River Bend Neighborhood

Diana Rezac and Lori Helleso have planned a River Bend Neighborhood Barbecue and Potluck for October 8th, before the regular neighborhood meeting. Come meet your neighbors and share in the food!

Monday, October 8, 2007
5:30 Social time
6:00 Potluck
7:00 Neighborhood Meeting

Location:

Salvation Amy Building (Map)
1330 6th Avenue
North Door

Plan on attending the next River Bend Neighborhood Meeting:

• When/Where are meetings held?
  Meetings are held the second Monday of each month at 7pm at the Salvation Army building at 1330 6th Ave. (Map)
• Who can attend?
  Everyone is welcome to attend, and there’s no charge. If you want to become a member, which gives you rights to vote for the Association board, the cost is $10 per person per year.

Mercy Hospital, located at the edge of the River Bend Neighborhood at 6th and University Avenues, has announced the upcoming Mercy Day. It will be September 24.

A luncheon will be served from 11 am – 1:30 pm, at the Mercy Medical Center Campus, 3rd and University Avenues.

Mercy Day is an annual celebration to mark the opening of the first House of Mercy founded in 1827, in Dublin, Ireland.

On December 8, 1893, Mercy Hospital opened its doors at the site of Hoyt Sherman Place on Woodland Avenue. When it opened, there were two private rooms and a ward for five patients.

From the hospital’s modest start by six nuns, Mercy has evolved into one of Iowa’s leading medical centers, celebrating many of Iowa’s medical “firsts” and “bests”.

There will be a meeting of the River Bend Neighborhood Association on Monday, Sept 10th at 7pm.

The meeting will be held at the Salvation Army building at 1330 6th Ave. (Map)

Everyone is welcome to attend, and there’s no charge. If you want to become a member, which gives you rights to vote for the Association board, the cost is $10 per person per year.

The DM Register reports that a 13-member police team created to reduce central Des Moines’ crime problem will disband within the next few weeks. Des Moines Police Chief Judy Bradshaw decided this week to send officers back to their usual beats.

The Neighborhood Enforcement Strike Team, known as NEST, monitored the Drake, Carpenter, Sherman Hill and River Bend neighborhoods.

Police had planned from the onset to disband the NEST program, which borrowed manpower from other departments and forced those officers to carry the extra work.

The decision disappointed some residents, who credited the increased patrols and anti-crime block parties for improving safety in neighborhoods where children used to stay indoors.

The Neighborhood Association is working to convince the city to increase regular enforcement and actively enforce the law, instead of reacting to problems as they come up. Lack of enforcement is seen by many in the neighborhood as one of the biggest problems the area faces.

In an area of Queen Anne, four-square, and “painted lady” homes, this weekend’s River Bend “Walk In The Past” house tour will be able to spot a variety of housing details you can’t see in every part of town—clamshell roof shingles, “witch’s hat” turrets, gingerbread trim, and a variety of front porches.

Homes on this tour include various styles—Prairie, Victorian, Craftsman, and Transitional Colonial Revival. Trinity United Methodist Church, at 8th and College Streets, built in 1886, will also be open for touring.

Times and dates: 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, September 8, and 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday, September 9.

Tickets: $10 for adults and $5 for youngsters under 17, available at Moulton School, 1541 Eighth Street.

Parking: Available at Moulton School or along neighborhood streets.

Transportation to homes: By trolley, included in ticket price.

Host house: 1330 Ninth Street, home of Carolyn Jenison and Angela Thorne. Visitors can take a rest and enjoy food from the past, such as 7-layer bars, sweet potato pie, oatmeal cookies, cinnamon rolls, hot cross buns, and beverages. Vintage music will be played on a digital keyboard. In addition, the Something Good Restaurant, 1610 Sixth Avenue, will be open for lunch and snacks.

The Friends of the Forest Avenue Library are holding a garage and book sale Saturday, September 8, to clear out extras from their recent remodeling. The garage is accessible from 13th Street Place and will be open from 10:00 AM to 3:00 PM.

Featured items include:
Lots of oak chairs
Small tables
Oak book bins
Glass display case
MANY children’s books

Many items are reasonably priced and could make a good addition to any college dorm room or help expand a child’s home library.

A block party was held in the 1300 block of 8th Street last Saturday, August 25. The cookout, exhibits, children’s games and street concert celebrated the grand opening of the St. Paul AME Transformation Center, which comprises three apartment buildings on the corners of 8th and 9th Streets on Forest.

In addition to 19 apartment units for families, the center offers programs to help homeless families get their lives back on track. Services offered at the center include a food pantry, a women’s support group, career counseling and Alcoholics Anonymous.

The three apartment buildings had previously been used by Good Samaritan Urban Ministries as housing for the homeless. But financial difficulties forced those facilities to close last year. St. Paul AME Church bought the buildings last winter and workers have been renovating the buildings since.

The center opened in March, but work still needs to be done on many of the apartment units. The block party marked the kickoff of a fundraising campaign to raise $250,000 to fully renovate the apartment buildings.

The Transformation Center is a joint project spearheaded by St. Paul AME Church, but also backed by Grace Lutheran Church andHomeTogether, a collaborative effort of the 29 Evangelical Lutheran Church in America congregations in greater Des Moines.

The Transformation Center is being promoted as a more practical, long-term-temporary housing alternative for homeless families. The homeless, particularly families, have few options when it comes to looking for long-term housing. There are a number of shelters (including some in the River Bend Neighborhood) that house the homeless (particularly single men) for a day, or a week. But few shelters offer longer-term housing, or housing for families.

HomeTogether aims to provide a housing alternative for families not served by other shelters.

Long-term shelter is necessary because mentoring and support over a longer period of time will help keep bring families back into society.

The shelter is a cause for concern for some in the neighborhood, with the River Bend and adjacent neighborhoods already dealing with the side-effects of a high number of social service agencies, shelters, halfway houses, and other agencies.

Summer brings with it warmer weather, picnics and outdoor festivals, trips to the pool and… road work.

Our end of the River Bend neighborhood had its turn last week, when Indiana Avenue was resurfaced between 7th and 9th Streets, and 7th Street was repaved from Indiana to Forest Avenue.

Effective today, the Neighborhood-Based Service Delivery (NBSD) law enforcement program has a new chief.

Officer Todd Dykstra writes:

“I am a Lieutenant with the Des Moines Police Department and beginning Tuesday September 4th, I will be replacing Lieutenant Scott Rounds as the commander in charge of the Neighborhood Based Service Delivery Program. Lt. Rounds will be taking a new assignment as an investigator in the Office of Professional Standards.

I am excited about my new assignment and look forward to interacting with all of you. If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to call or e-mail. My numbers are:
Office: 237-1583
Cell: 205-2203
email: TTDykstra@dmgov.org”

The NBSD is a community policing program that, according to the Des Moines Police Department’s website, “empower[s] neighborhoods otherwise infected with high levels of crime. Citizens and police officers together find solutions to crime problems and conditions that affect the neighborhood.”