St. Andrews Square Neighborhood Association

OUR NEIGHBORHOOD COUNCIL IS BORN!

Dec 06, 2000

After nine months of grassroots effort, the Mid-Wilshire Neighborhood Council sprang to life on Thursday, October 26. Neither rain nor a World Series game kept 100 people away from the meeting at the United Methodist Church on Wilshire Boulevard, where they participated in the formation of our own neighborhood council. Mandated by the LA City Charter reform, it was a huge step toward greater citizen participation in the business of city government.

The MWNC will act as a liaison between the neighborhood and the city bureaucracy. By bringing so many associations under one umbrella, the MWNC will enjoy the clout which no single association has ever been able to claim. All development projects proposed for the mid-Wilshire area will now have to come before the MWNC. The MWNC also has the potential to be proactive. It can apprise city officials and city departments of our needs and goals as a neighborhood; it can make requests and demands of the city. All this should have a positive effect on the city?’s allocation of resources to our neighborhood.

We in SASNA are at the eastern edge of the proposed council area, which stretches from La Brea Avenue east to Western, and from Olympic Boulevard north to Willoughby from La Brea to Wilcox, and to Melrose from Wilcox to Western. We are just one of over a dozen neighborhood associations to be represented under the umbrella of the MWNC. On October 26, after ratifying the boundaries and the bylaws proposed by the organizing committee, the meeting proceeded to constitute a board of directors. First, extant neighborhood associations presented their slate of candidates for ratification. Then, areas without neighborhood associations chose their directors by caucus, as did those stakeholders representing business, educational, religious, and other non-profit organizations. The MWNC board consists of 24 directors, with 24 alternates.

Tina Mata will represent SASNA on the MWNC Board of Directors. Henrietta Cosentino will serve as alternate. The first meeting of the Board of Directors will take place on January 10. From January to June the board will set its priorities while also working to guarantee that we meet the criteria for certification by DONE (the Department of Neighborhood Empowerment). The certification process begins