(Above) Dimond volunteers serve Thanksgiving dinner at the Fruitvale Presbyterian Church last year.

• The Melrose Neighborhood Crime Prevention Council provides baskets for needy families at Horace Mann School each year. If you can donate a turkey or other food, contact Carmen Perez in our office.

• Holiday Gift Certificate Distribution for Low Income Families. The City of Oakland Hunger Program and the Emergency Food Providers Advisory Committee sponsor a holiday distribution of food gift certificates for low income families and seniors. Call 986-2721 for details.

• For the the 15th Year, the City of Oakland provides free turkey dinners at the Marriott, 100 Broadway, next Tuesday, 11:30 am - 3 pm. Free transportation is provided from senior and homeless programs, but all Oaklanders are welcome. I usually help serve and enjoy meeting so many of our active seniors. Donations may be sent to LaTasha Howard, Thanksgiving Coordinator, 150 Frank Ogawa Plaza, Oakland 94612. For more information on Hunger and Homeless Programs, call 986-2721 or 238-7416.

• 6th Annual Community Thanksgiving Dinner at Fruitvale Presbyterian Church, Wednesday, November 22, 5 - 7 pm at 2735 MacArthur at Coolidge. Local residents are invited to join their neighbors at this annual holiday meal. I usually bring a turkey, so I hope to see you. Donations of the following items would be appreciated: 5 turkeys/baked or unbaked, 4 hams/baked or unbaked, 5 cakes, 6 pies of any kind, 4 large bags frozen corn, 4 large bags frozen peas, 20 bags of bread stuffing, bottles of soda or juice, 10 lbs oranges/10 lbs apples, 5 bags hard Christmas candy.
Please deliver unbaked items between 10 am and 1 pm on Saturday, November 18; all other items on Wednesday, November 22 between 11 am and 5 pm. Please call Linda Blagburn, Meal Coordinator, at 543- 5666, to confirm your donation. Volunteers to help with set up, decorations, serving, hospitality and clean up are always welcome. For more information 530-0915.

• Stop Hunger Year Round: Many groups receive donations at this time of year, but hunger is a year round problem in our community. 35% of the Alameda Food Bank's clients are children. 25% of households with children reported they went without food at least once in the last year. One third of the clients at emergency food programs are seniors. 38% of the families have at least one working member. 41% are unemployed. Consider a donation to the Alameda County Food Bank.

• The Laurel Merchants Association is installing 40 planters this weekend between the arches. Our office provided a matching grant. Please thank them for continuing to improve the look of the neighborhood.

• Friends of Sausal Creek - Creek Restoration, Saturday 11/18, 9am-noon: Meet at the El Centro trailhead to prepare for winter planting, remove cape ivy, and pull ivy out of trees near the Earth Team plots. Nursery Program, Saturday 11/18, 1:30 to 4:30 pm: "There are two types of jobs at the nursery. The first is of course plant propagation. Right now our green house is bursting with seedlings that are just calling out to be transplanted. The second job is the general back work that keeps the nursery functioning such as moving plants and caring for the growing areas. Nursery work is also is a great way to get up close and familiar with the local native flora."

• The Maybelle Avenue Neighborhood Group nearby picks up trash once a month. Rubber gloves and trash bags are provided, meet this Sunday, 10 AM, at the corner of Maybelle and Masterson.

Up to 5 bags can be picked up from local these District 4 fire stations, Monday - Friday 8am- 9 pm; Saturday-Sunday, 8 am to 4:30 pm:

• Report flooding or other storm problems to the Public Works Call Center at (510) 615-5566 24 hours.
• Don't sweep leaves into the gutter, put them into your green cart.

• Volunteer to Maintain-A-Drain: Heavy rains wash a large amount of garbage, litter, and pollution into storm drains (inlets). Clogged storm drains cause flooding. Public Works will provide you with rain gear and a tools if you volunteer to help them keep an inlet on your street clear.

• Facsimile Guns Are Illegal: Sue Piper and I recently followed a series of panicked emails describing teens with guns in Montclair Park. Following up with the police it turns out the teens were using paint ball guns. The incident points out why realistic "toy" or facsimile guns are illegal. Not only might there have been a tragedy if police were not aware that the "guns" were "toys", but paint guns and B-B guns lead to mandatory expulsion from public schools.

• Montclair School Meeting on Safety: Parents and local residents attended this past Tuesday's safety meeting at Montclair Elementary School. Police Chief Wayne Tucker, Lt. James Meeks, Officers Leronne Armstrong and Everett Peterson, Park Ranger Kent McNab, School District Facilities Director Tim White talked about safety issues at the school and nearby park. They dispelled rumors about gang activity at Skyline, but shared issues related to loitering by teens from several schools in the park. They noted that there have been extra patrols in the area, and asked residents to use the non-emergency line to call in suspicious behavior, 777-3333.

The second half of the meeting focused on lighting and sidewalk safety. The City, District, School and PTA will be meeting after Thanksgiving to finalize plans for improvements. The District will try to find funds to repair sidewalks and improve lighting on campus. I've committed to paying for one street light from my Pay-Go funds to improve visibility along Mountain Blvd in front of the school. I will work to add more funds to next year's budget for lighting, since the failure of the LLAD update there has been no city funding for new lighting.

The ordinance also requires that take out food ware be compostable or biodegradable when as affordable (the same price or less) as alternative products. Some methods are affordable now, for example, some plain paper plates and cups, foil, etc. The Chinese Chamber of Commerce is considering organizing purchasing to reduce the cost of green products. St. Vincent's is organizing a similar effort for non-profits.

Some restaurants are interested in going totally green although those products may be more expensive. We plan to develop a symbol that restaurants using compostable food ware can display. Some restaurants investigated savings in garbage bills. The Oakland A's save $100,000 a year in garbage bills because they use compostable beer cups make from corn oil that look like clear plastic.

Over the next months we will encourage grocery stores and other retailers to offer more green food ware for consumers to use at home. We hope as San Francisco and surrounding cities adopt similar legislation that prices will come down further.

• Visiting Chabot on a rainy day is a perfect activity for kids of all ages. Next weekend Chabot's newest planetarium show features the constellation of Orion and its Greek legend. This animated 20-minute presentation spectacularly splashes across Chabot's 70-foot domed planetarium - the only fully digital domed projection system in Northern California.

Right after the Big Dipper, the three stars that make of belt of Orion makes it the most recognizable constellation in the skies. As the nights grow longer the most dominant of all the constellations assumes its place high overhead. But has Orion always ruled the heavens? The tale of Orion, once a mere mortal, is filled with the juiciest elements of a Greek tragedy: love, betrayal, banishment and a heroic quest - all culminating in the epic battle with Scorpius that sealed Orion's eternal fate.

• Glenview Scholastic Book Fair offers a good selection of children's books at good prices, and is a fundraiser for the PTA and school library. In a special program One for Books, Scholastic will match every dollar and donate books to schools in need around the country. Last year they donated several million dollars worth of books to (mostly) Hurricane Katrina schools. The hours are as follows:
Tuesday, 11/28, 8:30 am -9 pm; Wednesday, 11/29, 8:30 am to 6 pm; Thursday, 11/30, 8:30 am - 8 pm; Friday, 12/1, 8:30 am - 9 pm

• Redwood Heights Elementary Kindergarten Information Night , Wednesday, December 6 at 7 pm. Prospective parents welcome to this presentation about Redwood's program and to sign up for tours. Adults only please.

• Fruitvale School's 5th Annual School-wide War Against Improper Toys (WAIT) Drive, Tuesday, December 12 . The Oakland Police Department, the Oakland Police Activities league, Oakland Firefighters Random Acts of Kindness, and several elected officials, civic and religious leaders will join in this toy drive to address violence introduced to children through their toys and video games. students and community members are encouraged to trade their toy guns and violent games and toys for non-violent toys and books. For details, call 879- 1170.

• As part of this grant, FOSC is hosting a special walking tour on Saturday, December 9, 1 pm. Join FOSC and our office on a walk in Dimond Canyon to appreciate our oak woodlands. Meet at the Scout Hut in Dimond Park.

• Planting at Joaquin Miller Community Center, Saturday, December 9, 9 am-1 pm . Boy Scouts, neighbors and members of the Hillside and Bonita Garden Clubs plant shrubs and small plants, as well as pull broom and other invasives. For details, contact Bobbie Feyerabend at bobbi@fmlanddesign.com

• Neighborhood Emergency Communications Workshop, Saturday, November 18, 9am – 12 noon: Registration required. Increasingly Neighborhood groups are purchasing hand held walkie-talkies and other equipment to communicate during a disaster. This Forum will exchange information and is an opportunity to establish uniform protocols to strengthen two-way radio emergency communications within neighborhoods. Learn about developing network relays and building a neighborhood network.
1:00 – 3:00pm: If your neighborhood group owns its own walk-talkies or radios, learn/review the basics of two-way radio operation and standard radio etiquette.
 

• We also encourage you to participate in your local Neighborhood Crime Prevention Council (NCPC), that works with the police to highlight the top two or three priorities for police to focus on during the next month in your neighborhood. Here's a list of District 4 NCPCs .

We believe these meetings are so important-- and informative-- that staff from our office is assigned to each of these meetings and I make a point of getting to each of these NCPCs on a quarterly basis, as well.

• On Friday, 26 new police officers completed their year long training. This is the fourth class of new graduates, with two other classes in the pipeline. We can expect new Beat or Neighborhood Problem Solving Officers to be assigned in December.

• Sad Incident at Allendale Recreation Center: Michael Foster, Allendale Rec Center Director, was attacked this week by the family of one of the center's students. Michael expects to be back at work soon and wants the community to know that the incident will not stop his or the centers work in the community. Talking with the Director of Parks and Rec Audrey Taylor-Jones this week, we are looking at staffing patterns and ranger deployment to provide better staff support. Please stop by and visit

• Police Department Open House, Wednesday, December 13, 6-8 pm, at the Eastmont Police Station 2651 73rd Avenue, 777-8500. This is an opportunity for those who have been involved in neighborhood alert groups and crime prevention councils to meet the command staff in their area, problem solving and crime reduction team officers.