Reaching Across the Aisle: Why the Charrette Matters Now (More Than Ever)
By Bill Riddick
In the summer of 1971, the city of Durham was facing a highly tense situation that could have become explosive without intervention. Earlier that year, a fire had occurred at an African American elementary school in the city that destroyed half of the building’s classrooms. I specify African American because, even though Brown vs Board of Education had been in effect since the 1950s, Durham schools had remained segregated until this point. After the fire, however, the Black and White communities of Durham became fiercely divided over the possibility of school desegregation.
Because the city was so split on the issue, I was called in by the North Carolina AFL-CIO to bring folks together for a conflict resolution mechanism known as a charrette, a method I had successfully used previously at Shaw University in Raleigh, NC; in Indianapolis, IN; and in Troy, PA.
A charrette is designed to create dialogue between community members with opposing viewpoints to solve problems for the betterment of the community. It’s a holistic, grassroots, and solution-oriented tool that brings different perspectives together into the same physical space so that ideas can be shared and heard.
This particular charrette process began with a myriad of concerned community members — from both sides — strongly voicing their opinions. Two individuals who were at polar opposites in their views about school desegregation were selected to be co-chairs of the committee: Black civil rights activist and community organizer Ann Atwater, and local Ku Klux Klan chapter leader C.P. Ellis. Both were strong personalities that came to the table as opponents.
Part of my methodology as charrette manager was to plan daily activities for the co-chairs that would cause them to work as a team. I remember going home each evening and spending an extra hour to think about how I could create situations and tasks that would put them in the same room and compel them to communicate. There were days that I asked them to do mundane tasks such as stapling and stacking papers, just to practice how important it is to work together. I knew that their communication was essential to the success of the charrette.
Ultimately, to my surprise, and to theirs, their conversations led them to realize that there were many things that they shared in common. Ann made C.P. see and understand that the hate that he had learned was wrong, and he ended up denouncing the KKK and the two of them became lifelong friends. Ann even gave the eulogy at C.P.’s funeral. I am still astonished and completely blown away by what happened that summer of 1971. But it really happened.
This inspiring and unexpected journey is powerfully chronicled in the current Taraji P. Henson and Sam Rockwell film THE BEST OF ENEMIES. It’s a story that I witnessed first hand and one that I think we need now more than ever before.
It saddens me to see how communication has broken down so severely between people with different ideologies and how hatred and violence has escalated in America.
I see this movie as a major springboard to encourage individuals to look in the mirror and examine their own biases and attitudes that could be harmful to others. I had my own biases when I first starting working with Ann and C.P. but, in order for the charrette to be successful and to make progress, I had to put them aside.
Our country is in dire need of something greater than the echo chambers of our own beliefs. We all need to identify our own prejudices, privilege and influences, and do the transformative work necessary to expand our world views and seek commonality with our neighbors. And the only way that can happen is if we take a deep look into our own souls to be better, and then look each other in the eye and speak with each other.
The way forward must be paved by people who are brave enough to change their own minds and bold enough to change the hearts of others for the good of all.
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Bill Riddick managed the Durham charrette of 1971, which resulted in the desegregation of local schools, a story portrayed in the current film The Best of Enemies. He is also the author of The Charrette Process: A Tool in Urban Planning.
Riddick has worked in the area of human services for more than 35 years, providing organizational management, substance abuse programming, and program evaluations for clients throughout the United States. As President of Skills Management Group, Inc., a consulting firm, Riddick has facilitated training sessions and workshops in 38 different states, as well as in Canada, Jamaica, and the Virgin Islands.
His many career honors include the prestigious Chancellor’s Award for Outstanding Service to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and the Roney Cates Award as an Outstanding Substance Abuse Prevention Professional for the State of North Carolina.
