The House Issue

Been having a lot of meetings lately about the vacant and abandoned housing issue.  It could be that it's just me, but it seems as if there is an agenda for the city its task force.  It bothers me that the task force meetings that are "open to the public" aren't advertised and they aren't being completely forthcoming with their data.

I think this is a great opportunity for Transforming Action through Power  to step up and make this an issue.  To that end I have attended a couple meetings of the city and Wendy is helping with that.  We are lacking information regarding the location of the abandoned houses and what the city's ultimate agenda is, but we are moving forward.

To appropriately address this issue we are going to have to build community and neighborhood resources.  Each house or group of houses is specific to the location and there are different needs for each locale.  The only way a response can be formulated is on a case-by-case basis, which is in direct opposition to what Wendy calls the city's data driven model.

Spoke with Ryan Yazel today who told me about the down sides of simply tearing the house down.  The lot across from his house has become a dumping ground for the community.  Because of the location there is little to be done to remedy the situation.  Clearly, response to the abandoned houses needs to be on an individual basis based on neighborhood input.

Another Busy Week

I finally got over to Richard and Lisa's to check out their new place.  I helped them move last week and had seen this place, but this was the first chance I had to really check it out.  This week the weather was great and they were all outside enjoying the spring.  As I expected, they are the neighborhood hang out.

The New Crib

These were some of my best hook-ups by the church and they moved.  The new place is really nice and I got the grand tour.  Darryl has like a bachelor pad upstairs.  Pete said the only thing he needs now is a woman.  These are really good people and care about their neighborhood.  A good resource.

The awesome garden crew

We got the garden beds done.  The crew showed up and did the work-impressive.  It was a good afternoon to do all this.   Fortunately, Valerie brought her guy, Max.  The good thing was that Max had a grinder to cut the rebar.  I had a jig saw, but it just didn't have enough guts to cut the rebar.  We had to hand saw some of the timbers and Patrick was amazing!  Patrick sawed through those timbers like they were butter.  Anyway, we got the beds done.  We're a little short on rebar, but I picked it up this week and there's some dirt piles that I think we can use to fill a small bed.

I had a meeting with Josiah this week and he told me about how he had a handle on a dump truck.  Thank God.  I checked out dirt prices and I didn't know how we were going to fill the beds.  Now we have a truck and can get the free compost from the city.  God is so good!

I am really loving doing this community ministry and the challenge is figuring out how I can keep doing it.  I might be able to get something out of the presbytery and I have been talking with a guy who would like me to do a program thing.  I pray God works this so I can keep doing what I'm doing for the next several years.

Spring is Springing

I haven't posted for awhile, but no good excuse.  I just let the blog slip.  On the other hand, I've been pretty active in the last weeks. 

Moving Day

The weather is changing here in Northwest Indiana.  It's the oddest thing to have a few inches of snow one day and 60 degrees the next.  There are a lot of people taking advantage of the return of nicer weather, though.  Richard, Lisa and Daryl sold their house and I helped them move last week on a day between the frigid temperatures.  I'm sorry to lose them from the neighborhood around the church, but they are staying in South Bend and give me the opportunity to make some more connections in another neighborhood.

The INSPIRE Grant is all in place (God bless the NRC), signed and waiting so the garden is on the list.  I ordered the lumber to build the beds and the group is all coming out Saturday afternoon to build.  We should be able to put those together in short order, but don't have dirt to fill them.  The city won't have compost until mid-April and I think we need to get the beds established before that date.  I'm hoping Chuck can help me out with some top-soil at little to no cost, but at least we'll have the beds.  There is a lot of enthusiasm for the garden and I look forward to it being a productive experience.  It seems as if there is a neighborhood association slowly emerging from the garden group which makes me happy as that is the ultimate goal.

I worked for months to put together an initiative on vacant and abandoned houses to draw together congregations and nonprofits from all over the city.  I think, with the help of Fr. John, Wendy and Gene, that we have something to roll out and I look forward to bringing that to the table on Tuesday at the Clergy Caucus.  Basically, we're going to put it back on the congregations to voice their issues and alternatives which will then be brought back to the larger group and then on to the mayor's task force. 

I'm doing a lot of other things, but this blog post is too long already.  I'll post again next week.  Remember Listening Training at Niles Pres. this Saturday 9-11.