Carrollton-Riverbend Neighborhood Association (CRNA)

Carrollton Riverbend Neighborhood Association Newsletter

The Spring 2008 newsletter is available in printed form only at this time. Please contact Pax Bobrow at paxbobrow@yahoo.com if you would like a copy.

Fall 2007 newsletter:

This is what we’re working on right now for our neighborhood. If you think anything here would be gratifying to work on too, then please contact us and join up. We need all our neighbors to get involved.

Lead Paint Sanding
Many of the houses in our neighborhood have an undercoating of lead paint. When a painter comes to sand and repaint your house, make sure that the house is draped in a tarp from roof to ground and that the paint flakes are vacuumed up and properly thrown away at the end of the day. Lead in the soil around your house gets into your kids, whether they’re playing in the yard or it just gets on your shoes and into the house. This is serious business. Lead can stunt physical and mental growth in children. Don’t let the painters sand out into the air! Walk up to them and tell them to stop!

Have Us Plant a Tree in Front of Your House – For Free!
We’ve got it in the works! We plan to walk round the entire neighborhood and ask every household to pick from three kinds of trees that grow really well in New Orleans, and if you want one, then we’ll get together volunteers and plant it right in front of your house. It will provide shade in the summer and make your home a lovelier place. It can also cut down on electricity bills by reducing how much a/c you need to cool down your house. We’ll pick trees that do well in high winds and heat. For more info, email Todd at tsleavitt@aol.com.

Curbside Recycling Is BACK!
A private company, Phoenix Recycling, is starting up citywide pick-up of recyclables on August 6, in front of your house! It’s not free though — $15/month, and then $1/month off if you’re a member of a neighborhood organization (like us). Collections will be bi-weekly and routes, schedules, a recyclable material list and a copy of their flyer are available at www.PhoenixRecyclingNOLA.com
or call 504-914-0739 or send an email to:
phoenix.recycling@gmail.com for more info!

Priestly High School Needs Students
Enroll your 9th and 10th graders in this cool Architecture & Construction school, call504-862-5100 OR just come to our General Meeting on August 18th. The Priestly Board of Directors as well as students and teachers will BE there to answer your questions and help you register your kids for school. So, don’t miss it! http://www.priestleyschool.org/
KABOOM! Playground at Johnson School
On Thursday, July 26, 2007, we got together with KABOOM! a non-profit organization that builds playgrounds across the nation and helped to build our very own playground in the yard at Johnson Elementary School.

No Broken Windows.com
Karen Gadbois has been going around the city and taking photographs of all the blighted houses she can find, and then looking up who owns them. Interestingly, many of these properties are owned by a single individual or company. All the information is at www.nobrokenwindows.com — where you can see it for yourself, and perhaps help bring a little pressure where it’s needed. If you have an address that she should add, email her (you can do it at the Nix Branch Public Library) at Karen.Gadbois@gmail.com and she’ll add the house to the website. Go Karen!

Night Out Against Crime
There will be a night out against crime gathering on Tuesday, Aug 7, 6:30p – 9p in the Castellon pharmacy parking lot (Oak & Dante). Sponsored jointly by CRRA and Oak Street-Main Street. Meet your neighbors, & our local police & fire fighters Food ~ fun ~ live music! (byo lawn chairs)

Mini Playgrounds
Here’s something we’ve been scratching our heads over. There’s all these empty lots around the neighborhood. What if we could get the people who own them to give them to the city and then build little playgrounds on them so our kids don’t have to walk out of calling range or play in the street to shoot some hoops or play on swings? Any ideas?

We have a Website!
Lots of information (you name it, it’s on there) can be found at our website, http://crra.wordpress.com so check it out!

Our neighborhood needs your ideas and energy
Come to the big party on August 18th and become a CRRA member. Your little stretch of block and all your neighbors need you to represent them!

Here’s a link to a PDF version of the newsletter. Note that on an older computer or a slow internet connection it might take a little time to download. You must have a recent version of Adobe Acrobat Reader, which is a free download from Adobe. Click here to download.