Friday, May 15, 2009

Our schools as community centers

Back to the comments by Alderman Lyle:
on Apr. 7th, I met with Ron Huberman about the necessity for opening up our schools as community centers after school hours and on Saturdays. He agreed that we will start moving in that direction. On Tues. Apr. 14th, I was working on approval for a new after-school and summer program for community youth across from Ruggles Elementary. South Central Community Center will start this program in the next month. On Thurs. April 16, 2009 I asked Police Command staff for a dedicated car to be assigned to 79th Street from State to the railroad tracks, at a City Council committee meeting. On Fri. the Library shooting occurred. On Sat. a dedicated beat car was assigned to patrol 79th St. The following week, I was meeting with the Park District about free open gym at Tuley Park and a Tennis program for our community on the courts at Tuley and Ruggles. Today, I was informed we have hired a Tennis instructor. Last week, I was in discussion with Kubla Toure (Amer-i-can) and Minister Muhammad (Nation of Islam) about violence prevention and suppression programming efforts in our community. Understanding that the causes of violence are numerous, it will take long term action on various fronts to attack the roots. In future posts I’ll discuss in detail some of the actions we are going to be taking in the 6th Ward to stop the violence and ‘reweave the social fabric’ that strong communities must have to raise healthy, educated, well-adjusted children.
Actually I think I can go with this idea of turning our schools into community centers. Perhaps schools shouldn't be out, but also available for additional programming for our young people or even our elderly. Perhaps during the school year or summer recess community organizations can hold meetings on school grounds as well. Something to consider.

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