A film screening and a call to act

Our child abuse town hall is tonight, but we've already been thinking about the next event.

In the past 10 years, YorkCounts has worked to address, among other things, declining urban centers and struggling schools. We have advocated for fairer tax policies and more regional collaboration. We’re teaming up with organizations across the state to convene a statewide summit on issues such as declining urban centers, struggling schools, fairer tax policies and regional collaboration. The Building One Pennsylvania summit will be July 16 at Thaddeus Stevens College of Technology in Lancaster.

To raise awareness of the event, YorkCounts and the York Campus of Harrisburg Area Community College will host a screening of "The New Metropolis." You might remember we showed portions of this film at our community summit in March and invited Lynn Cummings, whose work was featured in part of the film, to be our keynote speaker. On June 22, we'll show both parts of the documentary - "Cracks in the Pavement" and "The New Neighbors" - and have a Q&A session afterward. The film will start at 7 p.m. in HACC'S Glatfelter Community Room in the Cytec Building, 2161 Pennsylvania Ave., York. Admission is free.

The issues raised in the film are critical to all of York County. And the statewide summit has two goals: to give visibility during this critical election year to the common challenges faced by our communities and to launch an organizing structure for advancing the state and federal policy agenda that will revitalize and strengthen Pennsylvania.

BOPA has a modest registration fee of $15, which includes lunch, and the day will feature national experts on regional equity, land use, and municipal and school governance. Our partner organizations for this event include 10,000 Friends of Pennsylvania, Good Schools Pennsylvania, the Pennsylvania Council of Churches and the Southeastern Pennsylvania First Suburbs Project. Advance registration is requested; here’s how to do it:

1. Go to http://tinyurl.com/BuildingOnePA and use the secure server to pay online by credit card;
2. Or download the PDF of the registration form at http://www.yorkcounts.org/ and follow the instructions to register by mail.

More information is available on Facebook by searching for the Building One Pennsylvania event. For any other questions, call 866-720-4086 or e-mail buildingonepa@gmail.com.

Remember: June 22 is the screening at HACC in York; July 16 is Building One Pennsylvania in Lancaster.

- Dan Fink