2010 Tet Cultural Event

The Vietnamese-American Community Service Center (VACSC) invites the community to this February 16 event to celebrate the Year of the Tiger.   This cultural event will help VACSC, the Vietnamese community, and friends of this Ward 1 nonprofit to celebrate a year of new hope, new beginnings, new strength, and new future!
Lunar New Year Invitation 2010

More TPS assistance

Catholic Charities' Immigration Legal Services is hosting workshops on Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Haitians pursuant to the recent change made by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, a division of the federal Department of Homeland Security.   (See this prior blog post for more information.)

The first workshop is being held on January 30 at 10:00 am in Silver Spring, MD.   Details (in English and Kreyol) are in the fliers, below.

HaitianTPSWorkshopsENGLISH

Aplike pou tanporè Protected estati yo

Catholic Charities is also holding a training on representing Haitians in applications for TPS on February 8.

DC Environmental Health Collaborative Community Forum

There are thousands of reasons why Ward 1 residents, and especially parents, should be concerned about the myriad ways our environment negatively impacts the health of children.   Others, too, have a stake in the environment and how it affects health, given the high rates of asthma and other health problems experienced by the residents of Ward 1.   These health challenges limit work productivity, voluntarism, and the like.

Those who are concerned and even interested should plan on attending this community forum on Saturday, February 6 from 10:00 am - 1:30 pm at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library located at 901 G Street NW.   The purpose of the meeting is to engage community stakeholders in discussions about local environmental health concerns.   All participants will work together to create an action agenda to address key issues of concern such as drinking water in schools, healthy homes, asthma, and lead poisoning.

Those who attend the meeting will be treated to a warm lunch; activities for children will be available.   Transportation to the event is available for those in need.   Additional information, including the process to RSVP is found in this flier.

Want to know more about how the environment affects health?   Consider that in 2004 nearly 7% of Ward 1 residents had been diagnosed with asthma (DOH fact sheet).   According to Rebecca Morley of the National Center for Healthy Housing, "asthma is epidemic in the District of Columbia: over 16,000 children, or 15.2%, were reported to have had asthma at some point in their childhood, the third highest rate in the nation (behind only Delaware and Hawaii)."   (Rebecca Morley, Executive Director, National Center for Healthy Housing)   Or consider that close to 90% of the city’s housing stock pre-dates 1978 and 50% of the total was built prior to 1950.   (Rebecca Morley, Executive Director, National Center for Healthy Housing)   This means that the chances of lead poisoning are greater than in newer, post-1978 homes.   The District of Columbia Coalition to End Childhood Lead Poisoning reports that Wards 1, 2 and 5 are considered to be "high risk" Wards for childhood lead poisoning.

ANC 1C06 reports on SWOT kickoff meeting

A shout-out to ANC 1C06 for reporting on the January 22 SWOT meeting - and taking and sharing some of the photos.

Strengthening Ward 1 - 72 strong!

Seventy-two people representing more than 50 organizations and civic associations packed a room at Girard Recreation Center for two hours on January 22, 2010 to kick off the new collaborative effort Strengthening Ward One Together.   The energy was palpable and exciting and clearly demonstrated the need for and interest in a coming together to better help our neighbors in Ward 1.

The group that convened at Columbia Heights Youth Club (in Girard Rec) generated an incredibly insightful and useful list of needs, assets, things to improve, and most importantly next steps.   Next steps include:

• In-service training on the SWOT blog - how to make the best use of it and how to contribute
• Workshops to improve the skills of staff
• Improving networking among and between service providers and the government

By the close of business on January 22, the Columbia Heights/Shaw Family Support Collaborative, which is facilitating the collaboration, had sent minutes from the meeting and the needs/assets/improvements/next step ideas (link above).   The Collaborative also announced the next big meeting and smaller group meetings:

• Next SWOT meeting:   Mark your calendars for the next SWOT meeting, February 19 from 9:30 to 11:30 am at the Columbia Heights Youth Club/Girard Rec Center.   During this meeting we will finalize next steps for the coming months based on all the feedback from the initial meeting.
• Sign up for SWOT blog notices:   Visit http://swotdc.blogspot.com to sign up for daily email updates of blog posts.   If you have specific events/ideas/data to share, send them to swotdc (at) gmail (dot) com.   If the information you want posted on the blog is also on your Web site, let us know by sharing the URL.
• Data meeting:   Contact Jess Quaranto (jquaranto (at) chsfsc (dot) org) if you are interested in participating in a the data work of discussing the service organization inventory, Ward 1 fact sheet, and service needs/assets survey.   The meeting is tentatively scheduled for February 5 at 1:00 pm.
• SWOT blog working group:   Contact Susie Cambria (susie (dot) cambria (at) gmail (dot) com) to get involved specifically with maintaining and transforming the current blog to meet the needs of all SWOT members.   This group will also meet in the next couple weeks before the next large group meeting.
• Review the action steps and consider leading a subcommittee:   Please review the next steps (see link above) and decide how you or your organization would like to participate in taking the next steps.   If you are interested in specific efforts and would like to lead a subcommittee, contact Jess Quaranto (jquaranto (at) chsfsc (dot) org).

If you missed the first meeting, no matter -- there is plenty to do and we welcome you to join the work!

Finally, if you have questions about the future of this collaborative effort or follow-up materials, contact Jess Quaranto (jquaranto (at) chsfsc (dot) org).

November 2009 unemployment

Ward 1's November unemployment rate, 10.2%, represents a miniscule, scientifically insignificant decrease from the October 2009 rate of 10.4%.   The Ward 1 rate was just under the citywide rate of 11.8% for the same period.   The change in Ward 1's unemployment between November 2008 and November 2009 is +42%, midway between the Ward 8 low of +33% and the Ward 3 high of +45%.

Free TPS assistance from CARECEN

Starting on Friday, January 29, the Central American Resource Center (CARECEN) will provide free assistance to low-income Haitians who live in DC filing for TPS (Temporary Protected Status).

CARECEN is having an information session (with French translation) on Friday, January 22, at 2:00 pm on TPS.   The session is being held at 1460 Columbia Road, NW C-1.   At the session, Haitians wanting to apply for TPS can get information on eligibility criteria, documents needed, and the application process.

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, a division of the federal Department of Homeland Security, may grant TPS to eligible nationals of certain countries who are already in the United States when conditions in the foreign country prevent the safe return of their nationals.   The Department of Homeland Security has designated Haiti a country incapable of accepting the return of their nationals.   Under this program, eligible participants may stay in the United States for 18 months and work.