A Montana grassroots initiative has reached a new milestone as it enters its seventh year of working to break down barriers and strengthen community dialogue across cultural divides.
See footage from Saturday's peace-building seminar below:
The Montana Cross Community Reconciliation Project, founded by the Global Peace Foundation, aims to promote cultural respect and mutual understanding by helping participants overcome personal biases and prejudices.
The group meets once a month, with each seminar featuring guest speakers from around the globe who share their personal experiences related to culture, race, gender, religion, or economic status.
"As we've been doing this through the years, even here, you'll see people coming and saying, 'Wow, I've never had a chance to meet people from another culture 'til now," said Mike Yakawich, the founder and project manager of the Montana Cross Community Reconciliation. "So, it wraps around education and dialogue... understanding and communicating with each other."
On Saturday, members of the project celebrated seven years, holding a peace-building seminar, with guest speakers including Billings Mayor, Bill Cole, and Billings Deputy Mayor, Mike Boyett. At the end of the meeting, 20 Montanans graduated from the program.
Yakawich explained that it's important to sit down with people from different cultures over a hot meal. He said understanding and education are key factors in preventing biases and prejudices.
"In the old days, our former city council member said that he remembers signs in the window, 'No dogs or Hispanics.' We don't want to emphasize the tragic nature of that, but we also want to understand that we can find reconciliation," said Yakawich.
The program maintains an open-door policy for community participation.
"There is no barrier to be a part of Cross Community Reconciliation," said Nick Enslow, a member and facilitator at the program. "There's no reason that they can't come in, whether it's for one time, or every time once they get started."
The Montana Cross Community Reconciliation project is a self-funded project, but is assisted by sponsors, such as the Mike and Diana Boyett Foundation and the Bill & Ann Cole Foundation.
Sessions are free and open to any community member hoping to learn more about community peace building. The group meets at the Community Leadership and Development building in downtown Billings, located at 24 So. 29th St, every third Tuesday of the month from 5:30 p.m. until 7 p.m. Meals are provided.
"Ultimately, the greatest form of change, the greatest form of just improvement of different causes, different issues, different strife between people really just seems to be, sit down, have a meal together, have difficult conversations," Enslow told MTN.
This story was reported on-air by a journalist, and portions of this article have been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.
