By Joe Culhane
Hello good fine folks of Concordia! My name is Joe Culhane, I am one of the new board members of the CNA and had the pleasure of coordinating the first-ever street painting at the intersection of NE 28th Ave and NE Jarrett St this last year. It was one of over 40 street paintings that took place here in Portland through City Repair’s annual Village Building Convergence. It was a great success and many of you may have been there and participated in the project. We had well over 100 people come out to help make this beautiful street mural come to life! We called the sight Jarrett Grove and have started a Facebook page where you can see pictures and a time-lapse of the painting from last year as well.
This is intended to be an annual project and is a great way to get together and meet more of our neighbors and build a greater sense of community. While I was delighted and honored to lead this project last year the reality that is literally in my hands (on my chest sleeping actually) right now is my newborn son, and he has taken center stage in my life these days. His care and that of my whole family has become my highest priority as you may well imagine. This year’s VBC is from June 3rd-12th, the paintings all happen during these 9 days, usually on one of the two Saturdays during that stretch.
So, this is a call out to you good people of the Concordia Neighborhood to please step up in to a leadership role this year to help make sure this year is a success as well. What that means is helping set up a few preliminary meetings with the neighbors involved, go to a few VBC meetings, and also help organize a small fundraiser for supplies. We held one at Wilder last year and it was really fun and very successful, many of the local businesses contributed prizes and we had a raffle, tons of people showed up and it was great!
It takes a lot for me to admit when I’m overwhelmed and have too much on my plate but alas, that is exactly where I find myself at the moment. I’m afraid this year’s painting may not happen if one or more people don’t step up and take the reins so by all means, please do! I’ll be available to give direction and guidance where I can and will absolutely help in the painting day and preparation leading up but really that will be the extent of my time and energy I realistically will be able to offer.
Thank you to all who helped make this happen last year, we couldn’t have done it without you! It really is a great time, last year we had donuts, coffee donated from Extracto, pizza, lemonade and iced tea, delicious treats, face painting, music, laughter, and community goodness abounding! May this be another successful year and maybe turn out to be even better as well!
Thank you again! You can email me or text/call me at (503) 446-2925 for more details.
Joe Culhane is a CNA Board Member