Welcome to summer, Sunnyside! Long days and hopefully cool nights; it’s the best! I can’t wait for all the summer activities that Portland has to offer. Check this space next month for our annual guide to warm weather events in and around the neighborhood.
Now onto the news…
In May, the SNA held its Annual Meeting. It was a great time to reflect on the past year, look towards the next and elect Board members to serve for the next two years. You can view the presentation slides at tinyurl.com/dzm2twn8 but I’d like to highlight a couple of accomplishments from 2025/2026. First, after a few years of fading paint, over 80 volunteers, led by Board member Tim Quayle, came out to freshen up the Sunnyside Piazza. We’ll be out next year to do it again! In November, we had a meeting highlighting the need for a new Neighborhood Emergency Team (NET) in Sunnyside and a community member responded! Shout out to newly-elected Board member Ophelia Schechter for stepping up and getting trained to be our newest leader of the Sunnyside NET! It makes me feel like the SNA can make a difference through not only our actions and projects, but by highlighting public needs.
Thank you to all who came out to run for the SNA Board. We had seven neighbors running for five Board seats! Congratulations to Ophelia, Tim, Dresden De Vera, and Lindsay Cogan Sant for stepping up to help your local civic association. I also got re-elected and look forward to continuing to work with this Board to bring you the local information you need and projects to improve the community and help Sunnyside succeed.
In other news, there’s a new crosswalk in the neighborhood! Thanks to neighbor advocacy, additional safety protection is now in place for those crossing Stark near 44th. This is not the end of the story. There’s still so much work to do to improve safety on this arterial road, including increased speed enforcement and improving pedestrian light timing along the entire stretch of Stark through the Sunnyside neighborhood. Additionally, the speed limit on Belmont has been reduced to 20 mph. Please be mindful of the new, lower speed limit in this area. Together, we can protect all of our roads’ users and make Vision Zero a reality.
That’s it for now. Our next General meeting isn’t until September, but the Board will be meeting in June and August to organize ourselves for the new term and continue working for you.