The Nehemiah Davis Foundation is holding its annual Back To School Extravaganza and book bag giveaway on Sunday, Aug. 24, 2 – 5 p.m., at Malcolm X Park (52nd and Pine). During the event, volunteers will help distribute more than 300 book bags, school supplies and clothes to local families. There will also be entertainment for the whole family, including free pony rides, moon bounces, and face painting, complimentary haircuts for kids, refreshments and food.

The rally in Clark Park on Saturday. (Photos by Mike Lyons/West Philly Local)

About 125 people gathered during a light rain in Clark Park last night to talk about recent events in Ferguson, Mo. and many pledged to work in Philadelphia toward racial justice.

“It’s time for action, not reaction,” said Jondhi Harrell, head of the The Center for Returning Citizens. “It’s not sexy, it’s not protest time. It’s organizing time.”

Jondhi Harrell of The Center for Returning Citizens speaks at Saturday’s rally.

Though organized days in advance, the rally had an impromptu feel as people emerged from the crowd to share their views on Ferguson and reiterate calls for volunteering.

Harrell and others urged people to participate in voter registration drives, attend meetings, even teach children to read.

“Be about this on a day-to-day basis,” he said.

About 20 police vehicles were parked near the park during the rally and a separate, unassociated “march” afterwards resulted in a skirmish with police and two arrests.

See our Civic Life page for a list of non-profits in West Philly, including the West Philadelphia Alliance for Children, Books Through Bars. Many are looking for volunteers.

A group of local activists are organizing a rally, including a vigil, march, and speak out for Mike Brown and the people of Ferguson, Mo. on Saturday, Aug 23, at Clark Park (44th and Baltimore).

The rally starts at 7 p.m. The vigil will be followed by a march around the park, followed by speeches from community leaders. Participants are asked to bring a candle. Originally, the vigil and march had been scheduled for tonight but were postponed until Saturday due to thunderstorms in forecast. The Unitarian Universalist Church of the Restoration (Facebook page) is also one of the organizers.

The following speakers have been announced so far:

– Michael Coard, Civil Rights Attorney and Activist
– Jondhi Harrell, Director, The Center for Returning Citizens
– Reverend Dr. Kathryn Ellis, Minister, UU Church of the Unitarian Universalist Church In Mt Airy-Restoration

The Kemi McCoy Drummers will also participate in the rally.

The same group of activists are behind Tuesday’s rally at 52nd and Market Streets to protest Ferguson shooting (The Daily Pennsylvanian has a report on it).

For more information and updates, visit the organizers’ Facebook page.
 

Hey West Philly parents and guardians, you probably have some stuff in your closets that your kids have grown out of over the past year. Here’s a great chance to get rid of it, earn some cash, and support a neighborhood school. The annual “West Philly Grows Again” Kids’ Consignment sale, which benefits St. Mary’s Nursery School, is scheduled for September 20, 2014 and consignors are welcome to register. Here’s how the sale works:

If your items are accepted and then sold at the event you earn 50 percent of the profits. The other 50 percent will go to support the school. If you also volunteer during this fundraiser by working a 3-hour shift you can increase your percentage to 60 percent.

Gently used and good-quality children’s items are accepted at the sale, including clothing (newborn up to size 16), shoes, toys, books, baby and sports equipment, and more. Maternity and nursing clothing is also accepted. For the full lists of accepted and not accepted items and general consignor guidelines, check out this page. Click here to register ($10 consignor registration fee is applied).

The “West Philly Grows Again” Consignment sale will take place from 9:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 20, at St. Mary’s Nursery School, 3916 Locust Walk. Consignors, volunteers and shoppers are welcome. For more information, visit: stmarysnursery.org/consignment-sale. To check out sale updates as they arrive, visit the event’s Facebook page.

West Philly kids are doing great in sports and are in the spotlight of some current and upcoming sporting events.

The Taney Dragons. (Photo from Taneybaseball.com)

• The Taney Dragons, Philly’s youth baseball team that made it this year to the Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pa., keeps winning! In their second game, on Sunday, they defeated the team from Texas. We learned that there are at least three West Philly kids on the team. According to neighborhood sources, these kids are: Eli Simon, No. 4, a student at Penn Alexander School (43rd and Locust), Tai Shanahan, No. 7 (who had the game-winning hit on Sunday), goes to St. Francis de Sales (47th and Windsor), and Carter Davis, No. 9, lives on 49th St.

We’re very excited about the success of these and other young stars on the team (their amazing pitcher, Mo’ne Davis, is on this week’s cover of Sports Illustrated!). Taney’s 3rd game is tonight, at 7:30 p.m., when they will take on a team from Las Vegas, Nev. You can watch it on ESPN. Also, there’s a free Taney Dragons Pep Rally and Watch Party tonight, 7:30 p.m. – 9:30 p.m., in the City Hall Courtyard (Broad and Market Sts). Go Taney!

• It’s not every day when you get a chance to practice with tennis stars like Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic, but a West Philly kid will be at this year’s U.S. Open. Eleven-year-old Tauheed Browning, a student at Legacy Youth Tennis and Education Center, is heading to Flushing Meadows, New York, to participate in Arthur Ashe Kids’ Day on Saturday, Aug 23, as part of the 2014 U.S. Open Tennis Championship. Tauheed will get to warm up with tennis professionals and another Legacy student, Brandon Caban of Drexel Hill, will compete against the pros in a target-hitting contest in the hopes of bringing back $15,000 to provide tennis and life skills education to more than 4,500 young people from the greater Philadelphia area, many of who come from low-income and under-resourced communities.

Tauheed is a student at PA Leadership Charter School, and is from Overbrook. He is one of the youngest Legacy student-athletes with very high potential, according to a spokeperson at the center.

Tauheed Browning. (Photo courtesy of Legacy Youth Tennis and Education)

Elissa Sklaroff with the Clark Park photo collage.

West Philly residents Elissa Sklaroff and James Klasen, whose Clark Park photography project was featured in a June post, are inviting everyone to check out their photo collage in the park on Saturday, Aug 16. Elissa and Jim were documenting events in the park and capturing images of diverse Clark Park visitors of all ages – people who “bring the magical park to life.” Since the beginning of the summer, they have been sharing their photos with the park community and with their “models” by creating a “photo garden” – from nearly a thousand photos taken over the course of the summer, they selected and posted the most representative ones in clusters on the kiosks around the park.

“Feedback has been positive, including lovely comments posted by some who have stopped to look,” Elissa wrote us in an email.

Now, as Elissa and Jim are nearing the final stages of their Clark Park photo project, they have created a collage with an idea to capture the project and the park in a more complete way. All the decorative materials used in the collage were made from recycled materials: “green” shopping bags, soda cans, etc.

The collage will be displayed in the park on Saturday and from 2-4 p.m., Elissa and Jim will be giving prints out to anyone in the park whose picture they used. Additional copies or posters will be available to the public later by request, at either Elissa’s email address (elissa.sklaroff [at] gmail.com) or Jim’s (klasen.james [at] gmail.com).

It should be very festive, writes Elissa, as it is an Uhuru flea market day as well. Many of the vendors have agreed to display printed copies of the collage at their tables and even on food trucks! Elissa and Jim want those in the photos to be happily surprised to see themselves in many locations.

When a friend asked Elissa, “Why are the pictures so close together?” she replied, “Because as humans we are all close together and these photos show how the diversity in Clark Park emphasizes our commonality. This is what we hope we are saying to everyone.”

“We thank everyone with whom we connected during this project”.

(Photos by Elissa Sklaroff and James Klasen)