COMMUNITY ACTIVISM IN OAK PARK: COMPETING AGENDAS ...

ecome board members, they eagerly agreed and we began to schedule meetings to
discuss plans to create our own community group in Oak Park.
The four of us decided to name our organization the Oak Park Neighborhood
Latinos. We decided the mission of our organization would be to provide a platform to
give a “voice” to Latinos in Oak Park, although all residents in the neighborhood would
be welcome to attend. The four of us would hold bilingual meetings once a month in the
Oak Park Multi-Service Center and we would inform attendees of issues of importance to
them. We would inform attendees of community projects and revitalization projects that
were occurring in the neighborhood and share information about available community
services and resources. Our group would provide information about issues such as
health, education, and home ownership to attendees and we planned to provide
information about discounted and free services in the neighborhood also.
The four of us had many board member meetings before we held our first official
Oak Park Neighborhood Latino meeting. At these board member meetings we discussed
our mission statement, issues of importance to Latino and other community residents,
meeting objectives, created a meeting agenda, a list of goals and objectives, and a
meeting sign-in sheet. We also spent a lengthy amount of time designing bilingual
Spanish and English flyers to advertise our first community meeting. We publicized our
meetings by posting flyers throughout the neighborhood. Flyers were posted in coffee
shops, the multi-service center, neighborhood churches, and small community businesses.
The rest of the meeting preparations included reserving the meeting room, buying
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