Mac Arthur Heights Neighborhood Meeting

5:45 PM at Gary Van Calster’s home – 1935 Knotty Pine Dr

Gary opened the meeting by welcoming the attending members which were Gary Van Calster, James Anderson, Julie O’Connell and Brian Danzinger.

Julie O’Connell reported that the association had $ 352.56 in the checking account and $ 107.00 in petty cash. The minutes of the last meeting were emailed to everyone and therefore not read aloud.

The members present attended a Planning, Development and Transportation meeting the previous night and had a brief discussion about it. Brian thought that there would be a traffic study done on Hazelwood to determine if the speed limit should be lowered before the anticipated increase in traffic and if better crosswalks would help with pedestrian safety on the corner of Shady and Hazelwood.

Gary reminded us that the check for $1,000 grant money was arriving on Thursday, Sept 2, 2010. Also, our alderman, Brian Danzinger would like to donate up to $500 of his paycheck to our neighborhood association to be used to fund a neighborhood family event next summer. Brian had many ideas as to how to use the money and we especially liked his idea of having a neighborhood cook-out with just our neighborhood association members, but then after a few hours, bringing in a band and inviting the other west side neighborhood associations to join us for some music and fun. Brian’s donation would help fund the cost of the food and soda. We would certainly welcome any other ideas from our members.

We decided to go ahead and write another newsletter for a fall edition. There are some important topics that our neighbors should be aware of that will be coming in the near future, especially the traffic/ pedestrian situation on Hazelwood and Wood when Mason St. exits are shut down. We would like to see the newsletter completed by Oct 20^th. We will be needing volunteers to hand deliver these newsletters.

We also set the date for the Beaver Dam Creek clean up for November 13, 2010 at 8:30 AM. Gary and James discussed the possibility of getting the school involved in this and also asking the school to advertise this on their school marquee. Gary said he will get the signs ready so they can be placed out. (One sign was stolen from the corner of Packerland and West Point this past summer). Gary thought maybe donuts, hot chocolate and coffee might be a nice idea to pass out to the volunteers.

James and Brian also kicked around an idea of having a free football camp at the park on the weekend of Nov 13-14. That is a Packer bye-week. James said that there are some details that would have to be worked out with the city before this could happen but he will look into it and contact Brian about it.

Gary would like to develop a flyer that would explain what a neighborhood association is (and isn’t). He would like to make it as generic as possible so all associations in the city could use it and then maybe the city would pay for it.

The meeting adjourned at 7:00 PM.