Clarendon Field Officers Strengthen Partnership for Community Development

More than 100 representatives from some 22 government and social organisations, came together to network, align strategies, and strengthen partnership for community transformation at the inaugural Clarendon Field Officers Conference.

Held on Wednesday (May 27) at St. Gabriel’s Anglican Church in May Pen, the event was organised by the Clarendon Inter-agency Network, a framework under the Social Development Commission (SDC), in collaboration with the Planning Institute of Jamaica’s (PIOJ) Community Renewal Programme (CRP).

The conference was highlighted by the launch of a Field Officers Database geared towards improving cooperation and collaboration among officers to increase the quality and speed of services to residents.

During an interview with JIS News, SDC Clarendon Parish Manager, Baldvin McKenzie, said that the event was about partnership building.

“The Clarendon Field Officers Conference is a strategic initiative aimed at bringing together, field officers or frontline development practitioners operating in the parish. Field officers play a critical role in supporting communities through their delivery of programmes and services related to social development, agriculture and others in communities. This platform also provides for information sharing,” he pointed out.

Mr. McKenzie said he was excited about the launch of the database, noting that it will facilitate faster action to address issues citizens face.

“It will have contact numbers so when an issue comes up, we can make a call. Do you know how the communities will feel to see action immediately? That is possible when we have a database and we know each other,” he pointed out.

Technical Specialist for Governance, PIOJ, Charmaine Muirhead, in her remarks, said that the conference “intersects beautifully with the Community Renewal Programme’s goals and objectives, because we believe that for communities to be renewed, you have to have a more targeted approach to community development. You have to be better coordinated.”

“You have been coordinating with each other, but what this conference is seeking to do is for us to [act] in a more deliberate way. This conference is saying that it is giving you a tool, the database, to help you to know that you are going to operate outside of a silo approach,” she added.