In lieu of one more heartfelt walk after heartfelt walk, all competing with each other to find a cure, can we talk?
Throughout the year, well-intentioned L.A. non-profits reach out through every medium possible to encourage random members of the public to join their cause by walking on a particular Saturday or Sunday and raise money for their issue.
These include the AIDS Walk; the American Lung Association’s Healthy Air Walk; the American Heart Association’s Heartwalk; the Alzheimer Association’s Memory Walk; the City of Hope’s Walk for Hope and Underwear Affair Walk; the American Diabetes Association’s Step Out; United Way’s HomeWalk 2009; Autism Walks; the ALS Walk; the Easter Seals Walk; the March of Dimes’ Walk America; and one of the newcomers to the parade, the Walk for Food Allergy, among dozens of others.
Instead of walking all over each other – with some walks falling on the same day – maybe it’s time to consider the exponential power of all walking together on one day.
One of the great attributes of our City of Angels is that while we are in some ways a traditional U.S. city, we are not rigidly stuck in conducting our civic duties in a traditional way.
Perhaps the most recent example is the brilliant move by the Los Angeles Philharmonic crowning the 28-year-old Venezuelan Gustavo Dudamel its new music director. Talk about taking a town by storm. His exuberant presence has not only single-handedly reinvigorated music appreciation for thousands of students throughout the Southland, but also he will be a long-term beacon for talented artists around the world to make their path to a city that embraces passionate talent no matter what their age.
In more mundane civic matters, during this third year of our drought, the public has responded to pleas to reduce water consumption and cut back by 11 percent in June and a remarkable 17 percent in July. Also, an innovative rainwater harvesting pilot program started in July – with 600 homes eligible to receive a free 55-gallon rain barrel – has at least begun the long process of educating homeowners on this necessary household accessory to capture precious runoff during the rainy season.
Efficiently helping
Yet, with so many walks independently vying for the public’s participation, couldn’t we help all these wonderful organizations more efficiently by creating one annual televised Unity Walk that would build momentum over time?
Walk with me on this idea. …
Visualize 25 non-profit organizations with 2,000 to 3,000 walkers for each group gathering in the parking lots around Dodger Stadium. Each group would have their signs, banners and different colored T-shirts for easy identification from the air for the TV helicopters televising the Unity Walk on one or several local stations.
Then the mass of organized walkers would move out toward the Glendale (2) Freeway on their way to the Rose Bowl. This Unity Walk would naturally close down the northbound lanes, but since it’s the least traveled (and least-known) freeway in Southern California, not many motorists would mind.
TV reporters could walk and talk with participants to share why the Memory Walk, Healthy Air Walk, Underwear Affair Walk, AIDS Walk and Walk for Food Allergy are so important for them to raise awareness and funds.
Back in the TV studio, executive directors and chief executives for all the organizations would be interviewed by the hosts to illuminate the progress in their search for a cure, post wish lists for their organizations, and direct people watching at home to their respective Web sites to contribute or learn ways to volunteer or participate at a future event or silent auction. Those organizations with larger walks and well-established track records could still participate in the Unity Walk in addition to their major annual event for added exposure to a broader audience.
Phoenix has created something similar with its annual Rock ’n’ Roll Arizona Marathon Series. Along with corporate teams, a couple of dozen charities train for a marathon or half-marathon to raise money for their causes. But this is Los Angeles; we walk for our charities.
And in this fragile economy, as we’re beginning a long recovery of reinvention, rehabilitation, rebuilding, restructuring, redesigning and reassessment of all aspects of the way we’ve done business, we must also re-examine how we can revitalize our philanthropic efforts.
To sustain our social safety nets and to keep pushing ahead for research and cures, this “new normal” requires the non-profit world to operate in a more synergistic, cooperative and creative mode. What better way to set the tone for this re-emerging Southern California society than to collaborate together on one Unity Walk, the Mother of all Charity Walks.
John T. Boal is a co-author of “Chicken Soup for the Volunteer’s Soul” and the author of “Be a Global Force of One! … In Your Hometown.” He lives in Burbank.
