Board Members Present: Nancy Norby, Heidi Kohne, Bing Wong, Paul Leistner, Jim Blackwood, John Laursen, John McLaren, Mike Shaver, Greg Snider

Board Members Absent: Bruce Treat, Cascade Anderson-Geller, Mark Bartlett, Tom Dolan, Nadine Fiedler, Stephanie Stewart

Others Present: Officer Gary Manougian, Barb Gamelgard, Kevin Bryant (Warner Pacific), Callie Goodman, Megan Selby (Sunday Parkways), Gordon Magill, Wayne Dietz, Aliesje King, Katherine Anderson (Portland Crime Prevention), Gina Whitehill-Baziuk (Portland Community College), Ron Sumner, Denise Marychild, Jane Sadowski

The meeting opened with introductions led by Vice-President Norby. The minutes from the February meeting were then approved on a motion by Jim Blackwood, seconded by John Laursen.

The financial report was presented by Treasurer Wong.

Catherine Anderson reported on the Upper Hawthorne Good Neighbor Agreement, saying that the biennial meeting of these businesses on April 6, 6:00pm at the Police office on E Burnside. Also, there will be a program on liquor establishments March 31 at 6:30pm, also at the Police Bureau’s Traffic Division office on Burnside.

Neighborhood Crime: Officer Gary Manougian reported that there were about 13 crimes that occurred in our neighborhood in the last month, mostly robberies and larcenies. He said that the number of larcenies has risen a bit. Please do not leave items in your vehicle where thieves can see them. There was discussion about an incident that happened throughout southeast Portland last Friday. A question was asked if the police bureau’s website has information about missing people.

SEUL: Paul Leistner reported that SEUL will have a board retreat on April 10 with the new director. They are looking at focusing on more public involvement on major city issues. Also, ONI will present March 30 to City Council wanting more money for the neighborhoods. The TaborCommons will now open July 17, a week before the Clinton Street fair. He also said that some residents in northwest Portland are sending out a petition regarding the validity of covering the reservoirs.

Neighborhood Issues and Concerns

Neighborhood Cleanup: Bing Wong reported on the upcoming neighborhood cleanup. McFarlane’s will donate $400 of yard box containers for the cleanup, as well as the cost to empty them. It will be joint with North Tabor NA. The event will be held May 22 at the Mt. Tabor Middle School. Please contact Bing Wong or Heidi Kohne if you are interested in volunteering for this event; it is usually held in the morning until around 1:00pm.

Sunday Parkways: Megan Selby gave a presentation about this year’s Sunday Parkways. The southeast event will be held August 15 from 10am-3pm. The biggest change from last year is they will not go up Mt. Tabor. Like last year, there will be activity areas throughout the route for vendors and information. Megan suggested that MTNA could also have a mini-event as part of the Parkways, such as games or activities. More information can be found at www.portlandsundayparkways.org

PCC Bond Measure: Gina Whitehill-Baziuk reported on the Asian new year and the subsequent meeting at the PCC Southeast campus. PCC is hoping to make the campus more of an actual campus rather than a college center. She listed many of the ideas that were given at that meeting. She said that if the bond measure passes, the items that are listed as part of the measure will actually happen as stated (if one campus will build a childcare room, a childcare room will actually be built). It is likely that kiosks will be built at each campus that will have information about all of the other PCC campuses.

MTNA Letter to City: Jim Blackwood gave us an update on the city council’s wish to arm security personnell of Water Bureau for the parks. It turns out the Water Bureau has the legal power to arm security people as constibles in Oregon’s laws, and it does not have to be approved by City Council. Some parks in Portland are already manned with armed security, but most of the public doesn’t know it. The new security won’t be trained as police officers, won’t have access to the police radio frequencies, won’t be equestrian, and must work only on Water Bureau property.

Atkinson Elementary Learning Garden: Aliesje King gave us some information on the Summer Outdoor Learning Garden at the school for four weeks in July, with each week being a different focus. This is open to any student finishing K-5, and they are taking up to 45 students. They are also looking for volunteers for this event. Info can be found at http://olgsi.blogspot.com/.

^Committees

Friends of Mt. Tabor Park:

Nancy Norby reported that Friends will not do their usual yard sale this summer. The off-leash area now has a water fountain. The Saturday work parties (last Saturdays, April-Oct, 9am-noon) will be coordinating with Bureau Environmental Services now.

Land Use

As Stephanie Stewart couldn’t make it to the meeting, a few people gave a combined report on land use issues. It was announced that a joint hearing will occur on March 23, 2010 at 6pm that will be about a citywide tree policy report and new codes/code changes; this will try to consolidate all of the rules for tree replacement for the entire city and attempt to make this more enforceable than it currently is and will also educate the public on the homeowner’s right and rules of tree-ownership.

There was a Public Utility Board hearing about the open reservoirs on March 3. At the meeting Dr. Gary Oxman, Multnomah County Health/City of Portland Health Officer, stated that there simply isn't any sound science linking open reservoirs to any public health problem. A MTNA attendee who was also at the hearing said that Dr. Oxman has now changed his mind, saying that we should follow the EPA’s recommendation. At the same time, city officials are dragging their feet about making written testimony available to the public. PURB will vote on the subcommittee’s recommendation to "expeditiously close" the reservoirs Thursday, March 18, 2010 to City Council. Jim Blackwood said that City Council’s meeting today (March 17) had a considerable discussion about the reservoirs. Greg Snider stated that PURB did vote unanimously, saying that it is a shame that the reservoirs are being tampered with at all.

The meeting adjourned at 8:00pm.

The next meeting will be Wednesday, April 21, 2010, at 7:00pm at Mt. Tabor Presbyterian Church, located at SE 54^{th and Belmont.}

For more information, please go to www.mttaborpdx.org.