The Weekly Bulletin

Nov 27, 2017

Call to order: Ed Musterman

Invocation: by Red Leighton

Pledge: led by John Sapp

Introduction of Guests Noelle Case introduce her thirteen month old daughter, Haven. With the help of her mother, Haven waved to the luncheon group.

Birthdays and Anniversaries

None

Mystery Person – Jim Beckett awarded this week’s gift card to John Sapp for all the work he has done to make our Christmas tree fundraiser a success.

 

Greeter   – Phil Rodriquez told the group of events in his life during this past week. His Christmas light decorating company, started in St. Louis for his kids, has complete 132 houses in St. Louis in addition to some banks, clubs and restaurants. They are just getting started in Columbia where they completed decorations on 23 houses. Also, Phil officiated at a local high school wrestling match and later at three dual meets in Eldon, Camdenton and Moberly.

 

Announcements

• Sign In or Pay the Pig Ken Oster paid his quarter to the pig for being slow to sign in. He mentioned he is selling caps for $12.00 each with the Kids First logo embroidered on them. Caps come in different colors and would be suitable gifts for kids.
• Food Bank –Jim Murphy reported the Food Bank volunteers packaged “Buddy Packs” this past week. “Buddy Packs” consists of 2 cans of ravioli or other small canned meals, a trail bar, powdered milk and cereal.
• Koeze/Certificate update: Steve Winters reported sales of Koeze Nuts sales reached $92,000 vs. $102,000 at this time last year. There is still time for members to get additional orders to him as Steve won’t close off the final order until Thursday, Nov 30.

• Tree Lot – John Sapp, C.O. Scheffer reported as of Sunday the Christmas tree sales totaled somewhere between $18,850 and $24,000. Group consensus of those who worked this past weekend estimated the total had to be closer to the $24,000 number. This figure compares favorably to the $21,000 total during the same period last year. John Sapp reported he had to hire outside help to manage tree sales at a cost of $650.00
• Tree lot sign up/ Cash Register – C.O. Scheffer
• Respect for Law – Kelly Schilling- C.O. The special Christmas tree decorated with “thank you” ornaments for police, fire and first responders and mounted on a soap box derby car was on display.  Kelly has notified print and broadcast media of this tribute. Officer Justine Anthony used his twitter account to notify his 200 followers of this tribute.
• Holiday luncheon:  Dec 11^th at the Club House.  – Contact Larry Fick (lfick41@centurytel.net) if you wish to attend but haven’t yet signed up.
• Board – No December meeting

 

 

Today’s Speaker

 

Randy Cole, City of Columbia, Housing Programs Coordinator Jerry Dowell Government Affairs Chair, Columbia Chamber of Commerce and Secretary on the Columbia Community land Trust.

 

Randy Cole moved to Columbia from Liberty, MO to attend graduate school at MU. As part of his studies in Public Service he accepted an internship with the Columbia city manager’s office and subsequently began work with the City. Jerry Dowell is local to Columbia attending Hickman H.S. and graduating from MU with a degree in Political Science. He works for the Columbia Chamber of Commerce as Director of Government Affairs. He is the current secretary to the board of the Columbia Community Land Trust (CCLT).

 

The CCLT was formed to provide a sustainable model for affordable housing in Columbia. It is patterned after similar programs in 46 states. Its mission is to “Strengthen our community through the creation and stewardship of permanently affordable housing.” It is an established 501-c (3), not-for-profit entity with an anticipated 9 member board of directors comprised of 1/3 community and business leaders, 1/3 neighborhood representative and 1/3 program participants. (Program participants will be added to the current 6-member board when houses are sold.)

 

CCLT defines affordable housing as paying 30% of family income for housing. Currently, it’s estimated many families are paying 50% of their income for housing. This causes disruption of family life, food instability, youth learning loss with frequent relocations often effecting school attendance, neighborhood instability and neighborhood crime. It is estimated every move to a different house causes a two month learning loss in a child.

 

The target populations are families with income below 80% of the median income for the area. The sixteen houses being built are all within the City’s Strategic Plan. The initial houses are in the neighborhood surrounding the Downtown Optimist Clubhouse, three on Lynn Street and one on King Ave. Randy Cole focused his comments on the Lynn Street houses that CCLT is building. The City acquired the land transferring ownership to CCLT while committing to improve the land within the same city block by burying electrical cables, improving the sanitary sewer system, installing a storm water retention system to alleviate the current flooding conditions, and creating a community garden. Funding in part is from Community Development Block Grants. Upon completion the new energy efficient houses are expected to sell without the land to qualified buyers for $100,000 each.

 

The Land Trust is partnering with Habitat for Humanity, Central Missouri Community Action, and Job Point to build a total of 16 houses within the Strategic Plan area. Their expectation is to create generational wealth for over 100 families over the next 50 years. Monthly mortgage payments along with taxes, insurance and energy efficiency payments to CCLT will easily be below $650.00. Qualified families who purchase the houses will not be required to pay private mortgage insurance because of the land value will remain under the ownership of CCLT. Families are expected to stay for about six year before acquiring enough equity to purchase a house elsewhere. (Under the purchase arrangement with CCLT, owners can capture all of the equity they have paid on the principle and 25% of the property appreciation.)

 

This is a substantial investment on the part of the community for long range objectives. Quantitative measures of program success include neighborhood stability by creating owner occupied homes, student academic improvement, neighborhood crime reduction and wealth accumulation.

 

UPCOMING SPEAKERS

Dec 4 –  Dan Steska, Bike to the Future

Dec 11 – Holiday Lunch at the Club House

Dec 18 – Sonja Boone,  Boone County Administrator

Dec 25 – No Meeting

Jan 1 – No Meeting

Jan 8 – TBD

Jan 15 –TBD

Jan 22 – TBD

Jan 29 – Peter Stiepleman, Supt. Columbia Public Schools

 

 

 

 

Adjourn with the Creed: 1:00

Optimistically Yours,

 

Sid Sullivan

Secretary