The monthly community meeting with 18th District police officers, which usually takes place at the Calvary Center at 48th and Baltimore, will be held in Clark Park (43rd and Baltimore) tonight, beginning at 6 p.m. As always, Lt. Brian McBride and Sgt. Ron Washington of the University City Division of the Philadelphia 18th Police District will be there to answer your questions and hear your concerns and discuss crime in the area and other neighborhood issues.

Residents are also invited to meet police officers who work in the neighborhood during a public Police Roll Call at the park. Last month Cedar Park residents got a chance to meet and greet 18th District police officers at the public outdoor roll call (see photo below).

Photo by Algernong Allen.

Editor’s Note: This week we received a classified ad from neighbor Jena Laske, who was looking for a musician to take ownership of her father’s prized 12-string. We asked Jena to tell us more. She sent the note below.

Hi West Philly Folks,

I’m giving away my father’s 12 string Yamaha guitar. Just to let you know a little bit about my dad, his name was Thomas. He had a mass of curly red hair. When he was a teenager, he was quite a heartthrob and played and sang at small town bars around the Adirondack mountains where my grandparents had a cabin on Seventh Lake. He was only 22 when I was born and I have memories sitting on the floor as a youngster listening to him sing Jim Croce’s “I Got a Name” and an old folk song, “Froggy Went a ‘Courtin’.”

I remember going with my Dad to pick out this guitar. It came with a case that was bright red and furry inside. Unfortunately, the stitches rotted a few years back and I left the case on 49th and Cedar for someone else to refurbish – so the guitar does not have a case.

My father died from cancer at 30 around 1979 or ’80. Although I have wanted to play his Yamaha for a long time, I just never learned to do it well.  I would like to offer this guitar to someone who really loves to play. It still resonates well, although there are slight issues with the neck which make the strings tight and hard to hold down.

If you are interested, please write me a short essay about why you want this guitar. You agree never to sell it, but to pass it on to a musician should you decide to part with it someday.

As my father would say, Sat Nam

Jena

As the end of the summer is approaching fast, the city has announced that it would start closing outdoor public pools beginning this week. Some pools may have closed even earlier as we noticed that the Shepard pool at 57th and Haverford was already drained out Monday morning. Other pools will stay open until the end of next week. By the way, the sprayground at 48th and Woodland will stay open until September 1.

Here’s the schedule for closings of the pools located in West Philly and vicinity:

Tuesday, Aug 13 – Baker (5431-43 Lansdowne Ave.), Tustin (5901-29 W. Columbia Avenue)
Friday, Aug 16 – Mill Creek (743-81 N. 48th Street)
Monday, Aug 19 – Lee (4328 Haverford Avenue), Myers (5800 Chester Avenue)
Wednesday, Aug 21 – O’Connor (2601 South Street)
Friday, Aug 23 – Kelly (4231 North Concourse Drive), Sayre (5835 Spruce Street)

If you have something to say about the latest public education crisis in Philadelphia, this meeting may be for you. Parents, educators and community residents are invited to “Tell it to the Children,” a citywide town hall meeting to address the budget crisis that could cost the district thousands of jobs and delay the opening of the school year.

The meeting will begin at 7 p.m. at the Mother Bethel AME Church (419 S. 6th St., near 6th and Lombard). The interfaith social justice organization POWER is hosting the meeting and Rev. Kevin Johnson of the Bright Hope Baptist Church and Rabbi Laura Grabelle Herrmann of West Philly’s Kol Tzedek Synagogue will moderate.

Organizers say that one of the purposes of the meeting is also to discuss the District’s long-term funding issues.

Organizers say that the meeting will also be streamed live at  http://new.livestream.com/accounts/4917752/events/2315718.

School District of Philadelphia Superintendent William Hite announced last week that the start of the 2013-2014 school year could be delayed if the District does not receive $50 million in funding, which he said will just “get the doors open.” The District is maintaining a “school opening” website here to help parents and students navigate the beginning of the school year.

The new school year is scheduled to start in a month, Sept. 9 (fingers crossed that the budget crisis is resolved soon) and there are some efforts in the area to help many local families get ready. So far we’ve heard of two school supply drives to help West Philly families with school children. If you know of more school supply collections/drives, please drop us an email (editor@westphillylocal.com) or leave a comment below.

ACHIEVEability’s Backpack and Book Donation Drive

Photo courtesy ACHIEVEability.

You can help ACHIEVEability to support more than 250 school-age youth and community residents by donating to their Backpack and Book Donation Drive. If donating a backpack please consider including the following school supplies: spiral bound notebooks, loose leaf paper, composition books, pens, pencils, markers, highlighters, calculators, pencil sharpeners, glue, etc. If donating a new or gently used book, please ensure that it is appropriate reading material for school age children (K-12).

Donations for the backpack and book donation drive can be delivered to ACHIEVEability’s administrative office located at 35 N. 60th Street (between Market and Arch Streets). If you have questions, please contact ACHIEVEability Events Manager Brian Hoskins at brian.hoskins@achieveability.org or 215-748-8814.

Penn School Supply Drive

Through Friday, Aug. 16, multiple locations across the University of Pennsylvania campus will serve as drop-off points for the Penn Volunteers in Public Service’s annual back-to-school drive.

The school supply drive collects basic back-to-school items such as binders, dividers, dictionaries, staplers, glue, tape, calculators, crayons, pencils, pens, paper, rulers, notebooks, book covers, markers, folders, lunch boxes or bags, school bags or backpacks, umbrellas and blank CDs or DVDs. The preference is for new items, but they would also accept “gently used” items like book bags (they have to be in really good condition).

The supplies will be distributed to nearby schools, after-school programs and other organizations in West Philadelphia. One of the schools in West Philadelphia that will receive a portion of the collection is the Henry C. Lea Elementary School.

There are a lot of drop-off locations, so please check out this link for more information.

UPDATED 8/9/13 at 2:10 p.m.: After a few readers asked about the petition in City Paper, we reached back out to Greensgrow to get more info. According to Greensgrow’s Ryan Kuck, as a phase one step, the farm hub gathered signatures from business associations and community leaders for each proposal they’ve assembled. If any of the proposals move forward and once they’ve identified a site, Greensgrow will reach out to the community through meetings and the like for community input.

As we reported in June, a garden center was being proposed at an empty lot at the southeast corner of 51st Street and Baltimore Avenue (pictured). A couple of weeks ago City Paper wrote that Kensington farm and garden hub Greensgrow has its eye on two plots of West Philly land, including at 51st and Baltimore. We checked on it and found out that nothing is set in stone, although, according to a Greensgrow rep, those sites are among many swaths of West Philly land they are considering as their next home.

Ryan Spak, owner of the corner lot on Baltimore, said much the same when we spoke to him this week. While he would be “honored” to bring a garden center to the lot because “the neighborhood deserves one,” he said that he is considering multiple possibilities for the land and an operator has not been identified. As for Greensgrow, Ryan said they were at the community meeting at Seeds Gallery on June 21 and showed interest, but he would not confirm if they are in talks.

We’ll keep you posted on this development when we have more information.

-Annamarya Scaccia