How do you listen to thousands of life stories and ideas for a better community, and then turn those conversations into unified action that echoes in local and state government offices?

For the last four years, the Los Angeles Metropolitan Organizing Strategy-Industrial Areas Foundation --- an association of multi-denominational and multi-ethnic church and community organizations --- has worked to help create a stronger civic community in the vast Los Angeles metropolis. In homes, churches and community centers, the association has regularly gathered input from residents whose families are impacted by the issues addressed and decisions made by legislators.

Now, organizers say they are ready for prime-time action.

On July 11, some 10,000 delegates are expected to attend L.A. Metro-IAF's founding convention (2:30-5 p.m.) at the Los Angeles Convention Center, an event that will launch the group as a formal organization with membership dues, a governance structure and a priority list of issues to press (and a name change, since L.A. Metro-IAF is too often confused with the transit authority).

L.A. Metro coordinates the community change efforts of more than 80 member organizations --- many of them Catholic parishes --- from the San Fernando Valley, to Santa Monica, to South Central Los Angeles, and to Upland on the east side.

"The work of L.A. Metro, whether preserving, reviving or creating a level playing field for all, is both spiritual and democratic work. It is faithful citizenship," said Cardinal Roger Mahony at an L.A. Metro delegates' meeting in May.

"Your most important contribution in Los Angeles," the cardinal added, "is fighting isolation and resignation by carefully bringing together Jews, Protestants, Buddhists and Catholics, congregations, schools, unions and community organizations into a powerful force for change."

Strength in unity
L.A. Metro continually monitors the changing pulse of communities, trying to discern where there's enough energy on an issue in which neighbors are willing to invest time. When united, communities can accomplish almost anything, as when Inglewood voters recently denied Wal-Mart in its bid to skirt local ordinances in pursuit of a "super center" the size of 17 football fields.

Most recent issues that L.A. Metro has tackled include protesting stepped-up immigration raids and checkpoints; advocating drivers' license legislation for all California drivers, even those living and working without legal documents; improving communication between teachers and parents; and opposing the proposed expansion of the Bradley Landfill in the northeast San Fernando Valley.

The work is daunting. Los Angeles County covers 4,000 square miles and 88 cities, and houses 10 million people. It's not easy to organize a myriad of communities across diverse class, race, religion and political affiliations, and reach a consensus around a variety of issues that could benefit the common good.

Even the basic question about who is a community member is hotly divisive among Angelenos. Undocumented immigrants fight for rights; others insist they return to their countries of origin; and the community as a whole struggles to deal frankly with an economy that depends on immigrant labor.

To date L.A. Metro leaders have come down on the side of helping immigrants improve their situation.

"We have to keep working for our dignity," Msgr. Emigdio Herrera, pastor of St. Emydius Church in Lynwood, told some 500 parishioners and community residents at a drivers' license rally in the church parking lot June 11. "We profess a faith, but this faith needs to be seen in action."

Organizers invite, inspire, persuade, plead and cajole their parishioners to attend and participate in community-wide meetings and actions. What L.A. Metro can't count in big money, they hope to count in people. Every person matters.

"Staying in your house, you don't solve anything," said St. Emydius parishioner Elizabeth Hernandez, a mother of three. She came to the parish rally to show support for State Senator Gil Cedillo and other elected officials working to get new drivers' license legislation passed. Hernandez said she drives her children --- two of whom were born in the U.S. --- to school, to basketball practice and for after-school homework help. She does so without a license.

"We want to be legal. We want to buy car insurance," said Hernandez. "I want the governor to see we're human and we deserve rights. We came to work."

A plus for parishes
Missionary of St. Charles Father Richard Zanotti, pastor of Our Lady of the Holy Rosary Church in Sun Valley, said joining L.A. Metro enabled the church to add a justice and peace component to parish ministry.

Some 250 people gathered in Holy Rosary's parish auditorium June 14 to learn about local efforts to clean up air and water polluted by the nearby Bradley Landfill. Residents complained of allergies, asthma and bloody noses. Asthma rates in Sun Valley are reportedly twice the rate as the U.S. average.

State Senator Richard Alarcon, Assemblymember Cindy Montaņez, and L.A. City Councilmember Tony Cardenas told the crowd the specific steps they are taking to make Sun Valley more livable. Wherever possible, non-partisan L.A. Metro seeks to collaborate with elected officials.

Holy Rosary parishioner and bus driver Silvestre Flores has lived less than a mile from the Bradley dump for the last 14 years. The smell in the early morning is "ugly," said Flores. "You feel it," he added, lamenting the headaches he gets when driving in the morning. His wife suffers from asthma attacks.

"We've been thinking about moving out, and then I say, 'What if we fight the problem?' I want to be part of the fight," said Flores, whose three grown children and one grandchild live in Sun Valley and Pacoima. "There's an opportunity for children to grow in a better environment."

Flores said he'll give it at least two more years, until he retires, to see if an organized community can effect change.

Admittedly, it's hard to get parishioners to attend L.A. Metro public meetings. Parents work, sometimes two jobs each, and have household and family obligations --- cooking, cleaning, spending time with their kids.

And the meetings --- heavily-scripted agendas, prerequisite testimonials, accountability questions for politicians --- leave little to chance, but also can dilute the passion and power to inspire people to remain involved.

Perhaps with that in mind, parish and community organizers gather after every meeting, to evaluate the most recent forum and offer fresh-on-the-spot opinions. Other parish gatherings typically include time for small-group breakouts, called "house meetings," during which parishioners and community residents listen to each other's experiences and ideas around a specific issue.

A work in progress, organizers said they are trying to change a pervasive culture of "isolation, experts and bureaucracy" into a culture of conversation, participation and relationships. They hope creating a network of relationships and building trust will lead to power and effective action.

'Slow and respectful work'
For historical context, insight and inspiration L.A. Metro organizers have been reading William Fulton's "The Reluctant Metropolis: The Politics of Urban Growth in Los Angeles," and Charles M. Payne's chronicle of in-the-trenches civil rights organizers in "I've Got the Light of Freedom: The Organizing Tradition and the Mississippi Freedom Struggle."

Building new leaders among neighbors for the long haul is termed "slow and respectful work."

"Through conversations we inform each other what the needs are in the community," said Russell Conboy, pastoral associate of Sacred Heart Church in Altadena. "We're going to build the voice of this community."