Family support and clinical services are Family Continuity's "bread and butter". These are the services we provide to most of our families and individuals... it is how we make our living. Yet beyond understanding what our families need, we have to know what our communities need. As an example, on Thursday, May 16 in Northbridge, MA, Family Continuity  will convene a Community Leader Forum, the first of what we hope will be a regular series of events designed to get feedback from community leaders about our successes in working together, places where we can do better, and certainly, to examine present and future community needs and how we can better support the communities where we work and live. 

The event will feature a panel providing feedback from a range of community stakeholders including human services, schools, courts, medicine, churches, civic group, and others, from Northbridge and surrounding communities. The forum is based upon the assumption that no single entity has the full understanding, nor the capacity or resources to solve the complex problems our communities face. Working together in the Northbridge area over the last several years has produced important and impressive gains in educational, medical and behavioral health services, but this forum will offer an opportunity to take stock and define the important work to be done. Look for a follow-up report in subsequent newsletters.