Somerville is home to a veritable army of nonprofits, community organizations, meet-ups and groups working to make our little corner of the world a better place. So if you’re feeling overwhelmed and want to do something right now, why not find other people who are doing something awesome and ask, “How can I help?”
Here’s a list of places you can start!
- Become an ESOL teacher at The Welcome Project.
- Use your tech skills! Help The Welcome Project develop a rapid-response system for immigrant families.
- Volunteer to canvass for the Safe Communities Act and help other cities become sanctuary cities.
- Watch Somerville Neighborhood News, Tuesdays at 7 p.m. on Channel 3—it’s seriously the best local news.
- Get a SCATV membership and help make Somerville Neighborhood News.
- Take a class at SCALE—learn some skills, meet your neighbors and build stuff at the high school.
- Pick a local campaign and spend the weekend canvassing in your neighborhood.
- Donate to Books of Hope; follow their FB, spread the word to youth and young adults who want to publish books, run writing workshops and host open mics!
- Find out when your local Resistat meeting is happening. Go and ask tough questions.
- Get to know your ward alderman. Find out what’s on the docket for land use and legislative affairs. Advocate for the things that are important to you.
- Meet your School Committee member, and start a conversation about what’s happening in the schools.
- Read the municipal budget (new and improved as of June!) to find out what Somerville spends money on.
- Host a house party and donate the funds to MIRA to support immigrants and refugees statewide.
- Join AHOC (the Affordable Housing Organizing Committee); become a member of the Somerville Community Corporation (SCC).
- Talk to your neighbors about the transfer tax. One percent of every real estate transaction for affordable housing!
- Volunteer as a tutor at Somerville Public Schools.
- Make friends at the Center for Arabic Culture at the Armory, every second Saturday from 4 to 6:30 p.m.
- Register to vote.
- Run for local office.
- Vote in the upcoming municipal election.
- Comprehensive zoning overhaul starts up again in the fall; go to the zoning meetings and ask how it will impact you and how it will impact developers.
- Run a workshop at the Mystic Learning Center.
- Be a reader at Freedom Connexion’s summer program—or better yet, sponsor a scholar!
- Volunteer with the Somerville Boys and Girls Club.
- Donate to the Ryan Harrington Foundation to help combat substance abuse disorders.
- Donate materials to Parts and Crafts and Beautiful Stuff Project; share your crafting skills as a workshop leader.
- Walk to Save our Homes to help combat displacement and support the Somerville Homeless Coalition.
- Check out the Black Lives Matter Cambridge Action Plan and support their summer fundraiser.
- Become a member of Union United?—the group meets the ?first Thursday of the month at St. Joe’s, from 6 to 8 p.m.
- Go to Teen Empowerment’s Annual Peace Conference to support incredible youth.
- Donate and volunteer with the Community Action Agency of Somerville (CAAS) and other organizations vulnerable to federal funding cuts. Help with community outreach and organizing.
- Get to know the people at CAAS, the SCC, Mystic Learning, and other organizations that work directly with low-income folks in Somerville. Spread the word and share with friends who might benefit from these services!
- Go to the Somerville Overcoming Addiction annual vigil and honor lost loved ones.
- Help MIRA with voter registration drives.
- Go to meetings on new developments and public park design. Encourage low impact design to reuse our stormwater and better planting practices, and push for healthy green spaces.
- Call the aldermen and ask them to push the city to plant native trees.
- Check out Freedom Connexion’s finale to support young scholars in the community.
- Volunteer at the Growing Center, or South Street Farm, Concord Street Farm and ArtFarm. Apply to be an urban agriculture ambassador, start your own community garden and compost!
- Join with Somerville’s Climate Forward to lay out next steps in becoming more sustainable and to reach our goal of carbon neutrality by 2050.
- Talk to your neighbors about the condo conversion ordinance. Let’s get something on paper we can actually enforce!
- Join up with Indivisible Somerville and Our Revolution, two dominating new voices for change in the post-Trump era.
- Join a nonprofit board and put in some hours helping with the mission.
- Send a thank you card to ISD (they inspect all the buildings in Somerville?—?hard work!)
- Support your local firefighters.
- Submit public testimony at local and state hearings on issues you care about.
- Push for a city-subsidized and promoted stormwater management system?—?de-paving driveways, hooking up rain barrels to downspouts, planting rain gardens.
- Go to development meetings for projects that are happening in your neighborhood.
- Join a tenant association or neighborhood council. Get involved! Meet your neighbors!
- Turn the compost or tap a tree at the Somerville Community Growing Center.
- Support city-wide recycling initiatives.
- Go to a workshop at your local public library.
- Run for a board position in the Union Square Neighborhood Council.
- The next time appointments come up for a city committee, put your name in for a spot.
- Get to know your state delegation! Mike Connolly, Pat Jehlen, Denise Provost and Christine Barber are doing the people’s work. Go to their office hours, find out what’s up, advocate accordingly.
This list was compiled for June’s How to Fix the World Festival and originally appeared on Katie Gradowski’s Medium. An updated version is available in the July/August print issue of Scout Somerville, which is available at hundreds of locations around Somerville (and just beyond its borders).
Have stuff to add? Email scout@scoutmagazines.com or katie.gradowski@gmail.com and we’ll put it on the list!
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