Dear Friends of Community Weaver,
The long awaited open source code for Community Weaver 2.0 and a detailed installation guide is now publicly available.
Please note that the installation guide is intended for someone who knows Drupal and wants to install Community Weaver 2.0 on their own server.
Community Weaver 2.0 is based on Drupal 6; uses about 80 contributed Drupal modules, a few Drupal Supporting Libraries, and a Drupal theme. Additionally it uses 2 Drupal modules custom written for CW 2.0. The components developed for Community Weaver 2.0 are:
· the Time Banks Drupal Module – provides a number of customizations on top of existing contributed modules, Guardian Angel functionality, etc.
· the Availability Check Grid Module – creates a grid of checkboxes to show a user’s general availability throughout the week
· the MYSQL template of the Drupal database for Community Weaver 2.0 – provides all the settings and configurations that make up a complete Community Weaver 2.0 website ready for new users, ads, transactions, and other content to be added
The installation process includes the following 10 steps.
1. Install Drupal
2. Install Current Versions of Contributed Modules
3. Install Supporting Code Libraries
4. Install the Required Theme
5. Install Availability Check Grid module
6. Install Time Banks module
7. Load Community Weaver 2.0 database template
8. Configure Various Community Weaver and Drupal System Components
9. Configure Web Host Settings
10. Configure Final Settings in Drupal
For the full installation guide, including the links to the code repository go to: Install CW 2.0
(http://actionhub.timebanks.org/installing-community-weaver-20-timebanking-tools)
If you want to share your experiences about testing the installation of CW 2.0 and discuss it with others, join the discussion in the forum CW – Installation Guide & Code.
(http://actionhub.timebanks.org/topics/testing-installation-cw-20)
Please pass this announcement on to others who are interested in testing and using Community Weaver on their own servers.
FROM CONSUMERS OF LEGAL SERVICES TO CO-PRODUCERS OF JUSTICE: THE PARADIGM SHIFT Edgar S. Cahn
It is one thing to call for a paradigm shift. It is something else to see the paradigm shift actually taking place. The changes at Legal Aid Services of Oregon (LASO) going into effect on January 3, 2012 are nothing less than a paradigm shift in legal services: clients are being asked to sign a Pay It Forward Agreement, agreeing to match the staff hours spent by LASO on their case by enrolling in a TimeBank.
In doing so, LASO is undertaking to transform the clients they serve from consumers of legal services to co-producers of justice. A paradigm is defined as a map,, a world view, a model that one uses to chart a course to get A to B. When the legal service program was launched as part of the War on Poverty, effective legal representation was regarded as a key to enfranchisement. Lawyers would be the advocates needed to amplify the voices of those who were disenfranchised. It was hoped that providing that voice would break down barriers to opportunity, would hold officials accountable to the rule of law, and would thereby expand access to those “inalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”
Five years ago, the Legal Services Corporation released a study that for every client seen by a legal service program, one was turned away. Other studies confirm that the gap in availability of counsel was far greater, that fewer than one-fifth of those who needed legal services could get them. Now, with the need greater than ever, with unprecedented demand for government benefits and with a vast backlog, Congress has seen fit to cut federal funding for legal services by one-fifth. Given the shortage of resources and the magnitude of unmet demand, Legal Aid Services of Oregon has decided that it needs to do something that legal service lawyers are not used to doing: ask for the help of clients to address the critical social problems that so often give rise to legal problems.
Legal Aid Services of Oregon went to the United Way and the League of Women Voters to establish an independent TimeBank. Next, they linked their pro bono program to the time bank hoping that that will stimulate more pro bono work. The lawyers or their firm could accept and utilize those time dollars or donate them to advance a worthy cause. Now they are taking the next step: asking clients to participate in a “pay it forward” pilot program. The initiative is carefully structured as an effort to add prevention to the range of services already provided. Participation is not required and persons who decline to do so will be referred to the normal case conference. But the establishment of the TimeBank, the perception that clients can do things that advance the mission of legal services and the arrangement of a vehicle to enlist client capacity represents a major break with the past.
A TimeBank is simply an arrangement where people come together to give their time to help others. You give an hour of help. You earn one time credit. The person receiving the help owes one time credit. They pay back by helping someone else. In this case, clients are already receiving help; in return, they are asked to give back by helping someone else. Members of the TimeBank list what they are willing to do and when they can do it. That is entered into Community Weaver, a web-based program available to all members by computer. When some one calls in, or posts a request for help on the interenet, their need is matched to available members by a computer search. The coordinator or matchmaker may make a call or give the names to the person requesting help. Community Weaver includes e-mail addresses to that the parties can work out arrangements. Records of hours earned and spent are kept in the computer. One uses hours when needed or one can give them to someone else or to an organization that serves the community.
In 2009, the Legal Service Corporation reported that it served nearly one million clients. Legal Aid Services of Oregon is asking: What would it mean to enlist one million persons to build community, advance health, promote education, reduce substance abuse, make neighborhoods safer, strengthen families, bridge lines of race and national origin?
First, it means that clients are far more than the sum of their legal problems. They have capacities that have often gone unknown, unnoted and underutilized.
Second, by referring clients to the TimeBank, LASO has chosen to enlist them in addressing critical social problems to value their contribution and at the same time to provide clients with a way to enhance their own well-being by exchanges that can address and alleviate critical personal needs.
Third, it means that the legal services are no longer delivered as a one-way transaction. A “pay it forward” reciprocity changes the message from “how can I help you” to “we need each other.”
Fourth, it brings clients together, ending isolation that can be perpetuated by canons of confidentiality and privacy. Creating social networks and building community does not breach confidentiality.
Finally, when clients are redefined as contributors, their voice is amplified. A feedback loop providing a measure of effectiveness is created. When the governed become the actual workforce needed to address critical social problems, officials can be held accountable in a new way
In doing so, Legal Aid Services of Oregon can draw upon twenty five years of social activism and community building by TimeBank programs that have tackled some of the toughest social problems.
? In twenty-seven of Chicago’s lowest ranking elementary schools, fifth and sixth graders, (many labeled Special Education or ADD) earned time credits as tutors of first and second graders. The need for special education and remediation went down; test scores and school attendance went up; fighting and truancy went down. More than one school ceased to be on academic probation. There is nothing new about older kids tutoring younger kids. It has been validated as evidence-based.
? In a family support center, single mothers in recovery from drug addiction and returning from prison earned time credits providing instruction on AIDS and sexual abuse to teenage young women in high school. Elsewhere, parents of children diagnosed as bipolar, schizophrenic or handicapped by Severe Emotional Disturbance (SED) have banded together to prevent their children from being taken away and institutionalized. Utilizing TimeBanking to provide mutual support, they have created a statewide Parent Support. Network that is funded by the state – but that saves money, saves children and strengthens families.
? In Oakland, California, the Alameda County Department of Public Health funded a TimeBank in a neighborhood beset by racial violence. African Americans are now teaching English to Hispanics who in turn are teaching Spanish to their neighbors. Violence has gone down. We see similar bridging of ethnic, national origin, age, gender, class differences in New York City where the Visiting Nurse Service has created a Community Exchange with nearly 3,000 members in Chinatown, Washington Heights, the Lower East Side and Battery Park; 70% were born outside the US, 100% report their their physical health, mental health and well-being have improved and their trust for others has increased. In Allentown, Latino patients “pay it forward” by serving as medical translators for their doctor; with training, they get certification and are hired by the hospital.
? In upstate New York, the Youth Advocate program has incorporated a “pay-it-forward” element for youth on probation or subject to confinement at detention centers. Enrolled in a Red Cross supervised restorative justice program, they earn credits teaching homeless people to use computers, help them prepare resumes, work in soup kitchens, collect canned goods and toiletries. In Washington D.C., for the past ten years, teenagers have earned time credits by serving as jurors in the Time Dollar Youth Court, which hears the cases of peers accused of nonviolent crimes. Offenders may be sentenced to community service, life skills classes, an apology, writing an essay — and duty on the jury. Recidivism rates are less than 10 percent; the Urban Institute estimates that the District saves $9,000 for every offender who goes to Youth Court instead of the traditional system
? The National Homecomers Academy enrolls people leaving prison as students on a journey of personal development, learning, and service. Community service includes providing safe passage for youth too get to school safely across gang territory or helping reduce violence by teenagers in a mixed ownership-tenant housing development. Nationally, recidivism for persons returning from prison is in the 60-70 percent range within three years. So far, at the National Homecomers Academy, it is zero after a year and one half.
? In Montpelier, Vermont, the Administration on Aging has invested in a form of time banks called Carebanks. Seniors can get an assurance that informal care and support will be available if they or their families pay regular premiums—in time dollars earned helping build community or helping other seniors. In effect, the program uses time banking to create a new form of extended family. It is too early to project cost savings. But a recent study reveals that, as home-based care gets cut by state governments, hospital costs will likely rise as people are put off preventative care, or end up re-hospitalized due to the lack of transitional care.
In 1986, TimeBanking began as a vehicle to enlists older adults in community building, health promotion and intergenerational support. Mayor Bloomberg has launched TimeBanking for seniors in all five boroughs of New York. As baby boomers turn 65 at the rate of 10,000 per day for the next eighteen years, a paradigm shift paralleling that which Oregon Legal Aid has instituted will be needed to convert consumers of service into co-producers of health, well-being and community.
Time banking is now moving to a new scale with software being upgraded to an open source platform. Community Weaver software will make it easier to log, track, and share hours. It documents engagement, reliability, punctuality, and trustworthiness. The open-source code is already is available to individual time banks so they can easily build customized websites. Over 260 separate time banks are now using this open source version. And by next year, it will be on smart phones and tablets, radically expanding the ease with which co-production can be implemented by legal service programs.
Charles Houston, architect of the path that led to Brown v the Board of Education was renowned for declaring “A lawyer is either a social engineer or a parasite on society.” Legal Aid Services of Oregon is teaching us what being a social engineer could mean.
Appendix A. Letter from Victor Fortuno, President Legal Services Corporation to Professor Edgar Cahn
Re Letter of Support for TimeBanks USA