Mt. Tabor Neighborhood Association (MTNA) Regular
Meeting Minutes for May 20, 2009

Board Members present: Mark Bartlett, Jim Blackwood, Nadine Fiedler, Heidi Kohne, John Laursen, Paul Leistner, Bunny Marechal, Gayle Marechal, John McLaren, Nancy Norby, Stephanie Stewart and Bruce Treat

Board members absent: Cascade Anderson Geller, Don Jacobson, Cathy Kuehnl and Bing Wong.

Others present: Katherine Anderson, Susan Barnett, Dallas DeLuca, Frank Gorshe, Don Holden, Leah Hyman, Officer Gary Manougian, Mike Shaver, Dawn Smallman and Greg Snider.

Nancy Norby led introductions. Minutes from the March and April meetings were previously distributed via email and several copies were brought to this meeting. Katherine Anderson had some edits to the April meeting. The minutes were adopted with edits noted upon motion by John Laursen and seconded by Gayle Marechal. Bing Wong was absent so no treasurer’s report was presented.

Leah Hyman of SEUL visited to announce that WAMO-SLAMMO is happening on Sunday, May 31^st from 1-3 p.m. at the former Washington Monroe High School at 12^th/Stark. This will be an event to share your opinions about the future community center opening at the site. Contact Leah at Leah@southeastuplift.org or 503-232-0010 for more details.

Leah went on to say that there is a planning commission tour of Southeast neighborhoods on Tuesday, June 9^th starting at 4 p.m. at Mt. Scott Community Center. The tour will go by some odd shaped lots as well as success stories such as Tabor Commons among other things.

Bruce Treat conveyed the sad news that longtime Mt. Tabor resident Al Staehli had passed away. Al was instrumental in much architectural preservation in Oregon and will be missed. Motion made by Nadine Fiedler, seconded by John Laursen that MTNA make a $100.00 donation to Willamette Falls Heritage Foundation in Al’s name. Motion passed.

Deb Scott, who coordinated the annual cleanup, couldn’t make the meeting and will report next month on the results of the clean up.

Katherine Anderson, our Southeast Crime Prevention Coordinator, said a community policing forum would be Wednesday, May 27^th from 6-8 p.m. at the Southeast Precinct at 4735 East Burnside. Katherine went on to say that the Portland Police Bureau Chief’s office and City Council did hear citizen concerns about precinct restructuring. The police’s Traffic Division will move to the Southeast Precinct building. She also said that with police redistricting that she will be reassigned elsewhere and Jenni Bernheisel will replace her as the Crime Prevention Coordinator for Mt. Tabor Neighborhood. Ms. Bernheisel can be reached at 503-823-2781.

Officer Gary Manougian, our neighborhood response officer, said that he will still be our neighborhood response officer but that there will be fewer officers overall. District boundaries have changed since the announcement was made that police precincts would be condensed into East, North and West.

The slate of proposed officers and board members was previously distributed, which was accepted by voice acclamation. The group thanked outgoing board members Don Jacobson, Cathy Kuehnl, Bunny Marechal and Gayle Marechal for their service. The officers now are Bruce Treat (president), Nancy Norby (vice president), Heidi Kohne (secretary), Bing Wong (treasurer) and Paul Leistner (SEUL delegate). Returning non-officer board members are Cascade Anderson Geller, Mark Bartlett, Jim Blackwood, Nadine Fiedler, John Laursen, Paul Leistner, John McLaren, and Stephanie Stewart. New members are Mike Shaver, and Dawn Smallman and Greg Snider (members sharing one seat).

Paul Leistner made a transcript of the first part of the LT2 meeting on April 11^th available to people. MTNA will also be putting this on their website. LT2 is the issue about filtering/treating and/or covering the reservoirs. A rumor is circulating that EPA will not allow a variance request and someone mentioned that Senator Merkley is getting involved with the project. Some neighbors are still trying to gather information and feel like they’ve been delayed. On motion by Mark Bartlett and seconded by Paul Leistner, MTNA will be writing a letter to the Water Bureau to help facilitate the disclosure of publically available records. MTNA will also be writing a letter to Senator Merkley seeing if he needs assistance or clarification and providing previous correspondence with the Water Bureau.

Paul Leistner says that Commissioner Fritz fought very hard to keep ONI budget cuts to a minimum. Paul said that he is likely withdrawing his name from the applicant pool for the SEUL director position. He went on to say that there were about 80 applicants for the job and that SEUL will soon begin conducting interviews. Tabor Commons received some grant money and also other money toward renovating the site.

Stephanie Stewart says the ClearWire antenna near 49^th/Burnside is still causing noise problems and that she will be writing a letter to Bureau of Development Services seeking compliance with cell phone antenna noise restrictions.

Sunday Parkways bike event will be in the Park on Sunday, August 16^th. Bands will be there as will a Shakespeare performance. The City is working closely with MTNA on noise restrictions.

The Parks department is considering having movies in the Park on Mondays in August. Some people felt that the request was rushed and not timely. Others were also concerned about having four weeks of concerts in July followed by four weeks of movies in August. Parks had come up with another proposal about having one movie night as a test but Parks representative wasn’t able to make the MTNA meeting to discuss further. After much discussion, a motion was made by Mark Bartlett, seconded by Nadine Fiedler that MTNA send a letter to Parks denying their request. Dallas DeLuca made an amendment, seconded by Bunny Marechal that the letter leave the door open to future movie nights but asking Parks to come out earlier in the year to make similar requests in the future. Motion as amended passed by a hand count of eight to seven with one abstention. Stephanie Stewart will write the letter.

Stephanie mentioned that at some point in the future that MTNA should consider amending its regulations about noise in the park and we will revisit the issue later.

Previous Minutes can always be found at www.mttaborpdx.org/about