Frank McKenna On Building Community And The Critical Role Of Organizations Like L’Arche Saint John
SAINT JOHN – Frank McKenna grew up on a farm in Apohaqui, a small community near Sussex. He says they supported each other in ways that we can learn from today, as we emerge from the pandemic with an economy and communities to rebuild.
“If someone experienced a loss, like a barn burning down, within days there would be a portable sawmill brought in, and you’d see dozens of men working at sawing lumber and putting up a new barn and dozens of volunteers preparing meals for them,” McKenna said in a recent interview.
“It was a big coming together and it’s hard to say that it was organized virally because we didn’t have e-mail and everything else. But it was a community coming together to support somebody in need.”
McKenna, the Deputy Chair of the TD Bank Group, is the featured guest at a sold-out fundraising event on September 7 for L’Arche Saint John, an organization that supports people with intellectual disabilities. The local L’Arche community has a residential home on the west side and a social hub and workshop centre called “Creative Connections” on Prince William Street uptown.
The former premier of New Brunswick and former Canadian ambassador to the U.S. will take part in a fireside chat on “Building Community” as part of the event at the uptown Delta Marriott hotel.
McKenna compares the sense of community growing up in Apohaqui to the way people in small towns and cities are supporting each other through the pandemic.
“There is something special in the water right now,” says McKenna. “We’ve been through this pandemic in places like New Brunswick and smaller places like ours all around the world. We’ve learned that we are our brother’s keeper and our sister’s keeper; that we’re only as safe as the community in which we live. There’s going to be a lot of people who have fallen through the cracks that, despite the generosity of government programming, need to be lifted up.”
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He says organizations like L’Arche are going to be even more important with government budgets strained from providing so much financial support during the pandemic.
“We can’t look forward to a world where the government can do everything. Or even the private sector for that matter,” he says. “We’re going to have to engage as a community of people to help people who have fallen through the cracks. Quite frankly, the pandemic has placed enormous strain on our fiscal capabilities, I’m not sure governments have the ability to do all of the good work they would like to do, so we’re going to have to fill in those holes. We’re capable of doing that.”
McKenna understands, in a very personal way, the important role performed by organizations such as L’Arche. His grandson Connor is developmentally delayed and has had an “extraordinary support system” where he lives in Calgary.
“We’re very conscious of the supports that are available for children like him and the importance of community and we’ve become very respectful of the wonderful people who support young people who are challenged in different ways,” says McKenna.
Connor is now a young adult and starting to take on jobs that suit his interests and skills.
“He has an obsession with running water and anything that moves – a golf cart, a lawnmower…so he has a job right now washing golf carts when they come off the course,” says McKenna. “He does it two hours a day and he loves it and he can’t understand why they’ll pay him money to do it because he just loves what he’s doing.”
“This fall, he will start a job where he’ll greet special needs kids going to school in a school bus. He’ll help them off the bus and put them in their wheelchairs if that’s required, and take them into class, remove their jackets, etc., and just help them move around the school. This is something that he absolutely loves to do, so he can contribute and there will be more things in the future that he can contribute to.”
McKenna says the economy and communities will be stronger if our hiring practices are more inclusive. It will benefit all of us because people like Connor have a lot to offer.
“Labour is in short supply everywhere. When the pandemic is behind us maybe that will change but maybe it won’t,” he says. “We need more immigrants, we need more of our young people to come home, but we also need a more inclusive labour force so that we can take advantage of every single person who is capable of contributing – men, women, children, or adults with special needs. Everybody.”
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L’Arche board chair Jim Kokocki echoes McKenna’s view. He says people that are part of the Saint John L’Arche community have had similar opportunities here and they embrace the ability to work and contribute to organizations and businesses.
“They’re terrific workers. They love going to work,” he says. “They’re very reliable and engaged.”
Kokocki says L’Arche is thrilled to have someone like McKenna lead a conversation on building community. “He’s shown such great leadership and can offer valuable insights,” he says.
For his part, McKenna loves the L’Arche concept, noting the English translation of the name is “ark.”
“It’s a haven. It’s a safe place,” says McKenna. “It’s a community of like-minded people and I love the idea that people are giving of themselves to create that safe haven that allows people to grow. Everybody has the capacity to grow, and you need to give people all the room to do that.”
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