rek Uncategorized

Reminder: Time to renew your membership

If you’ve been a North Street Neighborhood Association member, thank you! If you are interested in joining, now is a great time.

Our membership year ended on August 31st. We hope you’ll continue to be a member for the membership year that starts September 1, 2024 and goes until August 31, 2025. You can renew your dues by going to https://northstreetna.org/join-nsna, where you can select whether you are an individual or a household, and how you’d like to pay your dues (as well as how to apply for a waiver of your dues).

If you are planning to come to the NSNA meeting on Thursday, September 5th, you should renew ahead of that so that you can vote at the meeting (anyone is always welcome to attend). You can even renew online and then bring your dues in cash or check (made out to North Street Neighborhood Association) to the meeting.

Note: if you have paid your dues since August 1st, you are all set for the year and don’t need to pay again until next year.

By the way, you should have gotten a postcard in the mail from us – we’re doing a neighborhood survey at https://northstreetna.org/survey, and we’d love to hear from you.  

rek festival

Eken Park Fest is this Saturday, August 17

Our North Street Neighborhood Association’s annual Eken Park Festival is coming up this Saturday from 11am to 8pm…now in the actual park! That’s right, the festival will be held in Eken Park for the first time. Tell your neighbors, tell your friends. Everyone is invited. The day will be full of music, good food, kids activities, and beer. Keep reading for all the details.

Music lineup presented by Benchmark Exteriors:

12 pm Kid Jordan and the Second Line
1:40 pm Pink Halo
3:10 pm Nester
4:45 pm Kat and the Hurricane
6:30 pm The Periodicals

Kids Activities presented by Liz Lauer and Lauer Realty

Listening Lawn presented by Ella Apartments
Bring your own chair or blanket and relax!

4:00 pm Kids of All Ages Parade led by Kid Jordan (crowns, tiaras, and festival best encouraged)

The City of Madison Water Wagon will be serving up H2O please bring your reusable water bottle or glass-free drinkware.

Food truck favorites presented by Northstreet:

El Sabor de Puebla
Just Veggiez
Melly Mell’s
Teddywedgers
The Chocolate Shoppe
Mentoring Positives

This FREE festival is completely volunteer-run. Volunteering is a great way to get to know your neighbors. There are still some volunteer slots available

To learn more about the festival and to sign up for volunteer slots, visit the Festival Page. For full information about the day’s events, visit the Eken Park Festival Facebook Event.

We’ll see you on Saturday!

rek announcements, General

August 2024 North Street Neighborhood Association Meeting Agenda

The August meeting of the North Street Neighborhood Association will be on Thursday, August 1st, at 6:30pm at Bashford Church and online via Google Meet. You can view the meeting agenda, which includes the call-in information, meeting materials, and several announcements. Note that a few items, including the meeting minutes from July, are still being finalized and will be added as they become available.

rek Uncategorized

Volunteer at Eken Park Festival

Our annual festival, Eken Park Festival, is coming up in August. Did you know that it’s an entirely volunteer effort? We’re seeking volunteers for this year’s festival, which will be Saturday, August 17th. Volunteering is a great way to support the festival and get to know your neighbors. You can sign up here. Volunteers help with setting up, selling beer, emptying trash bins, and keeping things running smoothly. We also need volunteers to help with our fantastic kids area.

A picture of a previous year's festival. In the front, a sign says "Eken Park Fest August 17th, 11am-8pm". Behind the sign are metal butterfly sculptures and yellow flowers. In the background is a crowd of people. At the top, a hot dog with mustard has a propellor and is trailing a sign that says "Now in the actual park".
rek announcements, Giving Committee

NSNA Awards Grants to Neighborhood Projects

Reminder that the July NSNA meeting is NOT in two days, it will be on July 11th. Read on for an announcement about our first annual giving process! At the May NSNA meeting, association members had the opportunity to hear from the local organizations that applied for funding from the annual NSNA Giving Process, and rank the applicants to determine the allocation of funds. The process, overseen by the Giving Committee, is how the neighborhood association gives out funds raised through Eken Park Festival to support local projects.

This year year’s awardees were:

Emerson Elementary PTO, $1000 towards the purchase of a mat for their GaGa Ball Pit.

Emerson Eken Arts, $1000 towards the 2nd Annual Emerson Eken Art Walk (September 28, 2024).

Friends of Starkweather Creek, $924 towards purchasing native plants for the park at the corner of Commercial and McCormick.

Our co-chairs joined the Giving Committee chair to present the funds to a representative from each organization. We’re so glad to be able to support all three organizations with our first round of our giving process.

Three people stand in front of the corner of Commercial Ave and North Street. The Giving Committee Chair and the neighborhood association cochair are on either side; the Emerson Eken Arts representative is in the middle with a sign for the art walk.
Two people are standing in front of a tree. A representative from Friends of Starkweather Creek is on the left; a cochair of the neighborhood association is on the right.
Three people stand right behind the Emerson Elementary School sign. From left to right are the neighborhood association cochair, the Giving Committee Chair, and a representative from the Emerson Elementary PTO. The school is in the background.
rek Uncategorized

Yard Sale – again!

Our neighborhood yard sale continues this Saturday, June 8th, from 8am-2pm. You can view an interactive map here. If you missed last week due to the rain, this week is sure to provide all sorts of treasures.

rek announcements, Uncategorized

Emerson East Sign Installation

The new Emerson East neighborhood sign has been installed, and it looks beautiful. Groups of volunteers worked over the course of two weekends to install the sign and plant around it. If you haven’t had a chance to see it, it’s at East Johnson and Packers. We were joined by our alder Amani Latimer-Burris and City staff person Linda Horvath, who works in the Planning Division (which gave us the grant to fund the sign). The sign was designed by Emerson East resident Sara Hinkel.

rek announcements, Uncategorized

Neighborhood Announcements

We have a lot going on in the next few weeks in the North Street Neighborhood Association area, and even more in the coming months. Here are announcements about some of those, including volunteer opportunities.

Emerson East Neighborhood sign installation: We’ll be installing the new Emerson East neighborhood sign over the next two weekends. On Saturday May 11th from 9am-12pm, we’ll be pouring concrete and pulling up sod to prepare the site for planting. On Saturday May 18th from 9am-12pm, we’ll be planting a variety of plants around the sign. More volunteers means easier work for everyone. The location is East Johnson Street at Packers. You can preview the beautiful new sign on our homepage.

Friends of Starkweather Creek will be doing some planting by the creek during the week of May 19th. They will post a time and date on their Facebook page.

Yard Sale: Our annual Yard Sale will be on Saturday June 1st from 8am-2pm (rain date is June 8th). Register by May 22nd to be listed on the map. For more information, visit our Yard Sale page.

Bike to Work Week: Our Transportation Committee will setting up tables on the bike path on two different dates during Bike to Work Week. On Tuesday, June 4th, they’ll be on Commercial Avenue at the Starkweather path, and on Thursday, June 6th, they’ll be at Emerson East Park. Both mornings will be from 7am-10am. They are looking for volunteers to give out coffee & pastries to cyclists. You don’t have to volunteer for the full 3 hours. Contact us to get connected. And if you are a bike commuter, check out these stops on your morning commute.

Common Council Budget Engagement Events: Facing a budget shortfall for 2025, our Alders have put together events for people to give feedback about how we want to see the City address this. The event for the Northside (which includes District 12) is on Wednesday, June 5th at 6pm, at Black Hawk Middle School. There is also a downtown event on Thursday, May 30th at 6pm which will be hybrid, with a virtual participation option for those who may not be able to make it in person.

Our annual Eken Park Festival will be on Saturday, August 17th in Eken Park. The festival is always looking for volunteers, especially volunteers to help run the festival during that day. We’ll announce when the official volunteer sign-up is available. In the meantime, save the date and think about how you might want to help out.

The Emerson East Eken Park Art Walk will be on Saturday, September 28th. The Artist Registration is open now. If you are an artist in the Emerson East or Eken Park neighborhoods, sign up to show your work at the second year of this event (and if you know your neighbors are artists, encourage them to participate).

Finally, a reminder that our July Neighborhood Association Meeting will be on Thursday, July 11th (rather than on July 4th).