The Providence Police Department is developing mounted patrols in the Summit neighborhood, primarily along the Hope Street commercial section, but including this excursion down Bayard Street. The program is a homecoming of sorts for officer Manny Soares, right, who grew up in the neighborhood.
The city has started posting signs that prohibit overnight parking on streets where residents have opted out of the city-wide plan.
Fans of the SNA newsletter, we need some help.
The first edition of 2013 is scheduled to hit the streets in time to announce the annual meeting on Feb. 25, but we are having difficulty getting it delivered to all the households in our neighborhood.
All we need is at most a couple of hours of your time. We drop off a packet of newsletters at your house and you get to take a walk, delivering one to each of your neighbors. It’s good exercise (you could pay a lot for the same workout at a gym) and you frequently have a chance to chat with old friends or meet new ones.
We have set delivery routes and usually can match volunteers with destinations near their homes. The number of newsletters allocated corresponds to the concentration of residences in a set area and we try to have only as many as can be delivered in an hour.
So please give us a hand – and your feet.
Contact Liz Cameron at elizabethcameron@cox.net, phone 305-5484, or Kerry Kohring at ride4995@ride.ri.net, phone 272-6323.
It’s a really easy way to help improve the quality of life in Summit.
Just in time to lift spirits from the gloom of clearing walks and driveways of snow, the deadline for getting new trees in the neighborhood is rapidly approaching.
Tom Schmeling, a board member of the SNA and a former “tree captain” for 12th Street, points out that the spring Providence Neighborhood Planting Program cutoff date is Jan. 15, so now is the time to act.
The first major snowstorm of the winter was met by volunteers from the SNA snow removal-assistance project who helped elderly and handicapped neighbors clear their walks.
Tom Schmeling, who manages the program with fellow SNA board member Britt Page, said there were 10 shovelers to take care of five calls for assistance in the Summit neighborhood. He said that one request came from the College Hill section and had to be turned down.
The assistance service this year is a resumption of one tried a couple of years ago that faded out because of a lack of volunteers, so having enough people is crucial. If you can help, please email SNASnow@gmail.com
By Anthony Arrigo
SNA board member
As promised, a second public meeting regarding renovations at the Summit Avenue “tot lot” to include community gardens was held the morning of Saturday, Oct. 27.
Members of the Summit Neighborhood Association, the city Parks Department and concerned residents gathered at Summit Commons, 99 Hillside Ave., to exchange views.
Participants at the bake-off prepare and sample pumpkin creations at Seven Stars bakery.
In what seems to be a tradition at the Summit Neighborhood Association’s Fall Bake-Off, pouring rain did not dampen the enthusiasm of the participants.
Despite the onslaught of Hurricane Sandy, about 60 people gathered at Seven Stars bakery on Hope Street the night before Halloween to sample 17 dishes whose primary ingredient this year was pumpkin. Last year’s apple-themed event was punctuated by rain that turned to snow.
Our friends at Hope Street Merchants Association are hosting a fundraiser to back some of the exciting projects they have in the pipeline. Looks like a great time for a great cause at a great restaurant for a great price!
When: Saturday October 27th, from 9:00-10:30 a.m.
Where: Summit Commons
There will be a second public meeting regarding the revitalization of the (so called) Tot Lot on the corner of 9th and Summit. The meeting will be held on Saturday October 27th, from 9:00-10:30 a.m. at Summit Commons (between Chace Ave. and Hillside Ave). In attendance will be members of the SNA board, head of the City Parks and Recreation department Bob McMahon, and landscape architect Megan Gardner.
There was some robust discussion of the toys at the park, the new community garden space, the park redesign and so forth on the list-serv after the initial meeting, so this is your opportunity to discuss those matters directly with SNA and the Parks Department.
The architectural rendering of the proposed redesign of the park can be viewed here:
https://www.sna.providence.ri.us/sna4/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/rendering_sm1.jpg
Summit Neighborhood Association board member Tom Schmeling moderates the discussion by candidates, from left, David N. Cicilline, David Vogel and Brendan P. Doherty.
Summit residents got a generous helping of grassroots democracy Wednesday when the candidates for two major offices came to the neighborhood to demonstrate their qualifications.
The Summit Neighborhood Association’s candidates’ forum brought together Democratic U.S. Rep David N. Cicilline and his two challengers, Republican Brendan P. Doherty and independent David Vogel plus R.I. House Speaker Gordon D. Fox, a Democrat, and his opponent, Mark Binder, an independent.
They spoke to about 75 people – which included the candidates’ own staffers as well as representatives of the media – at a question-and-answer format moderated by SNA board of directors member Thomas Schmeling, a professor of political science at Rhode Island College, at Summit Commons, 99 Hillside Ave.
The discussion began with an exchange among the congressional candidates after an introduction by SNA President Dean Weinberg, who called for a moment of silence for recently deceased long-time SNA member Judith Brown.
Cicilline said he believes there is a tremendous amount of work still to be done and that he would continue to fight against the power of Big Oil and Big Banks in Congress that espouse the Bush presidency’s “trickle-down” theory, “a failed economic policy.” He said his Republican opponent’s proposals are consistent with his party’s presidential candidate, Mitt Romney, and “the Republicans in the House who have held hostage small business.” Cicilline said the nation “cannot afford to give tax cuts to the very wealthy” and that he supported the Obama administration’s health-care law, calling it “good for Rhode Island and the country.”
Doherty said Obamacare had some good parts and he would “vote to repeal only with a new and better plan.” He said he thinks “Congress is broken” and needs new leadership. He added that he would tackle the national debt by halting “fraud and waste first in Medicare” and other areas, but would not cut the military budget. Doherty said the Bush tax cuts need to carry over until there is comprehensive tax reform, but that small businesses that make more than $250,000 a year should not be hit with tax hikes. He also said that the issue of same-sex marriage is up to the states, but that “marriage is between a man and a woman.” He said he is “pro-life by faith” and would not vote for any funds for Planned Parenthood “as it relates to abortion.”
Vogel said he was frustrated with partisan politics and was not “going to sit by and watch my government fail and fail and fail.” He said the stalemate in Congress was “exactly why I’m running.” He supported the new health-care law calling it an “essential piece of legislation.” Vogel said the military budget is “outsized in degrees of magnitude” and would vote to cut it, saying, “If that closes bases in Newport, so be it,” adding that “I don’t pander for votes.” On energy policy, he said “even a six-year-old understands” that increased drilling is not the answer, but that “green” power works. Vogel said voters need to “step outside their comfort zone” and do something different to affect the future.
The program then turned to the contest for the R.I. House seat held by the Speaker.
Binder said he is running because there have been “lots of shady deals with the Speaker” and that much legislation is developed through “cronyism.” Binder said he supports public education, but it started to decline with the “No Child Left Behind Act” that took power from the teachers. He said he backs equality of marriage, but that Rhode Island doesn’t have it because the Speaker didn’t bring it to a vote. Binder said he could be effective in office despite his lack of experience and political power because legislation in the past has been done “in backroom deals” and that he was running on the premise of “legislators having their own power.’
Fox cited his record of leadership in education, health care and housing coming from a “biracial gay kid who wasn’t supposed to be Speaker.” He defended his role in a state loan to the 38 Studios video-game company headed by Curt Schilling by saying the House never voted directly on the loan but added funds to the Economic Development Corporation after being asked to do so by former Governor Carcieri. He further said that the EDC “experts” promised to study and vet all applicants and “that didn’t happen.” Fox said that same-sex marriage is “a very complicated issue” that is “very sensitive to me” and promised to bring it up when it has a chance to succeed. He stressed his experience in “hardball” politics.
The evening closed with small group discussions over light refreshments.