Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, July 26, 1990 TAG: 9007270346
SECTION: NEIGHBORS PAGE: S-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: GRACE BOSWORTH
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
Each group started in response to some pressing need felt by the residents of a particular area. Residents of Gainsboro, one of the city's oldest neighborhoods, however have faces problems that have been different from other northwest groups.
Neighborhood beautification and resident safety are the prime concerns of the 40 neighbors who came together to form the Grayson Avenue Beautification Council in 1984, said president Lucy Brooks. But the more they looked, the more they saw that could be done.
"We set up a `Crimewatch' that proved itself well worth the effort recently," Brooks said. "Drug sellers had moved into our park [Eureka] and we wanted them out. Because we had a good ongoing relationship with the police, patrols were stepped up and, at least for now, the dealers have moved to other places.
"The park now has a walk for the handicapped and a security system on the building there."
The Grayson Avenue Beautification Council has hosted foriegn visitors who wanted to learn how to improve their neighborhoods in Russia, Canada and Africa.
"We're working to have two houses rehabilitated and converted to housing for low-income families. Another project we are excited about is finding a way to bring in young parents to take classes in parenting skills," Brooks said.
Saving the old Harrison High School was the concern that gave birth to the Northwest Neighborhood Improvement Council. In 1980, Hazel Thompson, who has since died, alerted neighbors on Madison, Harrison and Rutherford Avenues that the school was going to be converted to some other use at best or, at worst, dismantled.
Today, the organization has expanded to include Fifth to 12th streets and Fairfax to Orange avenues.
"We have taken on some housing projects, targeting abandoned houses that were eyesores as well as dangerous. A couple have been boarded up and one was remodeled. You would be surprised what results you can get if you have enough names on a petition and publish what you want in church bulletins," said Rosa Miller, the president.
Another successful project for her group was the actual counting of potholes and submission of a request to the city for repairs.
"The city sometimes takes longer than you might like to get things done, but our experience has been very positive. If you stay after them, they come through."
The Villa Heights Crime Prevention Organization started 12 years ago with eight members who were mainly concerned with house break-ins. "We began as Nosey Neighbors," said George Penn, president.
"Meantime, we worked out a system. If one of us saw something in the neighborhood that looked suspicious, like a car cruising or a stranger hanging around a house while the occupants were out, we would call one another. Everyone would immediately put all of his or her lights on - front and back porch . . . light up the whole area and then call the police. This system seemed to run off a good many trouble-makers."
At one time, the group had 125 members, but seldom have all of them been active at the same time.
Penn said financing and recruitment seem to be the major problems facing most neighborhood organizations.
"We have a dues schedule. It's $3.50 per year per member and $5 for businesses. That doesn't cover any kind of major expenditures we might want to put out. In the beginning, we held a carnival every year, but the insurance coverage got to be higher than any small profit we could make, so those stopped about four years ago."
More active and younger members also are needed. All residents in the area bounded by Cove Road on both ends and Melrose and Orange avenues would be welcome, he said.
The Villa Heights Crime Prevention Organization sends out a monthly newsletter.
"We give it to block captains and they put it in the hands of residents on their blocks, and we send it to city officials who need to know what's going on and what we are thinking about.
Penn said that cooperation from city officials sometimes seems slow, "but if you stay at it, downtown listens. Sometimes you have to be real understanding. One year we received 150 tennis balls; somebody missed a step downtown; we don't have any tennis courts. Things like that can happen."
"It's too bad that most of the time people only come together in time of mutual crisis," said Alfred Dowe, president of the Fairland Lake Civic Organization.
In the case of his group, the crisis involved 40 alarmed neighbors who met at a center in Eureka Park to organize to protest proposed new housing in their neighborhood in 1969.
"We hired a lawyer and did our homework and took our case to City Council. It took, if I remember correctly, just about a year and more hours than I care to think about it. But, the building permit was refused.
Area beautification has been added to the group's agenda. There is a long-term goal to find an appropriate recreation area for the young people in the neighborhood.
"We work long and hard, and we don't intend to stop. We're going to try to recruit," Dowe said.
Lucy Brooks of the Grayson Avenue group said, "The fate of the group depends on what happens in a neighborhood as events change. People move in or out, some have job transfers and some die."
Her group tries to have an anniversary event every four years.
"We set a banquet at a good hotel, with some prominent speaker, and try to emphasize the friendship a neighborhood generates."
Brooks' group's agenda includes community projects, such as preparing Christmas boxes for residents of the Roanoke Valley Home for the Aged and packages of basic necessities for women in the shelter for battered women supported by the Salvation Army.
by CNB