[NLC] August neighborhood reports

[Heidi Beierle]

NEIGHBORHOOD REPORTS August 2009

Crest Drive Citizens Association (CDCA)
South University Neighborhood Association (SUNA)
River Road Community Organization (RRCO)
Jefferson Westside Neighbors (JWN)
Cal Young Neighborhood Association (CYNA) … as attachment

CREST DRIVE CITIZENS ASSOCIATION
The Crest Drive citizens Association held its annual picnic on the 18th. We
had better attendance than the last few years, good food, and a lively
discussion of a current land-use issue. Our oral history project is revving
up; several members who will be doing interviews attended a training session
with a professional interviewer. The repairs and rebuilding on Crest Drive
are well underway, complicating travel in that region of our neighborhood.
Otherwise, a quiet summer.

David Kolb

SOUTH UNIVERSITY NEIGHBORHOOD ASSOCIATION
SUNA Report

*We had a fun neighborhood event on Sunday, Aug. 16, in University Park with
live music (Apropos), activities, wading pool, watermelon and desserts (but
no contest) and a tour of a home mid-remodel.

*Neighbors are interested in figuring out if we can fundraise to replace the
closing wading pool with a spray park.

*Using another neighborhood's idea, we are adding an Edible Exchange to our
website, sunaeugene.org

*Our incredible annual garage sale occurs Friday afternoon and Saturday,
Sept. 25 and 26, in Onyx Alley at 21st. Half our proceeds go to Edison
Elementary; the other half supports SUNA projects.

*Work on planning and student neighbor issues continues!

Marilyn Milne
SUNA Chair

RIVER ROAD COMMUNITY ORGANIZATION
River Road Update, Jan Spencer

Our most recent meeting August 20 included a chat with Lorna Flormore.  We
talked about Neighborhood Action Plans. Comments from RRCO included how can
NAPS improve over other citizen involvement plans that have had limited
follow through. Most agreed, its up to the neighborhoods to make this a
success.  Also mentioned was that the NAPS could be much broader in its
content to include local food production and community building.  The
discussion lead to a series of thoughtful e mails between RRCO board members
and Lorna

Also part of the meeting was a chat with city manager John Ruiz.  He was
asked if the city was considering the possibility that there would be no
econonomic recovery, what would the city do.  There was talk about better
improving transportation alternatives to automobiles.

September's agenda will include out reach publications, charter follow up,
SNAP follow up, perhaps a speaker about work on Beltline and River Road
Corridor

Most board members visited the ODOT's Beltline "improvement" Open House at
N. Eugene High School, July 29 and came away observing little forward
thinking on the part of the authorities and their paid consultants in terms
of transportation alternatives to the automobile.

RRCO green team had a work party Sunday, removing several 100 square feet of
sod from a front yard to put in a Fall garden.  Several River Road neighbors
are making parts of their property available to for others for gardening.

September's meeting will be more of a work session.

October's RRCO meeting will be a program/panel - "Creating Community
Resilience - Combining the Best of Neighborhood Watch, Emergency
Preparedness and Permaculture"  Monday, October 19, 7 PM.  Annex 1055 River
Road.

JEFFERSON WESTSIDE NEIGHBORS
Jefferson Westside Neighbors had a well attended ice cream social on August
4th (approximately 125 people or more) in celebration of National Neighbors'
Night Out. We had a live band, City of Eugene Recreation Services and plenty
of fun. The event was held at Monroe Park at Broadway and Monroe Streets. It
was also a great opportunity to have community members fill out the SNAP
Survey.

The executive board held a retreat in August. Board members had an
opportunity to hang out, get to know one another, and to brainstorm about
how to improve the neighborhood. Special emphasis was placed on developing
better tools for communicating to neighbors. We are working toward an e-zine
program that will allow neighbors to sign up on our website and opt in or
out. This will decrease the amount of data entry required by volunteers as
well as reduce administrative work overall.

The upcoming general meeting set for September 8th will have a speaker from
EWEB's Energy Mgt Services, who will lecture on weatherization and energy
saving techniques for homes.

________________________
Della Perry
Chair
Jefferson Westside Neighbors
Tel: (541) 344-1354
www.jwneugene.org
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://www.designcommunity.com/pipermail/nlc/attachments/20090824/9ca4858c/attachment-0001.html 
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: NLC8-25.pdf
Type: application/pdf
Size: 33954 bytes
Desc: not available
Url : http://www.designcommunity.com/pipermail/nlc/attachments/20090824/9ca4858c/attachment-0001.pdf