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There will be a Tools 4 Schools event at the Rainier Vista Boys and Girls Club on Friday, August 28 at 4:30-7:00PM.  Register for a new membership ($20 a year!) and receive a backpack filled with school supplies.  Get there early as supplies will be limited!

After you’ve got your Tools 4 Schools, stop by the Neighborhood House for story readings and bookmark decorating on Friday August 28, at 4:30pm (4410 29th Ave. S.).   Free books and resources!  This is for kids of all ages!

The local La Leche League meets here at NRV in the WAMU Room upstairs in the Neighborhood House. The next meeting will be Wednesday, 8/12, at 10:15am. The topic will be Improving Family Nutrition, but the discussion will first focus on the needs and questions of the moms that attend the meeting.

La Leche League meetings are a gathering of mothers and babies who are breastfeeding, struggling with breastfeeding and interested in breastfeeding. We will discuss the questions/needs that moms come with and a planned topic if time allows. If you are struggling with a breastfeeding issue, come and get support from fellow mommies. If you are enjoying breastfeeding, please come share your experience and support the other moms in your community! If you are pregnant, come and hear the tidbits of info we all wish we had known before our babies were born!

Children, pregnant women, partners, dads and grandmas are all welcome!

For more info, please contact the leaders of the South Seattle La Leche League, Emily (LLLemhealy@gmail.com) and Erin (erin.lalecheleague@gmail.com).

The first annual Southeast Seattle Vietnamese Resource Fair will be on Friday, July 17, 2009 from 5:00 pm to 8:00 pm at the NewHolly Gathering Hall, 7054 32nd Ave South, Seattle, WA 98118. The goal of the resource fair is to help the Vietnamese American and immigrant community become better acquainted with government services as well as services provided by advocacy and community-based organizations.

At the fair there will be health, education, employment, housing, legal and a variety of other resources. We have government, city and community-based organizations participating in the fair. There will also be performances by youth, raffle prizes, food and more. The event is hosted by the Vietnamese Service Providers Network. For more info, please call 206-724-9480.

Got Girls? There’s a Girl Scout troop that meets at the Neighborhood House (Paul Allen Room) every Tuesday from 4 - 5:30pm. Girls go on field trips, make new friends, play games, win prizes and get a snack. Contact Denise Brown at 206-407-6758 for more information (including ages).

Don’t miss the Spring into Summer resource fair on Friday. Come find out all the local ways to keep your kids busy when school is out!

Come to the Neighborhood House Community Room on Monday, June 1, at 6:30pm, to learn about important transportation changes coming to the Rainier Valley. Sound Transit and Seattle Department of Transportation staff will discuss:

• Link Light Rail – Grand Opening
• Link Light Rail Safety
• ORCA smart card / Fares
• Neighborhood Parking

All community members are welcome! Join us and have your questions answered. Interpretation will be provided in Vietnamese, Chinese, Cambodian, Somali, Amharic, Tigrinya and Oromo. Refreshments will be served.

For more information, please contact Naomi Chang (Rainier Vista) at 206-722-4010 ext. 2, or Keith Hall (Sound Transit) at 206-398-5468.

Parents, families and children of New Rainier Vista: Come to the Neighborhood House’s New Rainier Vista Center on Friday, May 29th, 4-6pm to find out about community summer programs, camps and events for kids. Learn why its important to keep kids busy during the summer!

Hosted by Rainier Vista neighborhood Youth Service Providers,

Understanding changes in your aging parents is important to help them connect with the most suitable resources. What is normal aging and what might be part of an illness? How can you detect depression or substance abuse? What services are available and how much do they cost? This workshop will provide critical knowledge for planning ahead and working with your parents to make informed decisions.

Monday, June 8
7:00 – 9:00 pm
Southeast Seattle Senior Center, 4655 South Holly Street, Seattle

Advance registration encouraged. $10/person; scholarships available.

Contact Ruth Egger at ruthe@seniorservices.org or Adam Halpern at (206) 861-8784 or familylife@jfsseattle.org.

About 15 people met Friday evening, May 1, to discuss our relationships with our children.  The panelists represented the major ethnic/linguistic groups living here at NRV.

We began by finding agreement with these premises:

• children who fight or hurt each other some other way (e.g. profanity, insults) should be stopped;
• children who harm or break trees or plants should be corrected;
• children who leave garbage, waste paper, etc. around should be corrected.

We then discussed questions centering on how we adults need to respond when a child misbehaves or creates trouble.  We found that with our own children, we are clear and firm regarding misbehavior, and we both talk about our expectations and try to help them solve the problem.

However, it also came out that we are all a little hesitant to become involved with kids outside our own cultural group.

Along this same line, some people said they were a little more tolerant of children fighting than others:  “I would let them (the fighting children) work it out.”  Others pointed out that young people in a fight may not have the ability to back away and resolve the issue peacefully and respectfully – that this has to be taught, seen in action.

We also acknowledge that what we do as adults is important in the eyes of any young person we come in contact with or are seen by.  Few other differences across ethnic/linguistic groups were voiced.

Discussion moved to the problem of what to do when older children or adolescents intimidate or threaten residents.  Women in particular experience being cursed and/or threatened when they try to stop bad behavior, and people who don’t communicate easily with English feel they have no one to turn to for help.  Expressions of fear and dismay came from the heart.

One homeowner who attended later wrote that we don’t realize what fears some people – especially older women – may be living with at NRV.  Most homeowners are protected by cultural and societal privilege that offers protection and buffering from intimidation, so such intimidation and threats to personal safety may not be seen in the lives of others.  We all need to be concerned about such intimidation and the resultant fear and isolation, and seek ways to be vigilant, involved and active.  Some older teenage boys acquire tremendous power by fear, something which becomes very attractive to them.  At base, we need to be sure to stay on this problem by involving those who do have the power to take care of this.

We talked more about this particular problem and the general problem of being intimidated, ignored, even cursed,  when trying to intervene.  Generally, the resources to turn to are:

• NRV property management staff
• NRV Security
• Seattle Police Department, South Precinct
• the Neighborhood House site manager (if the problem is on the premises of Neighborhood House)

Some of the contact info for these resources are on the Contact page on this site. Additions or corrections to this information can be sent to website@newrainiervista.com.

People also suggested that:

• we all spend more time being present and walking around NRV, especially being present in our central park.  Everyone agrees that when adults are around, misbehavior is greatly reduced;
• we return to a pattern of monthly meetings with a community police officer (preferably a woman) for all residents to talk about issues, needs, problems.  (A resident who lived here several years before NRV talked about the help of such meetings.);
• we organize and hold ‘town hall’ meetings for all residents, at which community issues, needs, problems can be aired, and at which we would have more opportunities to meet and get to know each other and our children.

This is a large, important area for all of us who live here to focus and work on.  We welcome and appreciate your ideas, comments, involvement and help. If you’d like to get involved, please download this form.

The next meeting of the Family Support Group will be on Wednesday, June 3, 6-7:30 p.m. at Neighborhood House. It will be a continuation of the same topic, NRV Residents, Children and Adolescents. We plan to have it take the form of a ‘town hall’ meeting, and we’ll invite all of the “who to contact when a problem becomes dangerous, is out of hand, involves threats, etc” resources mentioned above.

The New Rainier Vista Family Support Group invites all community members to a discussion on “How to talk with NRV community kids when there’s an issue.” This event will be on Friday, May 01, 2009, 6:00pm – 7:30pm, at the Neighborhood House Paul Allen Room.

The discussion will include:

• Panel comments from different ethnic/linguistic groups – Ethiopian (Oromo and Amhara); Somali; Vietnamese; Chinese and mainstream American
• Ways to communicate with kids from different cultures
• Ideas and understandings of what each culture expects when a child or adolescent misbehaves
• Ways to compliment kids from different ethnic backgrounds when you see and appreciate positive behavior

All community members are welcome! Some activities for children will be available. If your child comes with you, please bring a favorite quiet activity (e.g. a book) for your child.

For more information please contact Naomi Chang, Community Builder at 722-4010 ext. 2, or email “nchang (at) seattlehousing (dot) org“.