Party Among The Ruins Wednesday July 28 7 pm at Community Garden Site 6025 N. Johnstown

Your Invitation, and Please Invite Others

What: "Party Among The Ruins"
Make real the Miracle Among the Ruins project to turn a block of abandoned properties here in TulsaNorth/Turley into The Welcome Table Community Kitchen Garden Park. Come tour the proposed site and area and discuss the plans; even consider ways you might replicate such a project in your own part of town if you live elsewhere. See the video produced by the OU Graduate Design Studio of what it can look like and be even as we are partying amid what it is now. Beverages and ice cream social and watermelon and refreshments provided for freewill donations. Beat the heat with a water balloon fight. Listen to music. Meet others committed to community renewal, health, food justice, one block at a time.

When: Wednesday, July 28, 7 to 9 pm. We have a July 30 deadline to finish raising the funds to buy the property. Come celebrate and let us say thanks for all your donations. Bring friends who haven't donated yet, or take this opportunity to have fun and bring your own donation, or in the spirit of generosity and abundance give again if you have donated already. Surprise yourself as we surprise our community, so often seen as powerless and struggling and stereotyped, with this venture so needed here, and now.

Where: 6025 N. Johnstown Ave., between Peoria and Cincinnati, due west up the hill from Cherokee School. Enter the property off Johnstown. Park along the street or in the parking lot across the street at the nearby Methodist Church. This hilltop neighborhood has outstanding views of downtown Tulsa and out east toward the horizon of the Bird Creek bottomland; to the north rises Turley Hill. The party will take place in the center of the property on abandoned foundations between run down buildings. You will also get a chance to see the infamous resident-made walking trail people use going to school and stores on foot, some of the area we have raised a few experimental gardens already, and walk the paths in a native grass and plant area. Also tour our A Third Place Community Center at 6514 N. Peoria Ave. while you are in the area.

How: Just come, or if you can help by donating beverages or refreshments such as ice cream for an ice cream social part of the event; or come help fill up water balloons for those who want to "stay cool",. We are a grassroots group and we like our events to grow from the grassroots as well.

RSVP and also pass this invitation on by email, in announcements at church, synagogue, mosque, temple, or your civic group this weekend, pass it through social networking sites, to family, friends, colleagues and coworkers.

In case of rain, say a prayer of thanks and a halleluia and come drive by the area and stop for the Party at A Third Place Center, 6514 N. Peoria where we will move the event. If you haven't seen our unique approach to community renewal, this is a great time to visit, and to bring others who might not have been here yet. In fact, this past few weeks talking with medical students, we found out again that many of them have grown up in Tulsa but never been to the northside or been this far into the northside. If you know of anyone like that, use this opportunity to expand their horizons.

And be one of the folks who push us over our fundraising goal to purchase this property. We can't do it with just you alone (unless of course you can donate or arrange for a donation of $7,000), but we also can't do it without you. And we mean that. True, we have a ways to go still and a short amount of time to do it in, but we wouldn't call it a "miracle among the ruins" if it had been easy to do. We do have a commitment from Tulsa County to remove and clear the property for us once we purchase it, and we have volunteers ready to transform it; all we need is to own the land. Find out all the wonderful plans and donate now at http://turleyok.blogspot.com/2010/06/channel-six-news-story-on-our-miracle.html or send checks made out to A Third Place Community Foundation at 6514 N. Peoria Ave, Turley, OK 74126.

At the website for A Third Place Community you will also see the multitude of other ways we are giving back to our neighborhoods in our area between 46th St. N. and 86th St. N. and Highway 75 and Osage County Line. All of these need support. The Miracle Among The Ruins project is a vital one for us here in the zipcode of Tulsa with the lowest life expectancy and a fourteen year gap between us and mid town just a few miles away, but the kitchengarden project is part of a bigger picture connecting the dots in what we call "The Four Directions Initiative" for TulsaNorth/Turley; a true "TNT" vision explosion for renewal.

Thanks and blessings and see you for a "party among the ruins." Don't forget to share this with all others.

Ron Robinson
430-1150 home; 6913223 cell, 7944637 office
A Third Place Community, a 501c3 grassroots, 100 percent into mission, neighborhood movement
"Small acts of justice done with great love change the world."

Tulsa World Article On Our Partnership with OU

http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?subjectid=11&articleid=20100620_11_A18_TheRev414018&archive=yes

Read the article linked above in the Tulsa World about A Third Place Center and our growing partnership with the University of Oklahoma, the community health, the social work, and the design studio. We hope to increase and spread our partnership with OU into other departments, and also to partner with other universities in the Tulsa area especially.

Thanks to Dr. Lisa Byers of our A Third Place Community who helped bring others at OU into partnership with us back in 2007 when we had just opened our doors. From the first days with the mobile health van to our health clinic indoors here now, from the first community forums with OU social work students to our recently completed first Community Academy, to the work by the Design Studio on our radical transforming Miracle Among The Ruins project to create The Welcome Table Kitchen Garden Park where a city block of abandoned houses and weeds now reigns at one of the most beautiful spots in our area overlooking both downtown and much of the Bird Creek bottomland area, the campus and community working together are, in small ways, changing the world here.

Come be a part of it. Spread the news.

Our Summer Lunch For All Those 18 and Under Continues

We sponsor and pay staff for the summer lunch feeding program for anyone 18 years or under, from any place, no ID required, at Cherokee Elementary School, from 11:30 am to 12:30 pm Monday through Friday, at 6001 N. Peoria. We have been up to some 80 children lately. Part of that is that we are continuing the program all summer long and some of the schools in our area, who have to rely on school staff, must close their program when their summer classes are done. Since we are community based we are paying for it all summer long and we are getting children from many areas, including day cares and church groups, who are bringing their children to us.

This is a great community service. If you can help donate for it, or for any of our programs and services you read about here on this site, please do so easily and safely through the Donate button at the top of the webpage.

Heat Alert in our Area Continues: We are a Cooling Station

All this past week we have been open with water and a cool place to relax for those especially journeying by foot, bus, or bicycle. We will continue it as this next week looks like the heat alert will continue. We have also gone out to deliver cold bottles of water to those waiting at bus stops, on foot, or on bicycles in our area. If you know someone who has no electric power especially to run air conditioners or fans, tell them to come by. And we encourage you, if you are able to, to also take water around with you to distribute to those who find themselves outside and in need of it. We have supplies for you at the Center.

Take Your Community Life Survey at the Center

As part of one of the partnerships between A Third Place Community and the Graduate Social Work School at OU, we are taking surveys of how people feel about their neighborhoods and their community health. These surveys are available at the Center and take some 20 minutes on average to fill out. They are done anonymously. The data will help us shape future grant requests and programs to help meet the real needs of our residents. An OU student or Community Center volunteer will help you with any questions about the survey. Come add your voice to those of your neighbors.

This is the latest of the surveys and community forums we have partnered with OU to do over the past two years. The results have been real. We have community gardens, and we have abandoned properties scheduled to be removed, and we have a new and expanded Food Pantry, and projects underway as a result of the Springtime Community Academy program.

So your voice is being heard and is being turned into better life in the neighborhoods. There is still so much to do, so every bit helps. Thanks.

OU and A Third Place Tulsa North/Turley Poverty Education Workshop Friday July 23 Helpers Needed

We still need a few more folks to sign up to help us in the poverty education workshop Friday July 23 at O'Brien Park, 6147 N. Lewis, with OU Graduate Social Work students. Helpers will get free lunch at noon during an hour of easy training for the workshop which then take place from 1 to 4 pm in the gym. Pass it on to those you know who might be interested in the program. RSVP to Ron Robinson 691-3223 or 430-1150.

Helpers, community residents and activists, will take on roles of staff from health clinic, law, social services, school, bank, etc. as the incoming graduate students take on different roles of residents and try to access necessities. Play money is used but it is not a game; it is a way to begin raising understanding.

Come be a community educator.

Community Health Discussion for TulsaNorthTurley on Friday July 16 1 pm at A Third Place Center

Hi come listen to a great discussion of community health issues and needs and community life stories for our area this Friday, July 16 at 1 pm at A Third Place Center as we complete our conversations with Univ. of Okla. premed and medical students as they seek to learn about various communities and their health needs. The joys and struggles of living here and living here and growing healthy families, the changes in medical care, and more. Rev. Ron Robinson and Dr. Bonnie J. Ashing, M.D., will lead the conversation.

Free Movie and Meal and Discussion Tuesday July 13 6:30 pm

Come hear about the community garden plans and activities and ways you can help; and everyone can help...come have a free meal on us...come watch the acclaimed movie directed by Robert Redford, "The Milagro Beanfield War" about community, justice, land, water, farming, and risk. Tuesday, July 13, 6:30 pm at A Third Place Center.