Carrollton/Riverbend Residents' Association

President's Report

Apr 20, 2007

Friends: Many thanks for coming to our general meeting of the
Carrollton-Riverbend Residents' Association on March 6.

Since then, the board elected at that meeting has met and elected officers. I am honored to be your new president. Other officers are:

Marshall Hevron: Secretary
Cindy Morse: Treasurer

For the short term, at least, we have decided to organize ourselves around four basic committees: 1) Safety/crime 2) Zoning/Planning 3) Quality of Life (everything from potholes to education) and 4) Events (organizing our general meetings and whatever other events we may decide on). Contact info below.

Call this the Philosophy of the President (i.e., me) as to how I hope we can make our association one we're all proud to be associated with.

It's really about two things, it seems to me: communication and work.

1. I promise to do my part on the communication front. I will commit to getting out information by e-mail with some (ir)regularity?¡Xand Cindy Morse and Betty DiMarco have offered to contact our e-mail-less friends. I will also commit to listening to you when you have something to say.

2. The association IS the combined work of those of us who have the time and commitment to do it. Many of the ?¡?§quality of life?¡?¨ issues, for example, require making connections between folks with a problem and city agencies that can address it; keeping up with zoning issues can involve studying zoning rules and going to a fair number of meetings. There are always
meetings.

The connections we make, and the meetings we go to (and report back on) determine who we are and what we do. I am happy to have (some) members who simply keep up with what?¡?¦s going on and come to general meetings. But it is also necessary that we have a committed core of folks who are now (or are willing to be) involved in the issues that concern us all about the future of our neighborhood and, generally, of our city.

I will stop for now. These are the folks you elected to the Board:

Marilyn Barbera: malynbarbera@msn.com
Kevin Brown: kevin@tccno.org
Gordon Cagnolatti: brothergordon@aim.com
Betty DiMarco: dimarco_bl@bellsouth.net
Rodney Dionisio: rodneydionisio@yahoo.com
Rudolph Garrison: drrgarrison@aol.com
Chad Gilman: carrolltonconnection@yahoo.com
Earl Hamilton:
Marshall Hevron: mhevron@tulane.edu
Phyliss Jefferson:
Todd Leavitt: tsleavitt@aol.com
Cindy Morse: cindy.morse@att.net
Julianna Padgett: juliannapadgett@bellsouth.net
John Schackai: jschackai@cox.net
Amanda Smithson: ianrsmithson@gmail.com
Llewelyn Soniat:
Jerry Speir: jerryspeir@hotmail.com
Jim Stratton: jstratton_crra@mac.com
Evan Wolf: evancwolf@yahoo.com

Events Chair: Amanda Smithson
Quality of Life Chairs: Betty DiMarco and Todd Leavitt
Crime/Security Chair: Gordon Cagnolatti
Zoning/Planning: Marilyn Barbera, Marshall Hevron, Cindy Morse, John Schackai, Jerry Speir

We are having a Board Meeting next Monday evening, 7:00 p.m., at the new Gelato Pazzo 8115 Oak Street. This is not a general meeting, but members are welcome if you really want to attend. We'd be especially happy to see if you want to get involved in one of our committees. If you wish to come, I'd appreciate your letting me know in advance, so that I can try to be sure that we have enough chairs.

Let me hear from you.

Jerry Speir, President
Carrollton-Riverbend Residents' Association