Hartley News: Online Edition

Hartley 2009 Spring Events

April 3, 2009 — It's time for the Hartley Neighborhood Association Annual meeting on Thursday, April 16 at 7:00 pm in the Hartley Elementary School gym. Speakers will include Jon Carlson from the Mayor's office, among others. Refreshments will be served.

Our annual Spring Neighborhood Clean-up is scheduled for May 16th with a rain-date of May 23rd. Dumpsters will be available at Peter Pan Park from 8:30 until noon. Tires (off the rim) may be brought to the park, and brush coupons will be available. Members of the Hartley Elementary PTA will also be there, accepting donations of items for their garage sale fund-raiser.

Please do not bring:

Hazardous Waste (Call 441-8000 for information about hazardous waste disposal.)
Household trash
Appliances
Brush or yard waste

Volunteers are need for litter pick-up. Bring your work gloves and meet at the park at 9:30 am.

After the clean-up, at 1:00 pm, please come to the Peter Pan Park picnic shelter and bring a dish to share for the annual Hartley Neighborhood Association Potluck Picnic.

"Hartley News" Neighborhood Newsletter

We publish a newsletter 2-4 times a year, depending on upcoming events, etc. If you would like to contribute to the newsletter, place an ad, or if you simply have questions, please contact our Newsletter Committee Chair, BarbaraCornelius, or any association Officers.

Paper copies of the newsletter are distributed to blocks in our neighborhood that have block captains. Please contact BarbaraCornelius if you have questions about receiving the newsletter in printed form.

Newsletters are in PDF format; if you don't have Adobe Acrobat or some other PDF reader, you will need to download one.

Hartley Welcomes Community Crops

March 25th, 2007 — This spring, we have the opportunity to work with Community CROPS to help create a community garden on a vacant lot at 30th and Q Streets. Community CROPS staff are committed primarily to "increasing food security for refugee, immigrant, and low-income people in Nebraska" by providing help to grow and market local agricultural products. The program started in 2003 with one community garden. Today, they offer support to six gardens, technical assistance to a variety of Lincoln organizations, as well as a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) to market vegetables grown by Community CROPS clients. Some garden plots at the 30th and Q Street location are available to Hartley residents. Volunteers are also needed! For information, visit http://www.communitycrops.org, call staff at 474-9802, or email crops@communitycrops.org as soon as possible.

Neighborhood Roundtable Takes on Graffiti

February 8, 2007 — This month the Mayor's Neighborhood Roundtable focused on the problem of graffiti, graffiti abatement, and a new antigraffiti law. Speakers included Captain Joy Citta of the Lincoln Police Department, City Ombudsman Lin Quenzer, and Shawn Ryba of Lincoln Action Program. They provided useful information for dealing with graffiti if you spot it in our neighborhood or elsewhere in the city.

If your own property is vandalized, you should contact the police department using the non-emergency number, 441-6000, to report the crime. Though the vandal is guilty of a crime, you will be responsible for removing the graffiti as owner of the property. To maximize the likelihood that the vandal will be prosecuted, you will need to provide the police as much information as possible, including your name and the exact location of the graffiti.
Contact Lin Quenzer, City Ombudsman (441-7511), to report graffiti on someone else's property, including commercial or public property, or you may use the Graffiti Report Information form available online. All the information required by the form must be provided for the request to be processed. When a report is received, and the graffiti verified, a certified letter is sent to the property owners, alerting them they must remove the graffiti within 15 days, or the city will remove it at the owners' cost. Both Lin and Captain Citta stressed the importance of having an exact address when reporting graffiti on residential property.
Shawn Ryba reported on successes realized in Clinton Neighborhood through collaboration between the neighborhood and the Free To Grow program. Together they were able to locate, report, and clean-up graffiti in that neighborhood in a timely fashion, improving the quality of life for neighbors and helping to reduce crime in the area.

Captain Citta told the group that over 160 instances of graffiti have been reported since January 1, 2007, but that by making just a few arrests the police department was able to close over 100 cases. By working with neighbors, the city, and other agencies, you can help put the brakes on the vandals who deface property around our neighborhood and the city.

Big Event a Big Success

April 8, 2006 — Early on a bright, crisp Saturday morning, students from UNL joined together with members of the Hartley Neighborhood Assocation for NU's Big Event, a one-day service event sponsored by the Student Involvement office and the Association of Students of the University of Nebraska (ASUN). BarbaraCornelius, EricaCorwin, and MichaelCornelius met 19 students from the university to deliver newsletters and pick up litter throughout the neighborhood.

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Hartley has over 40 blocks which need newsletters delivered door-to-door, but only about 20 block captains, leaving 19 blocks with no regular newsletter delivery. Newsletters for these blocks were divided among the students and neighborhood volunteers who then walked them to all corners of Hartley. If you did not receive a newsletter, or you are interested in becoming a block captain, and taking responsibility for distributing newsletters to one of Hartley's currently open blocks, please contact BarbaraCornelius.

With newsletters delivered, the group turned their attention to litter. They hit the streets and sidewalks armed with bright yellow bags, blue latex gloves, and pickers. From 28th and 29th Streets, to T Street, to 33rd, to Peter Pan Park, the neighbors and student volunteers collected and disposed of dozens of bags of plastic bottles, fast food trash, pizza boxes, and beer bottles left behind by litterbugs who just don't care about Hartley Neighborhood or the people who live here.

At noon, with newsletters delivered and litter picked up, the students headed back to campus for their Big Event lunch and the neighbors waved to each other and headed home. We in Hartley appreciate the hard work done for us by the students, and look forward to future Big Events and other opportunities to work together with our UNL neighbors.

"Hartley News" Neighborhood Newsletter

Newsletters are in PDF format; if you don't have Adobe Acrobat or some other PDF reader, you will need to download one.