Winter Newsletter
December 2020
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Staff: Sophia Figueroa, Liaison Email: District11@DallasCityHall.com
Madison Johnson, Assistant Telephone: 214-670-7817
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Season Greetings,
This year has been difficult for many because of COVID-19. If you or someone you know is needing assistance with any resources, please contact our office.
Please enjoy reading our newsletter which provides district and citywide updates. Constituents can voice their concerns through calls and emails to our office and can also submit service requests by using 311.
Thank you for your community engagement and dedication to make this City a better place to live!
Sincerely,
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Lee M. Kleinman
Council Member
District 11
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Branching Out Events
(Pagewood Park & Valley View Park)
Thank you to everyone who volunteered at "Branching Out" Tree Planting Events at Pagewood Park and Valley View Park! The trees look amazing thanks to your planting expertise.
A special thanks to the Park and Recreation staff, Jeff Kitner D11 Park Board Member, and to all the volunteers.
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Thank you Park and Recreation Staff
(Valley View Park)
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Thank you volunteers
(Valley View Park)
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A special thanks to Park and Recreation staff Sloan Anderson and Jeff Kitner Park Board Member (Valley View Park) |
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Tree planting was an awesome experience
(D11 Council Liaison - Sophia Figueroa
Valley View Park)
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Park and Recreation staff and volunteers
(Pagewood Park)
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Park Board Member Jeff Kitner and volunteer (Pagewood Park) |
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Thank you to all the volunteers
(Pagewood Park)
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Park and Recreation staff
(Pagewood Park)
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Services of Hope
A special thank you to Services of Hope Farmers to Families & Community Food Boxes for helping families in need. Services of Hope provided Thanksgiving Boxes to Anne Frank Elementary for families in need. Thank you to all the volunteers that helped with this amazing event.
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Thank you to the teachers and volunteers at Anne Frank Elementary School. |
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Park Central Condo HOA
Update by Bill Gart HOA Representative
As you know each year our Park Central Condo HOA we hold twice a year a Food and Clothing drive the first Saturday in May and the first Saturday in November. This year due to COVID-19 we had to cancel our May drive. I contacted our committee and suggested to send out notices to all of our homeowners that would like to make a donation of $5.00 and the proceeds would go to Vickery Meadow Food Bank on Walnut Hill Lane.
The program was November 1 thru November 15th and flyers were placed on each door and each mailbox of the HOA announcing the drive. Also, our neighboring HOA Hillcrest Forest was invited to join us and they accepted. They reached out to their community and provided a website to make donations for this cause. Their donations were $5, $15, or $25.00. The total amount collected from both HOA groups was $2,300.00 and presented to the Food Bank. The Vickery Meadows Food Bank shared that since March 2020 they now serve 4 times as many people than they have in the past.
The goal is to implement this program for each district beginning February 2021.
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Esperanza District Building Blocks
Building Blocks Stakeholder meetings for the Esperanza District will restart in January 2021 with the assistance of Community Prosecution, Dallas Police Department, and various community leaders.
These meetings will be held to develop and discuss crime reduction strategies and offer collaboration on quality of life improvements for residents and businesses. Owners and managers of businesses in the district should participate to discuss concerns and learn about helpful resources.
You are invited to join a virtual meeting on Thursday, January 14th at 10am - 11am.
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Northaven Trail Expansion
Update by Jeff Kitner D11 Park Board Member
The Northaven Trail, which on the eastern end currently terminates at Valleydale Drive, is expanding east. As part of a Texas Department of Transportation (TXDOT) project, the trail will eventually connect with the White Rock Creek and Cottonwood Creek trails on the east side of Central Expressway via a bridge over Central Expressway. The bridge is currently in the final design stages with TXDOT, and the project should go out to bid in spring of 2021. For renderings of the proposed bridge, please visit here. Additionally, the City of Dallas is preparing to make modifications to Valleydale and Northaven Road to make these more pedestrian and bike friendly as the final connection between the current terminus and the entry point for the new bridge.
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Valley View/Galleria District
I am excited to be kicking off a strategic planning process in 2021 for the Valley View/Galleria District along with co-chair and former Park Board commissioner, Amy Monier. Stakeholders and neighbors will be included in an extensive process to shape the direction and bring all the facilities, amenities, and connections together into a single, cohesive vision.
In November, voters approved a Dallas Independent School District bond election, including a new K-12 choice school to be located in the Midtown area and designed to compete with private schools in North Dallas.
Thanks to the incredible work by the North Dallas Chamber of Commerce and Texas A&M Commerce, a new DISD Choice school will be coming to D11!
The International STEAM Academy will be the first DISD PreK-12 school in Dallas.
The focus will be science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics with an international perspective.
Due to the success of the recent DISD bond election the school is slated to be in the 1st tranche of funding. After the new year the DISD will be hiring a project manager and begin bringing this dream to reality!
For details about the STEAM Academy visit here.
Also, the City of Dallas is in negotiations to acquire several different properties in the area. These acquisitions will be used to help create new park and cultural affairs spaces in the district. The Midtown Park Foundation has been working on strategies to raise funds for the acquisition of additional land in the district for the development of a signature park. Finally, the North Central Texas Council of Governments and Jacobs Engineering completed a mobility study for a people mover project within the
Midtown area.
A park vision plan has been completed view details here:
A Transportation/Parking study for an Automated Transportation system is complete:
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Budget and Management Services
(Virtual Neighborhood Public Meetings for HUD Grant Funds)
Budget and Management Services (BMS) and the Community Development Commission (CDC) will host six public engagement meetings, beginning January 7 - 14, 2020. The purpose of these meetings, is to encourage residents to provide comments and input on potential uses for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) funds of the Consolidated Plan. The Consolidated Plan grants include: Community Development Block Grant (CDBG), HOME Investment Partnership Program (HOME), Emergency Solutions Grant (ESG), and Housing Opportunities for Person with AIDS (HOPWA). Information on the dates, times, and links for the virtual meetings are published on community development website click here.
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City Website Dalbot Feature
Dalbot is a new chatbot tool on dallascityhall.com that makes it easier for Dallas residents and stakeholders to find City services, resources and general information. Dalbot is available in both English and Spanish. For more detail click here.
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Dallas Animal Services
(DAS Offers New Online Tool to Help Residents in Need of Rehoming Pets)
DAS recently launched a partnership with Home to Home™, an online platform that allows residents to proactively rehome their pets when keeping them is no longer an option. This free tool offers an adoption process very similar to the one at DAS and helps the owner have quality conversations with potential adopters to find the right match. Home to Home™ also allows pets to go directly from their old home to a new one, preventing shelter overcrowding and saving shelter resources for pets with no other options. Within the first week of launch, 26 residents utilize the tool to rehome their pets.
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Dallas Public Library
(Wi-fi hotspot)
Request your hotspot now!
With the rollout of the additional 2,100 hotspots, for a total of 3,000, the Dallas Public Library is encouraging residents to place a request for a hotspot now. It's easy to log click here, search hotspot in the catalog and mark your place in the queue. Requests will be available for pick up at any library location, except Bookmarks in NorthPark Center.
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Holiday Safety Tips
Holiday gatherings are not recommended this year. If you decide to celebrate with close friends and family, practice these safety tips to prevent the spread of COVID-19. #StayOnGuardDallas
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Office of Arts and Culture
(Arts & Culture Holiday Events & Programs)
The Office of Arts and Culture (OAC) has put together a list of highlights of 2020 holiday events and programs for the month of December. Whether you are staying inside and enjoying virtual events by the fire or looking for in-person, socially distanced events, there are so many ways to feel the holiday cheer this season. The list of highlights pulls from OAC Cultural Centers as well as partners from all over Dallas such as the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, Dallas Arboretum and Botanical Gardens, and more! For more information, please click here.
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Office of Community Care
(Office of Community Care - WIC Reimagine How Families Access Social Benefits)
The work of the Office of Community Care’s Women, Infants and Children (WIC) Local Agency 07 (LA07) in partnership with Child Poverty Action Lab (CPAL) was featured in a recent newsletter for global nonprofit design firm, IDEO.org. The feature highlighted a design thinking project implemented by WIC LA07 and CPAL to better understand the needs and barriers to service for WIC clients and target populations, showcasing incredible work on the front line transforming a program to better support families across Dallas.
WIC Local Agency 7 and CPAL prototyped different ways to implement seamless trips to the grocery store and created warmer, community-centered clinic visits. Using the WIC playbook developed with CPAL and IDEO, the City of Dallas accessed national Americorps VISTA grant funding. New VISTAs corps members will be onboarded in the coming months to focus on prototyping and implementing additional concepts from the playbook to clarify and improve families’ access to social benefits.
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Celebration Week
In January 2021, the City of Dallas will host its 39th annual celebration of the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. with a weeks’ worth of events highlighting issues of equity, diversity, and opportunity. The theme for Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Week 2021, selected by the MLKJCC Advisory Board is “The Fierce Urgency of Now.” MLK Week 2021 will include a Candle Lighting Ceremony, Youth Fair, Wreath Laying Ceremony, Job Fair, Equity Symposium, and culminate with the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Awards & Scholarship Gala. Event details are being finalized and can be found here.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Essay Contest
The City of Dallas is pleased to announce the 2021 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Essay Contest! The contest will award six scholarships up to $5,000 (per award) to graduating high school seniors or first-year students accepted into a college-level educational institution (two-year college, four-year college, or trade school). This year’s essay prompt aligns with the theme of the 2021 Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Celebration Week, “The Fierce Urgency of Now”. The submission deadline is December 31, 2020.
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Office of Community Police Oversight
The Community Police Oversight Board (CPOB) took a historic step at its December 8th monthly meeting. The Board voted for and added Dallas City residents to all five of its subcommittees. The community members will be notified of their appointment by the Director of OCPO. You will be able to view the selected residents on the CPOB website soon. OCPO is excited about working with the CPOB to onboard the community members so they can start serving on those committees in the early part of 2021.
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Office of Economic Development
(Economic Development Small Business Continuity Fund Update)
The Small Business Continuity Fund (SBCF) has awarded funding to more than 300 Dallas small businesses impacted by COVID-19. Since July of this year, the SBCF program has funded 316 grants, totaling more than $2.7M in grant funding. An additional 18 loans have been approved, totaling $450,900, bringing the overall amount of approved funding under the SBCF program to $3.2 million. We will continue processing the first round of applications and expect to reopen applications again early in 2021. Businesses that would like to be added to the notification list can email SBCF@dallascityhall.com.
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The Office of Environmental Quality and Sustainability
(2019-2020 Air North Texas Partner Award)
The Office of Environmental Quality and Sustainability (OEQS) is pleased to report that the City has been awarded the 2019-2020 Air North Texas Partner Award for Outstanding Outreach by the North Central Texas Council of Governments (NCTCOG). This award reflects the work of the Air Quality/Climate Policy Team in OEQS who re-vamped the North Texas Climate Symposium, the Clean Air Action Day, and other outreach and engagement efforts to a virtual platform, to amplify the NCTCOG Air North Texas messages, through outreach and education on local air quality. As part of this work, staff analyzed air quality data over time compared with the air quality during the initial COVID19 shutdown, to investigate and better understand air quality improvements achieved with reduced vehicle emissions.
Staff was honored at the December 10, 2020 meeting of the NCTCOG Regional Transportation Committee. This award is well-deserved, and reflects the hard work, dedication, innovation and programmatic creativity by these staff members. Their efforts continue to reflect positively for the program and our City.
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Office of Equity and Inclusion
The Office of Equity and Inclusion implemented a campaign developed by the City of Dallas to engage residents, community leaders, and organizations to slow the spread of COVID-19 throughout our communities. #StayonGuard when at home, work, and school. Protecting ourselves, wearing our masks, and maintaining a safe distance are strategies we must continue implementing to protect our loved ones. For additional details about Stay on Guard visit here.
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Office of Homeless Solutions
(COVID-19 hotel shelter operations)
St. Jude - Park Central began Phase I COVID-19 hotel shelter operations for guests. At present, there are 13 guests receiving care. Efforts are continuing at the site to make all 180 rooms available for COVID-19 hotel sheltering. The St. Jude – Park Central project is a joint collaborative between the City, County and Catholic Housing Initiative. OHS is supporting this property by managing hospital referrals.
Based on the current availability of hotel rooms, OHS will have capacity and an approved contract, from the City Council, under the Coronavirus Relief Funds to meet the needs of the Bridge: Homeless Recovery Center.
In conclusion, OHS and our partners have served more than 1,000 unduplicated guests in hotel sheltering since March. OHS will meet the deadlines of the Coronavirus Relief Funds that support these operations by concluding hotel sheltering prior to December 30th, 2020. Due to the added capacity of the St. Jude – Park Central development, we estimate enough capacity to support on-going needs.
The Office of Homeless Solutions (OHS) has implemented a Service Request dashboard to be utilized to track the progress of encampment resolution efforts. Constituents can access the dashboard by clicking here.
Homeless Encampment Cleaning Update
On December 4th, City Council was advised by the Office of Homeless Solutions and Dallas Police Department of the implementation of a temporary suspension of homeless encampment resolutions as a result of on-going COVID-19 cases and current guidance. This week, The OHS Street Outreach teams engaged with persons experiencing unsheltered homelessness, following all current CDC COVID-19 protocols and procedures, and provided proactive clean-up of trash and debris, distributed waste and hygiene supplies, and made connections to resources and shelter. The following locations were served on Tuesday, December 15th:
- US-75 & Forest Lane
- 508 & 515 Park (Corner of Canton St. & Park)
OHS will continue to monitor, assess, proactively clean and provide sanitary products to known encampment locations to limit the potential spread and effects of COVID-19. Information on continued service to homeless encampments can be found here.
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COVID-19
Mobile In-Home Testing
Call 1-833-657-1887
(See Details Below)
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¡Pruebas Móviles, En Casa,
COVID-19
Ya Estan Disponsibles!
LLAME A 1-833-657-1887
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Dallas Water Utilities
(Rates became effective October 1, 2020)
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Dallas Public Library
(Bring the internet home)
Bring the internet home with a Wi-Fi hotspot from Dallas Public Library! The library will soon have 2,100 more hotspots for cardholders to borrow. Request one now to get on the waitlist and you'll be first in line when they're available for check out. To request a hotspot click here.
Traiga Internet a Casa
¡Traiga el Internet a casa con un Hotspot Wi-Fi de la Dallas Public Library! La biblioteca pronto tendrá 2,100 Hotspots más para que los titulares de tarjetas puedan pedir prestado. Solicite uno ahora para entrar en la lista de espera y será el primero en línea cuando estén disponibles para alquilar. Para más información haga clic aquí.
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Domestic Violence Information
- Domestic Violence affects individuals in every community, regardless of age, economic status, sexual orientation, gender, race, religion or nationality. You are not alone; help is available.
- It takes courage to ask for help when someone you love is hurting you. You are not alone; support is available.
- Domestic Violence includes physical violence, sexual violence, psychological violence and emotional abuse. Violence in relationships is never okay. Speak with someone to understand the signs of abuse.
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Violencia Doméstica
- La violencia doméstica afecta a personas de todas las comunidades, independientemente de la edad, la situación económica, la orientación sexual, el género, la raza, la religión o la nacionalidad. No estás solo; hay ayuda disponible.
- Se necesita el valor para pedir ayuda cuando alguien que amas te está lastimando. No estás solo; hay ayuda disponible.
- La violencia doméstica incluye la violencia física, la violencia sexual, la violencia psicológica y el abuso emocional. La violencia en las relaciones nunca está bien. Habla con alguien para entender los signos de abuso.
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Caring for an aging loved one is no easy task. Whether caring in your own home for a parent or spouse or caring from afar while a loved one is in a nursing home or assisted living facility, things can be stressful. This year, with the pandemic and the upcoming holidays added on, The Senior Source offers these Top 10 Tips for taking care of yourself so you can be the best caregiver you can be.
1. Reset your expectations. While it used to be feasible to travel from various relatives’ homes, traveling might not be possible or recommended for elderly people this year. Stay home and stay safe if you are able.
2. Prepare family members for any changes your loved one may exhibit during a socially distanced visit or on a virtual visit or call.
3. Maintain routines as much as possible.
4. If your “to do” list is a mile long and you aren’t enjoying the season, re-evaluate and determine which items on the list you can cut out or assign tasks to other family members.
5. Ask your loved one what THEY would like to do this holiday season and find out what their expectations are. There are still fun ways to enjoy the holidays safely. If your loved one lives with you, take a drive together to look at lights from your car or check out online opportunities for holiday music or shows.
6. Prepare and share at least one favorite holiday dish instead of trying to prepare the whole meal.
7. Keep your sense of humor. Research shows that laughter and humor help manage stress and has many health benefits.
8. Create new traditions when the old ones are no longer feasible for your loved one to engage in or because of pandemic restrictions.
9. Designate a quiet time or quiet space where your loved one can rest and relax.
10. Recognize the signs of caregiver burnout before they strike. Take time for yourself and engage in activities that bring you comfort and relaxation. Don’t forget to ask others in your household for help and allow family members to take on tasks to give you a well-deserved break.
Bonus Tip-11. Call the Caregiver Support Program team. We are here for you! 214-823-5700.
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View these links for helpful information:
Building Inspection online permit process view here.
City Website Dalbot Feature for details click here.
Dallas County Covid-19 information view here.
Dallas Library view here.
Dallas Police New Chief view here.
Dallas Water Utilities view here.
Office of Arts & Culture view here.
Office of Community Care Covid-19 resources view here.
Office of Homeless Solutions view here.
Office of Welcoming Communities & Immigrant Affairs view here.
Office of Special Events view here.
Park and Recreation view here.
Sanitation Services view here.
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Virtual Neighborhood Public Meetings for HUD Grant Funds
Information on the dates, times, and links for the virtual meetings are published on community development website click here.
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Dallas Area Rapid Transit
SilverLine
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Contact Us
We enjoy hearing from you and ask that you continue to connect with our
office. As always, our office is here to assist with any service requests and any
policy questions.
Sincerely,
The District 11 Team
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