May 23

PPNA Community Meeting — May 13th, 2024

Election

Nate Baker submitted his credentials for consideration, running for Treasurer on PPNA Board. At the end of the meeting, the votes were counted and Nate was duly elected as the Treasurer.

Conversations About Racism

The neighbors had a conversation about the effects of racism and what PPNA can do to address it in our community. Rather than trying to summarize a complicated and nuanced conversation in text here, we encourage you to watch the video above (or put it on in the background so that you can listen while doing something else. We think you'll find it worthwhile).

One other idea that was suggested in order to help us connect with neighbors who do not speak English is to create a registry of people who can volunteer their language skills to

Haydee from DPW, in addition to creating a cleanup in Highlandtown, offers assistance in speaking with Latino/Latina neighbors -- (443) 721-0028, haydee.batista@baltimorecity.gov *She says the app to use for translation, though a person is always better, is "Say Hi Translate" and it can even translate meetings

Community Announcements

Parks and Rec

The Park Building is open! If you have an event you'd like to hold we can contact: Monique.Ghee@baltimorecity.gov

Major Colon of the Baltimore Police Southeast District

Thank you to Ernest for opening a conversation that is very difficult but very important and productive. Thank you to Mary who noted the importance of knowing people's first name and the way in which that changes the atmosphere of the neighborhood. Introduces Sgt Eric Johnson, who will be supervising the community police unit; this group goes out into the community and does formal and informal conversations with individuals and business owners. We try to bring collaboration back between the police and the community; we'd like to be invited to events, we do give out steering wheel locks, and we do want to be more integrated with the community

email: eric.johnson@baltimorepolice.org

With Us For Us Coalition

Announcing a petition for the ballot - the With Us For Us campaign is working to get large nonprofits to pay their fair share of property taxes within Baltimore. Their ballot initiative is collecting signatures. They will be back to present in PPNA's June Meeting.

Livable Streets Coalition

Delegate Lewis helping to lead the livable streets coalition, bringing neighbors together across some of the historic boundaries that are residues of redlining. We have a grant through BRNI looking to improve connectivity between Library Square.

Also did you know there are two legally gated alleys in the neighborhood? PPNA has a tradition of making these alleys into green spaces that can help to bring people together and she would like her newly gated alley to reignite this tradition.