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Events & Announcements

GWCA* POTLUCK & AUCTION in the Park

Saturday  (July 30) 6 – 9 pm       at       WARNER PARK & GARDENS (1446 West Warner Avenue)

FREE to paid-up GWCA members who bring a dish to share.  Donations gladly accepted!
–> Join GWCA today (www.gracelandwest.org – “Join GWCA” or check under “About GWCA” –> FORMS – last form there – you can print off and fill out hard copy) or join at the potluck.


B.Y.O.B. …
Soft Drinks, paper plates, plastic tableware and music all evening are all provided by GWCA — and, of course, you bring a dish to share, thus “Potluck & Auction”. Come bid on some great deals, listen to the music, visit with neighbors and enjoy the evening.  The food last year was fabulous!   Don’t miss out!
Didn’t go last year?  Well here’s how it works:  You can vote for the best dish and winners will be announced by category:   Appetizer, Entrée, Side Dish, and Desserts.
–>  In true Chicago fashion:  vote early and vote often for your favorites (additional votes may be purchased at the potluck!) 

Bring your family, friends & money (after all it is a fund raiser — to support our GWCA fest on Sept 10) 

Questions or want to volunteer to help?  Contact Kathleen Dudley  (773) 472-1221

To donate to the auction:  Drop off items at  4240 North Greenview Avenue — by July 28 …  or email certificates with contact information to:  annmaxwell24@gmail.com

GWCA = Graceland West Community Association.  GWCA encompasses the community bordered by Montrose, Clark, Irving Park & Ashland.

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Events & Announcements

Lake View High School assistance needed on painting their school fence.

Dear GWCA,

We are the new 47th Ward Alderman’s office at 4243 N. Lincoln Avenue.

We were recently contacted by Lake View High School for assistance on
painting their school fence. Unfortunately they do not have the budget
to do this so our office is helping to coordinate a community
volunteer day there.

We are also reaching out to local youth to help paint this
fence. I don’t yet have the details of date and scope of the project
but should be getting this soon from the school officials.

Ernie Constantino

Director of Constituent Services

47th Ward Alderman Pawar’s Office

773-549-4555

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Events & Announcements

Memorial service for Art Geranios

Hi all,

Thanks everyone for getting back to me with your preferred dates.  It looks like the best timing for the greatest number of people will be Sunday, July 17th at 5pm.

Ann Maxwell confirmed that the GWCA Garden Walk dinner will not be taking place at Warner Park, so we will plan to get together there.  If the weather is bad, we’re happy to host everyone at our house.

I have no set thoughts on how to best memorialize Art except that I’m certain that the idea of having his friends and neighbors get together with food and drink to remember him would please him greatly.  To that end, I’m happy to organize tables, paper goods and drinks and will plan on bringing some finger food.  If anyone else is able to bring food, that would be a great help!

If anyone has thoughts about how to best memorialize Art, please feel free to share them.  The kids of Cullom Ave. may want to do something themselves to remember him.  I’ll touch base with some of the kids to see if they’re interested in writing something to read or have a song to sing.

PLEASE pass the word on to anyone in the neighborhood who would like to attend.  If anyone sees Rick, the mailman, please extend an invitation to him.

Thanks and looking forward to seeing you all!

Sharon Langshur

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Events & Announcements

Road resurfacing update from Alderman Pawar

From his email updates. You can sign up for these updates at http://chicago47.org/

Letter from Ameya

Dear Neighbor,

Many of you have been wondering why there are some roads in the ward where the surface was removed (milled) and no resurfacing has taken place. For the past month, we have been working on the 2011 aldermanic menu. In order to get roads and alleys resurfaced in the 2011 construction season we had to move quickly. This is why we asked for your input and ideas on resurfacing projects. But there was an additional wrinkle – there were carryover resurfacing projects from previous years that were scheduled for this summer. These projects were necessary but our team found there was significant overlap between our projects and where People’s Gas was planning to work in the roadway. That is, our team discovered that the City was going resurface streets and then People’s Gas would have to tear them up again right after to complete their utility work.

 

In late May, I put a halt to all resurfacing projects in the 47th ward until a thorough review was completed. What we found was that there was nearly $300,000 in aldermanic menu allocations and over $700,000 in State of Illinois funding for road projects in the ward. While we are still investigating, here is what we now know:

  • Not all resurfacing projects are impacted. Some of the Peoples Gas work will only be done in the parkway. This work will not impact resurfacing and inadvertently waste tax dollars.
  • There are at least 3 projects where tax dollars (City or State) would have resurfaced the road, that would have then been torn up later this summer.

We are confirming the three projects and will be working with CDOT and Peoples Gas to coordinate projects so taxpayer dollars are not wasted. For now, we estimate that hundreds of thousands of dollars will be saved through better coordination. But more importantly, we are working collaboratively with the Chicago Department on Transportation to fix any coordination problems between utilities, CDOT and the 47th ward office. During the campaign, I heard countless stories on resurfacing projects that lacked coordination. I am going to work to fix this problem because this doubling up of efforts is likely happening city-wide. If we have saved a couple hundred thousand dollars in the 47th ward then think about how much can be saved city-wide by simply coordinating projects. Next, think about how much could have been saved over many years. The potential savings of tax-dollars is staggering.

 

While I don’t have all the answers yet, the 47th ward team is working hard to get them. We may not be able to get it all fixed immediately and we are sorry for any temporary inconvenience.

Stay tuned for more details. We are still planning on an aldermanic menu town hall in the near future. Thank you for your patience and input.

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Events & Announcements

New Links on the Forms Page!

Visit https://gracelandwest.org/forms/ for information on upcoming GWCA
events and Information on a new program for Recycle Pickup at your home!

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Events & Announcements

47th Ward Block Club Discussion

June 23, 2011
47th Ward Block Club Discussion
Led by Dan Kleinman, Organizer of TheNeighborhoodFirst.org and volunteer with 47 Ward Alderman Pawar
Recap of Meeting by Linda Silbert for Graceland West Community Association

The purpose of this meeting was to bring together the the other active clubs in the 47th Ward.
There are 12 active clubs, only 6 were present at this meeting; Greater Rockwell Organization, Ravenswood Community Council, Graceland West Community Association, Riverbank Neighbors, North Center Neighborhood Association, and Anderson South Neighborhood Association.

Ernie Constantino, Director of Constituent Services for Alderman Pawar spoke about improving services and reaching out to communities; truly communicating with local residents.
Attendees from the 6 clubs above introduced themselves and spoke a bit about their Councils and their neighborhoods. All the clubs have Active members, meet Quarterly and have a membership fee. They all have newsletter and pride themselves on communicating and knowing their neighbors; having Garden Walks, Garage Sales, Neighborhood Block Parties, Dinners. I said that I joined the Council about a year ago and I am the liaison between the Council and the Alderman’s office. In the past the Alderman has asked about new businesses and has wanted the approval of GWCA. It has been a good relationship and I expressed that I wanted this to continue. The Alderman continues to send Newsletters to members of the 47th Ward. If you want to receive these newsletters and are not…please send your email address to info@chicago47.org. Many groups have Websites and some use facebook and Yahoo groups to communicate with neighbors. Most Clubs began in the late 70’s early 80’s except for Ravenswood Community Council which began in 1959.
Dan Kleinman wanted this meeting to bring together the Clubs that form the 47th Ward to discuss and formulate a process that we all can use to develop and grow. There are other areas in the 47th Ward that do not have Clubs and there was talk about supporting these neighborhoods in starting a Council and possibly mentoring with existing Councils.
Ernie said that he would have a Map of the 47th Ward available so that we could see the Neighborhoods clearly. We even joked about having T-shirts made!

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Events & Announcements

Garden Walk

“Weeds are nature’s graffiti”


CALLING ALL GARDENERS


Our 29th annual Garden Walk will be Sunday, July 17th, from noon-5PM. Please consider showing your garden. If you only wish to enter your front yard, that is fine. Please help us scout eligible gardens by suggesting that your neighbors participate. There will be a dinner at 6PM for gardeners,(free) and anyone else who would care to join us ($5.00 donation) at 4117 N. Greenview. Contact donnaforsberg@sbcglobal.net to sign up.

 

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Events & Announcements

4330 N. Greenview Alley Update

Dear Neighbors who bounder the alley of Asland, Montrose, Greenview and Cullom.  Here is response from the Alderman’s office on our petition to rebuild the alley.

Hi Mark,

I have CC’d your neighbor Terry Baublis to this reply – he had dropped off a copy of your initial petition and special assessment paperwork.  I have been making some calls to City Hall to try to find out what the status is on this as it seemed that you had all of your paperwork in order.  I found out some things and have bad news and good news:
Bad news is the special assessment program has been halted and the project is not scheduled. The good news is I may be able to go through some other measures to have the alley resurfaced.
I am in contact with CDOT on the issue and I will be in touch soon.
Thank you and best regards;
Bill Higgins
Program Analyst & Coordinator
47th Ward Alderman Pawar’s Office

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Events & Announcements

Diesel Fuel Air Pollution from CUBS events

Dear Graceland West Neighbors:

PLEASE CALL 911 TO REPORT DIESEL BUS IDLING.

After years of legislative and citizen effort, Municipal Ordinance 9-08-095 passed making it possible for police to ticket diesel busses idling more than three minutes. You’ll see signs on Irving Park, Clark and other streets close to CUBS Field and similar venues. This ordinance will help us reduce diesel fuel air pollution in our neighborhood. This pollution is a health hazard which contributes to cancer, cardiac, respiratory and endocrine disease. Children, the elderly and those with asthma or other respiratory problem are at increased risk. (AFTER YOU CALL 911, YOU CAN ALSO REPORT TO THE CUBS HOT LINE 1 800 THE CUBS or 1 800 843-2827)

Please also let me know if you see problems not resolved by this regulation or have other neighborhood environmental or health concerns..


Another game day topic: Earlier this year, Beat Officers let our community know they have increased efforts regarding drunk drivers. Please call 911 to report impaired drivers.

Sincerely,

Janice Horwich

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Events & Announcements

Help Graceland West win $1000 for a party or project.

From Everyblock.com:

Enter to win $1,000 for your next block party or neighborhood project

Do you want to make your block a better place? Participate in the EveryBlock Very Important Neighbor Contest from June 13 – July 1 and you could win $1,000 for a block party or neighborhood project. To learn more about the Very Important Neighbor Contest, including the official rules, visit Chicago.EveryBlock.com or http://chicago.everyblock.com/2011/neighbor-contest/.

EveryBlock provides frequently updated neighborhood news, plus tools to have meaningful conversations with neighbors.

The site is simple to use: create an account and choose which places you’d like to follow — say, your home and your workplace. Your custom EveryBlock homepage, updated throughout the day, will show you what’s been happening near your followed places, plus what people in those places are talking about. Join in the neighborhood conversation when you’ve got something to contribute — a question for your neighbors, a news report, an event listing, or just a heads-up about something people in your neighborhood should know about.

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