Is Putting this on Worth The Effort?
It starts in April or early May. Volunteers meet to plan what is now a long tradition of fund-raising for FCL, the Quaker "Lobby of Conscience" in Sacramento. The main event is the annual Harvest Festival day at the Palo Alto Quaker meeting house with live music, food, homemade jams & chutneys, a rummage sale, children's activities, used books, and myriad specialties.
Every year the volunteers ask "Is all this work worth it? If everyone just wrote a check we could raise almost as much money!"
And the answer is clear: We do it because we are together in a community, and it is how we can contribute as a community to something we all believe in. It may not be logical, but working together is itself a reward, and the public benefits.
Many people contribute in unique ways: One vendor donates home-made local honey from his own bee hives. The musicians play for free. The chef cooks at no charge. Book-sellers move, sort and display literally tons of books, gratis. Volunteer parents entertain children with games and crafts. Rummage is priced, lemons are squeezed for lemonade, popcorn is popped. And everyone's favorite, the mess is cleaned up afterward!
And it has been happening every year for almost 40 years.
The FCL Harvest Festival got its name from the early days when it happened at the Hidden Villa farm near Foothill College. For the past decade it has been held at the Quaker meeting house in Palo Alto.
FCL is the Friends Committee on Legislation of California, and was started in 1952 by Quakers to advocate for social justice.
When developing positions on issues, FCL has been known to post links on its website to both supporters and opponents. FCL explains "people who develop an awareness of each other's politics and passions can build bridges of understanding."
Such an even-handed, respectful-to-everyone approach is, to say the least, unusual in today's politics.
To find out more about FCL, visit www.fclca.org or come talk to FCL representatives at the Harvest Festival:
The last Saturday in September, 9am - 4pm
957 Colorado Ave. (between Louis & Greer) in Palo Alto.
Directions: 101 to Oregon Expressway, go left on Greer, and right on Colorado.
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