Collaboration Video Transcript
Developed by CSAP's Northeast Center for the Application of Prevention
Technologies © 2002 Education Development Center, Inc. All rights reserved.
Narrator:
As communities around the country are learning, the key to effective prevention
is to use multiple strategies, in multiple settings, toward achieving
one common goal. One important strategy is Collaboration. New Haven Connecticut
has been addressing alcohol and other drug issues for the past several
decades. Several years ago, New Haven Fighting Back was born to coordinate
these ongoing efforts.
Sergio Rodriguez, City of New Haven, Fighting Back:
And in fact the feeling at the time was, that this was a city that was
resource rich, that New Haven was a city that was resource rich. But a
lot of the services were fragmented. Some folks put their heads together
and said, you know, maybe we need to try to do this a little bit differently.
Maybe we do need to come together, and begin to talk about what some of
the real issues are, around substance abuse for the city of New Haven.
Marzella Tyson, Director, City of New Haven, Fighting Back:
New Haven Fighting Back is the city’s initiative to reduce alcohol
and drug abuse. It is the city’s initiative and it’s also the
community’s initiative. It’s their response to the problem of
alcohol and drug problems in our city. It’s run and driven by a group
of citizens, which is composed of individuals who are in our community,
the police department, the hospitals, the board of education, significant
members, that have had an interest in the problem.
Legislators
City Officials
Hospitals
Colleges
Housing Authority
Police Department
Fire Department
Board of Education
Neighborhood Associations |
What we wanted was the community to know that it wasn’t just a isolated
issue, that it was an issue that effected the whole community, and unless
we included those different players in this, in the Fighting Back group,
we were not going to be effective at all.
Narrator:
To ensure the successful launch of this important initiative, the Fighting
Back staff engaged in an aggressive campaign of public education.
Marzella Tyson:
Well, people had to be educated about the problem and many people have
many different misinterpretations, misperceptions about the issues, so
people had to be educated about it and people had to see how it affected
them. We had to have major orientations with people, we had to have a
lot of informative sessions with people, one on one, what is your interest,
as you know that this problem affects your institution, do you know the
extent of the problem, and once we got to that period, people okay, well
I’m interested, and then they had to see how they were going to benefit,
and how they were going to make a difference.
Narrator:
As community awareness grew, Fighting Back shifted its focus from educating
the public to building a critical mass for change by recruiting key community
members to the coalition.
| …building a critical mass for change by recruiting
key community members |
Narrator:
Staff were able to engage people, by showing them how they would benefit,
and helped them take ownership of the problem.
| …helping them take ownership of the problem |
Marzella Tyson:
So, once they realized that, more people started to come to the table,
it had to be something that was accommodating to them, in terms of the
times and the days, because they were in positions that, they had very
busy lives. So it was very challenging trying to get them all at the same
time in the same place. Keeping them there is another story. People want
to feel that they have issues at the table that they’re going to
address. They like live wire kinds of things that they can deal with.
They like to see that they’re making a change so constant reports
of accomplishments, constant reports of where we are and where we’re
going.
Narrator:
As membership grew and stabilized, the coalition focused on developing
an action plan to guide program design and implementation.
Successful Collaboration:
Action plans guide program design and implementation |
Marzella Tyson:
If you have a good action plan in front of you, you have the right people
doing the right things in terms of the tasks that they’re assigned
to do, a good staff, a good staff support, people tend to have a successful
outcome.
Successful Collaboration
Good action plans result in successful outcomes |
Sergio Rodriguez:
Through this process of collaboration, provides us with the opportunity
to come up with much more creative ideas, less issues around burnout,
because more people are tackling the problem together.
Germano A. Kimbro, Male Advocate, Responsible Fatherhood Initiative:
So to come out here in public housing and to say that we want to work
with fathers, it was a challenge, because a lot of the other services
weren’t in place, traditional services in place for women and children,
and that’s just on a local level as well as a state level. So what
we’re able to do through collaborating was begin to lobby and contact
key legislators and have legislation passed on the statewide level that
recognized the need for support for low income, non-custodial fathers.
So we just had a bill that was passed in the state, that established the
Fatherhood Council. To look at how to begin to rewire the system to get
the Department of Social Services, Department of Labor, Corrections, community-based
organizations, those clergy and folks that we need to educate around the
Needs Initiative Fathers. And I guess the primary goal is to provide opportunities
to encourage and support those efforts, in father’s quest to be financial
and emotionally responsible for their children.
Narrator:
So with membership in place and a set of innovative programs underway,
New Haven Fighting Back now faced the single greatest challenge that all
coalitions must deal with – how to maintain and sustain this important
community initiative.
Successful Collaboration: Challenge
How to maintain and sustain this important community initiative |
Sergio Rodriguez:
Now I believe there are three skills necessary to maintain a coalition.
Successful Collaboration:
Political Education |
One would be education around the political system. Who are the people
in your community that are the political people that need to be involved,
that can really move your particular group’s agenda if necessary,
so that’s a very critical piece.
Marzella Tyson:
Having them at the table and having them informed when the sessions would
come around, would be a good opportunity for them to interject and be
knowledgeable about the issues whenever we had to present any type of
policy during that session.
Sergio Rodriguez:
I think the second thing is what are the resources that are truly available
to you. Who at the table, what resources do they bring? What can you harness
from them? Do you have somebody who can give you legal advice? Do you
have somebody who can give you, who is an administrator, who can help
to think about the group administratively?
Successful Collaboration:
Political Education
Available Resources |
And I guess the third thing, in terms of skills, how would you promote
yourself, once you’ve gotten these two areas taken care of. So that
other people can buy into it as you’re doing.
Successful Collaboration:
Political Education
Available Resources
Promotion |
Public Service Announcement:
Aren’t you tired of seeing your friends and loved ones devastated
by abuse of alcohol and other drugs? The New Haven Fighting Back Coalition
is on the move to reduce substance abuse the killer of hopes and dreams.
We are collaborating with AIDS organizations to reduce drug related HIV
infection. Working with the faith community on the role of spirituality
in addiction recovery. And helping families to create safe neighborhoods.
Join with Fighting Back to help people get sober and get well. Call us
for an information packet.
Marzella Tyson:
In New Haven we see, this alcohol and drug problem as it’s not isolated,
it’s something that you’re going to have to have a collaboration
to address. And if you don’t, it’s just something that you’ll
never have a positive outcome, if you don’t have all the players
around the table, and address it as a community problem. That it’s
not just one specific neighborhood, but then, it affects all neighborhoods.
And even those people who don’t live within the city, it can affect
those people that are close to our city, it comes in and out of our city,
that will do business in our city, so the employers, the employees, everyone
is affected by it.
The transcript of the video Collaboration is taken from interviews
conducted in 1999. The video series was developed as part of our training
and technical assistance to the Northeast Region.
Executive Producer: Michael J. Rosati
Produced by Beacon Communications
Special thanks to New Haven Fighting Back, New Haven, Connecticut.
The contents of this program are solely the responsibility of its authors
and do not necessarily represent the official views of the U.S. Department
of Health and Human Services, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services
Administration, Center for Substance Abuse Prevention.
Funding for this program was provided by the U.S. Department of Health
and Human Services, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration,
Center for Substance Abuse Prevention, Cooperative Agreement No. 5U1JSP08133-03-1.
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