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It was my pleasure to end the month of September by coming together to begin the Restorative Justice Collaborative.  While our name and mission continue to get ironed out, our general goal it to act as a hub for RJ practitioners across the state.  This is modeled after some of the work done in states like OR and CO.

Working with a great team to bring together a group of amazing people at the Whidbey Is Institute was such a pleasure.  I have to mention that the Institute was gracious enough to support our work in multiple ways.  Thank you to Tom, Dan, and the Institute for your support, interests, and leadership.  We arrived Monday afternoon and spent the first few hours in circle getting to know one another.  I sincerely appreciate how we try to walk the talk, if we think community is important we need to make time in every gathering for people to get to know one another.

I don’t want to go into every detail, so I will just say that we had many opportunities to sit, talk, and share throughout the two days, both as a large group and as small pairs/groups.  It was a pleasure to meet some of them for the first time and find such like minded people from around the state, represented regions included Bellingham, Port Townsend, Spokane, Tri-Cities, Clark Co, and a bunch from the Puget Sound.  We hope to increase our presence across the state and gather those that are doing the work.

Please reach out if you would like to be included in future discussions and gatherings!  We are looking to build teams that are working to support our collaborative, legislative policy, and direct work in a number of fields.

Semper,

Nicholas