Author Archives: Dave Paul

About Dave Paul

Past President of F.P.C.A. and active with Northland Community Council

Walk With A Doc 2015

Walk With A Doc is continuing! Dates are in our Calendar.

Flyers are now available on their web site (link below). Tell a friend!!!

Take steps to a healthier you with Walk with a Doc. Every other Saturday we will host an hour-long morning walk led by a physician from Mount Carmel Health System or the Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center. Walkers can come and walk for as little or as long as they like and all can enjoy refreshments and walking incentives at each walk.

Where: Woodward Park and Community Center, 5147 Karl Road, meet at front picnic tables*
When: selected Saturdays of each month, 8:30am – 9:30am

* Walks are held in the community center gym during bad weather.
** The June 6 walk will feature Mount Carmel’s Mobile Medical Coach – An urgent care center on wheels providing healthcare and screenings, while connecting patients to long-term care.

Call 614-645-1260 for more information, or visit the event website.
Ref: Walk With A Doc: Columbus Neighborhood Walking Clubs

Columbus Division of Police Community Meetings – Feb-Mar 2015

The one nearest our neighborhood is March 12th @ Crossroads Baptist Church, 5077 Cleveland Avenue (on the Calendar). Please come and contribute to a constructive dialogue with Chief Kim Jacobs and her staff.

Columbus Division of Police Community Meetings

Mayor Michael B. Coleman, City Council President Andrew Ginther, and Public Safety Chair Zach Klein announced in January a community outreach initiative to seek input on policing in Columbus. The initiative is in response to the national dialogue on building trust between the police and community.

The five (5) community meetings will take place in each police zone from 6:00p.m. to 8:00p.m. They have been set for:

  • February 23rd @ First Church of God, 3480 Refugee Road
  • March 2nd @ Briggs High School, 2555 Briggs Road
  • March 5th @ Linden McKinley High School, 1320 Duxberry Avenue
  • March 9th @ East High School, 1500 East Broad Street
  • March 12th @ Crossroads Baptist Church, 5077 Cleveland Avenue

These forums will provide the Chief and her executive staff an opportunity to listen to community concerns and accept suggestions regarding the Columbus Division of Police.

Upon completion of the community forums and reviewing the national, state, and local recommendations, Chief Jacobs will draft recommendations based upon best practices that will work in the City of Columbus.

The goal of these recommendations is to enhance training, review policing policies and procedures, increase education and outreach, and better improve upon relationships and trust between the community and police.
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For further information, Contact:
Sergeant Rich Weiner or Denise Alex-Bouzounis at (614) 645-4593

February 2015 Meeting

The next meeting of the Forest Park Civic Association will be on Tuesday, February 10, at 7 pm at Epworth United Methodist Church, 5100 Karl Road in the main sanctuary. ALL Forest Park residents are invited.

Bruce Robinson from Xenos Free Clinic will speak about the new Free Clinic in Northland.

We will also have a visit from our police liaison and a time to air any concerns and questions about the neighborhood you might have. We will pass them on to our city representative. Get an update on why and how nuisance hotels and clubs have been closed in the past year and learn what you can do to help in this effort.

In March we will have a speaker on the issue of feral cats, and in April City Council Member Shannon Hardin will come to personally learn about our neighborhood and hear our concerns. He attended the February NCC meeting, but did much more listening than speaking. I’m sure you will find him interesting.

Upcoming events are the Kick Butt Columbus cleanup day on March 28th (http://www.eventbrite.com/e/kickbuttcolumbus-2015-registration-14894071569), the first 161 Cleanup Day on April 11th, and the Northland Shredding Day on May 16th at Menards. See your February and March Foresters for more information.

Progress on A Nuisance Property – Club LaRue

Our work is starting to pay off!
Read:
Police shut down North Side after-hours club | The Columbus Dispatch
about progress in shutting down one area nuisance property.

Thanks to Bill Sperlaza at the City Prosecutor’s office, as well as Officer Scott Clinger and company at the Columbus Police. Thanks also to Rep. David Leland for working to get the bill in the Ohio legislature to give us more options.

Let’s keep the momentum, and keep building alliances with other community organizations on the legislative initiative.

Jan 20, 2015 Block Watch meeting on Nuisance Abatement

Whether or not you were able to attend the Jan 20, 2015 Block Watch Coordinators meeting which was open to all, here is some more information.

The information package supplied by Officers Scott Clinger and Larry Geis included three parts:

  1. License information and ORC change contains the most important thing: the Proposed changes to state law regarding Nuisances — as well as info about the licensure of a couple of problem motels.
  2. Inspection Report describes same problem properties, revealing the “worst hotels” inspector ever saw.
  3. Inspection Photo Report graphically illustrates the same.

# 1 is most important because it shows a course of action we can take, along with allies in other parts of Columbus and other municipalities throughout Ohio. A simple change in the law to include “offenses of violence, as defined by Section 2901.01 of the Ohio Revised Code” as part of the definition of “Nuisance” in Section 3767.01 would give authorities a means to act on cases where repeated violence occurs at problem properties.