CSHCA Events Committee, March 29, 2022

In attendance: Heidi Moesinger (host), Kirk Carapezza, Alix Giannetti, Doreen Miller (minutes), Michelle Miller, Celina Warot

Events

McConnell Park Grand Opening Event (Heidi)

• Liz Sullivan of external affairs of the Parks Department is excited to work with us and will attend our next meeting on May 3^rd.
• The Grand Opening is planned for the end of summer and will take place in the playground and passive park areas.

Park Tour with Noah McKenna (Heidi)

• The $150 fee is being funded by the CSHCA.
• CSHCA has funded a voice amplifier for event use.
• Alix spoke with Matt Collamer, who is willing to do the videography. He did not give her an answer to his fee.
• Date of the event: Saturday, April 30, from 3-4 PM with a rain date of Sunday, May 1, and a backup date in case of total wash-out of Saturday, May 14.
• Heidi will let Noah know.
• Heidi will draft a flyer to advertise.
• We should invite local officials and groups such as Representative Dan Hunt, Senator Nick Collins, Councilor Frank Baker, Parks Commissioner Ryan Woods, the local tree specialist from the Parks Department, board members of Speak for the Trees.

Savin Hill and Patten’s Cove clean-up, Saturday, April 2 (Kirk)

• From 8:30 AM- 3 PM
• Meet at the top of Caspian way for coffee, donuts and equipment (bags and rakes) supplied by the City.
  • Kirk will ask Bill Walczak to approach The Daily to see if they would be willing to donate the coffee and donuts for this event.
• Kirk will request two boxes of bags to cover both areas.
• Bring your own gloves.
• Alix will put some of the equipment on her porch to use in Patten’s Cove. She offered to purchase some cheap gardening gloves for those without.
• A graffiti crew will be requested.
• Mowing the grass is now on the Parks Department calendar. If the grass gets overgrown, contact Kirk, who will notify his connection in the Parks Department.
• Focus mainly on trash and glass.
• Issues at Patten’s Cove
  • Discarded needles.
  • Rusting muffler in the cove visible at low tide.
  • Homeless encampment.
• Mitigation ideas
  • Request the lower branches of the pines at Patten’s Cove be cut for better visibility.
  • Request improved signage and receptacles for trash and used needles.
  • Take pictures of the problems and post to social media sites to raise awareness of the problems.
  • Organize a core group of people to do periodic walk-throughs with trash picks during the summer to keep ahead of litter.
  • Kirk will check into the feasibility of renting a “billy goat” to vacuum up the glass shards.
  • Notify and work with the Safety Committee on issues such as discarded needles and homeless encampments.
  • Try to get DCR to be more responsible for the issues at Patten’s Cove.

Easter Egg Hunt on Saturday, April 2, 2 PM

• CSHCA donated $250 towards this event.
• Heidi will message the organizer Brianna on Facebook.

Native American Event (Doreen)

• Doreen emailed the activities coordinator at JFK library for information about the tribe they used a couple of years ago, but has not received a response.
• Thomas Greene, a descendant of the Neponset Tribe, will try to get a small group to come, but the summer months are busy for the tribe and there can be no guarantees.
• He will incorporate interactive activities for children to participate.
• He is available on July 23, 24, or 31.
• He needs a minimum of one month notice in advance to schedule – the sooner the better, however.
• He quoted a fee range of $300-500 for approximately one hour.
• We need to figure out how to raise the money: CSHCA, donors, sponsors?

Food Tour (Michelle)

• Michelle has reached out to Boston Little Saigon via Instagram but has not received a response.
• Her idea is to peg 3-5 places to visit. Take the T to Field’s Corner and work back to Savin Hill for the final stop.
• It was suggested she contact Fields Corner Mainstreet.
• Create an information pamphlet to hand out to the restaurants to gather interest and commitment. Responses can be sent to savinhillevents@gmail.com

Block Party on Davitt Street (Alix)

• She did a prelim on permits. We need to apply 30 days in advance.
• Steps
  • Write up a proposed production schedule and site plan to take to the city.
  • Once it is approved, we meet with the Consumer Affairs and Licensing.
  • Determine what licenses we need and the fees.
  • Get police presence.
  • Ideas include games, pot-luck dishes, a bouncy house, sunset movie, hoodsie cups provided free by the BPD Community program.
  • Alix will look into guidelines for food, open grilling.
  • Heidi will create a google doc for us to brainstorm poll questions to get neighbor feedback on their conception of what constitutes a block party. Once edited, she will post to Facebook as a poll.
  • Find local sponsors willing to donate or fund.
  • Heidi, Michelle, and Celina will help Alix with this event.
  • Alix will reach out to her neighbor Ashlyn, who was interested.

Miscellaneous

Budget

Think about this for the next meeting.

• Annual
• Cost of each event
• How to raise funds and reach out to potential donors.

Others

• Heidi shared and reviewed the Google drive spreadsheet for events.
  • Listed are recurring events, events that have already happened, and those that are in planning, as well as ideas for future events. Events are listed by the month they occur and include information on the location, organizers and other info.
  • We should keep things simple this first year to see how things pan out, and then add to events in coming years as our committee grows.
• Heidi will communicate with Mike Szkolka and the incoming president to keep the calendar on the website up to date.
• We should add photos from the various events to our committee page.
  • An IT person is needed to create a gallery on the website for us to do so.
  • In the meantime, we can post photos to an outside site and simply post a link to those pictures.

Committee Votes & Next Meeting

Vote on a Chair

• Heidi outlined the duties of a chair.
• Alix Giannetti and Michelle Miller were voted as co-chairs of the Events Committee.
• Heidi will email them information, links and passwords needed to run the committee.
• Heidi will inform the president Mike Szkolka of the new chairs and make the necessary updates to the committee page on the CSHCA website.
• The new chairs should send Heidi their headshots for the committee page.

Meetings

The committee will generally meet the last Tuesday of every month at 7 PM.

Next Meeting

Due to conflicts for both chairs, the next meeting will take place on

Tuesday, May 3, 7PM, via Zoom. Meetings thereafter will resume taking place on the last Tuesday of each month.