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Neighborhood Training: Succession Planning (Jan 6)

Neighborhood Training: Succession Planning (Jan 6)

The Office of Neighborhood Services will be holding another event in its successful and informative Neighborhood Training series. This one is on succession planning: that is, how the current group of neighborhood council officers will be replaced by the newly elected group of officers following this year’s voting process (which most councils typically hold in January).

Incidentally, Emerson-Garfield Neighborhood Council holds its annual elections in April.

The succession planning workshop will take place on Monday, January 6 from 6 to 7:30pm at the Northeast Community Center (4001 N. Cook) [map]. It will be a great opportunity to learn how your neighborhood — or any committee, for that matter — can groom new leadership as well as plan for expected and unexpected departures of current leadership.

Succession Planning Flyer

If you plan on attending, please RSVP to Jackie Caro at jcaro@spokanecity.org or (509) 625-6733.

This is not just for neighborhood chairs or executive committees; it’s open to anyone who’s interested. So please spread the word.

Traffic-Calming Orientation Tonight (Dec 16)

Traffic-Calming Orientation Tonight (Dec 16)

Apologies for the short notice (our neighborhood council is still waiting on being paired with a Web intern to help us post in a more timely fashion), but there’s a traffic-calming orientation tonight, December 16, from 5:30-7pm at City Hall [map].

Traffic calming is a frequent topic at neighborhood council meetings across Spokane. This 90-minute session will bring you up to speed on how you can slow down traffic in your neighborhood. You’ll learn how a stretch of road might qualify for traffic-calming measures, what forms traffic calming can take (such as curb bumpouts, roundabouts, or street trees), and what steps are necessary to get those improvements installed.

Traffic Calming OrientationThe meeting takes place in the Council Briefing Center, which is located on the lower level of City Hall, and is hosted by the Office of Neighborhood Services. Anyone with an interest in the topic is welcome to attend.

 

Give a Tree for Christmas

Give a Tree for Christmas

Pressure of holiday shopping got you down? The City of Spokane Urban Forestry program has a unique gift idea for any of your hard-to-please family members or eco-minded friends: a tree!

Urban Forestry Xmas Tree 2013For $350, Spokane Urban Forestry’s Team Lorax will plant a tree in a Spokane city park in honor of any person, family, group or business of your choosing. It’s cheaper than a statue and has the potential to grow as large as a monument. Plus it helps improve air quality — how many urban landmarks can you say that about?

More information is available at the Spokane Urban Forestry website or by calling Angel Spell on (509) 363-5495.

Materials for the December 11 EGNC Meeting

Materials for the December 11 EGNC Meeting

It’s been a quiet month here on the blog, but that doesn’t mean that the Emerson-Garfield Neighborhood Council has been any less active. In fact, the EGNC meets this Wednesday, December 11 for its annual holiday potluck at 6pm in the Corbin Senior Center. The meeting will follow at 7pm. If you live, work or own property in Emerson-Garfield, you’re invited to attend. Bring a dish!

This meeting has a few items on the agenda, the most pressing being the neglected city property along N. Maple that becomes a dust bowl in the summer. We’ll also be discussing the Police Ombudsman and Community Assembly recommendation regarding the current draft agreement. Planning head Megan Kennedy has also asked to present the results of the two planning workshops.

Download the December 11 agenda and minutes for approval here:

We look forward to seeing you there!

Materials for the November 13 EGNC Meeting

Materials for the November 13 EGNC Meeting

The Emerson-Garfield Neighborhood Council meets tomorrow (Wednesday, November 13) at 7pm in the Corbin Senior Center. If you live, work or own property in Emerson-Garfield, please attend and take an active role in improving the neighborhood.

This meeting is a biggie. There will be one guest speaker, Jamie Borgan of Transitions, who will describe what their organization did with the Community Development Block Grant funding our neighborhood allocated to them last year.

CDBGLogo2

After Jamie’s presentation, we’ll get right down to the nitty gritty of allocating our 2014 Community Development Block Grants (CDBG). This funding totals $57,274 and can be used to fund sidewalks, home rehabilitation, capital development (i.e., brick-and-mortar) projects, and some nonprofits’ operations needs. Spokane is unique to the whole country in that the city relies on direct input from the individual neighborhoods on how this federal funding should be allocated. Let’s not take that opportunity for granted.

This year the EGNC has an additional $10,756.04 due to returned or redirected allocations from 2013. This is above and beyond the $57k mentioned above and can be used to fund a capital project of our choosing. Combined with some other money, it could result in a neighborhood gateway, a pedestrian crosswalk, or something else altogether.

Download the November 13 agenda and minutes for approval here:

And here’s the last reminder on this subject: In September the EGNC voted to end future monthly mailings to voting members. This means that you will no longer receive print copies of the materials in the post as has been customary in the past. Instead, you will have to download the agenda and minutes here on this blog or pick up one of the limited print copies that will be available at the meeting.