Bristol Diversity Council Plans To Create Youth Coalition

By Dean Wright, The Bristol Press

January 3, 2022

The Bristol Diversity Council is hammering out details to create a youth coalition meant to address the concerns of Bristol’s young residents regarding the topics of diversity, equity and inclusion.

At a recent Diversity Council meeting, Council Chair Alicia Washington said council members have made “good progress” meeting with different groups within the city in regard to the creation of the youth coalition.

“Really what they’re going to be is identifying all the community activities that support (diversity, equity and inclusion) in the youth community. So that’s all the schools, all the programs relative to youth and then identifying other areas where we can support them,” said Washington.

The chair said the council has slated a meeting with the Boys & Girls Club of Bristol for January.

“What we want to figure out is what are the expectations of the youth coalition,” said Washington. “They’re going to have monthly meetings at probably either one of the high schools in their gymnasium because we want people to be able to come to the meetings. Obviously this is going to be geared towards the youth in the city.”

Washington said one of the areas where the council could help, for example, could be in the area of local transportation.

“For instance, one of the things that came up quite a bit for a lot of the programs that a lot of the schools are offering is transportation,” said the chair. “We know that’s a big issue right now in terms of not only the fact it’s hard to get bus drivers but really just getting kids from their home to where the activities are.”

She said there are a few other key topics that may be discussed in helping make activities more accessible to community youth as the coalition forms. The council will continue to move forward on its plans at the coming monthly meeting.

The council also intends to invite New Britain Mayor Erin Stewart to speak on the ways New Britain has been affected by declaring racism a public health crisis. The council has been researching and organizing the potential for declaring racism a public health crisis in Bristol for the better part of a year.