ANNUAL MEETING

Board Meeting: May 13, 2008

PRESENT: *Gregory A. Hession (Pres.), Chair, *Jim Llewellyn (Vice Pres.), *Abdullah Abdul-Rahim, *Stephen Gray, *Walter Kroll, *Denise Moccia, *Demetrios Panteleakis, *Rodrick Shubrick, *Ben Swan Jr. (Secy.), *Marianne Winters (Treas.), P.J.Bailey, Anne Bradley, Alysia Bryant, Karen Bryant, Lola Caldwell, M. Carter, Conrad Chaffee, Marva Craigwell, Beverly Daniels, Jeri Gardiner, Lisa Gaudreau, Michael Grant, Jamie Gray, Richard Gray, Marjorie Guess, Sandra Hession, Rosalind L. Hodges, Alan Howard, Sarah Howe, Ed Kelly, Liam Kelly, Alonzo Kenney, Elizabeth Lederman, Ceil Lewonchuk, Charles Markham, Deborah McCurdy, Michael McCurdy, Keturah Moore, Erin Panteleakis, Karan Parkin, Ariel Perez, Marilyn Prendergast, Aaron Richardson, Arian Richardson, Austin Richardson, Anne Richmond, Jose Rosario, Raymond W. Talbot, Stephen Thibeau, Beth Ward, Armani Ward, Gloria Wilson, David Wright, Kat Wright (*Members of the Board) [54]

Special Guest: Commissioner William J. Fitchet (Spfd. Police Dept.)

Guests: Mayor Domenic Sarno; City Councilors James J. Ferrera III, William Foley, Patrick Markey, Bud Williams; Alvin Allen (Spfd. Econ. Devel. Ofc.), Chelan Brown, DeJuan V. Brown Sr., DeJuan T. Brown Jr., DeVron Brown, DeVon Brown, Kathleen Brown (SPD), Tyrone Dawkins, Lewis Hackman, Nawana Holloway (Mosque #13), Lionel Jardine (F.O.Eagles), Mo Jones, Ruth B. loving, Darryl Moss (Mayor's Ofc.), Neel, Donna Seymour, Tammie Streeter, Latasha Wilkes; Marci Izard (Press TV40), Brian R. (Press TV22) [26]

Meeting called to order 7:10 p.m. 10 Board members present

PRESIDENT'S REPORT: President Gregory A. Hession welcomed all to the Annual Meeting; noted major agenda items, presentation of McKnight 2008 Revitalization Plan and address by Police Commissioner Fitchet, following brief council business meeting and Annual Report by Council Committee Chairs. Especially noted upcoming Council elections to be held Saturday, June 14, 2008, at Rebecca Johnson School; encouraged neighbors present to consider running for a seat on the Board of Directors. Reviewed some Council accomplishments over past year, including giving up the Catherine Street office for financial reasons, hiring a part-time administrative assistant, strengthening Council committee structure and tapping competent committee chairs, holding a public ‘envisioning exercise' for the first time to begin strategic planning for Council's future work, taking initiatives to get Springfield attention & presence in neighborhood re housing and other quality of life issues. Expressed hope that the Council can continue to build on this solid foundation.

SECRETARY'S REPORT: Minutes of April 8, 2008: DPanteleakis moved to approve, WKroll seconded. Motion passed.

TREASURER'S REPORT: Treas. MWinters: Reported on work of Treasurer's office and Finance Committee to organize Council financials, and to begin financial / fund-raising plans for the future. Noted requirement for a 2-year audit (FY07 & FY08) & asked for a volunteer. Year To Date financial report was submitted; noting the Council is in good shape financially through the end of this fiscal year. Financial report attached.

COMMITTEE REPORTS:

President GAH noted Council has moved its monthly meetings to STCC and that the meetings are open to everyone. Following are reports from the committee chairs, constituting the Council's Annual Report:

§ COMMUNICATIONS (Jim Llewellyn & Ben Swan Jr., Co-chairs): JLlewellyn reporting. Report attached.

o McKnight Council website is being redesigned pro bono by resident Karan Parkin, a professional web designer, will have a updated look, be interactive and should be done this summer.

o McKnight Newsletter is being published on a regular basis (bi-monthly), has more diverse voices writing, has local advertisers; encouraged neighbors to patronize our advertisers, asked for volunteers to deliver. Currently board members are each delivering about 150 newsletters by hand.

o Neighborhood Fair - working on a ‘signature event' to bring the whole community together annually; very preliminary stages but would welcome volunteers.

o Business directory - Ben Swan Jr. is heading effort to list all commercial and home businesses in the neighborhood so that we can patronize each other's business locally.

o Phone tree - will develop a calling system to alert neighbors to events and issue.

§ FINANCE & FUND RAISING (Marianne Winters, Chair): [See above, Treasurer's Report]

§ HOUSING (Denise Moccia, Chair): DMoccia reporting. No written report.

o McKnight Council got the City to finally address 79-81 Princeton Street: property abandoned for 10 years or more, has failed RFD process for rehabilitation several times, has been a hazard and eyesore to neighbors, unfortunately we are going to lose the house because the City has promised that it will come down; it is in the next round of demolitions.

o Property at 52 Westminster Street will be rehabilitated; Vocational students will be doing the work, supported by a grant and City money.

o Group from the Council had a meeting with the City Office of Housing acting director, Carl Dietz, to present a short list of properties in tax title that need attention as soon as possible; Dietz promised to move them through the process more quickly than in the past.

o Got City Office of Housing to agree that the City will work with an architect to design more appropriate standards for new construction in the neighborhood.

§ PUBLIC SAFETY (Walter Kroll, chair): WKroll reporting. Report attached.

o This committee had three goals: (1) to create a relationship with the Springfield Police Department to bring forth issues to them from the citizens of the neighborhood; (2) to increase public awareness and the need for people to report crime, and to develop a process that would make it easy in multiple ways for people to have confidence that what they report will be addressed; (3) to ensure accountability by following up with the SPD and with our neighbors that issues have, in fact, been addressed satisfactorily.

o Committee is in touch regularly with Dep. Cochrane, Lt. Trites and Community Liaison K. Brown at SPD.

o Committee chair, WKroll, has been meeting monthly with SPD to follow up. So far, every issue that has been brought forth has been taken care of. Noted new Flex Squad is looking into non-911 issues.

o Appealed to neighbors to step up, perhaps to be a ‘quarterback' for each street; suggested a neighborhood block watch. Noted the keys to making it work is public awareness, willingness to report, and effective follow-up.

§ DEVELOPMENT & PLANNING (Demetrios Panteleakis, chair) DPanteleakis presenting the McKnight 2008 Revitalization Plan. Plan attached.

o Noted that the Plan will now be presented to Mayor Sarno, to Development Chief Panagore, and to the City Council. Goal is for the City to budget for the Plan. Thanked all who worked on the Plan for many months.

o Noted the Plan is concrete; it is concerned with physical attributes of the neighborhood that we want to see today, not years from now. Said that Panagore and Dietz are ready to support the Plan. City has agreed in principle that there will be a single liaison person the Council can work with to implement the Plan; that person has yet to be named.

o Plan being presented tonight is a beginning; Council intends to look at it again next year and in following years.

o Noted the order of items being presented are not in any way prioritized, each part is as important as every other part of the Plan; the Council wants it all.

o Final version of the McKnight 2008 Revitalization Plan was then presented as a PowerPoint with DPanteleakis giving an explanatory narrative.

SPECIAL GUEST: Springfield Police Commissioner William J. Fitchet

WKroll, Safety Committee Chair, made the introduction. Commissioner Fitchet spoke for about a half hour and then took questions from the assembly for another 45 minutes.

President GAHession closed the meeting at 9:15 pm.

9:15 pm - Adjournment