February 2022 Minutes
Wednesday – February 9, 2022 at 7pm
Welcome (Stephen McBride)
Treasurer’s Report (Stacey Cordeiro)
- Income: 361.15
- Expenses: 326.41
- Assets: $11,060.53
- No Liabilities
Police Report (Officer George Downing)
- Contact: George.Downing@pd.Boston.gov
- C11CSO on Twitter: https://twitter.com/C11cso
- 6 incidences: Robbery involving knife and gun; B+E; and series of robberies
Committee Reports
- Social Committee (Steve Farrell / Starr Vermeulen): Hot Toddy Tumbler has been rescheduled for March 25th. Hosts and participants both needed. More details to come. Also there is a potential June event. Need more volunteers. Reach out to Steve or Starr if you want to get involved.
- Planning & Development (Kit Binns / Stephen McBride): DBEDC put a bid on the Hamlet parking lot to do a fairly comprehensive make-over of it. Residential and commercial and incorporate the 94 spaces already there. WIll include parking.
- Greenspace & Friends of Downer Park Steve (Carly): 1) Graffiti in the park has been reported and committee is speaking directly to the city; 2) Trying to find solutions for the lack of grass and committee is open to suggestions; and 3) Complaints from neighbors not shutting the gates in the park behind them, please shut the gates behind you and leash your dogs.
- Steve Farrell suggested pea gravel as an option.
- Tim Scott will also get some further recommendations
- Outreach Committee (Stacey Cordeiro ):
- Looking at a draft of a welcome card to engage with people during Jones Hill or social events, for the purpose of recruiting new JHA members. Matt H is working on some drafts of this to bring to the board for review before printing.
- Made a map of where members live and saw members are concentrated towards Upham’s Corner side of the Hill so perhaps we can coordinate with other associations so neighbors can meet each other.
- Meetings are the 4th Wednesday of every month. Everyone welcome. Next meeting is February 23rd.
- Traffic Committee (Chris Vella): Newly resurrected traffic committee met a couple weeks ago and id’s some issues:
- Sight lines at intersections
- Speeding on stoughton street and looking at pleasant st for what they are doing
- Pedestrian signals at stoughton and pleasant
- Increased traffic due to cars using some streets as cut throughs and general speeding on the hill
- Next steps: Meeting with Denise to address issues and ask for traffic report for accident data, and reach out to Hancock Association to learn about their safe streets initiative
- Safe Streets: Difficult to get into/ accepted, but could be helpful to address these issues
- To participate in Traffic Committee reach out to President@joneshill.com
Hodan Hashi with Councilor’s Louijeune’s Office
- Councilor Louijeune At-Large
- Here to help us liaise with the city and the Councilor’s office
- Hodan.hashi@boston.gov | 6176354376
8 Sawyer Avenue Presentation
- Aisling walked through the history of the project since 2015 and time that has lapsed since the ZBA decision.
- 5 unit, 3 story proposal with 8 parking spaces in the back
- Aisling walked through the currently proposed floor plan
- Can share a detailed site plan as follow-up
- Rear and front non-compliance: side yard in excess, rear yard will be 7 foot but requirement is 30 (but abutts the parking), front yard set back is 4.8 (requirement is 15) but currently would be in line with the houses next door and about where it is now.
- Contractor would be Aisling’s dad who lives in Savin Hill. One of his projects is 48 Sawyer Ave
- Next Steps: Eventually we will come to a vote. Questions can go to President@joneshill.com
Mayor’s Office of Neighborhood Services Update (Denise DosSantos)
- No update
On The Hill
- Local Business Spotlight: We want to bring in a hyper local business owner to spotlight local businesses. We invite ppl to nominate businesses for us to spotlight. Reach out to Meaghan for this or any JHA officer.
Community Announcements
- Rep. Liz Miranda’s office has secured community tickets for the Van Gogh experience at the Strand Theatre. Sign up to attend for free via this link.
- Boston Centers for Youth & Families (BCYF) are exploring options for a new community center in Dorchester. Find out more about the process, take the survey, and share your opinions by clicking here.
- The MBTA is proposing fare changes for 2022 – you can view the proposed changes here. You can also share your feedback and sign up for information sessions on February 10th or 17th through that link.
- Free walk up testing is available at the Lilla G. Frederick Pilot Middle School gymnasium (270 Columbia Rd) on weekends (find more testing locations here):
- Friday 5-9 pm
- Saturday 12-8 pm
- Sunday 10 am – 6 pm