots of people in Westport and Weston to 'achieve and celebrate a more welcoming multicultural community.' But saying we, as residents, want to make our town more welcoming to those with diverse backgrounds gives us all an achievable objective for community action, and lots of room for individual commitment. I hope the site reflects a growing interest and participation from more Westport people, making our community an even richer, more interesting place."
And if it ends up attracting an intriguing mix of transferees from MultiNationalWorldCorp, so much the better.
© Westport News 2004
TEAM Westport Sponsors "Laramie Project" Community Conversation
Date: June 4, 2004
Source: www.westportnow.com
A controversial play about the murder of a gay student in Laramie, Wyo., will be the focus for a community discussion by Westport's diversity commission known as TEAM Westport.
The group is sponsoring the discussion June 18 immediately following that evening's performance of "The Laramie Project" at the Westport Community Theatre in Town Hall.
Director David Roth and several cast members will join audience members in an exploration of the play's themes, and its applicability to Westport.
"The Laramie Project" explores the murder of gay student Matthew Shepard in 1998, and that Wyoming cowboy-and-college town's reaction to it. Ten actors portray 84 roles, including Shepard's two killers, his father and friends.
"June is Gay Pride month, so it is a particularly appropriate time for Westporters to think about issues of sexuality and community," said TEAM Westport chairman Harold Bailey. "'The Laramie Project' is an excellent vehicle to prompt this consideration."
"Every citizen's feelings and actions help make a town the place that it is," he said. "And everyone reacts differently when a horrible event happens in a community's midst. This play provokes audiences to think about the connection between thoughts and words and deeds…"
Plans Finalized for Amistad Event Next Week
Date: June 4, 2004
Source: Westport News (CT)
It will be all aboard the Amistad June 11 now that the Board of Selectmen at a special meeting yesterday approved a contract between the town and the Stamford Center for the Arts that will enable TEAM Westport to hold a dockside reception and provide access to the ship for town residents.
TEAM Westport has raised enough money to fund the $5,000 fee that the town is required to pay the arts center for the event…Harold Bailey, TEAM chairman, said there would be room for up to 250 people for the dockside reception…and that tours of the ship will be conducted…June is traditionally a month to celebrate African-American culture and history, according to Bailey, and the story of the Amistad is a chapter out of that history.
"This year we invite all Westporters to come to Stamford and see the Amistad. Slavery was a controversial topic throughout Connecticut in 1839, and the price of freedom remains an important issue around the globe in 2004," Bailey said.
The Freedom Schooner Amistad is a replica of the slave ship that was carrying 53 kidnapped Africans in 1839 for sale into slavery in the Caribbean, when the Africans rebelled and took control of the ship. It eventually reached the coast of Connecticut, was seized by the U.S. Navy and towed into New Haven harbor. A number of the Africans were charged with murder and mutiny, but the United States Supreme Court eventually freed them, and 35 survivors returned to Africa in 1841.
"TEAM Westport is committed to issues of social justice, and we believe one of the best ways to understand our community and country today is to see where we were yesterday," Bailey said.
Black History Month Project Praised
Date: May 28, 2004
Source: Westport News (CT)
Recognition from TEAM Westport is the latest praise to come in for the commemorative-stamps project at Coleytown Middle School (CMS).
The "2004 TEAM Westport Community Leadership Award" will go to teachers Paul Ferrante and Michael Pisseri, who led their eighth grade classes in a two-week interdisciplinary study during Black History Month in February that produced student- designed stamps to honor baseball players from the Negro Baseball Leagues.
Chief Seeks Assistance in Police Recruiting Efforts Date: April 2, 2004
Source: Westport News (CT)
The Westport Police Department is finding it difficult to recruit a culturally and racially diverse law enforcement personnel. That was the message Chief Alfred Fiore delivered at a meeting Wednesday of TEAM Westport, the town's commission on multiculturalism.
He said that the department has three full-time officers of Hispanic background and eight females, but no African- or Asian-Americans among the 69 full-time officers on the force.
Fiore said that in the past the department had a number of officers of Asian descent, but that they had all left for communities with larger police forces… "This is a wonderfully diverse town, but more work needs to be done. There is room for improvement," Fiore said. He invited the commission to participate in the effort… TEAM chairman Harold Bailey said at the meeting that he welcomed the opening of a dialogue with the police department and expressed a hope that in addition to hiring practices, the conversation would include other issues.
TEAM Westport Urged To Keep Up Its Efforts
Date: March 19, 2004
Source: Westport News (CT)
The 18th president of Brown University told members of TEAM Westport that their commitment to the effective achievement of multiculturalism was more needed today than it was in the days of segregation.
"We are, in fact, more inclined to be segregated and live in our own cultural neighborhoods than ever. Each group is saying it's just too difficult not to stay in your own neighborhood," Ruth Simmons told the diversity group.
Simmons, a black woman who has lived through the integration struggle, said that civil society and the values of the community will be in serious trouble in the future, if this pattern of cultural resegregation is not changed.
She made news recently by appointing a Committee on Slavery and Justice at Brown to study the question of whether or not her university should pay reparations today for the exploitation of slaves in the past… Harold Bailey, who chairs TEAM Westport, said there is a parallel effort taking shape at Staples High School. "History teachers there are working with us to bring people who were involved in the civil rights movement to speak in 18 different classes at the high school". He said this was being done to recognize the 50th anniversary of Brown vs. Board of Education…
TEAM Westport Huddles to Call Future Game Plan
Date: January 23, 2004
Source: Westport News (CT)
TEAM Westport, First Selectwoman Diane Goss Farrell's advisory council on multiculturalism, has four committees working up goals for the New Year, and one committee hopes to find candidates for two administrative searches currently under way in the school district.
Stephen Daniels, who was filling in for Education Committee Chairwoman Barbara Butler, told TEAM members at a meeting Wednesday that Superintendent of Schools Elliott Landon and Staples High School Principal John Brady would welcome receiving from the group, the names of qualified candidates for the two positions…Marketing Committee Chairman Cheryl Scott-Daniels said that her group is planning a TEAM web site that would publicize "diversity resources" available from area retailers, health care providers with diverse language skills, houses of worship for the diverse faith communities in the area and ethnic and religious associations.
An annual multicultural weekend is being planned by the program committee, according to Chairman Craig Polite, that would feature the traditional arts and artifacts of different cultures, international cuisine, live ethnic cooking demonstrations, dance lessons from different cultures and an international film festival.
Susanna Griefen's outreach committee plans to survey town departments on their plans for addressing issues of diversity and to explore the possibility of developing a study circle on multiculturalism with department heads.
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