Judge hails reconciliation program

The Chattanooga Times-Free Press Monday, January 30, 2006 VORP (Started by Our Kiwanis Club)

Judge hails reconciliation program By Brian Lazenby Staff Writer

    More than 300 people have participated in a Hamilton County program that arranges face-to-face meetings between nonviolent juvenile offenders and their victims, court officials said.
    The Victim Offender Reconciliation Program, or VORP, puts nonviolent juvenile offenders face-to-face with their victims in an attempt to foster communication and understanding.
"We’re trying to figure out how we can better serve the kids in our community who are making these stupid mistakes and not taking responsibility for their actions," said Berti LeWinter, executive director of the program.
More than 300 cases have come through the program since October 2002, when it received its first referral from Juvenile Court, Ms. LeWinter said. Organizers only know of about 2 percent of offenders who have repeated their crimes, she said.
"How do you know from this pool of people who doesn’t deserve a second chance?" she asked. "We’re trying to get people passionate about the youth in the community because this doesn’t just affect the victims. It affects everyone in the community."
Juvenile Court Judge Suzanne Bailey said the program has exceeded her expectations.
"It personalizes it for both sides," she said. "It allows the child to see that the victim was truly affected by their action and may not be able to repair a fence that they may have vandalized, and it allows the victim to see that the offender is not some monster, that they are a child, a child who made a mistake."
Danny Costello, co-manager of Wal-Mart on Brainerd Road, said he has participated in the program for about a year and has had several meetings with children who have been caught shoplifting from his store.
"For the most part, I feel it has made a difference in their life, and that’s the only reason I do it," he said.
Mr. Costello said he tells the offenders how their crime affects him and the associates who work there.
"That’s when most of them realize it’s not just a big corporation," he said.
The program is voluntary, and participants are referred by the court, Ms. LeWinter said. To qualify, offenders must accept responsibility for their actions and be willing to meet their victims to discuss various aspects of the crime and their lives, she said.
Even when the child is ready and willing to meet his victim, the victims themselves are often hesitant to participate, Ms. LeWinter said. When both parties are willing to sit down and talk, the crimes are personalized.
"It really makes an impact when they realize that it is a real person that they have hurt by their crime," she said.
Both Judge Bailey and Ms. LeWinter said the hard work by the facilitators who arrange the meetings as well as the offenders and their victims are responsible for the program’s success.
"We hope the program grows while we can keep the same success rate," Judge Bailey said.
                     E-mail Brian Lazenby at blazenby@timesfreepress.com

This story was published Monday, January 30, 2006

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Kiwanis Club Members Honor Speakers By Donating Books
by Judy Frank
posted February 3, 2007 The Chattanoogan

    The dozens of youngsters who giggle over the antics of Ella the Elephant in Carmela D’Amico’s Ella Sets The Stage – a brand new book in the children’s section of Chattanooga-Hamilton County Bicentennial Library – won’t have federal or state or even local government to thank for the fact that the picture book is there for them to read.
    The people to thank are the members of the Kiwanis Club of Chattanooga, who heard about the library’s need for funds to buy new books and decided to do something about it.    Like most civic organizations, the Kiwanis Club wanted honor the men and women who agree to serve as speakers during the organization’s weekly meetings. Further, since Kiwanis International is committed to helping children locally as well as throughout the nation and the world, members wanted to so something for the children of Hamilton County.
    Kiwanis President Jeff Hollingsworth had an idea: Why not come up with a single project that would promote both of those goals?      In short, why not donate a children’s book in honor of each speaker to the local library, where boys and girls throughout the community would be able to read it?   The idea has been a big hit with both speakers and Kiwanis Club members, he said.
    The club leaves it up to librarians in the children’s section to choose the books, Mr. Hollingsworth said, since they know what is needed. But Kiwanis members were delighted when they found out that the library’s selections are tied to the topic and/or interest of the particular speakers they are chosen to honor. For example, when Mayor Ron Littlefield spoke to Kiwanis Club members about the city’s recycling program, librarian Eva Johnston selected Grandma Drove the Garbage Truck by Katie Clark as the book commemorating the mayor’s appearance.
    A talk on money and forensic accounting by Bill Acuff of Decosimo & Associates led Ms. Johnson to Hungry for Numbers by Etienne Delessert, and a talk by Rick Hart on UTC’s athletics program inspired her to choose Farm Team by Linda Bailey. Other talks likewise led to appropriate choices.
    Ms. Johnston and other library officials are delighted by Kiwanis members’ decision to donate children’s books to Bicentennial, which faces a constant challenge finding the funds for the new books that are needed for both adult and child patrons of the library. Since she began working at the downtown library in 1998, Ms. Johnston said, the amount of funding available to buy new books for children and young adults has been slashed by more than 50 percent. And, of course, the price of books has gone up.
    This year the allocation for such books is just $35,000, and that must be divided between the downtown library and its four branches in Ooltewah, Hixson, Eastgate and South Chattanooga. To stretch funds as far as possible, the library has created a variety of ways for people to donate new books as a way of encouraging donations from people throughout the community.
    The library’s Memorial Books program, for example, encourages the public to honor special individuals with donations of $25 or more to the library. The donor can select which branch of the library will house the book purchased with that donation, as well as the age level of the book which can be anything from a children’s picture book to adult nonfiction. A person with a strong interest in genealogy and Scots-Irish forebears, for example, could be honored with a history of the Scots-Irish who migrated to America.
A special bookplate is placed in the commemorative book, and acknowledgements are sent out to both the recipient of the honor and the donor. A special Birthday Books program operates much the same way. The library also accepts donations of money, books, magazines, audio visuals, audio books and other materials, which can be dropped off at the circulation desk in the main library or any of the branches.
   “Items that meet the library’s selection policy and are in good condition will be added to the library’s (book) collection,” according to Friends of the Library publications. “Other items are sold at the Friends of the Library book sales, in the library book store and online.”
    The Kiwanis are not the library’s only benefactors. This past Christmas, for example, Chattanooga’s mayor and his wife, Lanis, donated $500 to the library to be used to purchase children’s books.
    “I cannot tell you how grateful we are for each and every donation we receive,” Ms. Johnson said. “Often, that donation is the difference between whether we go ahead and buy a book we really need – that children’ are asking for – or we decide against buying that one because there is another one that we need even more.”

For information on how to make a donation to the library, call (423) 757-5310, or email library@lib.chattanooga.gov.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Auditorium
399 McCallie Avenue
Chattanooga, Tennessee 37402

Published by the Chattanoogan May, 2007

Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Auditorium opened on February 22, 1924, a living memorial to Hamilton County war veterans.

First proposed at a Kiwanis Club meeting in 1918, Memorial Auditorium was designed as a municipal auditorium and all-purpose exhibition hall. Built by the City of Chattanooga at a cost of $700,000, Memorial Auditorium was designed by renowned architect R.H. Hunt. Memorial in the 1920s

For forty years, the Auditorium served as Chattanooga's primary meeting hall and largest capacity indoor entertainment venue. Its flat floor and flexible seating allowed it to accommodate a wide variety of events, including boxing matches, roller derby, ice shows, religious revivals, tennis tournaments, circuses, even aquacades. It also hosted dances, banquets, civic meetings, political rallies, and Chattanooga's annual Cotton Ball.

But by the 1960's Memorial Auditorium was in desperate need of repair. Civic groups including the Kiwanis Club, Chamber of Commerce and Allied Arts Council spearheaded a renovation, which was approved by the City Commission in 1964. The City authorized a $4 million bond issue, of which $1 million was earmarked for renovation of Memorial Auditorium. A few months later, an expanded renovation plan was approved, with a budget of $2.1 million. The Auditorium closed for almost a year, reopening on November 6, 1966.

The 1966 renovation added such amenities as escalators and air conditioning, and converted the basement-level parking garage into exhibit space. Memorial Auditorium would become a convention center and exhibit hall competitive with any in the southeast. Memorial in the 1960s

By 1985, its mission had changed. The completion of UTC's McKenzie Arena and the Chattanooga Convention and Trade Center had eliminated the need for an all-purpose hall. Instead of trying to do everything passably, Memorial Auditorium would concentrate on doing one thing well. It would fill Chattanooga's need for a mid-sized theater and concert venue.

A coalition of civic and veterans groups led by former Chattanooga Mayor Robert Kirk Walker persuaded the community that it was time to reinvest in Chattanooga's great hall. $5 million in public funds and almost $2 million in private contributions were raised.

After an 18-month renovation, the Auditorium was rededicated on January 31, 1991 as a near-capacity crowd honored the men and women of the Armed Forces. Technical improvements included new dressing rooms, a hydraulic orchestra lift, state-of-the-art sound and lighting systems, and increased stage depth. However, the major change was that the Auditorium had been converted from an all-purpose exhibition hall with a flat floor and movable seating, to a sloped concert hall with permanent seating and greatly improved sightlines. These technical improvements, along with a complete cosmetic overhaul, have made Memorial Auditorium a first class performing arts facility second to none in style, comfort and acoustics. Memorial Today

Since its reopening, Memorial Auditorium has hosted a wide variety of events, from national tours of "Cats," "Les Miserables," "Grease" and "Riverdance," to Baryshnikov, Isaac Stern, Bill Cosby, Bob Dylan, David Copperfield, Patti Labelle, Garth Brooks, Prince, and many others.

(RETURN)