New London — The Rev. Aracelis Vázquez Haye cited a Biblical verse to challenge a Saturday morning audience of city officials, civic leaders, human services agencies and educators to work together to improve their city.

“Seeking peace and prosperity of the city,” is the partial quote attributed to the prophet Jeremiah in writing to the exiles in Babylon. The quote continues: “Pray to the Lord, because if it prospers, you too will prosper."

The Church of the City, New London, where Vazquez Haye is associate pastor, hosted Saturday’s forum to launch a year-long effort to get the city's divergent public and private agencies to work together.

Executive Pastor Tom Hogsten compared the effort to the merger of two churches two years ago that created the stronger Church of the City.

The event, titled “Justice & Peace Forum 2015: Seeking the Peace and Prosperity of the City” addressed four main topics: education, domestic violence, human trafficking and law enforcement in the community.

School Superintendent Manuel Rivera was unable to attend, but was narrator of a video promoting the vision of the city school system as a pioneering all-magnet regional school district.

In the video, Rivera envisioned a time when the city’s school enrollment would top 4,000 — from the current 3,200 — with a waiting list of students from other towns trying to enroll in the magnet schools.

Collaboration with the region’s largest corporations, local and state colleges and with community leaders being recruited to serve as mentors for today’s students is critical to the plan, Rivera said in the video.

Mayor-elect Michael Passero embraced the church’s challenge to bring city and private agencies together.

New London eliminated its city social services department years ago, and several years later also eliminated the position of social services coordinator, leaving no city interaction with local private service agencies, Passero said.

Passero announced Saturday that he will restore the position of social services coordinator and likely appoint someone to the post in January. 

He said the city has been “too disconnected” with private agencies and the needs of the city's poorest residents.

During a break in the forum, Passero said he started meeting with private social services agencies when he was elected to the City Council six years ago.

He said agency officials “hungered for more participation by the city” to address problems.

One such issue Bill Rivera hopes the coordinated effort will address is human trafficking.

Rivera, who works for the state Department of Children and Families and serves as pastor of the Strengthening Families Ministry at the Church of the City, said more people need to learn the possible signs of human trafficking and to report potential incidents.

A 10-minute video available online titled “Tricked & Taken: A Masked Production,” created in 2013 by students at the Classical Magnet School in Hartford, featured a brief New London encounter.

In the video, anti-trafficking advocate Frank Bamada described seeing a beautiful young girl who looked out of place at the New London soup kitchen.

He asked what she was doing there, and she said she was kidnapped leaving school two days earlier.

Just then, a man grabbed the girl and the two left immediately. Bamada said they were never found.

“Human trafficking is happening in Connecticut,” Rivera said. “It’s happening in New London.”

c.bessette@theday.com

Twitter: @Bessettetheday