![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/wpid-wp-1416527968558.jpg\")
<\/a>\nThe crowd starts to roll in.
\n
\nRon Johnson starts our meeting.
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\nThe pastor of Mt. Vernon United Methodist Church welcomes us.<\/p>\n
Starling McKenzie from the Danville Regional Foundation will start by going over their report card for the region. .<\/p>\n
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We’ll link to the full version when we get to the editing process tonight. The report card is mainly a big compendium of data. Just like all data, you have to analyze what it really means.<\/p>\n
The panel takes their seats.
\n<\/p>\n
Cynthia Johnson (far right), Coordinator of Family & Community Engagement with Danville Public Schools talks about programs that help the youth. Amanda Oakes (middle), Director of Prevention Services with Danville Pittsylvania County Community Services, gives a long list of programs her agency uses. John Moody (left), Director of Danville Social Services, says his agency sees people at “ground zero”. He said he sees stories like psychiatrist reports saying thay a child’s life is ruined because they were raped as a child. Wow. 43000 Danville residents. $21 million in SNAP (food stamp) benefits given out yearly. Danville also leads the state in prosecution for welfare fraud.<\/p>\n
Four Danville City Council members here tonight: Sherman Saunders, Gary Miller, John Gilstrap and Alonzo Jones. City Attorney Clarke Whitfield, Police Chief Philip Broadfoot, Fire Marshal Shelby Irving, City Manager Joe King, Deputy City Manager Ken Larking, Public Information Officer Arnold Hendrix, Engineer Kent Shelton and Analyst Amanda Paez are here from the city.<\/p>\n
Tonight’s main point is that there are plenty of programs to help with today’s youth and parenting.<\/p>\n
Lillie Jones nails it by saying “The people who need this help aren’t here tonight. The people who need these services aren’t going to ask for these services.”<\/p>\n
Small group discussion now:<\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n
It’s interesting to see that Danville United has evolved from the original idea of race relations discussions into community relations topics. I’m quite pleased by that.<\/p>\n
Good quote: “You’re in a room with 41 engaged and concerned citizens”<\/p>\n
We’re done with tonight’s meeting. We’ll have a BreakDown article on this soon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
SouthsideCentral is LIVE! AT Mt. Vernon United Methodist Church for tonight’s Danville United meeting. Be sure to refresh this page often to get the latest happenings, photos and commentary.<\/p>\n
[…]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[58,13,20,22],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11295","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-danville","category-livecentral","category-newscentral","category-opinioncentral","odd"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pwqFk-2Wb","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":11338,"url":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2014\/11\/23\/breakdown-danville-united-meeting-11202014\/","url_meta":{"origin":11295,"position":0},"title":"BreakDown: Danville United Meeting (11\/20\/2014)","author":"SouthsideCentral","date":"November 23, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"I was wrong and I have changed my mind. Let's do a BreakDown on Thursday night's Danville United meeting. I know, you're shocked at hearing me say \"I was wrong\". I can't blame you for that. Let's bring on a Big Board. Let's get to the big point right now.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "BreakDown"","block_context":{"text":"BreakDown","link":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/category\/featurescentral\/breakdown\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"sclogo","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/sclogo.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":11291,"url":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2014\/11\/20\/randomthoughts-11202014\/","url_meta":{"origin":11295,"position":1},"title":"RandomThoughts! (11\/20\/2014)","author":"SouthsideCentral","date":"November 20, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"I've got thoughts. They're Random. It's been a while, hasn't it? Big Board! I caught myself saying \"the old Plaza Cinema location\" instead of \"Dan River Church\". Oops. Happy Trails, Liberty Fair Mall. The now half demolished Martinsville shopping center's name is being renamed \"The Village of Martinsville\". Speaking of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "RandomThoughts!"","block_context":{"text":"RandomThoughts!","link":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/category\/featurescentral\/randomthoughts\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"sclogo","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/sclogo.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":8323,"url":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2014\/03\/06\/danville-united-live-3614\/","url_meta":{"origin":11295,"position":2},"title":"Danville United LIVE! (3\/6\/14)","author":"SouthsideCentral","date":"March 6, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"here's our :IVE! recap of what happened at the last Danville United meeting. 6:30 PM - We're here first with River City TV's Mark Aron right behind us. The snow and sleet is starting to fall. 6:45 PM - Good seats still available. 7:00 PM - Let's get it started.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Danville"","block_context":{"text":"Danville","link":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/category\/locations\/danville\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":13419,"url":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2015\/07\/17\/danville-united-71615\/","url_meta":{"origin":11295,"position":3},"title":"Danville United – (7\/16\/15)","author":"SouthsideCentral","date":"July 17, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"If there had been enough room, the headline would be \"(A very few people in) Danville (make the effort to be) United\". We can do better than this, people. This Danville United meeting was at Holbrook St. Presbyterian Church and had ~25 people there. The object of this meeting was\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Danville"","block_context":{"text":"Danville","link":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/category\/locations\/danville\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/i.imgur.com\/YTfBKMU.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/i.imgur.com\/YTfBKMU.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/i.imgur.com\/YTfBKMU.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/i.imgur.com\/YTfBKMU.jpg?resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":17726,"url":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2016\/03\/26\/opinioncentral-a-tale-of-two-shootings\/","url_meta":{"origin":11295,"position":4},"title":"OpinionCentral: A Tale Of Two Shootings","author":"SouthsideCentral","date":"March 26, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"This OpinionCentral has a good chance of making you feel uncomfortable. That means I'm doing my job. Let's go back to the night of February 1st, 2016 and look at the Danville Police Department's media release... Two men were shot this evening as the result of an attempted robbery. At\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "OpinionCentral"","block_context":{"text":"OpinionCentral","link":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/category\/opinioncentral\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/i.imgur.com\/6dVZX4b.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":12024,"url":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2015\/02\/12\/danville-united-live-2122015\/","url_meta":{"origin":11295,"position":5},"title":"Danville United – LIVE! (2\/12\/2015)","author":"SouthsideCentral","date":"February 12, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"We're LIVE! at Averett University's Riverview Campus for tonight's Danville United meeting. The meeting is over. I'll be adding more content and photos on Friday. 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