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Love Your Block Mini-Grant Recipients Announced

April 18, 2019 | Department of Neighborhood Engagement

The Mayor’s Office of Neighborhood Engagement is pleased to announce the recipients of nine Love Your Block mini-grants, intended to help residents of Howard Avenue and the ChurchTowne neighborhood fight blight and build community.

The resident-led projects encourage neighbors to build community, while also addressing immediate litter and property façade concerns. Applicants were required to recruit neighbors as volunteers to help complete the projects.

“These projects, getting people to work together – ultimately we’re helping neighbors help their neighborhoods. And that’s the way to do it. It’s designed by neighbors, requires collective action. We hope to seek funds to institutionalize this in years to come, throughout the entire Southeast,” said project partner Jack Howell of the Spanish American Civic Association’s Elm Street Program.

The mini-grants are funded through the Love Your Block grant awarded to the City of Lancaster by Cities of Service and supplemented by funds from SACA’s Elm Street Program.

The nine mini-grants have been awarded to:

Kearasten Jordan – Neighbors on the 500 Block of Dauphin are coming together to rent a dumpster and organize a community clean up. They will canvass to promote the Adopt-a-Block program in the southern half of ChurchTowne and hold a block party, inviting speakers to educate on litter and health.

Rayvon Jordan – Rivers Edge Fellowship will install trash cans and a dog waste station, and organize a community pickup with neighbors. They will scrape and repaint windows and doorframes on the 500 Block of Locust. They will also host a block party at the end of their project days to bring the community together.

Erin Dixon – Neighbors on the 500 Block of North will scrape and repaint porches, railings, and doors. They will also purchase trash totters for residents on the block.

Edna Ortiz – Neighbors on Atlantic will scrape and repaint railings and doors, adding planters to the sidewalk to prevent parking on the wrong side of the street. They will also canvass and encourage the lead remediation program to neighbors on Atlantic.

Luis Torres – The Mix will work with neighbors hosting art workshops to design a mural of Nelson Polite. The mural will be installed on the corner of North and Atlantic with LED lighting to prevent criminal activity and celebrate Nelson Polite’s work in Lancaster.

Marquis Lupton – The Cultured Professional Network will perform a general cleanup outside and on the façade of the Crispus Attucks Community Center. This is the first step of the group’s initiative to rehab the space and provide programming for community education.

Erica Asso – The San Juan Bautista Plaza will install a trash can, as well as lighting and planters around the fencing on Lime. The community center will host public engagement workshops to design public art for the Plaza.

Valerie Bradley – Neighbors on the no hundred block of Howard will install trash cans and partner with CWS to organize frequent cleanups on the block. They will also install planters to beautify the space.

Cooper Linde – Neighbors on the 100 Block of Howard will replace a blighted fence, as well as install a trash can to fight litter. They will also purchase trash totters for neighbors that can easily fit through baker’s alleys between houses.

Projects will commence later this spring and wrap up by August. Another round of mini-grants will be awarded this fall. Residents interested in the next round of funding should contact the Mayor’s Office of Neighborhood Engagement for more information.