By Lindsey Fenner
East Phillips Neighborhood Group Partnering with Southside Harm Reduction Services for Syringe, Litter Pickup: The East Phillips Improvement Coalition (EPIC) approved $15,000 for Southside Harm Reduction Services”™ (SHRS) “Community Syringe and Trash Clean Up in East Phillips Project.” The funding will pay community members that SHRS serves in gift cards to help clean up the neighborhood of syringes and other litter. Based in South Minneapolis, SHRS “works within a harm reduction framework to promote the human rights to health, safety, autonomy, and agency among people who use substances.”
Public Housing Class Action Lawsuit Filed against City, Minneapolis Public Housing Authority:
The complaint against the City of Minneapolis and the Minneapolis Public Housing Authority (MPHA) was filed in MN District Court in September, on behalf of public housing tenant Kimberly Lowry and other Minneapolis public housing tenants. The civil rights lawsuit alleges “longstanding and egregious discriminatory practices that have forced public housing tenants in Minneapolis to live in substandard and dangerous conditions.” The current Executive Director of the MPHA is Abdi Warsame, former Ward 6 City Council Member.
New Program Providing Foreclosure Prevention Advising and Financial Assistance to Homeowners: Hennepin County and the City of Minneapolis have partnered with Minnesota Homeownership Center to create and administer the Hennepin Homeownership Preservation Program (HHPP). HHPP is promoting foreclosure prevention advising to Hennepin County homeowners, and limited financial assistance may be available under certain circumstances.
The maximum amount available to any household through HHPP is $35,000. To determine eligibility for HHPP, applicants should complete the eligibility form at HennepinHPP.com. For assistance, applicants may call 651-236-8952.
Grants to Plant Your Own Pollinator Habitat: The Lawns to Legumes program is now accepting applications for up to $300 cost-sharing grants to help Minnesota residents establish pollinator habitat in their yards. The program supports participants to put in pocket plantings, trees and shrubs, and pollinator lawns and pollinator meadows to help conserve at-risk species. A key focus is to protect the endangered rusty patched bumble bee, the Minnesota state bee. The deadline for applications is February 15, 2022. To learn more and apply: https://bluethumb.org/lawns-to-legumes/
2021 Creative Response Fund Grantees Announced: The City of Minneapolis is providing grant funding to 19 arts projects as part of an arts initiative to “heal and restore communities traumatized after the murder of George Floyd.” A sampling of projects with Phillips connections are:
Resiliency through Soliloquy: Maria Isa Perez and Charlie Thayer will highlight the collective voice of healing in the Twin Cities through drum, dance and song via a public art performance. The project will center the Native community in South Minneapolis through collaborations with Little Earth of United Tribes and the Latinx community.
Star Girl Clan: Rebekah Crisanta de Ybarra and Magdalena Kaluza will create a performance using magical realism and a journey into the Maya cosmovision. An intergenerational story of emergence and healing transformation, the show calls on ancestors and cellular memory to inspire a new generation of descendants to look up into the stars and to care for the earth.
Story Circles: Carolyn Holbrook, Sagirah Shadid and Melissa Olson will offer a series of writing workshops and story-circle-format public conversations around multiple issues of cultural traumas that impact BIPOC communities in every aspect of their lives.
To learn more about the projects, visit: https://www.minneapoliscreates.org/creative-response-fund
Celebrando Juntos:
nuestra cultura, nuestra gente y nuestra historia ”“ Celebrating Together: Our culture, our people and our history
Eventos y programas en linea de la biblioteca / Library online events and programs:
October 4 at 7 p.m.
Honoring Latino/a and Hispanic Heritage month, this fun, interactive session will present amazing facts about the Spanish-speaking world, with special emphasis on Spanish and Latinos in the U.S. ”“ English.
Octubre 11 a las 7 p.m./October 11 at 7 p.m.
Esta conversación está dirigida para los jóvenes latinos sobre los desafios y recompensas de crecer latino/a en los Estados Unidos. This conversation is led by Latino youth about the challenge and benefits of growing up Latino/a in the United States. ”“ Billingual.
Serie de clases de computación/Comenzando el 12 de octubre de 6:30-8:30 p.m. Todos los martes de 6:30-8:30 p.m. durante 8 semanas
Clases de emprendimiento/Los sábados en la mañana durante 6 semanas empezando en el 2 de octubre de 10-11:30 a.m
Llame o envie un texto al 651-503-8013 para recibir más información en español. / Please call or text our Spanish language line for more info: 651-503-8013.
