Let me begin with who I represent and other places you can connect with us if you wish. We are a family of eight from Bellefontaine, Ohio. We have been a couple since 2001 and our six kids are Zakk (musician/record store wrangler), Shane (chef/donut maker), Taylor (artist/dog lover), Hannah (singer/nurse), Sebastian (digital artist/DJ), & the youngest Lennon (Lenny Bruce the dude). Our collective interests range from Ancient History to Zappa & everything in between.

My other half & I can be found on Facebook & Google+ as George Smed & Jennifer Knotsmed or follow me on Twitter @LushusLolly. George is an accomplished musician as well as an artist and his solo bass videos can viewed here ~ https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLeh8z9Gfr8uoNDIUMqJJWczd7jxoQYcJf

I have a variety of interesting playlists available on my Youtube channel & here is a link to my favorite that contains a wide variety of fascinating documentaries, lectures, podcasts, radio, & other alternative media interviews ~ http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL677E0B8160684387

You can find our family orgonite (TM) business on Facebook as B4 Energy Art or follow us on Twitter @B4EnergyArt. Please feel free to message me if you'd like to receive a free sample Smiley :) B4 Energy Art is available for purchase on Etsy~ http://www.etsy.com/shop/B4EnergyArt AND Ebay~ http://myworld.ebay.com/b4energyart

Now with the introductions out of the way, let me get to the heart of the matter, actions that we have used in our community to affect change. We began over a decade ago with reaching out to local citizens using humor. We designed a funny "news like" website that poked fun at our local media called Lighten Up Lima. It was so well received that city officials decided to confer with us to help model and form a local advocacy group called LOVE LIMA. This collection of volunteers supports and promotes everything local from music to merchandise and its members are many!

Using the local matters mentality as a platform, it’s easy to reach out to community citizens and get them involved. It’s a matter of staying focused and committed to finding common ground and standing firm on it. Organizations like BlockWatch and Copwatch have extremely similar goals of safe neighborhoods without fear of criminal behavior. When allowed to freely discuss the motivations behind videoing law enforcement, nearly all the BlockWatch members present were 100% supportive of the Copwatch program coming to the neighborhood to film raids and arrests. Activists trying to get fluoride removed from city water were very interested in injections wells full of toxic fracking fluid being stored mere minutes away from water sources. Farmers concerned about GMOs were excite to join forces with other like-minded land owners and stand up to Monsanto.

Utilize your CHURCHES people! Even if you are not religious at all, there is a treasure trove of giving, conscientious people in congregations. We took part in and helped to form a local initiative called the Bridges Parenting Program to provide assistance to ALL parents of a child three years old or younger. Regardless of age, race, religion, or sex, if you were responsible for meeting the needs of a young child, this opportunity was open to you. An already existing anti-abortion organization called Heartbeat of Lima offered up office space and volunteers to participants. No preaching, no judgement, no questions asked, simply support. Then as a group, donations were collected from nearly all the county churches of new and gently used baby items and toddler needs. Then participants in the program can volunteer to teach or attend classes on cooking, vaccines, knitting, doctors, diapering, literacy, car seat safety, etc.. You could also read books or watch videos from the lending library and write short paragraph long reports about them. For doing these tasks you would earn what we called Mommy Money, Daddy Dollars, or Baby Bucks to spend in the "store". The store was full of donations that had been carefully cleaned, inspected, and displayed. Within a few months of the program’s inception, there were local farmers donating fresh food and major businesses like Panera routinely donating items to the members as well. We personally were able to obtain organic GMO-Free baby formula at no cost while using this program. It still exists today and is a life saver for many low income families in our community.

I can't stress how important to me it was to involve active military members and currently incarcerated inmates in my community planning. I myself have served sentences in county, state, and federal prisons, have had prison pen pals since I was a child, and I spawned from a long line of military men. When these two groups of people are connected, watch out, shit gets done. Institutionalized people are of great worth once awakened. They have time to research, similar states of being, and access to information that the general public does not. Need good legal advice? I would ask my friend on death row before I paid a penny to ANY attorney. If you are not comfortable conversing with a "criminal", start writing servicemen & women. Talk to them about how they feel about their current deployment, what their intentions were when they enlisted, and what they plan on doing when they return home to make a positive and smooth transition back into their lives as civilians. Ex-convicts and marines home on leave are my favorite people to see and hear at a city council meeting.

Our former town of Lima is home to a Husky Oil Refinery, an Army Tank Plant, Potash Chemical, and two enormous hospitals. Coincidence...I think not. My dear friend and a small group of social service workers formed the Northwest Ohio Rescue and Restore Coalition which provided completely free classes on how to spot and stop human trafficking in your city. At a film screening they hosted, we met many members of Truckers Against Trafficking who were very interested in learning more about the Anti-Fracking movement. Again, it’s just a matter of finding what is important to the person you are talking to. Many hospital employees including nurses, doctors, aids, and even volunteers have been an integral part in making things like community gardens and anti-trafficking training possible. Even our refinery employees were open to hearing the truth about the XL, Nexus, Rover, & other proposed pipelines. Husky is currently undergoing a $300 million upgrade to ensure its ability to refine Tar Sands from Canada and ship it to China. When big oil is exposed about the final destination of all our "energy independence", they hide like the slimy bastards they are!

Connect your schools and small local farmers (if there is any left). Our son Shane is an aspiring chef and participates in a program that brings fresh local produce to low income neighborhoods (where we live) using a food truck to distribute them. Connect your local musicians & artists with your local schools. Teenagers in public school are STARVING for the arts! We have at least three establishments in Lima that regularly offer open "jams" and wall space to display art from talented teenagers. We also enjoy an old school music store that still hosts unsigned artists weekly, but he wouldn't be able to stay open without all the support he gets from locals who refuse to shop at Wal-Mart!

I'm going to finish this novella with RADIO, don't forget that radio stations DO still exist and actual humans do still have the job title of Disc Jockey. I have friends who work for Clear Channel, Maverick Media, and Childers Media Group is local to us and managed to hang on to a few local stations. These stations have access to TONS of goodies they have to give away and all the local businesses you need to reach out to in your community. We made sure that residents of the Allen County Rescue Mission (homeless shelter) won the weekly free meals for an entire summer if not longer. A local domestic violence shelter managed to win a home makeover from Maverick. We won free tickets for a year and used the majority of the prizes to raise money for local organizations or we just gave them away to someone who needed the break more than we did. A simple e-mail or song request can make you a new friend and an invaluable asset to connecting community members :)