Yard Sale Saturday, June 30

Several residents on Cypress, Percy, and Chestnut streets will be holding a multi-family yard sale in the neighborhood Saturday, June 30, from 7am to noon (or whenever the buyers stop coming). If you have any friends who enjoy a good yard sale, please let them know. If you want to join in, feel free to set up a table on your lawn.

If you're not able to attend or contribute to this sale, many residents have expressed interest in holding another sale in late summer or late fall (when the weather's cooler)--we'll coordinate another sale then!

Mind Your Trash, Please

At this week's neighborhood board meeting, a neighbor on Chestnut Street noted that many trash cans in the neighborhood are not stored properly or removed from the street in a timely way, and felt that this was contributing to a "run-down" atmosphere that promotes crime.

David Wharton contacted a city employee about this, who said he would step up enforcement of the city ordinance, which runs as follows, and which basically says you have to remove your cans from the street withing 12 hours after pick-up, and you have to store your trash containers at the rear of your house.

Here's the text of the ordinance:

(1) All containers or carriers placed on any street to be emptied shall, within twelve (12) hours after the contents thereof are emptied and collected, be removed from such street to the rear of the premises by the owner or occupant of the premises from which such container came to a storage place provided for that purpose, which storage place shall be nearer to the house or building located on the premises than to any street abutting such premises or to any lot line.

(2) No solid waste containers or any form of movable carriers shall be placed, kept or left on any street for any purpose whatsoever on Saturday or before dusk on Sunday.

(3) Any solid waste container or any form of movable carrier placed or found in violation of this section will be deemed a public health hazard and reported to the county environmental health division and be subject to the fine outlined in this chapter.

Neighborhood Board of Directors Meeting

Our June neighborhood Board meeting will be held Tuesday, June 26, 6:30 p.m., at Coffee at the Summit.

We are looking for NOMINATIONS of who would like to serve on the Aycock Neighborhood Association beginning this September. Terms are for two years. There are four vacancies:

• Stephen Ruzika has decided to take a break after serving since 1984.
  
• David Wharton, Tracey Lamothe and Betsey Baun are also due to rotate off. All three of us will be running again. But we welcome others to also put their names forward. New energy is always good!

Please send your nominations to Paula Patch, Aycock’s secretary. This includes YOUR OWN NOMINATION if you are interested. Paula’s email is paulapatch@triad.rr.com

THE DESCRIPTION OF AN AYCOCK BOARD MEMBER is someone who:

• Lives in our neighborhood and is interested in serving our neighbors
• Wants to publicly help maintain and build our community through various projects and events
• Attends monthly meetings held the Tuesday before the last Wednesday of each month
• Gives careful consideration to the COA process which is the foundation of maintaining our historic designation
• Shares their interests, rolls up their sleeves occasionally to get things done and includes other neighbors in the process
  

IF THIS IS YOU – ATTEND TUESDAY’S MEETING AND LEARN MORE!

Board of Directors Agenda- 6:30 PM
Tuesday, June 26, 2007 Coffee at the Summit

Board Meetings are open to all Neighbors and Interested Individuals
Neighbors are encouraged to attend
Meetings typically run 1 ½ - 2 hours

6:30 – 6:40 PM Meet & Greet Introductions, New residents welcomed
6:40 – 7:00 PM Community Watch Officer Melanie Daniels and Chet Arnold


BUSINESS MEETING 7:00 PM

I. COA’s - Shawn Patch

II. Minutes – Paula Patch

III. Beautification Chairs- Laura Wall & Bert Vanderveen
· Neighborwoods
· Yard of the Month
· Home Improvement Award

IV. Treasurer’s Report – Tracy Lamothe

V. Marketing – Jacynthia Mitchell
· National Night Out

VI. Presidents Report – Betsey Baun

VII. Vice President’s Report – David Wharton

VIII. Other

Library Provides Access to Antiques Reference Database

From a recent issue of the Greensboro Public Library's newsletter:

Whether you’re a bona fide collector or just curious to know if the possessions you’ve cleared from the attic for your next yard sale are treasures rather than trinkets, you’ll want to check out the library’s Antiques Reference Database, available via the Premium Resources link on the library's website at http://www.greensborolibrary.org/. Spend just a few moments with this database and you’ll soon see why it is the preferred online resource of personal property appraisers, auction houses, museums, and government agencies that need to ascertain worth of an object. The Antiques Reference Database is freely available with your Greensboro Public Library borrower’s card!

If you need help getting started, click here or call the Information Services desk at (336) 335-5430.

Can You Hear Them? They're Talking about Us...

It seems that everyone in Greensboro is talking about what to do about War Memorial Stadium.

First, the city of Greensboro seems poised to do something: demolishing the parts of the stadium that are beyond repair, such as the entire third-baseline, could be part of the plan. Information about this appears in a May 11 post on neighbor David Hoggard's blog.

Several weeks ago, Irwin Smallwood, retired sports editor for the Greensboro News and Record, wrote an editorial that proposed dismantling the stadium and moving the facade to the grounds of the Greensboro Coliseum. (Here's what David Wharton had to say: A Little Urbanity: Um, Let's Not Do That)

The author of a letter to the editor in the June 10 News and Record agrees with Irwin.

And just last week, an editorial in the alternative newspaper Yes! Weekly
(which generally speaks favorably of neighborhood business) proposes a slightly
different solution in "What to do about War Memorial":

[W]e do not hate the old ballpark. In fact we admire its pre-war
architecture and the iconic gateway to the diamond. But that's not the primary
reason we don't want it torn down.

Like we said, promises were made, both to neighborhood residents and preservationists, that this old ballpark would not cease to be a live operation, that it would get its makeover and become the locus of community events, concerts and even baseball games, though not of the professional stripe. Placing the issue in the public's hands via a bond referendum does not constitute a promise kept.

And we think it's important to hold people to their promises.

Also, we've come up with a great use for the old space: Let the hipsters have it.

The infield is large enough to accommodate a stage, either at home plate or at left or right field, and there are already plenty of restrooms, concession areas and seats. We envision a spring and summer mini-festival series, with crafts and cheap beer and lots of bands, the louder the better, each installment raging until well after the lights cut on.

And if Aycock Historic District residents are serious about keeping the old ballpark, they shouldn't mind the noise all that much.

Maybe it's time that we (the Aycock Neighborhood) start talking about this, too. As always, send comments to historicaycock@gmail.com .

Events in Downtown Greensboro

Downtown Greensboro, Inc. has posted information about upcoming events near the 'hood.

Meet the New (Proposed) Neighbors

Aycock neighborhood association board member David Wharton has posted information on his blog, A Little Urbanity, about a multi-use development proposed for the old Pet building site on Summit.

Here's what David says:

It may not be the huge, $200 million-plus project that's all the buzz in Greensboro these days, but Brown Investment Properties and Kavanagh Homes are moving toward building Murrow Station, a residential/office project in the northeast corner of the downtown business district, about 200 yards from my house. It's a $42 million development, and that's nothing to sneeze at.It looks like it will have about 132 condominiums and townhouses, along with office or retail on the first floor along Lindsay and Murrow, and (I hope) Summit Avenue.

Check out the entire post to see an artist's rendering of the proposed project.

If you have suggestions or comments about the project, let the board know by contacting a board member or sending an e-mail to historicaycock@gmail.com.

Save the Date: National Night Out and Neighborhood Picnic

This year's Aycock Neighborhood Picnic is scheduled for Tuesday, August 7.

More information about food, fun, and other related events will be available soon.

Doing Our Part for the Environment

The May 20 issue of The New York Times magazine focused on eco-friendly living, or what the Times called "eco-tecture." One of the articles, "An Eco-House for the Future," which described a futuristic "guilt-free, sustainable, luxury Phantom House," elicited this response from Steven McClain, president of the National Architectural Trust:

Your attention to the issue of sustainable design is laudable,
yet it omits a player in the green-building movement: historic preservation. Rehabilitating existing buildings is almost always more environmentally efficient than tearing down and building anew. Maintaining and improving historic buildings and the neighborhoods in which they stand allows for the continued use of valuable infrastructure.

McClain has an ally in historian and essayist Adam Goodheart, whose essay "This Old, Organic House" appeared in the same issue of the NYT Magazine. Goodheart, the director of Washington College's Center for the Study of the American Experience, reminds us that "green" building is nothing new:

If by “green architecture” we mean buildings designed to exist in harmony with environmental conditions, to conserve fuel and regulate temperature by “natural” means, then it is easy to forget that this did not begin with the invention of solar panels, photovoltaic cells and LEED certification. Americans have been experimenting, adapting and reshaping their architecture to suit their local environment since the very beginning.

As if any of us here in the Aycock Neighborhood needed reminding.