December 2009

Community Participation Resources Peter Guttchen has prepared a list of resources he's used to support NENA's efforts to improve the quality of life in our neighborhood. If you're interested in learning more about involving community members in important community projects, this resource list is worth checking out.   What can NENA do for me?   Everything you need to know about NENA's... Reeves Middle School~Howard Avenue Trail proposal Roosevelt Elementary proposed parking lot revisions Closing the Gaps sidewalk-building proposal Traffic Safety and Walkability Improvements An update from Peter Guttchen, NENA President (Dec. 15, 2009): On Monday, Dec. 14, the Olympia School Board unanimously passed a resolution to put a 4-year levy on the ballot next year that includes funding for traffic safety improvements at the entrance to Roosevelt School. I am overjoyed and over the moon about this news.     NENA has been working to realize our vision to make our neighborhood a safe and beautiful place to get active and get connected since 2002.  And - together with our community partners - we've made lots of progress toward realizing this vision with completion of the trail system in Mission Creek Park and with the construction of new sidewalks on Miller Ave. and on San Francisco and Quince Streets.  However, in our outreach to the neighborhood and the Roosevelt school community, the intersection at SF and Bethel streets/Roosevelt School entrance was consistently cited as the most serious traffic safety hazard in our neck of the woods, especially during school commute times. Although we dedicated hundreds of volunteer hours and secured grant funding to pay for the engineering and design work to make the intersection safer, we could not find funding to pay for the improvements. Until last night! If the levy passes in February, sometime in the next two years, improvements will be made to make it much safer and easier for students to walk to Roosevelt School and for all of us to navigate through what is now a "zoo" of an intersection during school commute hours. Details about the current design for these improvements are on our project web page.   I went to the OSD Board meeting last night to personally thank the School Board, the District's Citizen's Facility Advisory Committee and District staff for their responsiveness to our request and for their leadership on this project. Key District staff and others in the OSD community that deserve special recognition include: Superintendent Bill Lahmann, Capital Planning & Construction Supervisor Tim Byrne, Assistant Superintendent Jim Crawford, Communications Director Peter Rex, Roosevelt School principal Domenico Spatola Knoll, former Facilities Director Bob Wolpert, and all of the Roosevelt staff and families who shared their ideas and participated in our surveys.  I also want to thank all of you who recently testified before and wrote letters to the Board to advocate for this project. Your collective voice made a difference. There are too many others to thank in this note for their hard work and commitment to this project over the years. In a future note, we'll recognize their contributions to the success of this important project.    And more great traffic safety news! CHAPEL HILL, N.C. (December 8, 2009) ─ The National Center for Safe Routes to School announced today the selection of 25 mini-grants recipients to receive up to $1,000 for local projects that encourage student creativity in Safe Routes to School (SRTS) activities in the spring 2010 semester. The selected 25 mini-grant recipient organization programs/activities include:  Madison, Roosevelt and Pioneer Elementary Schools (Olympia, Wash.) will develop an anti-idling and anti-speeding campaign for parents. The campaign will use social marketing tools and incorporate a special pledge for drivers in the family to drive the speed limit and to turn off their engines if they are idling more than 30 seconds. Walk n’ Roll partners will help teachers conduct speeding audits using a speed gun and will monitor air quality by measuring particulate matter in emissions (via car exhaust on note cards coated with petroleum jelly) for use in class lessons. Students will create Public Service Announcements to contribute to the anti-idling and anti-speeding campaign. Graffiti Program Update NENA's successful Graffiti Busters program is back! Graffiti Busters is a program NENA developed in partnership with the City of Olympia, local utilities, and a group of dedicated volunteers to report, clean up and prevent graffiti in our neighborhood. Read all about it and learn how to help combat graffiti in our neighborhood in this letter from our new coordinator, Diana Cushing. Neighborhood Kiosk Update Check out the new kiosk (photos below) that's going up at the San Francisco Bakery! Thanks to a City of Olympia Neighborhood Matching Grant, we are building a lovely kiosk to help handle community messages currently overloading the bulletin boards at the bakery entrance. HUGE thanks to Katie Cox, neighborhood mom and architect, who rescued the lame kiosk design I submitted with the grant application and lifted the idea to an eye-catching piece of art. Katie drafted neighborhood artist Rus Geh, who executed Katie's design and created the metal art on the back side of the kiosk. During October, we drafted husbands and friends to plant the kiosk firmly in the bakery gardens. Thank you, Brian Cox, Keith Spencer, and Katie's visiting colleagues. The last step in this process will be to install cedar slats and the bulletin board material. We will also dig a French drain to steer runoff from the kiosk into the bakery gardens. Keep watching! Rus Geh creating the structures Preparing the foundation, Oct. 24 Front, which soon will sport cedar slats and surfaces to post messages Back, with water cycle-themed art panels Visitor:         Updated: 07/22/2010