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November/December 2007 Living Now
Portland Approves Peace Resolution

The Portland City Council approved a resolution in support of establishing a U.S. Department of Peace and Nonviolence.

Sponsored by Commissioner Dan Saltzman, the city's resolution backs House Bill 808, which seeks to create a federal-level department that will provide nonviolent solutions to domestic and international conflicts.

"While it's important to focus on the need for international peace, it is also important to focus on the need to build peace internally," says Saltzman, who supported the resolution because it will develop new programs to addresses the challenges of violence.

The peace department would address violence here at home by creating strategies to solve gang violence, child abuse, school shootings and domestic violence. The department also would allocate federal funding to nonviolence programs in cities and states, such as mediation trainings for police, firefighters, and other emergency services personnel, alternative dispute resolution techniques, peer mediation and nonviolent communication programs in public schools.

Internationally, the peace department would provide conflict resolution and peace-building techniques, providing the military with complementary approaches to ending violence. Taking an educational, humanitarian and psychological approach, the peace department would foster a deeper understanding of cultural and religious differences.

The proposed federal legislation calls for the peace department to be funded with the equivalent of two percent of the U.S. defense department budget, which is currently $400 billion annually.

Visit www.thepeacealliance.org.