Irish Channel Neighborhood Association

Hi Neighbors,

The Lyon’s Center is open for business.  I am attaching a picture so you can see how nice the water looks.  They will need to close one day this week to relocate the bathroom trailer but will have regular hours the remainder of the summer.  You’ll also notice in the pictures there is no shade around the pool.  A neighbor in the Faubourg Delachaise is collecting money to purchase umbrellas and chairs.  Please let me know if you would like to donate towards this effort. Here are the hours of operation:

Monday – Friday

9-12 Day Camps and General Public (Lessons)

1-3 General Public Free Swim

3-4 Adult Swim

Saturday

9-12 Day Camps and General Public (Lessons)

1-4 Free Swim

Sunday – Closed

Our monthly ICNA board meeting is this Thursday @7 PM at 819 First Street (in the back). The board meeting is, as always, open to the public. 

* Hurricane preparedness discussion

* Live Oak & Laurel Charter schools

- Vote to sponsor painting of a classroom

- Update from ReNew Schools

* Lyon’s/Burke Booster Club updates

- Lyon’s Center pool

- Lights and baseball

- Dogs at Lyon’s Center

- Burke park improvements

* National Night Out Against Crime

- Review from last year

- Ideas/Planning/Budget

* Land Use update

- outstanding issues?

- Jackson Ave updates

* Treasurer report

Thanks and I look forward to seeing you soon,

Kara

Hello everyone,

Here are several upcoming events in the next week or so we think you should know about.

Friday, May 7th from 5-7 PM: NORD will be holding baseball & softball registration at Lyon’s Center and Burke Park for both boys & girls, ages 5 to 14 years old. They also need to recruit volunteer coaches. (please see other registration dates below)

Saturday, May 8th:

 10 AM – 12 PM: NORD baseball & softball registration at Lyon’s Center and Burke Park

 11 AM: Grand Opening of the Creole Cottage furniture store at 1029 Ninth Street

 ALL DAY: Letter Carrier food drive is collecting non-perishable foods that will be distributed to local families affected by the oil spill. Leave a sturdy bag of nonperishable food items (canned fruits, vegetables, tuna, beans, pasta, rice, peanut butter or cereal) next to your mailbox before your regular mail delivery. Your letter carrier will deliver them to Second Harvest Food Bank for distribution to fishermen and their families. Items also may be delivered to local post offices until May 14.

Tuesday, Mat 11th, from 6:30 – 8:30 PM @ Xavier University of Louisiana, University Student Center, 1 Drexel Drive, William and Mary McCaffrey Ballroom:  Inspector General’s Community Forum with Featured Panelists Arnie Fielkow – President, New Orleans City Council, Jim Letten – U.S. Attorney, Eastern District of Louisiana, Rev. Cornelius Tilton – Vice Chairman, Ethics Review Board and Ed Quatrevaux – Inspector General, New Orleans

Thursday, May 13th,: 7 PM, ICNA monthly board meeting at 819 First Street (Irish Channel Christian Fellowship).  All board meetings are open to the public. Agenda will be distributed early next week.

Friday, May 14th,5 – 7 PM: NORD baseball & softball registration at Lyon’s Center and Burke Park

Saturday, May 15th:

 9 AM, @Jackson and Magazine: The Greening Krewe will round out the tree planting season on Jackson Ave in the first and second blocks. We’ll need all hands on deck to get many trees planted on Saturday morning. We’re starting at 9 a.m. We have shovels and gloves, just need helping hands!

 10 AM – 12 PM: NORD baseball & softball registration at Lyon’s Center and Burke Park

 EARLY Voting begins for House District 93 run-off election.  The Irish Channel had a great turnout for the primary but let’s see if we can do even better in the run-off.  Please note that the run-off election day is May 29th which is Memorial Day weekend so many of you may be out of town.  Plan ahead and vote early!

Thanks, 

Kara Morgan

Jane’s Walk through the Irish Channel, Saturday, May 1 at 8 a.m. at Belladonna Day Spa, 2900 Magazine St. Please join the ICNA as we walk and talk through the Irish Channel about history, architecture, education, beautification and other initiatives. Free. Belladonna will hold a drawing for services and we’ll have complimentary Absinthe cocktails courtesy of Tales of the Cocktail.

Thank you kindly,

Wendy Waren
504-453-6690

Hope you have all been enjoying this beautiful weather! Flowers, trees and plants are blooming like crazy and it’s the perfect time of year to take an evening stroll through the Irish Channel, walk up to Magazine and hang out.

Here are few items of importance:

Lyons Burke Boosters will have its general membership meeting Thursday, April 15 at 6:30 p.m. at Rachel Sims Baptist Mission, 729 Second Street. If you are interested in volunteering to support youth activities in the Irish Channel, please make plans to attend.

The ICNA has been asked to help with a Regional Planning Commission Citizen Participation in Transportation Planning Survey. Please take a few minutes and complete the survey so the residents of the Irish Channel can be heard.

http://www.edesignengineering.com/sites/RPC/

NONPAC Meeting, Wednesday, April 21 at 6:30 p.m., 2020 St. Charles Ave (Convention and Visitor’s Bureau). Want to know what crimes are taking place around you? Interested in additional information about a crime that happened in your area? This is your opportunity to speak directly to Commander Bardy of the NOPD 6th District.

Meet Your New Assessor Erroll Williams, Tuesday, April 27 at 7 p.m. at Rayne Memorial United Methodist Church, 3900 St. Charles Ave. Parking on Pitt Street. Williams will discuss his plans for addressing the issues confronting his office at an informational meeting. Williams will discuss completion of the 2012 quadrennial citywide reassessment, ending inequities in the assessment process, transferring paper records to a searchable database, hiring qualified assessors and combining the seven assessor offices into one.

Jane’s Walk through the Irish Channel, Saturday, May 1 at 8 a.m. at Belladonna Day Spa, 2900 Magazine St. Please join the ICNA as we walk and talk through the Irish Channel about history, architecture, education, beautification and other initiatives. Free. Sponsored by ICNA and Belladonna Day Spa.

House District 93 Primary, Saturday, May 1. Residents in the Irish Channel are reminded to vote for a new representative to replace Karen Carter Peterson, who was elected to former Sen. Cheryl Gray-Evans seat in the Senate.

The candidates are: Louis Charbonnet III, Rhodesia Jackson Douglas, Carlos Hornbrook, Helena Moreno, James Perry and Thomas Robichaux.

To find out if live in House District 93, please click on the link, scroll down the page to Find Out. Enter your address. http://www.legis.state.la.us/

Thank you kindly,

Wendy Waren
504-453-6690

Hello friends and neighbors,

Hopefully everyone has had a chance to recover from the craziness of the Super Bowl and Mardi Gras — just in time for St Patricks day! Our monthly board meeting is this Thursday at 7 PM at 819 First Street (Irish Channel Christian Church) . These meetings are open to the public. Our next big general meeting is scheduled for April and we will have some exciting guests, including representatives from ReNew Schools, the Charter Management Organization that will be taking over Live Oak and Laurel elementary schools. Please mark your calendar now for that meeting which will be on April 8th.

In addition to the agenda I want to take a moment to speak about something that is extremely important to our neighborhood, city and the state. I am assuming many of you, like me, had your Census 2010 form hand delivered over the weekend. Please make sure you fill this out and return by April 1st. Please also remind your neighbors to send in their forms. Besides being a legal requirement, it is vital to our community and used for everything from federal funding to private marketing. Here is a link for more information.

Thanks so much to everyone for making the Channel such a wonderful place to live,

Kara Morgan

3 /11/2010 Agenda:

Treasurer update

Newsletter Update

Land Use committee updates — Tran’s, Gnott Gourmet, Cultural District expansion, and 1027-29 9th street — and recruitment of new members

PRC Sellabration (March 20th at the PRC)

NPN and Capacity College update

Greening the Channel update

LBB Update

Crime & 6th District updates

April Big Meeting

- Schools – update on charter of Laurel/Live Oak – ReNew Schools will speak at April meeting; costume donations; other needs?

- Crime – discuss inviting someone from the 6th to speak

- District 93 Special Election (Karen Carter-Peterson’s seat)

- Census 2010

Website issues update from Trey

January 14, 7 p.m., Irish Channel Christian Fellowship, 819 First St.

Hear about the Cultural Districts program. Residential and commercial tax credits and sales tax exemptions are available to the Irish Channel! Representatives from the state, the city and other districts will be present to answer your questions.

Cultural Districts are designated areas that are meant to revitalize communities and contribute to the lives and livelihoods of the citizens by creating locally driven hubs of cultural activity. This program provides two primary incentives for communities to create or rebuild cultural destinations:

1. Any buildings in the Cultural District over 50 years old, including both residences and businesses are eligible to apply for state historic tax credits for renovations.

2. Sales of original, one-of-a-kind works of art are exempt from local and state sales taxes.

See you on Jan. 14!

Wendy Waren, ICNA Program Coodinator

Hello members (and non-members) of the ICNA,

As is tradition, our December meeting will be replaced by our annual Holiday party. Tess Conrad has once again graciously agreed to host this event. The event is a potluck with a White Elephant gift giving game. The party starts at 7:00 p.m. on Thursday, December 10th at 2406 Laurel.
We encourage everyone to donate some food items to the less fortunate this holiday season. You may bring donations to the Holiday party next week and we will drop them off for you.

We are actively supporting the Christmas at the Sixth fundraiser. Last year they were able to give away 177 bicycles to children in the 6th District. To make a donation, email Karen Chabert at kc4nsicrn@aol.com. You may also bring your cash or check donation to the Holiday party next week.

We are planning a Holiday home decorating contest for our neighborhood this year. We will ask for entries or nominations and have a team of judges pick the winner. There will be a small token prize awarded but it’s mostly for pride. Look for more details soon!

Our monthly ICNA Board Meeting is this Thursday, 7:00 PM at 819 First Street (Irish Channel Christian Fellowship), Board members are open to the public

Welcome & Announcements
> Community Events
    * December 5, Irish Channel Bike Tour, 1-4 p.m
    * Other?
Committee Updates
> Committee Meeting Night on 11/19
    * Review of last meeting
    * Some ideas for improving
> Community Outreach
    * Greening the Channel
           – Home Depot grant
           – Discussion on welcome signs
> Youth Outreach
     * LBB Club updates
     * Laurel Elementary School needs
> Land Use
     * Cultural District Tasks
          - Vote on using December vs January vs a separate date for public meeting
          – Update on costs for mailing
          – Finalize what we would like to include
   * 548 Jackson – Tran Vuong will discuss potential uses for this property
> Crime updates
> Technology
Other
   * Holiday party and Candidate meet & greet dates

Trick or Treat

To encourage families to Trick-or-Treat in the Irish Channel, we are compiling a list of participating homes. Please take a moment and follow the link below to register your house as a designated Trick-or-Treat participant. Your home will be listed as a place families know they can stop. The final list will be sent out to our membership email list.

Click here to sign up!

Thursday, October 15 at 7 p.m.
NOLA Brewing Co., 3001 Tchoupitoulas St.

The ICNA has multiple initiatives underway and we need your help. There are several committees to join and make a difference in your neighborhood.

Community Outreach and Membership (Co-Chairs are Wendy Waren and Jane Howard):

This committee is tasked with creating and distributing the newsletter, the weekly community calendar, Greening the Channel and membership drives. We would also like to work on things like monthly socials and events at Burke park.

Youth Outreach (Co-Chairs are Jason Nix and Ed McGinnis):

This committee is working with other neighborhood associations to form the Lyons and Burke Booster (LBB) Club. The LBB Club will help support NORD activities at the parks, help with improvements to the park and allow us to hold community events there. They are also working to bring Kaboom! back to the neighborhood. We would also like to support our neighborhood schools but need more volunteers.

Land Use (Co-Chairs are Michelle Kimball and Harvey Stern):

The land use committee is responsible for reviewing all zoning requests and making a recommendation to the board and general membership. We currently have two requests that are technically in the Coliseum Square district but they would like our support as well. Both are on Chippewa & Jackson. An investment group would like to turn the old Synagogue at 709 Jackson into a local and organic upscale market. The other proposed project is to turn the old hospital across Chippewa into condos. Representatives from both projects will be at the Thursday meeting to present their ideas and answer questions. This committee is also very involved in making sure our voice is heard in the Master Plan process. Additionally, the Land Use committee monitors blighted housing in the Channel. We have worked over several years to document every blighted house in the neighborhood and push to have them cleaned up or sold. Going forward we will track the blighted houses in a more timely fashion, post a map with links to blighted houses on our website and continue to work with the City to turn them around.

Crime (Co-Chairs are Adolph Lopez and Karen Chaubert):

This committee attends the NONPAC meetings hosted by the NOPD 6th District every 3rd Wednesday of the month. This is considered their monthly committee meeting and allows us an opportunity to voice any concerns the ICNA has with crime in our neighborhood. This committee also acts as a liaison between the 6th District and the ICNA forwarding announcements for donations or events as requested. Additionally, the Crime committee plans and hosts the National Night Out Against Crime each year in Burke park.

Ad-hoc Committees:
There are two committees working on short-term temporary issues. We have a Legislative session committee that is tasked with developing a plant for tracking and voting to support or oppose the many bills proposed during each legislative session that affect the Irish Channel. This process would apply to city ordinances too. We also have a committee working on updating our by-laws.

Technology (Chair is Trey Bornmann):

This committee manages the ICNA website and email list. We are also working to publish our blighted housing list to the web, link our community calendar to the website and make some general improvements to the site. This committee supports each of the other committees on technical issues.

Thank you for your time and I look forward to seeing you on Thursday,

Kara Morgan
ICNA President