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Neighborhood Council Meeting Recap

Neighborhood Council Meeting Recap

Last night’s Emerson-Garfield Neighborhood Council meeting was one of the more satisfying ones. That’s because it was the one where we decide how to allot the Community Development funds (since that’s a term that keeps cropping up, we’ll soon have an explanatory post on what CD funding is and why it’s so important).

A small volunteer group of council members met prior to the neighborhood council meeting to review funding applicants. From a list of 28 organizations with 39 separate requests for service funding, the actual recommendations were narrowed down to six. Those were decided on some basic criteria:

  • Did Emerson-Garfield fund the organization last year?
  • What is the organization’s stated reason for applying for funding?
  • Does the organization have a physical location in our neighborhood? Or is it at least active there in some form?
  • Has a representative of the organization ever attended an EGNC meeting to personally “pitch” the funding request and field questions from the public?
  • Does the organization have access to additional funding sources beyond E-G’s Community Development funds?
  • Will the organization’s services directly benefit residents of our neighborhood?

On the basis of those criteria, the following six organizations were put forward and later approved by all voting members of the EGNC:

These organizations will receive letters of recommendation on behalf of the Emerson-Garfield Neighborhood Council to be granted all or part of their funding request. (In previous years, the neighborhood council used to exercise almost complete control over funding recipients, but that process has changed this year to save administrative costs.)

From a separate pot of capital funding, the EGNC allotted the following amounts for the following purposes:

  • $2,600 to Corbin Senior Center for repairing a parking lot entrance and miscellaneous improvements like heat tape
  • $20,000 for sidewalks — which receives 1:1 matching funds from the city, therefore a total of $40,000 will be available for sidewalk installation and repair throughout E-G in 2013
  • $34,650 for home rehabilitation — which receives 3:1 matching funds from the city, therefore $103,950 will be available for initiatives like SNAP and Lead Safe Spokane throughout E-G in 2013

A representative of the City of Spokane’s Community, Housing and Human Services Department was on hand to answer our questions about funding procedures and possibilities. During the discussion about apportioning of funds, he informed us that we still have $17,000 remaining in unallocated funds for street tree removal and replanting.

New this year in the CD funding process is an additional $100,000 general pot. All neighborhoods are allowed to submit project applications for part or all of this money. After some discussion on whether or not the looming deadline (December 6) was feasible, the EGNC decided to put forward its own application for a covered bus shelter on the southbound corner of Monroe and Montgomery.

Other project ideas included a dog park, a pedestrian crossing at Grace and Monroe, and a picnic pavilion in Corbin Park. All of these were seriously considered, but voting members decided unanimously to concentrate on a single project so that it stood a better chance of being approved. It’s likely that all these ideas will be revisited in the future.

Also discussed at the meeting: recent crime hotspots, park improvements, a forthcoming mailer, and this year’s snow plow protocol. These will all be covered in a second post tomorrow (because this one’s getting awfully long).

If you are a resident of Emerson-Garfield and would like to apply for street tree planting/removal or sidewalk installation/repair, we will soon have posts that describe how to do that and that will provide the relevant forms. Please stay tuned.

Materials for the Nov. 14 EGNC Meeting

Materials for the Nov. 14 EGNC Meeting

We’ve just posted the minutes (often imitated, never duplicated) from the October 10 meeting as well as the agenda for the upcoming November 14 meeting. Get ’em here:

We’re still waiting on confirmation that this month’s Neighborhood Planning meeting will take place as usual. As stakeholders and attendees of last month’s neighborhood meetings will know, E.J. Iannelli has stepped down as planning manager for a variety of reasons (some of which are noted in the above minutes); Jay Cousins has stepped up to fill the role.

As always, the Emerson-Garfield Neighborhood Council meeting will start at 6pm at the Corbin Senior Center. We’ll be discussing how to allocate the approximately $57k in funding that the neighborhood will be receiving as part of the Community Development Block Grant in 2013. The process and stipulations for CDBG funding have changed this year, and there are a number of issues to address if we want to ensure that Emerson-Garfield sees the same (or greater) level of attention as in years past.

One of the big changes is that much of next year’s CD funding is designed to be used for capital projects (i.e., bricks and mortar). Some examples of what other neighborhoods have done — as well as some of the facts and figures behind 2013 CDBG funding — are outlined in the previous post.

And remember: the neighborhood council isn’t a cabal of insiders. It’s open to everyone and anyone who wants to attend. Please come to find out what’s going on and help shape Emerson-Garfield for the better.

Materials for Tonight’s Meetings

Materials for Tonight’s Meetings

The agendas for tonight’s Emerson-Garfield Neighborhood Council and planning stakeholder meetings are available for download. Save paper and grab your copy here:

Remember: the meetings start at 6pm (planning) and 7pm (neighborhood council) at the Corbin Senior Center.

As much as we wish everything was always sunshine and rainbows in the world of Spokane neighborhoods, there are some pressing issues to consider on both of these agendas. Many of those issues stem from decisions made by various departments within the city bureaucracy.

Traffic Calming on Mansfield & Montgomery

Traffic Calming on Mansfield & Montgomery

Earlier this year our neighborhood submitted a request for traffic-calming measures to the city. The request was for curb bump-outs along the 1100 to 1400 blocks of W Mansfield Ave. They were intended to slow speeders and discourage drivers from using it as a cut-through between N. Monroe and NW Blvd.

City engineers recently investigated the request (we think that’s when the electronic speed limit signs appeared) and they discovered that the problem included W Montgomery Ave as well. If anything, Montgomery had a bigger problem than Mansfield. A traffic light at the intersection of Montgomery and Monroe means that people hotfoot it for a block or two when the light is green. Trinity Catholic School is along that road, too, which makes inattentive speeders doubly dangerous.

Instead of curb bump-outs, the engineers proposed something more effective: traffic circles (aka “roundabouts”). They will address Montgomery Ave immediately and Mansfield will follow later, although it might require another application process next year to ensure that the project remains a top priority. Their preliminary plan for a total of six roundabouts — with trees and flowers, no less  — is depicted below.

Mansfield & Montgomery traffic calming proposal. Click for a larger view.

Over the next few weeks, the City of Spokane will be sending out letters to residents and businesses in the Montgomery area. If you’re in support of the project — and why wouldn’t you be when it means less transient traffic, fewer accidents, and fewer speeders? — you should promptly sign this letter and return it to the city. A group of volunteer residents will also doorbell with signature sheets to ensure that everyone understands the positive impact the project will have. We’ll need signatures from 50% +1 of properties for approval.

It’s important to note that this is not being funded by tax dollars. It comes from Photo Red funds. Photo Red funds come from people who are fined for running red lights. This money is pooled and then allocated to implement these types of traffic-calming projects. In other words, red-light runners are paying for you to be safer and your property values to go up.

More info will be posted as it becomes available. If you’re interested in helping to gather the required signatures, please get in touch. It will only take an afternoon at the most.

Status of N. Monroe Revitalization

Status of N. Monroe Revitalization

About two weeks ago, we made a request to have a written status update on North Monroe Revitalization, which, according to previous reports, was scheduled to break ground shortly.

On September 7, we received (via our appointed city rep, Tirrell Black) the following statement from Andrew Worlock, who is helping to oversee the N. Monroe revitalization project at the city level:

We are working on finalizing the contract with Studio Cascade. We have re-scoped the consultant’s work plan to provide a greater emphasis on economic development and identifying the public actions (infrastructure, etc) that are needed to stimulate private investment within and along the corridor. The approach uses a more refined focus given to three nodes along the corridor: a northern node, a “mid” node and a southern or “Northbank” node. We think this will mesh well with the neighborhood planning efforts of the EG Neighborhood as well as the other planning efforts (Kendall Yards, Spokane County) ongoing along the corridor. We hope to have the consultant under contract early this fall.

We’ll present this statement and discuss its impact at the neighborhood council meeting this week, which takes place on Wednesday, 7pm at the Corbin Senior Center.