Laughlin’s Caring for People forum Published May 12, 2011 By Senior Airman Scott Saldukas 47th Flying Training Wing public affairs LAUGHLIN AIR FORCE BASE, Texas -- Laughlin members gathered at Club XL for the first Caring for People forum here to have the opportunity to discuss their opinions and concerns and be heard by base leaders. About 100 participants separated into nine different working groups that each concentrated on a specific topic while they were able to voice their views. The topics were family, deployment, school and single Airmen support, special needs, housing, health and wellness; youth and spouse communication. "The topics are issues that the Air Force has identified as important for Airmen and their families," said Grisel Sanchez, 47th Medical Group health promotion program manager. "These topics correspond to what the integrated delivery system helping agencies on base work on. This is great for us, the IDS helping agencies, because it provides the issues directly from the people of Laughlin, which then focuses our outreach and programming efforts." The committee will now review the top two issues from each group, prioritize them and present them to the community action information board, which includes all commanders. Then, they will vote on the top 10 issues and be forwarded to the Air Education and Training Command. "We had just under two months to pull this together, and I believe the committee, the supporters and facilitation teams did outstanding jobs," said Mr. Robert Wade, Air Force Smart Operations for the 21st Century program manager. While making the best of the short time they had to create the event, committee members were pleased with the event turnout and activity. "There was an awesome response from Team XL as it was the first forum held at the installation," Ms. Sanchez said. "Participants were extremely engaged and vocal at each table. Not only did they discuss what was working at Laughlin, they also had the opportunity to tell us how we were doing and provided suggestions on how to make things better." The next step in the Caring for People process is scheduled to take place May 17 where the selected issue will be chosen.