Rapid City’s Community Conversations group is hosting an Innovation Summit on Thursday. The event marks the group’s one year anniversary. Chas Jewett, a group organizer, says the event celebrates the changes and relationships developed in Rapid City over the past year.
“We’re going to talk about all of these accomplishments we’ve had. We’ve done a lot of great things, and we’re going to celebrate each other and celebrate the fact that instead of our conversation on race ending up in violence like it has in other cities across the country, we’re going to talk about how we came together and concentrated on our shared values really sort of created a safe place to have a really difficult conversation,” says Jewett.
The group formed after a dispute at a Rapid City Rush hockey game involving Lakota children. Since then, more than 100 community members meet regularly to discuss how to reduce racial tensions and improve cross-cultural communication.
Jewett says Community Conversations has many events planned for the year ahead, including a Four Directions 5K Unity Day in June.
