Vice President John McLachlan has made arrangements with the proprietors of The Dish for an Eight Streets NA Afternoon Social on 2/17/01 from 3:00 to 5:00.

There continues to be confusion as to whether the South side of Shawmut Ave. is covered by the Bradford St. NA. An inquiry will be sent to BNA President Rolf Carlson to get a definitive answer.

President Tim Kozlowski reviewed for the membership an issue (which came up and needed to be dealt with between meetings) around the threat of relocating an unsightly telephone connections box from the North side of Tremont to the South side (Eight Streets territory) in connection with the development of Parcel 8. Business owners on Tremont declined to give Verizon permission to relocate in front of their establishments. Tim has gained assurances from Jordan Warshaw (Druker liaison to the neighborhood) that their engineers would try to find an alternative, and if it is physically impossible to place the box anywhere but on Eight Streets territory, Mr. Warshaw will state so in writing.

Improvements by NSTAR around development of the Waterfront will (somehow) have a positive impact on the South End. NSTAR is breaking down the South End into smaller blocks to lessen the impact of any problems (i.e. if there is a problem it would affect a small section instead of half of the neighborhood).

Mr. Allen is attempting to have a representative from the Association of Boston Neighbporhoods speak to us about joining.

The Boston Park Department, as a part of The Mayor’s Arts for Parks program, is commissioning twelve temporary kinetic sculptures for a dozen neighborhood parks throughout the City. The sculptures are intended to be installed in November of this year, moved to Boston Common as a part of First Night festivities, and then returned to their original parks for the balance of January 2002. The design for the Ringgold Park sculpture is not in place but is due to the Park’s Department early next month. Mr. Thompson’s background is in computer/electronic/high-tech art. He will work to keep us informed of the progress on this project.

Mr. Heroux hopes to leverage this program into changes to Ringgold Park. Making the sculpture permanent is a possibility; a grant from the Browne Foundation is being sought for a permanent decorative fence around the grass ellipse.