- The
Neighborhood Sustainability & Preservation
Fair
- Saturday, Sept. 27, 1 to
4 pm
Lincoln
Elementary School
Free!
Questions? 360 357-2502
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 Hear
renowned architect, preservationist and
sustainability advocate Peter Steinbrueck. 1:30 in
the cafeteria.
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Interactive
exhibits will teach practical strategies to build
sustainable homes, gardens and communities.
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Tour an
historic and sustainable neighborhood.
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Bring
your children to create fun sustainable art.
Presented by
the South Capitol Neighborhood Association
With funding from
the
City of
Olympia through the Sustainability Grant Program
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Our
Walking Routes through
Northeast Olympia guide
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is here!
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If you didn't get
a copy at our potluck on September 10, you
can also find them around town at the San
Francisco Bakery, City Hall, the Olympia Center,
the Smith Building, and the Thurston County
Department of Health and Human Services.
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Our Annual NENA Potluck &
Celebration
on Sept. 10 was a HUGE success!
Close to 200 neighbors and
friends joined us for a lovely late-summer evening featuring:
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Hostess
duties beautifully executed by Cheryl Hougham. |
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Emcee
responsibilities enthusiastically performed by Peter Guttchen. |
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Great music from
our neighborhood's own Samarkand.
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Face painting donated by
Emma Guttchen. |
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A
bounce house donated by Pastor Bruce Sanders
of the Capital Vision Christian Church. |
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Set-up and clean-up provided
by the boys from Touchstone. |
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Information about the City's
new Downtown Bike Commuter program provided by Kerry
Tarullo and John Keeffe. |
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Information
about graffiti clean up and child fingerprinting provided by Amy
Stull and volunteers from the Olympia Police Dept. |
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Information
about the green-built Habitat for Humanity community
under construction on Fairview. |
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An endless
smorgasbord featuring kitchen and garden bounty. |
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Our Annual Good Neighbor Awards |
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NENA Job Descriptions
- As Peter mentioned at the Potluck, the NENA
Board needs YOUR help to keep
going! For several years now, we have operated with a skeleton
crew, yet have still accomplished amazing things to put our
neighborhood on the map as a great place to live and grow. Will
YOU be part of the next wave? We
hope so! Check out these
job descriptions
to see where you can invest your talents and
interests to best serve YOUR
community.
Thank you!!!
Never doubt that a
small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the
world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.
Margaret Mead
Good Neighbor Award winners!
In a culture that seems to be getting
more self-involved and less civil, let's rebel and do the opposite: pause and think of
the generous ways in which members of our community have acted to make their homes, streets,
and our neighborhood a better place to be. Then take the time to tell them
that their kindness is noticed and valued. Thanks to everyone who did
just that and submitted the following Good Neighbor Award nominations!
- As you all know graffiti has been a big
problem though out our beautiful city. Valerie has spent
many hours walking and biking through our Northeast
Neighborhood looking for the unsightly graffiti. She then
photographs it, posts it on our Blog, seeks donations of
paint and works with the city and Touchstone to clean it
up. A big Thank You to Valerie for all your time and hard
work to keep our neighborhood beautiful.
- I would like to nominate Jack and Mary
Horton for the good neighbor award because they are
thoughtful neighbors to my family and me by always extending
small kindnesses. They are a benefit to our neighborhood and
the surrounding areas with their other volunteer work.
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Robert Jorgensen
- Robert has built a studio addition to his
home where he teaches piano, practices and entertains
neighbors with several concerts during the year. He not
only plays the piano, but he features other musicians on
their musical instruments. Robert also opens his studio to
the board members of the Northeast Neighborhood for their
monthly meetings. When he built this studio it was his
vision that it would be a place where neighbors could get
together and get to know each other. He certainly has
fulfilled his vision. Thank you Robert for all you do for
the neighborhood.
Lisa is an upbeat, can-do force of nature,
identifying what needs to be done to make our neighborhood a
better place to live and then buckling right down and doing the
work required. No job is too messy for her, and no weather
conditions are unpleasant enough to keep her indoors when
there’s dirt to be moved, concrete to be poured, or irrigation
to install. Lisa has donated her professional expertise,
hundreds of dollars in plants, and hundreds of hours to install
and keep our new gardens at the hub of Bethel and San Francisco
looking great.
Melinda Spencer
Melinda is a powerful voice and tireless
champion for our great neighborhood. Many of the improvements
in our neighborhood can be traced back to Melinda’s vision and
hard work – from the Human Sundial and new landscaping at
Roosevelt School to the most successful Walk and Roll to School
day in Olympia’s history - from creating and maintaining NENA’s
informative, colorful and fun website to developing a
neighborhood “Walkaround Guide” that highlights many of the
things that make our neck of the woods so unique and
special. And Melinda is not done yet. Her recent work to develop
– in partnership with the City – a process that would provide
neighborhoods the opportunity to leverage their volunteer energy
and skills to design and build sidewalks more quickly promises
to dramatically accelerate efforts to make Olympia a safer and
more walkable community. Thank you Melinda for your
extraordinary leadership and commitment to our neighborhood! We
are blessed to have you as our neighbor.
Pastor Bruce Sanders,
Capital Vision Christian Church
Pastor Bruce seems to be everywhere! From the
charity 4th of July fireworks stand at Ralph’s to the 1,000 tree
planting even in March, Pastor Bruce freely gives his enthusiasm
and resources to support our neighborhood. As volunteers waited
and waited (and waited!!!) for the City to deliver planting maps
and team assignments on that early March morning of the
tree-planting event, Pastor Bruce supplied bottomless pots of
coffee and hot chocolate. Thank you for these creature comforts
that really helped to keep our spirits up and give our gathering
a sense of civility during that drizzly Saturday morning! Pastor
Bruce is also the invisible force behind our unofficial
off-leash dog park. He allows neighbors to use the large field
west of the church parking lot on Yew Avenue to run their dogs.
We, and all of our happy dogs, thank you!
- City of Olympia:
Jennifer Kenny
- Jennifer is dedicated to supporting Olympia’s
neighborhoods as we look for ways to improve our city from the
bottom up. NENA has benefited from several City grants that
Jennifer administers, including the 2007 Neighborhood Matching
Grant and the 2007 Neighborhood Sustainability Grant. These
grants made it possible to install the pocket gardens on San
Francisco; buy native plants to enhance the San Francisco Bakery
gardens; and install a native plant garden, create a new
preschool garden; and purchase lots of soil, mulch, and a really
big tree for the other gardens at Roosevelt.
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- These gardens are not just about helping our
neighborhood look better; they embody the idea that we can make
a difference in our neighborhood, one square yard of dirt at a
time. With the programs administered by Jennifer and her vision
for community involvement, we’ve been able to demonstrate that
people can do more than just talk about the changes that
are needed to make our neighborhood more livable—walking the
talk requires that we get out of our houses, make connections
with our neighbors, and just start making the changes we want to
see. With Jennifer’s support, this frame of mind is becoming
contagious!
- City of
Olympia:
Amy Stull, Jeannine Stewart, Bonnie Herrington, Rick
Knostman and the City’s Signs and Streetlights crew
- Amy from the Olympia Police Department,
and Public Works employees Jeannine, Bonnie, Rick and the
City’s Signs and Streetlights crew have collaborated closely
with NENA to develop and implement innovative and effective
ways to bust graffiti in our neighborhood. Their help has
included providing us with graffiti removal kits and
educational materials, facilitating communication with
private property owners and utility companies, and quickly
responding to clean up graffiti on City property. Thanks to
all of you for your extraordinary efforts to partner with us
in making our Graffiti Busters campaign so successful and
for helping to make our great neighborhood an even better
place to live!
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Touchstone:
Darrell Knoedler, Jason Lucarelli, Jacob Daniels and
residents
- From graffiti busting to maintaining
planting strips, from stuffing envelopes to helping with the
set up and break down at community events, Darrell, Jason,
J.D. and the boys at Touchstone are making an invaluable
contribution to the quality of life in our neighborhood and
community. Thank you for your generous help and support. Our
neighborhood is a more beautiful place to live because of
you!
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San Francisco
Bakery – Gene and Judy
- The San Francisco Bakery is our
neighborhood’s heart and soul and Gene and Judy, the
bakery’s owners, have given back to the community and our
neighborhood in countless ways over the years. This year,
the NENA Board wanted to express their appreciation to Gene
and Judy for the generous investment they’ve made in
designing, installing and maintaining the gorgeous new
landscaping and outdoor seating in front of the bakery.
These improvements not only provide an attractive place to
relax while enjoying one of the bakery’s scrumptious treats,
but are helping to transform the once sterile intersection
of San Francisco and Bethel streets into a vital and
beautiful neighborhood crossroads.
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Qwest Graffiti Busters: Karen Hundley
- Karen and her “rapid response” team
quickly leap into action when we contact them to clean up
graffiti on Qwest property in our neighborhood. In some
cases, they are out the same day we make our reports. Thanks
to Karen and her co-workers for their strong support of our
Graffiti Busters campaign and to Qwest for being a
responsible corporate citizen of our community!
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Sherwin Williams
- Sherwin-Williams generously donated paint
and primer to us for our graffiti busting needs. They came
through quickly and supplied us all that we asked for. They
are also the ones who donated paint for the mural on the old
garage at the corner of Bethel and San Francisco. A big
Thank You to Sherwin-Williams.
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