April 19, 2022
Hampton Park Terrace Neighborhood Association
Meeting Notes
Short version:
The April meeting was a great chance to meet some new neighbors. The new officers want to start doing social events again. They are interested in gathering contact info to help with distributing and collecting info. Several committees were set up to start working on on-going topics like Yard-of-the-Month, Traffic/Infrastructure, and Zoning & City Board Matters. Also, do NOT leave your typewriters in your unlocked cars!
Long version:
We started the meeting at the Church of Christ, Scientist on Moultrie Street 7:05 when Anne Kelley Russell called the meeting to order. She then introduced the other officers: Kim Ralph (vice president), Kevin Eberle (secretary), and Ben D’Allesandro (treasurer).
The minutes of the March meeting had been posted on Facebook for people to see. Anne Kelley accepted a motion to approve the minutes, and they were approved.
Ben gave a bank report that we have $5924.23. Anne Kelley said we are looking to spend some money this year and solicited any suggestions for events and anything else.
Anne Kelley noted that this meeting would be relatively free of an agenda and was mainly intended to give people a chance to show up and meet each other for the first time in a long time.
Kevin gave a report on new communications efforts. The neighborhood Facebook group has 57 members. New members are being asked to answer a simple intro question (Where do you live and what is your email?) to weed out fake accounts. Ashley Williamson is going to be worked up a website that might be a warehouse spot for newsletters, minutes, etc. and maybe can be a place to pay dues. We now have a Google account (HPT29403@gmail.com) and have email contacts for 117 people representing 97 houses (35.4% of the houses). Our newsletters will be shared in print, via email, and will be posted on Facebook.
Kim introduced the block captains and said that email seemed to be the preferred means of communication, but that we would still use print too to reach as many neighbors as possible.
Ben mentioned ads in the newsletter. Details were not settled yet.
Kim said she will be in charge of social events and sought ideas. Estee Perlmutter at 365 President St. will be spearheading a block party on President St. on May 22. We need approval to close the street. If it doesn’t work out, we will have an ice cream party at the Ralphs’ house at 478 Huger St. on that day instead.
Kim has contact info and resources for anyone who wants to host an event. We might divide the neighborhood into quadrants and try to have an event in each quadrant every year to make sure we spread around the events. Kevin said coffee-and-donut socials are super easy and always popular.
Kim said we would be getting the “Yard of the Month” started and asked for some volunteers to help with that. Kim would speak with them after the meeting.
Anne Kelley suggested starting an Infrastructure Committee to work on issues about trees, speeding, potholes, etc. Gervais DelPorto said she is interested in that topic. Anne Kelley would talk with interested committee members after the meeting.
Anne Kelley suggested having a neighborhood-wide yard sale later in the year. The event would be a bunch of individual yard sales on that same day, not all in one spot. One suggestion was sharing maps showing the spots at all the different locations. Having Habitat for Humanity come around to collect left-over items was suggested.
Bob Olson is a former president of the HPTNA and has been attending meetings of the “Peninsula Consortium”—a meeting of all the downtown neighborhood association representatives—and will continue in that role. He invited anyone to join him if they wanted.
Anne Kelley said that, while this was an oddball meeting without a specific agenda item, we would try to have a keynote speaker at future meetings. If there are potential speakers, let the officers know. Or, if there are topics you would like addressed, let us know, and the officers can try to find a speaker for that point.
Congress and Glenwood sinkhole – AK will look into it – someone is redoing a house on the south side of Congress (Joe Tolley) / greenery HPT would be great – adopting tree talk – won’t plant oaks under power lines – sent to Infrastructure Committee
Johnny Chandler asked if the HPTNA would be taking positions at public meetings. Bob Olson said we have done that in the past. Sometimes the City boards agree with us, and sometimes the boards do not. Richard Sidebottom suggested created a committee to field requests for our neighborhood input. Brian Ralph suggested that we might want to see stricter zoning rules for our area. Jeff Gleim recalled that we had discussed having BAR review in the area.
Anne Kelley said the meetings of the neighborhood would be on the third Tuesday of alternating months at 7:00. The church volunteers the use of their space. Other locations like the Citadel would charge us. We will try to track down yard signs that used to be posted at prominent corner locations or perhaps we will buy some new ones if the old ones can’t be found. Maria Richardson suggested making a donation to the church for having meetings there. There seemed to be support of perhaps a $25 contribution each meeting, but no one ended up making a motion before the conversation moved to another point. (We should squarely vote on that at the next meeting.)
Anne Kelley said that the issue of dues is being considered.
We ended the meeting by going around the room and having everyone do a personal introduction. Just a few of the highlights were:
Brian and Kim Ralph used to live at 4 Glenwood Ave. when they were married, but later restored and relocated around the corner to 478 Huger St.
Joseph Blake of Sutherland Ave. has lived in the neighborhood since 1969. His parents lived in his house. He retired in 2009, but loves the neighborhood. But, he cautioned not to leave typewriters in unlocked cars.
Richard Sidebottom lives at 74 Hagood Ave. with his family. His wife’s family bought the house in 1970.
Bob Olson was a high school principal and has worked with the school district for 45 years.
Jean Murphy has lived at 361 President St. since 1967.
Claudette Smith at 48 Parkwood Ave. is from New York and was interested in the historic plaques on the houses. (Gail Corvette is the person in charge of that.)
Beau Mueller at 52 Parkwood Ave. was interested in starting a list of babysitting kids in the neighborhood.
Leonard Lee was actually born in house on Moultrie St. when his dad (a doctor) delivered him in 1966!
Jeff and Wendy Gleim of 54 Parkwood Ave. operated Little Line Café on Line St.
Christian Kendl just bought 497 Huger St. and is getting ready to do some restoration work before moving in.
We adjourned at 8:05.