October 2023 Community Meeting

Welcome:

• Go O’s!

• Overview of Agenda

Geon Floyd:

• Has been doing community outreach for 8years

• Previously with the Mayor’s Office of Homeless Services & Paul’s Place

• Now with Downtown Partnership of Baltimore; the outreach program is contracted by the City office to conduct outreach to the unhouse populations in districts 11 & 12

• MOHS has to approve removal of unhoused people and Geon has to submit tickets for trash removal and biohazardous waste removal through city agencies; causes delay and not immediate action; he does his best to utilize connections he personally has with different city services to expedite things; the health dept might help with needle removal if 211 does not send anyone

• The City requires him to make 3 visits/ contacts with an unhouse person before he can submit a ticket and someone can be removed by the City; Must extend opp for services 

• There is no permanent way to stop the problem as there are organizations that hand out tents and provide aid. Geon has had multiple conversations with this religious organization to explain the impact they are having despite understanding their intent. Cannot force people to be housed can only encourage them to get services. 

• Our neighborhood is in a “money making” area being along MLK and Russell Streets

• Geon is available for contact in the future email is gfloyd@dpob.com

Redistricting:

• The current district map is not accurate in PowerPoint that was shared and needs to be updated and resent to us

• Under the proposed redistricting Ridgley’s would be moved to Felicia Porters 10th district if approved

• There is a scheduled implementation of the redistricting of Feb 1st, 2024

• The next City Council meeting is 10/16 for the members to finalize their proposed map to the Mayor then the Mayor has until 11/6 to veto any of the information and put forward to the Council his changes then the council can override until 11/11 and if there are no overrides then the mayors map in play at 11/17 

• Nick Mosby encourages feedback from the community, but says the opportunity for feedback has been cut out from the mayors process; make sure feedback reaches the council and mayor’s office

• Eric Costello is opposed to the current redistricting and losing Ridgley’s Delight

• Suggested that both individuals and community groups reach out to the council and Mayor’s office to submit feedback

• The redistricting is happening based on the council charter that all districts are supposed to be similar sizes; 2020 census shows that there is an imbalance of actual population in representation; districts 11th and 1st are large representing the “white L” where all the growth is occurring

• Bobby asked the attendees of the meeting for feedback on support or opposition to the redistricting based on how it is currently outlined; there was not a conclusive vote on how people feel and it was suggested that everyone needed more information; Bobby suggested folks reach out individually with their feedback

ARC:

• There are no active applications 

• One inquiry from an ARC member and one project on South Paca from a new owner t

• The painting and project at 213 Penn have been approved for white or off white

Treasurer:

• No new business 

• Karin provided an itemized review of the current budget including expenses and balances

Safety:

• Currently waiting on traffic and community safety signage 

• Waiting on camera on Fremont and Pratt

• 8 Cars have been stolen out of Ridgley’s last month and highly recommended to purchase steering wheel locks 

• Many houses have personal security cameras with some being registered with the police database. The committee posed the question to the community about doing outreach to create an accessible list/map of all addresses that have cameras (both visible/not visible) to provide to the department for easy referral while canvasing the neighborhood during investigations

• This process has been started in the past and Deb O’Neill will connect the committee with the member who has worked on the project in the past

• Some members mentioned that the police don’t utilize the footage and some mentioned it has been very useful in solving crimes in the neighborhood

• Straw poll was taken of people at the meeting and it was decided to move it to the next agenda as people need more information 

Sept Recap:

• Community swap was a success

• Mayor’s clean up on 10/21 at 9AM

  • Ms. Lilly needs a leaf blower & more plastic lawn bags / Bobby will help coordinate leaf blower 

• Gary Mullen (muralist) approached Bobby with a design that has been approved by the City for Russell + MLK; will attend a community meeting to discuss concept and plan

Bylaws Update:

• Participation has fallen since COVID

• These changes to the bylaws were created to make a more streamlined approach and the board easier to run; there has been difficulty running the board in the last two years

• The proposed changes have been made after research by Bobby and proposed for the board

• Bring changes to the Nov. election to be voted on or discuss at the current community meeting? 10+ attendees voted to discuss then.

• The changes are meant to be thought as “packaged changes” and approved at once and a list of all changes will be sent out

• Proposed change and feedback:

  • Communications:

    • The neighborhood has many older adults who only received communication by phone and not e-mail and need more than 24 hours notification regarding special meeting decision making 

    • Differentiate between regular communications and what is required for special meeting communications 

• Clerical/Admin:

  • Change the role and name of the Vice President

    • The attendees gave general feedback of approval without any changes 

• Membership Committee

  • The attendees at the meeting gave general feedback that they were in support of the changes

• Meeting Schedule:

  • Provide clearer wording for the suggested text changes 

  • Suggested that the “at will” scheduling of Aug/ Dec meetings gives the board too much power to decide when meetings are needed without community input

  • Bobby said that these changes will make it so that we are not violating our by laws in general 

  • Proposed to address the changes to Aug/Dec meetings at the next general meeting

  • Noted at how hard it was to get people to join the board and having less meetings might make it easier to recruit new members 

  • 3 votes people voted to approve as written and 14 votes prefer it to say “every other month” (some didn’t vote)

• Good Standing

  • Individuals self-report six things they have done; changes would lower the barrier for participation and would broaden what it means to “contribute” to be more inclusive

    • Most attendees verbally agreed to these changes 

• Nominating:

  • Feedback that the committee does not have a process to reach the full community when making selections for the board nominees; taking away nominations from the floor would prevent those who were not aware from making a last-minute bid for election

  • Nominating committee is a recruitment committee so perhaps change the name to better reflect their goal and tasks

  • Maybe there needs to be a nominee from each street

  • Nominating committee will need future work, but not at this time as suggested by Bobby 

  • Everyone voted for this change, but a few 

• Membership 

  • Gives people the vote without being a member in good standing 

  • Keep participation age to 18 due to legality of including adolescents 

  • Bylaws committee are happy to see the membership changes

• Quorum

  • Slightly more people in attendance voted for the current stipulations of quorum on how it is written 

• Anything removed from the bylaws is still kept and shown online 

• Amendments to the bylaws approved by the majority of the attendees

Attendees

Bobby Goodfellow
Bill Reuter
Clare Elliott
Paul Rubenson
Sidas Saulynas
Paige Kelly
Billy Huffnell
Gerri Salley
Julia Lebherz
Nicole Dungee
Julie Milstien
Amy Bopp
Rachel Abbotts
Amy VanderStoep
Greg Rieke
Shayna Jordan
Julie Day
Linda Smith
Syrus Razan
Shani Kamberi
Riley Aker
Sharon Reuter
Deb O'Neil
Karin Lundquest
Nancy Mead
Molly Goodfellow