Community Caring Conference brings together varied people with common interests, common goals.

As the QC Times notes,

Four dozen Rock Islanders gathered for a neighborhood summit Tuesday brought 1,634 years of collective Quad-City life experiences, almost all in the town they were proud to call home. The summit began by totaling the depth of wisdom represented by those who cared enough about their community to show up on a chilly night of the season’s dribbling snowfall.

No single experience was alike. Paul Fessler offered his experience of living in and restoring a century-old home. Kevin Isaacs offered his experiences growing up by Saukie golf course. Lauren Boswell-Loftin shared her experience of becoming the first African-American woman to serve on the Rock Island County Board.

Community Caring Conference director Jannette Higginson and United Way director John Kiley led the group through innovative exercises that will plug the millennium’s worth of experiences into neighborhood development plans.

Davenport did it admirably last week in a big, organized way, enlisting a consultant to carefully launch a similar process to identify and build on community strengths. Rock Islanders did it in a township hall with Post-it Notes, magic markers, coffee and cookies.

A few elected officials were on hand for this opening exercise. But they didn’t talk like elected officials. Alderman Chuck Austin shared a table for a time with David Levin. The pair ran against each other in the last election.

Nothing about TIF districts, public/private partnerships, mixed-use developments, new urbanism or even used urbanism. Perhaps that will come later when these broad visions get refined into action plans, or when the professionals take charge and residents’ eyes glaze over.

1,634 years of experience can’t be wrong.

The topic of community/neighborhood development have attacted some excellent comments in the related threads below. Feel free to share ideas and opinions here. If a good discussion emerges, I'll give it a permanent link for discussion into the future.