By Joy Koesten
Guest Columnist
The Kansas Leadership Center in Wichita is tapping into its statewide network of 12,000 alumni to ensure “Kansas Beats the Virus.”
KLC, in partnership with the State of Kansas, aims for Kansans to generate their own local ideas for reducing the spread of COVID-19. Spreading across the state at an alarming rate, the death toll from the coronavirus hit 2,072 in Kansas on Friday prompting the governor to order flags be lowered to half-staff in commemoration of those who have lost their lives to the illness. So far, more than 185,000 Kansans have contracted the illness and there is no sign of it slowing.
With so much at stake (our economy, our schools and our families), KLC alumni like myself have committed to collectively host more than 1,000 virtual meetings before the end of the year in an effort to identify action projects to combat the virus and to generate local solutions. Groups of all kinds are being asked to come together, including clergy, coaches, neighborhood leaders, school districts, nonprofit organizations, business owners, community officials, PTO members, volunteers, and everyday Kansans. Both Jewish Federation of Greater Kansas City and Congregation Beth Shalom have already agreed to convene meetings with a small group of 8-15 stakeholders each. Other local organizations have indicated their interest too.
Established by the Kansas Health Foundation in 2007, the mission of KLC has always been to foster civic leadership for healthier Kansas communities, and certainly the current pandemic lends itself to precisely the kind of daunting civic leadership challenge for which the KLC was established. Former State Representative Ed O’Malley has served as president and CEO of KLC since the beginning.
O’Malley says they decided to launch the statewide initiative after consulting with the Kansas Legislature and Gov. Laura Kelly’s administration, in search of bipartisan approaches to curb the spread of the pandemic. The Department of Health and Environment approached KLC with the idea of mobilizing its alumni across the state to engage local leadership networks across Kansas to generate local solutions to help eradicate the pandemic.
In a recent conversation O’Malley shared his appreciation for our faith community saying: people must be co-architects in designing their future. Faith communities know this. Much like God gave instructions on how to build the Tabernacle and Moses engaged all the Israelites in making it happen, so too today must we engage all our people, empowering and equipping them to help our communities move forward. This is instinctive for many faith communities, which are critical for this effort to succeed.
Each one-hour meeting is led by facilitators, trained by, and using guidelines from KLC. Those gathered will identify, discuss, and agree on a specific action plan to combat COVID-19 in their local community. Facilitators get the group to quickly diagnose the situation, brainstorm possible action projects and commit to action in the days following the meeting.
The meetings are designed to commit each gathering to implement at least one #KSBeatsTheVirus action plan that will slow the spread of the virus in their locality. Some ideas that communities are trying have include creating heated outdoor spaces for teens to safely socialize in the winter, committing the local PTOs to hold virtual meetings only and creating a network of people at church to handle shopping for at-risk individuals in the community.
Identified solutions will be shared with Kelly’s administration, the KDHE, and the Kansas Legislature through weekly reports on local action plans and examples of shared learnings. KLC has created a specific landing page on their website (https://kansaleadershipcenter.org/ks-beats-the-virus) to provide daily highlights of meeting reports and stories from their professional team. They have also launched a private Facebook group, https://www.facebook.com/groups/kansasbeatsthevirus/, for those involved in the meetings to share resources, ask questions, and hear what other Kansans are doing in their communities.
They say all politics are local, but a public health crisis isn’t political. It is, however, up to us to bring our local community together to beat this virus. At its core, this endeavor is about leadership, relationships, and building trust. Our local Jewish organizations and its leaders know our community members and neighbors better than anyone. It makes sense that we call on each other to drive local solutions. Join us in this endeavor and commit to hosting a one-hour meeting to think about how your organization can ensure that “Kansas Beats the Virus.”
Joy Koesten, of Leawood, is a former Kansas state representative from a district that included parts of Leawood and Overland Park
Chronicle Editor Mike Sherry is helping oversee reporting for the “Kansas Beats the Virus” campaign.
