What Is AMOS?
AMOS (A Mid-Iowa Organizing Strategy) is a broad-based, nonpartisan, interfaith community organization comprised of twenty eight congregations in Des Moines and Ames.
What Does AMOS Do?
AMOS seeks to exercise the power of organized people in a relational and responsible way. Through face to face meetings, AMOS members build relationships with members of their communities. In the process, they cut through divisions such as race, religion, and socioeconomic status, and discover the passion and concerns that unite us all.
AMOS pursues an agenda that is multi-issued and that responds to the concerns and pressures people feel. These concerns and pressures, which are identified through hundreds of small-group conversations, are then explored in depth by research teams who investigate the facts and develop possible solutions to the problems. Some issues currently being researched by AMOS include health care, immigration, youth and education, the environment, and economic justice.
AMOS then publicly acts, bringing the power of organized people to decision-makers to implement the AMOS agenda. Through this process, hundreds of people reenter public life and reclaim responsibility for their future here in central Iowa.
AMOS in Ames
Economic Justice
The Economic Justice Research Team (EJT) of AMOS addresses issues of living wages, predatory lending, and affordable housing. The EJT has lobbied state legislators to increase the minimum wage, expand the earned income tax credit, cap car title and payday loans, and close a tax loophole that is unfair to locally-owned businesses.
Environment
The Environmental Research Team of AMOS has added their voice to leaders of Ames and Iowa State University to commit to lowering greenhouse gases consistent with the Kyoto Protocol. The team is working with the city government and others to provide educational programs designed to help citizens conserve.
Health Care
The Health Care Research Team of AMOS, based on input from local citizens, identified three issues to pursue:
1. Improve the financial assistance policy at Mary Greeley Medical Center (MGMC);
2. Lobby for an Urgent Care Clinic; and,
3. Advocate for pre-natal care for low-income, uninsured women in Ames and Story County.
In November 2007, the Board of Trustees at MGMC approved a significantly expanded financial assistance policy. In February 2008, McFarland Clinic announced the launching of urgent care services. And at present, AMOS is actively engaged in facilitating discussions between medical providers and social service organizations to provide pre-natal care to uninsured women.
Immigration
The Immigration Research Team of AMOS is passionate about welcoming newcomers as children of God who have dignity and worth regardless of their birthplaces. This team gathers and disseminates information about immigration, and advocates for reasonable, comprehensive legislative reforms that will protect the welfare of citizens, employers, immigrants, and the economies of our state, our country, and our world. We vigorously advocate, through letters and conversations, against anti-immigrant state legislation, and we advocate for federal-level positive solutions for all.
Youth and Education
The Youth and Education Research Team (YET) of AMOS, in an effort to address youth and education issues, met with Ames School District leaders and over 130 middle and high school youth. Since we wanted to know the concerns of young people, we asked youth in the seven Ames member institutions, the Boys and Girls Club, and Youth and Shelter Services (YSS). The eighteen issues identified in the meetings were prioritized by the same youth in preparation for a future workshop. YET and youth will address the issues that are named there and seek viable solutions.
A Word from the Presiding Bishop
Our Christian mission by its very nature drives us out into the world to be a public church, standing in unity as an advocate for the poor, working tirelessly and in partnership for justice and peace, seeking to resist prejudice, hatred, violence, oppression and fear. The Rev. Mark Hanson, Presiding Bishop of the ELCA, puts it this way:
Our baptism calls us, Scripture compels us, and the world demands that we be a public church—a church that is deeply affected by the pain of others in our interconnected world. When addressing issues of global concern as a public church we must listen intently to our international partners and commit ourselves to accompaniment—not to lead or follow, but to walk with—on a journey of reconciliation and hope, centered on God’s mission of restoring community.
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