Photo courtesy University City District

The University City District is continuing experimenting with new “social seating” structures in the area. Last year, they introduced the Looped In structures in various locations, and earlier this week, a custom public transit stop seat was installed at 36th and Lancaster Avenue.

The new seats are designed to “provide seating and information to passengers waiting for public transit… the latest in a series of social seats designed to be functional, versatile, and unique to University City.”

The 3600 block of Lancaster Avenue was selected as a high-volume transit area where there is a strong need for seating. The location is a popular stop on the Route 10 SEPTA line; it serves mostly Drexel students and patrons of local businesses. UCD plans to install two more in other similar areas in University City and is currently evaluating additional locations.

The idea of these new seats was conceived by UCD’s Policy and Research Manager Seth Budick, and Capital Projects Manager Nate Hommel designed them and oversaw their production.

Current Cedar Park Neighbors Board members (Photo courtesy CPN).

Cedar Park Neighbors (CPN), the community association for the Cedar Park neighborhood, is recruiting candidates for its board of directors.

The deadline for nominations is March 27, 2015. The openings are for two-year terms starting in June. To qualify you need to live in Cedar Park (here is a map) and register as a CPN member by April.

Responsibilities include participating in monthly two-hour board meetings and committee work. CPN handles a number of neighborhood initiatives, including block organizing and a scholarship fund, and consults with the city on zoning matters.

Contact Meg Ferrigno at skyflowers0@gmail.com or 267-241-7606 with questions. To be considered, e-mail a “concise” (under 500 words) biography to the address above.

Board elections will be held at the annual membership meeting on Monday, April 20, at 7 p.m. at the Calvary Center at 48th & Baltimore.

More information is available on the CPN website.

A large building project has just been completed in West Powelton. A ribbon-cutting ceremony took place Wednesday for Bigham Leatherberry Wise Place, a new affordable housing project, which includes eleven units. A vacant lot and an existing structure at 4226-32 Powelton Avenue were transformed into the homes, seven of which are for formerly homeless women with special needs and their children. The housing includes six two-bedroom and five three-bedroom units, two of them will be fully accessible to people with disabilities and one will be accessible to individuals with sensory impairments. Bigham Leatherberry Wise Place also features a courtyard containing a rain garden and a large rear yard.  Continue Reading

Vacant lots in some parts of Philly are suddenly a hot commodity, meaning that the makeshift community gardens that residents have tended, sometimes for years, are disappearing. One that is in a fight for its life right now is the garden adjacent to the Ahimsa House on the 5000 block of Cedar Avenue.

Photo from the Ahimsa House’s Facebook page.

The property at 5005 Cedar was vacant until earlier this year, when a developer snatched it up just before it was to go up for sheriff’s sale. The likely buyer in that sale would have been Meg Ferrigno, who runs the Ahimsa House next door at 5007 Cedar, a community space focused on environmental sustainability and community mindfulness. A couple of years back the Ahimsa House began cultivating vegetables on the vacant lot and started a program to help students at nearby Samuel B. Huey School learn how to grow food.

“My neighbors helped shovel over a ton of compost mix onto the lot so we can grow organic veggies and fruits and have the space be 100 percent lead-free,” said Ferrigno in an e-mail. “The garden provides food for anyone who wants it and it provides a point of human-nature connection for our neighborhood. Everyone can plant, compost and harvest and we simply keep track of what is where on the chalkboard on the side of the house.”

As the owner of an adjacent property, Ferrigno had been advised to request that the property be put up for sheriff’s sale. The last owner died in the 80s, she said. But just before the sale a developer bought the property, brought the taxes up to date and then sold it to another developer for $62,000. That developer is willing to sell it to Ferrigno, but for no a dime under $80,000.

So now the fundraising has begun. Ahimsa House raised nearly $5,000 in a recent Indiegogo campaign. Now they have a GoFundMe campaign, which you can find here.

Once the garden is purchased back, Ferrigno plans to place it into a land trust. You can talk to Ferrigno about the garden by e-mailing ahimsahousephilly@gmail.com or calling 215-488-7772.

– Mike Lyons

UPDATE (12:05 p.m.): The Philadelphia Inquirer‘s Aubrey Whelan is reporting that two viewings will be held for Officer Wilson. The first will be held at the Francis Funeral Home at 5201 Whitby Avenue from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. on Friday. Another viewing is scheduled from 7 a.m. to 10 a.m. on Saturday at the Palestra on Penn’s campus (235 S. 33rd St.) followed by a funeral service at 10:30 a.m.

State Sen. Anthony Hardy Williams, Councilwoman Jannie Blackwell, and Neighbors of Cobbs Creek will host a candlelight vigil for slain Philadelphia Police Officer Robert Wilson III, who was raised and lived in the Cobbs Creek neighborhood of West Philadelphia. The vigil will take place on Thursday, March 12 at the basketball court on 61st Street and Baltimore Avenue, beginning at 7 p.m.

Wilson served in the 22nd Police District in North Philadelphia and was murdered last Thursday while making a security check at a Lehigh Avenue business.

The Philadelphia Police Department and Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 5 have established a GoFundMe page for Wilson’s family. Click here if you would like to contribute.

Mary Pitts-Devine. From Linked In.

The 46-year-old woman who was shot eight times Sunday morning by a neighbor who then shot himself remains in “very critical condition” at Penn Presbyterian Medical Center, according to police.

Police say that Mary Pitts-Devine had an ongoing dispute with her male neighbor, identified in media reports as 53-year-old Steven Outlaw. They lived in separate apartments at 4530 Spruce Street in a three-story converted twin. Outlaw reportedly lived above Pitts-Devine, an entrepreneur, writer and former social worker.

The dispute culminated in Sunday’s shooting. Police recovered a handgun in Outlaw’s apartment that was registered to him.

Pitts-Devine, a 1997 graduate of LaSalle University, is the CEO and Founder of Prophetic Presentations, an artistic production company that is “speaking to the hearts of mankind via the arts,” according to its website. On the site, she writes that she has “a desire to help those trapped in the social ills of life, such as drug addiction, homelessness, disparity of all kinds, and severe family dysfunction. This burden stemmed from my brokenness I experienced as a child growing up in Foster Care.” On social media platforms, she writes that she is a breast cancer survivor and a kidney transplant recipient.

Neighbors have said that the dispute between her and Outlaw had been ongoing for about two years and that he had accused her of tapping his telephone line.

Our thoughts and prayers go out to the friends and family of Ms. Pitts-Devine. We’ll update with new information when we get it.

– Mike Lyons