2022 Year in Review

2022 Year in Review

2022 was an incredible year for the ARC community. Looking back, we remember some of the highlights as we worked to educate, embrace and empower our community.

Educate
A wide variety of topics were presented by a diverse group of speakers at our Sunday rallies, including climate change, nuclear weapons, biracial adoption, indigenous rights, affordable housing, and voting law. We learned how each topic plays a part in the continuation of racial injustice.

We worked in collaboration with the Westerly Library and the United Theater to create programming to educate our community. 

With the United Theater, we offered the monthly Black Film Series.

In March, in collaboration with the Westerly Library, we held a month-long community book study featuring The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together by Heather McGhee.

We launched our website westerlyarc.weebly.com which is updated weekly with links to our newsletter, a calendar of events, calls for action, and more.

In addition to the website, we upgraded our weekly newsletter with a new format and enhanced content for our readers while increasing our mailing list from approximately 150 in January to 241 at the end of this year.

We also maintained a consistent social media presence on Facebook and Instagram, posting frequently with news about ARC.

Embrace
Talented performers like Kevin “Big Lux” Lowther, Frank Pendola, and Geoff Kaufman continued to bring inspiring music to our Sunday gatherings. Whether joining us on special occasions like Juneteenth or Children’s Day, or spontaneously bursting into song on any given Sunday, we were enriched by the power of music.

We held many celebrations of our multicultural community, including a Juneteeth celebration, Indigenous People’s Day, Asian Pacific Heritage Month, LGBTQ+ awareness, Black History Month, Human Rights Day, Hanukkah, Christmas and Kwanzaa. We gathered and celebrated with music, dance, stories, traditional foods, and guest speakers.

We were embraced by other organizations fighting for justice and were pleased to share the ARC story at the Unitarian Universalist Church of South County in Peace Dale, and at the Friends Meeting House and Christ Episcopal Church in Westerly. Each of these communities also inspires us.

In May, we commemorated our 2nd anniversary with a Sunday celebration.

On July 4 we had an emotional and powerful reading of Langton Hughes “What To the Slave is the Fourth of July.”  We continued with “Honoring Our History: Contribution and Resilience of African Americans in Building America” visually representing “17 Generations” presented by members of the Unitarian Universalist Church of South County in Peace Dale.

Empower
ARC provided a platform for any local candidates to embrace our community on Sundays, leading to the election of Leslie Dunn to the School Committee, Kevin Lowther to the Town Council, and Victoria Gu as State Senator, and making history in the town of Westerly.

Based in large part on the advocacy of ARC, the town’s first Multicultural Committee has been formed and will start its work in early 2023. 

Through letters, emails, and speaking at the School Committee meetings, we showed our widespread support for the Westerly School Commitee’s effort to approve a district-wide equity audit.

We engaged with local radio (NPR and WBLQ) and newspapers (The Westerly Sun and The Boston Globe) to advocate on local issues and share our goals and objectives.

Core supporters regularly attended School Committee and Town Council meetings to keep us informed on local issues.

Many of you wrote letters to the editor and/or spoke at the School Committee (go to 1:18:35 for a great example) and Town Council meetings in favor of initiatives to make Westerly a more welcoming, equitable, and just community.

We continued to collect donations for the Jonnycake Center and local food banks.

We welcomed speakers from the League of Women Voters on voting registration and law. 

Ery Caswell brought his Social Justice Mobile Library to a Sunday rally and we held a silent “read-in” protest in opposition to calls to remove books from local public and school libraries. 

Thank you to each and every person who helped to make this year such an amazing one for our all-volunteer organization. We continue to learn and grow together keeping an open mind, a tender heart and a love for justice.