March 2022 Community Meeting

Type of meeting: 
Community
Meeting date: 
Wednesday, March 2, 2022
Status: 
Approved
  1. Police report for prior 28 days:
    • ​1 street robbery, 1 larceny, 1 larceny with auto
    • The Officer defined/provided an example of each term
      • Burglary - forceable entry into a home
      • Robbery – forceable theft of victim’s belongings
      • Larceny – theft of approximately $500 value; victim is not necessarily aware that it has occurred (e.g., car break-in)
  2. Presentation on lexington market by David O’Donnell and Kristen of BPMC - progressing significantly. Working on stall build-out now.
    • Will have 48 spaces for vendors 15 vendors from existing market will move to new space
    • New market will open in 2022; opening announcement expected in 6-8 weeks
    • Construction is almost complete and is located on site of former Market parking lot
      • 51% are women owned
      • 45% are African American owned
    • Baltimore Museum of Art will have programming/installations in new Market space
    • Community space will be available in new Market (approximate capacity of 300)
    • Security and safety are priority issues and are comprehensive plans are underway
    • Plans for existing Market building are TBD
    • Tour of new Market will be held on April 9th  at 11 am and is open to the community
    • The lower part of the market on Eutaw St will be open earlier in the morning with grocery items, the rest of the market will be open until 8 pm
    • Krause’s light fare
    • Cho’s garden produce
    • Butcher and poultry
    • Trinacria
    • Taharka brothers
    • A community member posed a question about lighting in the immediate area for safety 
      • should be very bright, compared to Times Square
    • Question about increased security in the area - 
      • developers hoping for redevelopment of the old metro west building to get more activity and foot traffic in the area. 
      • Working on trying to address security via a holistic approach - more than just increased police presence. 
      • Market coalition working to get lots of local groups together to work on this issue. Also have a community workgroup looking to get input from community members
  3. DPW liaison - Larry Nunley made some announcements and can be contacted at: Larry.nunley@baltimorecity.gov, cell -443-615 -2626 - for any DPW issues
  4. RDA Committees 
    Active Committees and their chairs include:

    Spotlight - Finance committee

    ARC Report
    they had two applications in the last month - both recommended for approval

    • Bylaws - Paul Rubenson
    • ARC - Paul Rubenson
    • Finance - Christine Middleton
    • Membership - need chair and members to get going
    • Nominating - Sharon Reuter
    • Parking - Ab Bear
    • chair is Christine Middleton, Karin is the other member - looking for members - about $9,000 in bank account. A little more is earmarked for beautification, currently switching person with access to bank account from Chad to Karin
    • Looking to update the budget to reflect current wants/needs
      • A community member asked for a spreadsheet with a financial report to show activity for last 3 years? Christine says yes this can be done for the next community meeting
    • House closes to ridgely’s minimarket - has plastic shutters, owner would like to replace with functional shutters
    • Repointing bricks in a basement, 
    • General announcement: There was a zoning hearing on 207 s. Fremont - the number of units increased from 1 to 3 units.
  5. February recap
    • cleanup went well, dumpster was filled quickly
    • March happy hour is march 4th at 5:30 upstairs at Friends Grille
    • City shred event
    • ARPA funding - $ 41 million going to parks in baltimore
    • Encampments - working with City, BGE, downtown partnership groups to find a resolution for neighborhood and encampment residents -
      • A question was posed about money being used to move people from encampments to motels. 
      • $91 million in ARPA funding/HUD funding available for addressing homelessness - city plans to use part of this money to acquire hotels to provide housing, funds for case workers to work with individuals, funds for rapid resolution (emergency), funds to break down current hotels being use and move people
      • Costello doesn’t see this $$ as having a major impact on MLK encampments. Won’t change until there is a policy change - curren CDC guidance is to not break down a homeless encampment unless absolutely necessary (matter of life or death) - due to COVID
      • The Mayor’s Office does not think the current situation warrants moving encampment
  6. Redistricting - ridgely’s moving From 40th district to 46th state senator bill fergusen, 2 delegates
    • ​​Costello has organized a meet and greet at Pickles on 4/26 from 5:30-7:30 pm for ridgely’s residents to meet new representative
  7. Other announcements:
    • Bill mentioned we could use volunteers to deliver the newsletter - email editor@ridgelysdelight.org
    • ​Continuing to evaluate safety of in-person meetings - will do soon
    • Meeting minutes from last month’s meeting approved - no one opposed
    • Question about when street cleaning will resume - Costello responded that it’s undetermined when they will resume. No street sweeping parking citations are being enforced at this time. Also not sure when weekly recycling will resume.
    • We can come together as a community association to request Costello to fight for street sweeping.
    • It was asked if we could pay for street sweeping/cleaning like the people we see cleaning downtown - people in yellow jackets - they are employed by downtown partnership by a special grant that does not include Ridgely’s
    • Comment from Syrus Razavi - question about lot at MLK and Washington BLVD - behind 681 washington blvd- can we fence it off? Prevent trash and loitering - managed by DOT - classified as pedestrian byway - BGE says that lot is managed by City.
      • This issue was tabled and Syrus Razavi will come to board meeting to present the information he’s gathered on the lot and we can brainstorm options to present to community at the next meeting.

 

Attendees:

bobby goodfellow
bill reuter
maia tatinclaux
Paul Rubenson
Liz Lupino
Julia Day
Julia Lebherz
Silas Salunas
Sharon Reuter
Leslie Parks
Julia Dumont
Chad Terry
Rachel Abbotts
Karin Lundquist
Susan Clayton
Michelle Snyder
Christine Middleton
Sawyer martin
cable day
syrus razavi
deb o'neil
larry nunley
molly goodfellow