Minutes for June 2026 WNA General Meeting

2026-06-18

Minutes for June 2026 WNA General Meeting

Woodlawn Neighborhood Association General Meeting Agenda

Tuesday, June 2, 2026, at 6:30 pm

Please make every effort to join us In Person at Classic Foods: 817 NE Madrona

Or join the meeting online via Zoom (now with improved audio): https://zoom.us/j/3014662210?pwd=d3VKbXkzVldqYzNWU2RwVm9OUkZyZz09

Meeting ID: 301 466 2210, Passcode: WNA

Streamed/recorded on our YouTube channel: youtube.com/@woodlawnneighborhoodassoci5818

Welcome and Vision: “In the future, Woodlawn will be a place where people live harmoniously, respectfully, and in support of one another. The neighborhood will be a clean and thriving community… All Woodlawn residents will share and pursue the common values of health, efficiency, beauty, equity, and justice.”

6:30 – 7:15 Neighborhood Meeting General Business

Board & Community Introductions (5 minutes)
Approve May Meeting Minutes (5 minute)

Joy Keen makes a motion to approve the May minutes. Linde seconds. All are in favor. May minutes are approved.

Plaza Updates – John (5 minutes)

John Tudisco was unable to attend the meeting so no new updates at this time. We believe there will be action on this in the near future. Keith notes one update—there is one minor hiccup on fire engines needing access to the apartment building because of codes and regulations, but this should be able to be easily worked out.

NNO/POP – August Party in Woodlawn Park – Need Volunteer Event Chair and Co-Chair + Fundraising to host the event for our community – August 4th 6-8pm? – Woodlawn Park – PZ/Joy (10 minutes) Jill & Angela have volunteered to collect prizes for raffles. Samantha has volunteered to help coordinate festivities. PZ is down to Co-Chair with someone else! We need to register our event with the city by June 30th https://www.portland.gov/community-safety/ovp/safe-blocks/pop#toc-register-your-party

We are financially lean this year so the event may have to be scaled down.

Jill and Angela have met about collecting prizes. They are reaching out to John about who to talk to re: businesses for prizes. They want to have a letter to explain the WNA and the WFM so that folks can understand what they are being asked to support. Jill and Angela are going to branch out to Concordia and other businesses on MLK re: raffle donations as well. They are currently waiting on PZ to write a letter. They have a long/complete list of neighborhood businesses and contacts. The goal is to make this more organized and use the information and process year after year! They will be doing email and in-person solicitations. Joy will set up a Gmail account for Angela and Jill to use from the WNA Google Workspace.

Joy found a historic binder about NNO planning. She is happy to hand it off to whoever ends up being in charge of the event. We may need to get creative about having food this year.

Another option—What if Tamale Boy could set up to sell food then gave us a percentage of their sales for the evening? Melissa might have a For Good and Company option for a grill.

Church by Tough Luck on NE Dekum—they want to volunteer at National Night Out. Melissa is a contact for this via her co-worker.

There are many different ways to approach it. It can be whatever we make it! Melissa reminded us that we have a letter re: in-kind donations for tax deductions.

Woodlawn Farmers Market Updates – Outdoor Season every Saturday June-October 9am-1pm. PZ/Keith (5 minutes)

Updates—The WFM is hiring 2 Team Leaders to work Saturdays this summer! Volunteer with us – sign up online – https://signup.com/go/bPHsYZf – Community Table Sign Ups are now live: https://forms.gle/fnTFd1Zr6A1fUaMg6

2 Cents Portland Group – 10 minutes

Jim Labbe gave a presentation on participatory budgeting. Since 2016, he has been working to bring this type of budgeting to Portland. It will now be a ballot measure in November 2026. work on bringing this type of budgeting to Portland. Participatory budgeting is a way for people to feel they have a meaningful voice in how city money gets spent. People don’t feel they have a meaningful voice in how money is spent in the city. The idea is to take a “pot” of funds and let residents decided how to spend it within a comprehensive process. Budget delegates then work with city staff to develop feasible projects. These then go on a ballot. This approach is a way for elected officials to learn what constituents value. Advocates for participatory budgeting need help getting signatures to be sure they are on the ballot. Need 41,000 valid addresses to be submitted by July 7, 2026.

Community Topics – Open mic – please prepare your topics at 2-3 minutes with 2-3 minutes for questions (5-6 minutes total) – It’s your turn to activate in Woodlawn! (15 minutes total)

Heritage Trees—James Y. is going to become a steward for our neighborhood and will be starting to inventory heritage specimens in Woodlawn and adjoining neighborhoods as part of this work.

Laura asked about the Woodlawn emergency planning event hosted by Portland Net. Woodlawn Net went to Piedmont to join their exercise to get a critical mass of participants. The exercise included stress testing, incident command, supplies acquisition among other activities. If you want to participate in future exercises or join the team, Ethan Jewett is the contact here in Woodlawn.

Neighbor Eric asked via e-mail if we might consider having flags in buckets at crosswalks to increase safety. Melissa previously evaluated the Dekum and Holman crosswalk near her house. $230-250 for 2 buckets and 12 flags. Supplies to make out own might cost less – maybe we can DIY some for that intersection? DIY workshop to teach folks how to make them. Keith — city doesn’t provide these but there is a Metro grant that has been successfully used to get these items. in the past. Another suggestion was to have them made at a future craft table at the farmers market.

Linde reminds folks on Saturday June 20^th celebration at the gazebo at Piedmont Park to honor Rosa Parks sign toppers. Via a grant, the Piedmont NA worked with PBOT to design and get these installed.

June 15^th is Breakside 16^th anniversary with a block party and street closure.

Saturday June 27^th Open-Air Sculpture walk in Cully.

*Conclusion of neighborhood meeting, feel free to stay to socialize!

7:15-7:30 Social Time

Meet your neighbors – this is a great time to connect with your neighbors, presenters, and partner with others doing awesome things in Woodlawn.

*Feel free to leave or stay for Board business!

7:30– 8:00 Board Business

Chair Updates – PZ
- Board Interest Topics from survey and Strategic Planning Sessions 2x per year

no update because PZ wasn’t able to attend.

- Community Table at WFM this Summer – opportunity to recruit volunteers, spread the word, etc.
Vice Chair Updates – Joy

Joy finished scanning and organizing all of the historical WNA documents that various folks on the board found here and there. She met with Guthrie and put together a Style Guide and a template folder. Other documents include a ticket log for volunteer events. All of these are currently in MS Word documents.

Joy also set up a password manager because it was time to change it.

Nancy will look at the historical minutes and see which ones are missing. Nancy will ask Lydia at NECN how Joy and PZ can get access to the Google Classroom at NECN.

Melissa has some of the Secretary of State reports and will get them posted.

Joy thinks we need a new W-9. We need to sign it and date it 2026.

Treasurer’s Report – Melissa

We have $3027.28 in the bank which is more than we had last year. At NNO last year, we spent only around $2000 but we had some in-kind donations. We got a $100 donation from someone in Alabama.

Farmer’s Market Finance Update – Keith

See above. No additional updates.

Land Use and Transportation Report – Anjala

A neighbor has announced that they will be doing short term rentals from an apartment on NE Holland. We also received a notice of a land use compliance project hearing – Anjala will investigate and see if it is important to WNA and then let us know.

Secretary’s Report – Nancy

Nancy met with Shelly to talk about Go Woodlawn hosting and what she has been providing for us. Shelly is happy to keep hosting for us, but we can also plan for a transition to our own server in the future likely via Go Daddy as a hosting service. Nancy will have more specifics about option, logistics, and costs at the July meeting.

Nancy will write to Shirley and Thelma re: board resignations including Shirley’s NECN resignation using the resignation letter template that Guthrie recently created.