January 2013

1. Call to Order – Meeting called to order at 7:11 pm

2. Sign In and Introductions

3. Treasurer Report – No change, balance is $1451.71

4. Announcements

Karen Greene announces that the Main Library’s Seed Library volunteer orientation is on February 9 at 8:30 am and there will be a Seed Saving Workshop at the Wilmot Library on April 19 at 8 am. Cyclovia is on April 7 and 28 from 10 am to 3 pm. Volunteers are needed! There is also the Tucson Sculpture Festival this weekend at the Whistle Stop Depot and the Sculpture Resource Center.

Claire notes that there was an attempted vehicle theft, and Sky notes that there was an attempted burglary last Friday. Cam Juarez offers to coordinate a TPD contact for us to attend our meetings quarterly.

5. Discussion

(a) Reinvestment Project Dedication – The reinvestment project is complete! Cam Juarez, our project coordinator at Pima County, is here to discuss a dedication event. The proposed date is Saturday, March 9 at 9 am. This is the same day as the Festival of Books but by having it early, neighbors and elected officials should be able to attend both. The event will be held at the community garden and there will be a self-guided walking tour of the artwork and features. Cam will develop a two sided invitation/map that we will distribute. Invited speakers include Supervisor Richard Elías, Councilmember Regina Romero, Brad Lancaster, someone from WMG, someone from TDOT, and someone from TPAC. We will need to clean up the garden beforehand and help set up and take down. There is a $200 budget for food, so we will get half from Green Gourmet and half from Anita St. Market. Starbucks will provide free coffee. Sky Jacobs will be a contact for food and Vince Pawlowski will be a contact for the garden. Cam will bring music. Invitations will go to all elected officials, as well as adjacent neighborhoods and neighborhoods in the reinvestment grant process.

We will need to meet once again to finalize the details.

(b) Whistle Stop Depot – Nobody here, no information.

(c) Ironwood Tree Experience: Community Action Toolkit – Rachel Glass and Martha Gebhart are here to present a pilot project of Ironwood Tree Experience called Community Action Toolkit. Ironwood Tree Experience is an organization connected to Prescott College and their purpose is to connect teens with nature through a variety of programs. The Community Action Toolkit is a $500 grant for neighborhood scale projects to help bring community together and give youth a chance to be involved in a positive local project. The project must be completed in 3 months (and in our case, by August) and it requires a committee of community members and specialists, who are trained local youth provided by ITE. The project is open ended, it does not need to be infrastructure be can also be a service, event, or program.

ITE is interested in having us participate so they can test the program and so we can provide useful feedback as an active, mature neighborhood. We can apply online. Some of us are burned out, having just completed the reinvestment project, but some of us are interested in getting started by starting dialogue about ideas, especially with teens in the neighborhood. We will need to follow up with a meeting to get committee members.

6. Committee Reports

(a) Downtown Links – Karen attended the most recent meeting. The staff understand that from the community’s standpoint, the deck park is a requirement, not an amenity, and it is the only reason that the community consented to the project in the first place. A subcommittee is being created for the deck park, which may not be able to vote, but will work on the plan with the architecture group on the plans. There have been no votes on the plans so far. Vince would like to have Ann Chanecka talk to us about bicycle and pedestrian plans for Downtown Links. The no whistle zone was discussed, and UPRR has actually been in discussion with the city, but in order for the zone to be established, the Arizona Corporation Commission must designate the crossings as public, not private, which may be an ordeal. There is no budget for it with the current shortfall of $6 million. Regular meetings have resumed.

(b) Neighborhood Garden – The garden is not broke! It has enough funds to survive at least two more months. No pipes were broken in the freeze, there has been no sleeping thanks to Vince and Brad’s staying on top of this. The new signs have not yet been installed.

(c) Dunbar Coalition – No information since last meeting.

7. Approval of Minutes from December – Minutes approved unanimously.

8. Adjourn – Meeting adjourned 8:49 pm.