For the umpteenth time, the Haitian community is trying to cobble together a national or regional agenda that would move it to the next level after rapid ascension to the ranks of the middle and working class.

In April, the National Coalition for Haitian Rights held “Moving Forward Together in 2004,” a conference at New York University to help groups to “speak in a unified voice.” The daylong event inspired Haitians to vow to register voters and to become more active in educating their compatriots.

In 2002, the organization produced a three-day conference, “Developing a National Agenda: Moving Forward Together,” in Miami whose ostensible goal was to assemble people from across the country to determine how Haitians will move forward collectively during the next five to ten years.

Three years earlier, at New York University again, the National Coalition for Haitian Rights held a symposium with a similar theme as those that followed it.

“How many times are we supposed to set the Haitian agenda,” said Jean Vernet, a long-time activist and founder of the Haitian-American Voters Association. “It’s a little premature for us to think of a national agenda when we don’t have the infrastructure to identify issues at the local level. We’re always jumping the gun.”

At all three conferences, participants said they were inspired to return to their communities and organize. But, the fruits of promised labor from these conferences – on a national level– have yet to be seen.

“We keep doing things, and we don’t follow up on them,” said Francois Pierre-Louis, former executive director of the Community Action Project in Flatbush. “People don’t follow up. It’s been like that for a long time, trying to get people to commit to things.”

The lack of tangible results has not discouraged groups from hosting “national agenda” conferences. In early summer, minister-activist Alfred Joseph organized a conference in Atlanta to do just that. On Oct. 16, the Washington D.C.-based Haitian American Leadership Council held a meeting to introduce its intention to develop “a unified voice” in the Haitian community.

Jocelyn McCalla, executive director at National Coalition for Haitian Rights, said the conferences are “just scratching the surface.”

He said commitment is missing. “Ideas come out of the conferences,” he said. “Implementing those ideas takes grassroots efforts to bring the community to a higher level.”

Experts said the estimated 1.2 million Haitians in the United States are going through the process of self-determination that has been observed among other immigrant groups. It is normal for organizations to try to take the lead, but what matters more is the means each has available to rally the people, they say.

Adding to the mix is the clash between the old guard activists whose organizations’ missions are to serve mostly newcomers and the younger group of advocates that are pushing for building a structure.

“Part of it is being young,” said Pierre-Louis, a trans-nationalism expert at Queens College. “We have a history in Haiti where things always break down or get stuck in the middle.”

Groups often fail because their skills are incompatible with community needs. “They are technocrats,” Pierre-Louis said. “They are not in the community and don’t do work actively in the community. They may mean well, but they are forgetting one thing: That everything is local. They forget that Haitians connect on a personal level with their leaders.”

The failure of nonprofits to deliver services has hampered efforts to set an agenda, McCalla said.

At the April conference, for example, each organization was asked to bring 10 clients they served. Not one of the 15 organizations brought that many clients. That means the meeting which National Coalition for Haitian Rights staff had planned for a larger audience fell short of its objective.

“That’s a problem,” McCalla said. “People are not responding. There aren’t enough newcomers to the debate.”

McCalla said a divide exists between the old guard, or Haitian organizers concerned with providing services to mostly newcomers, and the younger ones who prefer to set a foundation. Yet, the number of newcomers has decreased and most people are looking to move into the mainstream.

“Service providers have not moved with our population,” said Vernet, who made an unsuccessful bid for the State Assembly in 2001. “We can’t leave this up to the professionals. We must have a dialogue with the community. We have to make it [agenda building] available to everyone.”

What Vernet envisions is a town hall meeting filled with Haitians from all walks of life. What he envisions is a meeting where the taxi driver sits next to the internist at Kings County Hospital, sitting next to a home attendant with a school teacher two seats down. Vernet said people could complain about school overcrowding or demand for a children’s dance center.

“We need to begin at the local level,” he said. “This is not something you do overnight or while under heat. This is something you do with a cool head.”

Jean-Robert Lafortune, executive director of the Haitian American Grassroots Coalition in Miami, said there are issues that Haitians nationwide face such as juvenile delinquency, lack of political representation on the local level, and culturally insensitive school curriculum for Haitian children. These daily challenges could be converted into a foundation for a viable agenda, Lafortune said.

Haitian-Americans’ support of Haiti through remittances is another opportunity, he said.

“It is by identifying those problems that we could speak with one voice,” he said.

Lafortune said a credible group of organizations must be identified to meet regularly and formally discuss an agenda.

He said the Haitian American Grassroots Coalition has worked with other organizations. In the past few weeks, they have been lobbying for Haitians to be granted temporary protected status because of [the situation in] Haiti.

They said it is inhumane to deport illegal immigrants back to Haiti in the aftermath of Tropical Storm Jeanne, which killed thousands in the northwest, and recent violence in Port-au-Prince that killed 50 residents.

Lafortune said Florida groups reached a consensus in 2000 to ensure that Haitians participated in the census. They persuaded state officials to add “Haitian” as a national origin category on voter registration cards.

New York, Boston, and other metropolitan areas must be doing similar work for a national consensus to be determined.

But a connection must be established between the leadership and the community at large.

“The system is set in such a way that if you are scattered and divided, you cannot best defend your interests,” said Emmanuel Coffy, chairman of the Haitian American Leadership Council.

Coffy cites Miami Cubans’ power in U.S.-Cuba relations, Jews that dictate actions in Israel from Washington, D.C., and professional associations that lobby for their members.

With the many disappointments suffered during this 200th year of Haiti’s independence, some believe it is time for Haitians to get their act together. The Haitian-American Leadership Council slogan is “It’s Now or Never” emphasizes the urgency to unify.

“If Haitians need a rallying time, it is now,” said Samuel Nicolas, an aide of New York State Comptroller Alan Hevesi. “We need to continue integrating into American society.”

Nicolas, who made an unsuccessful bid for the State Assembly in 1998, said groups must urge legal residents to become citizens, to join local boards, police precinct councils, and other bodies and to attend forums.

“By just doing a little bit more than working 40 hours a week and coming home, we could shape policy and make our voices heard,” Nicolas said. “We need to get up to speed.”