One Common Ground: Flagler community leaders seek to prevent racial tensions

Sheriff Jim Manfre: 'We are not an occupying force. We are your neighbors, fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers and children.'

By Observer Staff
| 2:45 p.m. July 16, 2016

Sheriff Jim Manfre (Courtesy photos)

Jackson Courson

Area leaders came together July 14 at the new Flagler County Inmate Facility.

Pastor Sims Jones

Palm Coast Observer
News

Flagler County Sheriff James L. Manfre welcomed area pastors, high school students, School Board officials and community members July 14 to the new Flagler County Inmate Facility as part of the agency’s fourth “One Common Ground” meeting.

Citing recent weeks of violence in Orlando and nationally, Manfre and local leaders discussed the need to cooperate and communicate.

“We have to acknowledge we have issues before we can solve them,” Manfre said to the audience. Following the recent shootings in Louisiana, Minnesota and then Dallas, Manfre said, “Cooler heads must prevail, and I believe they always will. Fear leads to hate and hate leads to violence. Tragedy is a true tragedy if you don’t learn from it.”

Manfre said community-oriented policing is designed to build relationships.

“We are not an occupying force,” he said. “We are your neighbors, fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers and children.”

One idea for building relationships includes area churches inviting law enforcement officers to visit their congregations.

During the meeting, Bunnell Police Chief Tom Foster and Flagler Schools Superintendent Jacob Oliva each explained the challenges they have to attract and keep black employees and emphasized the importance of partnering with the faith-based community.

Linda Sharpe Matthews is the president of the Flagler County NAACP branch, and her husband was killed in the line of duty as a Florida Highway Patrol trooper in 2004. She said, “We’re not anti-police. We’re anti-violence. When we protest, we’re not protesting the Bunnell Police or Flagler County Sheriff’s Office. We’re protesting for equal rights.”

The One Common Ground concept began following racial unrest and tensions in many areas of the country last summer, to discuss how local officials would address the potential of the Confederate battle flag being brought onto campuses on the first day of public school.

The first meeting in Flagler County was held on Aug. 11, 2015, at First Baptist Church in Bunnell. Efforts identified at the meeting were put into place and issues at school were handled without incident.