For the past nine months, Better Together’s organizing committee — called the Leadership Circle — has been working to convene a broad community conversation around the myriad differences — in culture, race, age, abilities, politics, economic resources, and more — that make us who we are.

This Saturday, August 29, from 10am-3pm, that conversation begins, as the now hundreds of registered Decatur residents meet in the gym of the Beacon Municipal Center and begin the process of finding common ground on challenging issues like fairness. Or inclusion. Or equity.

Won’t you be one of them? All are welcome and encouraged to attend. Registrations are still being accepted here so please make plans to join us.

Guided by volunteer facilitators — many of whom were trained last Saturday at Better Together’s Leadership and Facilitation Training session — the gathering will launch a broad community conversation inspired by the “World Cafe” model of rotating small group discussions. Participants will be invited to share experiences and perspectives on diversity-related issues such as housing cost and availability, racially-just community policing, and more.

From those contributions, and others to be collected this Fall, we’ll craft a substantive Community Action Plan filled with policy goals and other recommendations for implementing Principle B of Decatur’s 2010 Strategic Plan: “Encourage a diverse and engaged community.”

See you there!