I’m writing to invite you to the first Somerset Convergence event on June 23rd in Wells Town Hall. We are inviting you because you are someone actively working towards a more resilient social, economic or environmental future in the county.
In planning the event, we have consulted change-makers from across Somerset. The responses we have received have shaped our thinking about the challenges and opportunities before us. These were encapsulated in one reply by this: "We have a relativley large number of small organisations led by dedicated individuals operating within their communities. That is their great strength - rootedness and focus on doing positive things. but we need to feel we are part of something bigger - that we can achieve something collectively that individually we cannot". In order to realise this potential, our purpose for the event is threefold:
1. To Connect: The event will not just strengthen and extend existing networks, but offer an opportunity to give and receive more support in whatever way will hep you and others. By being in the room, you will discover just how connected you are, and how much more you could be.
2. To Collaborate: The heart of the event is for people to generate the agenda for resilience; 'what are the issues you feel are most important? What would it be like if we could work together more effectively? What might we do more of? Who else might we enlist that we haven't considered before? If we wanted to really move this forward, who would be great partners and what would our actions look like? What's on our impossible list that might be possible with help from others?
The day will generate a swathe of actions that lead to more joined-up effective plans, across, within and between different sectors such as community energy, well-being, transport, food production, social enterprise, businesses and community projects. There will be opportunities to idenitfy the obstacles to change and to evolve our shared vision. by adding your ideas and generating new actions alongside others, within the priorities we all identify, we can build real partnership and collaboration.
3.To INSPIRE: the event is an invitation to reaffirm our power to change things; we can do more than we think; bottom-up change is more effective than top-down; above all, we can make a sustainable society that takes care of our planet and our people, that champions a localised economy, community cohesion and collaboration. You will leave feeling positive about the future, as well as with some actions in the back pocket to make it happen.
We need you to add your voice, your successes, and your ideas. This is the next step on the journey to enabling us all to achieve more together in the coming years and we’d love you to be with us.
I look forward to hearing from you and to a fun and highly productive event
With kind regards
Stewart Crocker
Chair, Somerset Convergence Streering Group
An initiative of Sustainable Wells, Transition Langport and Green Wedmore, supported by Somerset Community Foundation
