A Gainesville City councilman is organizing an effort to promote values in Hall County.

George Wangemann has reached out to religious leaders in the community, hoping to ignite interfaith cooperation aimed at “offering a community-based solution to problems, rather than government solutions.” He is proposing religious leaders devise a “community value of the month” that can be promoted by word and action.

An initial meeting with faith leaders will be held July 24 at Good Shepherd Lutheran Church.

Wangemann said traditional values seem to be pushed aside in much of mainstream society.

“We feel like if we promote values we already have and improve on those, it would be a great improvement in the community,” Wangemann said.

Wangemann, who used to be a bishop and is still active in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, said this effort is not associated with his City Council duties and no city funds are being used in the organization.

Instead, Wangemann said he wants to see action beyond what government can or should do to improve the community.

“It’s got to start with a grass-roots effort in our community,” he said. “We hope it will spread like a fire through the community.”

Wangemann said he values a community that’s clean, healthy, friendly, well-prepared and well-educated.

The Rev. Ben Haupt is pastor at Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, where the initial values meeting will be held.

Haupt said he was approached by Wangemann about the idea of bringing faith groups together to highlight values.

The offer struck a chord.

“The main issue is when we don’t define our values, we will just kind of roll with society and the latest fads,” he said. “Communities of faith are a great place for a (larger) community to define what its values are.”

While Haupt said there are many differences that distinguish churches, there are a lot of shared values to unite around.

The terms “value” and “family values” have become loaded in modern politics.

That’s not exactly what Haupt is getting at when he talks about values.

Put simply, a value is “something of extreme importance,” the pastor said, but not necessarily something specific.

“It helps prioritize,” he said. “It guides actions but does not define what those actions are.”

And action is exactly what Wangemann and Haupt envision to come out of their promotion of values.

“At the end of the day, the goal is to make a difference,” Haupt said. “If our church is not here to make a difference in the community, I’m not sure what it’s here for.”