We kicked off the warm weather with a May 9th Spring Clean-Up clearing 100’s of lbs of litter off every block in the neighborhood.

Thank you to Kevin Gregory for leading the event, Micha McDonald and North Vegans for cooking delicious sloppy joes, Luther Memorial Church and Pastor Bee Vang for graciously opening up their kitchen and dining hall for our post-clean-up celebration, Lucy Craft Laney K 8 Elementary School for donating May Day basket giveaways, and the City of Minneapolis for providing clean-up supplies and resources about recycling.

The Cleveland Community Garden went big in it’s second year with the help of Project Sweetie Pie, Kimberly Carpenter and our new GreenCorps Member, Eric Wilson. We built Compost bins to divert tons of organics from the waste stream, we taught folks how to ferment their vegetable scraps, we donated a couple hundred pounds of food to a local food shelf and we hosted garden parties for the whole community.

Star-studded performances from Debbie Duncan, Toki Wright and Javier Trejo made 2015 a huge year for our community concert series in it’s 8th year.

In our third year, Party in the Park is a community dinner at Cleveland Park for neighbors to come together to eat, play games and connect with resources. We even had owls and falcons visit from the Raptor Center!

In Partnership with Major Taylor Cycling Club, Lucy Craft Laney Elementary School, Safe Routes to School, North Minneapolis Bicycle Advisory Committee, Loppet Foundation, Minnesota Black Riders Association and Free Bikes 4 Kidz, we were able to bless 150 northside youth and their families with a free bicycle and helmet in December. A great opportunity to promote health, alternative modes of transportation, and community pride on the northside. A spring ride for families that received a bike is planned for April 2016.