Eight Streets Neighborhood Association

Monthly Meeting Agenda

September 13, 2016

Updates!

· Next Eight Streets neighborhood association meeting October 11^th, Project Place.

· Fall Clean up: City will support neighborhoods with a fall clean-up effort on November 19^th, more information to follow at the October Eight Streets meeting

· Officer Ritchie will be invited to execute another safety walk through one of our alley ways and Peters Park

· Stoop party: Dwight Street, October 4^th, 5pm to 7pm, 7 Dwight Street and others will be participating, look for the balloons and do pay them a visit.

· Speakers to date for October meeting (subject to change and additions)

o Polka Dog, Indigo Matthews

o South End Community Health Center, Karen Van Unen

o Peters Park dog run refurbishment update, Bernard Petersen

o D-4 Police Department security update, Sargent Taxter or Office Ritchie Litto

o Berkeley Community Gardens update, John McLachlan

o Ringold Park update, (Don and Michael Almond)

o Watson Park update, (Louane and Colleen)

October speaker review

Lauren Prescott - Executive Director of the South End Historical Society

The South End Historical Society is dedicated to historic preservation and education in Boston’s South End. Through outreach and education, the South End Historical Society promotes the unique history of the neighborhood and work to preserve the South End’s historic buildings.

A great walking tour……don’t miss this one titled “A Walk in Stone”!

Join the South End Historical Society for a tour of Mt. Auburn Cemetery. Focusing on 45,000 monuments, visitors will see some of the more significant works of art on the grounds while discussing issues of monument preservation. Save the date: Saturday, September 24 at 11am. 580 Mount Auburn Street, Cambridge. $5 for members and $10 for non-members. To RSVP, email admin@southendhistoricalsocieity.org or call 617 536-4445

48^th South End House Tour offered through The South End Historical Society. A self-guided walking tour featuring single family row-houses in Boston’s historic South End. Save the date, Saturday, October 15^th, 10am – 5pm. www.southendhistoricalsociety.org/housetour 617-536-4445

· Become a member or renew membership

· Sign up for a quarterly e-newsletter or hard copy

· Make a donation or volunteer

South End Historical Society historical collections:

The South End Historical Society’s strives to collect, preserve and promulgate the physical, social and intellectual history of the South End of Boston.

The SEHS collections are primarily made up of archival material relating to  mid- to late-20th century Urban Renewal and architectural preservation. However, the collections also contain numerous images, maps, books, pamphlets, files, and other assorted items from all periods of the South End’s history.

By far our most extensive collection is our 1972 South End Streets Survey, a compilation of over 3,500 photographic images of buildings and streets in the South End from 1972.

Sandrine Rossi (Owner of Le Comptoir) – New Parisian Style Cafe and Bistrot on 560 Tremont St.

· They have their liquor license approved

· They are looking to have 11am to 11pm hours and Saturday, 10am to midnight

· The terrace will take up the same space as Café Nero currently does

· The terrace will shut down at 10pm (this is unofficial, still needs to be confirmed)

· The terrace will have alcoholic restrictions (this too still needs to be confirmed)

Abutters Concerns raised at this meeting

· Abutters with issues exchanged emails with the owner

· Abutters present were NOT present at the abutters meeting but many others were

· Follow up with the abutters is suggested as details with the terrace and the liquor license get confirmed.

Peters Park dog run update – Bernard Petersen, local resident and volunteer Friends of Peters Park board member.

Dog run refurbishment update.

The City Parks has informed the Friends of Peters Park that the contractor is ready to start work on September 12th

The contractor will be erecting fences to divide the dog area into construction zones, this will happen almost immediately.

During the construction we will provide more updates as we get them.

Temporary dog run space will be made within the current dog run area throughout the entire process.

We thank you for your patience during this construction period as we know this will be an inconvenience for all.

If you have any questions about the process please feel free to email the Friends of Peters Park at FriendsofPetersPark@gmail.com

The refurbishment is expected to be complete by the end of October or earlier.

Watson Park communication update: Louanne and Colleen

· 501c3 and Federal ID has been confirmed for the park

· Bank account will now be opened in the name of Friends of Watson Park

· Some of the benches have been repaired and are much more appealing to view and to sit on. We thank local neighbors John and Lou for volunteering their carpentry skills

· Reminder to visitors to this park and others that feeding the birds by throwing food in the gardens does infact kill the flowers because the birds eating the food will defecate naturally and that happens to be toxic to the plants. PLEASED DO NOT FEED THE BIRDS OR ANY OTHER ANIMALS IN OUR PARKS.

· Signage to restrict feeding the birds in our parks will follow

Berkeley Community Gardens (John McLachlan)

· Quiet Summer

· More fundraising required to finish the fence on the Alley way #705, currently 50K set aside but the job will require another 100K, these are rough estimates and in no way reflect any commitments at this point.

· Rabbit issue in the gardens was managed over the Summer and they no longer are present.

Ringgold Park (Don & Michael)

· Irrigation failures

· Dry Summer killed off some of the flowers

· Select few people throwing food into gardens is an issue because the birds will naturally defecate where they eat…..their poop is toxic to the flowers

· New plants will be put into the soil in the Fall

· Fall clean up, Nov 19

ESNA Mission and 2016-2017 Goals

· PLEASE TAKE A LOOK AT THIS YEAR’S PROPOSED EIGHT STREETS MISSION AND GOALS. YOUR VOLUNTEER BOARD MEMBERS TOOK THE TIME AND EFFORT TO PUT THIS TOGETHER FOR YOUR REVIEW. WE WOULD ASK THAT YOU MAKE SUGGESTIONS AND CONSIDER VOLUNTEERING YOUR TIME TO AN AREA OF INTEREST TO YOU. WE’LL DISCUSS THIS IN DETAIL OUR NEXT MEETING

<INSERT MISSION AND GOALS SHEETS>