Everyone is invited to join us. Come and find out what we’re involved with this month. Your talent and ideas are always welcome!

The Social Justice Committee normally meets on the third Thursday of every month at 7:30 p.m. in Room 126 at the church. (Check your newsletter or the AUUC calendar on this website.)

Committee members include: Claire Brown, Nancy Davis, Scott Dunham, Julie Floyd, Jim Gerard, Pete Fontneau, Dick Foster, Ed Jaffee, Roberta Kiver, Ed Kringer, Mary Kringer, Vicki Long, Mike McCord, Yovana Pero, Kathy Shinal, Marsha White.

.Accotink Social Justice Participation
Christine Beauvais and Pete Fontneau serving the Beacon House picnic	AUUCers volunteered at the Habitat for Humanity ReStore in Alexandria in May 2008
AUUC Participants in the 2008 Crop Walk
AUUC Volunteers at Burke Library	AUUC Volunteers at The Haven of VA

INDEX
Outreach Collections
Unitarian Universalists for Social Justice (UUSJ)
Beacon House
Local Community Outreach
Adopt-A-Highway
Eldercare
Voter Education
Volunteers Needed for Projects
Peacemaker Award

SOCIAL JUSTICE UPDATE:

Outreach Collections

Every year, the Social Justice Committee solicits recommendations from the congregation for our monthly Outreach Collections. The final selections and schedule for this year’s collections are:

Unitarian Universalists for Social Justice (UUSJ)

Accotink is a member of UUSJ, a regional (Baltimore-Washington-Northern Virginia) social justice organization established by local area Unitarian Universalist churches and social service agencies. UUSJ’s objectives are to help UU congregations strengthen their individual social justice efforts; to stimulate joint social justice activities among area UU congregations; and to elevate area UU’s awareness of the importance of social justice work in our faith tradition. Task forces work on helping local congregations make a difference in focused areas. They team geographically and regionally to multiply their impact. For more on UUSJ, visit their web site at http://www.uusj.org.

UUSJ is a membership organization. It is funded by dues, donations by UU congregations and individuals, and by grants. By paying annual dues Accotink gains one member on the UUSJ board. That position is currently filled by Mike McCord.

Here are just a few of the events that UUSJ has been involved with this year. Each year in October, UUSJ operates a booth at the DC Green Festival in cooperation with the Ministry for Earth and Green Sanctuary. Several AUUCers help to staff the booth and support the Green Festival.

On Nov. 1, 2007, UUSJ hosted a successful “Inspired Faith, Effective Action” workshop, with Bill Sinkford as a key speaker. On Jan 5, UUSJ co-sponsored a Virginia legislative issues program with presentations by the Virginia Interfaith Center for Public Policy as well as GLBT and immigration organizations. Manu AUUCers were in attendance at these events.

Each quarter, there is usually a workshop and meeting for the Virginia congregations to discuss their social justice activities and to coordinate joint ventures. In May 2008, AUUC provided a presentation of our activities working with the local community.

Beacon House

Beacon House is a neighborhood-based organization providing after school tutoring, educational, sports and cultural activities for young people in the Edgewood Terrace Neighborhood, N.E. Washington, D.C. Founded as an urban ministry in 1991 by UU minister Rev. Donald E. Robinson, Beacon House offers a safe place for 350 at-risk children ages 5-18 to meet, learn and play as an alternative to involvement in drugs, violence and crime. Support comes from foundations, individual contributors, and the Unitarian Universalist churches of the greater D.C. area, including Accotink.

As Beacon House supporters, members and friends of AUUC provide food and volunteers annually for their summer picnic, where we assist in feeding up to 300 campers, counselors and adults. During the late summer, we contribute new school supplies to the children of Beacon House. In December, we donate holiday gifts, as well as warm hats, mittens, and gloves, to Beacon House children, teens, and seniors. Individuals also volunteer their time to tutor the children on a regular basis. If you would like to help in these rewarding activities, contact Jim Girard. Check out their website at www.beaconhousedc.org.

Local Community Outreach

Fairview Families: In response to a UUSJ initiative to work in the area of education, our committee initiated contact with the staff of Fairview Elementary School. This led us to purchasing Franklin Spellers and educational software for low income children. At the recommendation of a counselor, we “adopted” two single-parent families living in subsidized housing. We have several food drives during the year to help support these two families. Through the generosity of individuals in our congregations, we give each child a back-to-school book bag full of all their required supplies, plus we provide holiday gifts to the children and their single mothers. Contact Scott Dunham for further information about this program.

Adopt-A-Highway

Adopt-A-Highway is a program sponsored by the Virginia Department of Transportation, which is part of our joint focus on the environment. VDOT has found that clean roadsides curb the tendency to litter. Since 1988, over 9000 organizations have participated in Adopt-A-Highway statewide. See http://virginiadot.org/infoservice/prog-aah-default.asp for more information on Adopt-A-Highway.

Eldercare

The Social Justice Committee is working on eldercare issues through the advocacy organization, TLC 4 Long Term Care Residents (TLC4LTC). The goal of TLC4LTC is to improve the quality of life for Virginia's nursing home residents by working towards optimum levels of compassionate and competent staffing, creating public awareness of this need, and to seeing that laws designed to protect the well-being and safety of our vulnerable citizens are vigorously enforced. Minimum staffing legislation has been introduced in the Virginia Senate and has been supported by many members of AUUC through calls, e-mails and letters to legislators.

You can help our frail, elderly citizens simply by being available to contact your legislators when important issues and legislation are being considered. Please contact Jan Clement to add your name to our growing list of people who support this effort. Virginia's legislators need to know that we care about our debilitated elderly and to hear that we believe they deserve to be treated with respect. Our aged relatives and friends who cannot speak for themselves must receive compassionate and competent care now; they do not have the time to wait.

Further information can be found on our website: www.tlc4ltc.org

Voter Education

Prior to every election, we provide information to help AUUC voters get registered or get absentee ballots, learn more about the questions that will be on the ballot, and find out where the local candidates stand on the issues. Upon request, we can provide information and maps on polling locations as well as the names and websites of your district legislators. We can even provide transportation assistance to help voters get to the polls.

For some elections, we assist local organizations in getting out the vote and educating voters regarding issues about which we deeply care, such as our opposition to the marriage amendment. Some of us work at the polls on Election Day as election officials or poll watchers. We organize events at the church to hear the candidates speak. We always provide literature and candidates from both major parties and do not officially take a stand on candidates or parties, just the issues

Volunteers Needed for Projects

So these are some of the projects where we've committed money. Now we need planners, organizers, and sleeve roller-uppers to commit time and energy. Money alone can't get these jobs done. And some of these projects need only our labor, such as our "Adopt a Highway" program that cleans up a neighboring roadway, gets us together for a fun outdoor activity, and gives us a highway sign to increase awareness of AUUC.

Please volunteer to help out on the committee or join us to contribute to any one of these worthwhile causes. Watch for newsletter announcements of monthly Social Justice Meetings and other planned activities. Our pledge campaign theme was "Stepping up and stepping out". The financial commitment shows we've stepped up. Now we need your help to step out into our community and the world. Contact Claire Brown or any other member of the committee for further information.

SJC sponsors Peace Award

For the past two years, the SJC has sponsored a peace award at Robinson Secondary School. This award is presented to one or two students who have made a substantial effort toward achieving peaceable resolutions to a conflict or conflicts in the high school or the larger community. We plan to continue sponsoring this award with Herndon Friends Meeting (Quaker), another local religious community. Lisa Hayes and Nancy Davis represent Accotink on the Peace Award Committee.