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In December 1988 a group of concerned residents in the area of 500 & 600 Blocks of N. 10th Street formed a Crime Watch group, aptly named, the North 10th Street Patrol. This group patrolled the 8th Ward by car watching for suspicious activity. The group only fliered a small area near the church and had their monthly meetings every 2nd Tuesday of each month at 7:00pm at Seibert E. C. Church at 10th & Allen Sts. in Allentown. Their monthly meeting attendance was approximately 10-12 citizens.
In 1992, Anna Ruch took over as President and our past President, Patti Engler began as the Secretary. We started fliering a larger area within the 8th Ward and began to increase in attendance to 15-20 citizens. We began to do events that year, starting with the Police Appreciation Dinner held in May, along with a Summer Block Party held in the 700 Block of N. Lumber St., Clean-ups, a Family Picnic and a Family Holiday Party including a donation of turkeys purchased at Little Apple Market and donations of canned items collected by our volunteers to go to the 6th Street Shelter. The following couple of years reinforced a lot of our events and Family Summer Picnics, National Night Out Anti-Crime Marches & Celebrations, our Block Party, Halloween Haunted House and Family Holiday Party became Annual Events. A Youth Group was started in 1992 and held weekly fun activities for area children. This group was started by Bonnie Wachter, currently our 2nd Vice President and our then Neighborhood Community Police Officer, Roger Johns. This group met for 3 years, every Tuesday, during the school year and gave children in the area an opportunity to get to know a police officer and various neighborhood adults who care about kids in our neighborhood.
The group lost the leadership of Anna Ruch in February 1995, and that is when our past President, Patti Engler took over. At 26 years old, she was the youngest President in all of the neighborhood groups across Allentown. At the reorganization meeting in March 1995, Patti told the group that she needed all of their help in order for the group to succeed. She asked for help to deliver fliers. Every hand of the 20 attendees went up. To this day, there are 8 of those individuals still delivering monthly newsletters to the blocks in their area and many still regularly attend meetings and volunteer in various ways to help the neighborhood. In March 1995, we renamed the group the 8th Ward Neighborhood Block Watch, since we were not all residents of North 10th Street. (The 8th Ward is the voting district in which we live and our group only goes to 12th Street, while the whole 8th Ward goes all the way to 17th St.)
The goal of the group when Patti took over was to dramatically increase our membership and activities, and with the help of Jo-Anne Pawluck who served as our Vice President (1996) and Caren Kaste, Secretary (1995-1996) we began The Patroller, the newsletter of the 8th Ward Neighborhood Block Watch. We started with 180 newsletters only delivered to those who attended meetings. Our monthly meeting attendance raised to an average of over 20 attendees per month. We also offered morning meetings during 1995 at 10am on our normal meeting date and had 6-8 attend those meetings.
In 1997 with the help of Betsy Levin from the Bureau of Recycling and Solid Waste of the City of Allentown, Allentown Clean & Green assisted us in getting started on a Community Gardening Project. Our Garden is on the corner of 9th & Tilghman Streets and continues to produce a lot of vegetables for salsa for the Block Party and there is a beautiful butterfly garden as well as a bed of Red White and Blue Annuals. Thank you to Seibert E. C. Church for allowing the use of this corner to help beautify our neighborhood. Thank you also to the volunteers and residents in the area who help to water, weed and watch this wonderful corner of the 8th Ward. It's hard to believe that this is already year #8! Congratulations!!!
Also, in 1997 since we began to speak with a lot of master gardeners who helped us enormously with the garden planning and planting, especially Delana Hornbeck, we found out some information about 4-H. Shortly after our planting our Vice President, Bonnie Wachter, our Treasurer Carol Moyer and a member, Connie Guimares were trained as 4-H leaders. They started the 8th Ward Tropical Jungle 4-H Club that meets every Thursday evening from 6-7pm during the school year, (formerly held at the Pioneer Senior Center at 8th & Tilghman) now held at Seibert E. C. Church at 10th & Allen Sts. This Church has been a wonderful community partner and we're so very grateful to have them in our neighborhood. We couldn't do it without their continued support. THANK YOU SEIBERT E.C. CHURCH! The 4-H Club starts again in September and runs until June. So, if you are a young person between 8-18 yrs. old, or if you know someone who would like to join, please come and sign up. During 2002 their are four 4-Hers from the 8th Ward that are going to Camp Shehaqua along with leader Bonnie Wachter who volunteers at the camp. We hope that they have a wonderful time!!
Now in 2005, our membership continues to grow and our boundaries have grown too! We have over 40 volunteer newsletter deliverers who deliver 3,000 newsletters monthly to the door of every household. We are in the 11th year of production of The Patroller, which has really become a wonderful read. Thank you to our current external president Kim Beitler, formerly 1st Vice President and former Secretary who took what was an okay newsletter and made it into the best newsletter around with information from various sources in and around our neighborhood. Please check out this issue of The Patroller. It changes every month and offers various information about what is happening, who to call for what and features articles written by 8th Ward Block Watch residents. Make sure you check this out, it's the best!!!
We still meet every 2nd Tuesday of each month at 7:00pm at Seibert E. C. Church at 10th & Allen Sts. Allentown PA. Our attendance varies between 25-55 residents every month.
We receive phone calls from residents in our area and we assist these citizens with specific crime or quality of life related concerns. We also alert different city departments of potential problems by forwarding many anonymous complaints or concerns brought to our attention. Some city bureaus also know of our high level of involvement and call us seeking information about things specifically related to our area.
Our annual activities include attendance at the Crime Watch Banquet, participation in the Mayfair Celebration, Clean-ups, Patrolling, Block Party, National Night Out, Halloween Party for 4-H youth, Oldies Dances, Candidates Night Forums, Holiday Lights Contest, participation of Police Apreciation Lunch & Dinner and our Family Holiday Party with canned food drive with donations going to 6th St. Shelter.
We have worked closely with other neighborhood groups over the years and have had many successful things happen. We were all a part of the grassroots effort to get the Rental Inspections Initiative passed; making all City landlords accountable for property condition and tenants' behaviour. This initiative passed in the May 1999 Primary by the Allentown voters who voted in favor of this legislation by a margin of 84-16. A percentage unheard of and we could never have dreamed possible but made true by all of us who fought a hard battle and won. We thank you for your support! This was the first time ever that a group of citizens used the Initiative process, created in our Home Rule Charter, to pass legislation.
We have worked closely with Allentown Neighborhood Information Exchange and the Allentown Police Department to hold various forums for Allentown Residents; varying from Quality of Life Meetings, Community Policing Problem-Solving Training, and our most current Reclaiming Our Neighborhoods; which was hosted by our State Representative Jennifer Mann. This meeting was to help locate leadership and interest in an Allentown neighborhood that wasn't at the time active as a neighborhood group or Crime Watch. Old Town Neighborhood Watch has now formed and are working vigilantly to restore quality of life in their neighborhoods. We thank them and support them in their efforts; now and in the future.
Additionally, members of our group regularly attend and participate in monthly or weekly City Council and City Council committee meetings, Zoning Board Hearings, Disruptive Conduct Appeals Board, Crime Watch Presidents Council, Sheriff Sales and other Neighborhood /Crime Watch Group meetings. We have even worked in partnership with Community Action Committee of the Lehigh Valley to host the first ever FREE Conversational Spanish Classes held a few years ago for neighborhood residents and the Allentown Police Neighborhood Officers. Thank you to Esther Guzman, our teacher, for making the class fun and educational for all of us! And thank you to Alan Jennings of CACLV for funding it for us.
We strive to be informed and inform the public about what is going on in our city. It takes time to learn what can be done and to do it. We recognize the power of the individual citizen and recommend their involvement at whatever level they can. Knowledge is POWER. Get informed, get involved. This is your community and your city, it starts with YOU!! Join us. Silence is consent.
HELP CLEAN UP ALLENTOWN...REPORT ILLEGAL ACTIVITY
The 8th Ward Neighborhood Group Officers for 2006
Kim Beitler, President, External
Bonnie Wachter, President Internal
Brian Engler, Vice President
Jim Bast, Treasurer
Carol Moyer, Secretary
George Manniatty, Jr., Board Member
Minnie Nathan, Board Member
Charlie Seifert, Board Member
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