It was a perfect day for the 20th Palms Bike Rodeo – the Palms Neighborhood Council annual affair that brings together the community for a day of fun, food, and friendship. Over 500 parents, students, and stakeholders came out to Palms Elementary School to enjoy face painting, a bouncy castle, arts & crafts, music by Anduze, food from Mrs. Garcia’s, and bicycles and helmets from Palms Cycle. This year’s theme was “zero waste” and the PNC had a crew of volunteers who helped to explain what gets composted, recycled, and what goes in the landfill. Over 60% of kids who attended participated in the zero waste program (bringing a reusable water bottle to the Bike Rodeo), and after successfully feeding hundreds of people, we ended up with less than 5% waste going to the landfill – considering that 100% of our waste went into the landfill last year, this is a huge accomplishment!

The Los Angeles Police Department, including our own Senior Lead Officer Juan Ceja, were on hand to teach bicycle safety and clock speeds with the radar. We were even joined by LAPD Pacific Division Patrol Captain Edward Pape and the founder of the Palms Bike Rodeo, Captain Rigo Romero (pictured), who we honored for his years of service to Los Angeles. This year’s Bike Rodeo fell on Armed Services Day, and in honor of all those serving in our military, the crowd was treated to a color guard from the LAPD Cadets, who then helped to serve food to attendees.

The event was ended with our bike giveaway, where we honored high performing students from our local schools – Palms and Charnock Road Elementary, and Palms Middle schools. A few lucky children and adults got bicycles emblazoned with the Palms logo to help us to do outreach in the community. Los Angeles City Councilmember Paul Koretz (pictured with PNC President Eli Lipmen) attended and, along with Congressmember Karen Bass & State Assemblymember Holly Mitchell, provided certificates to the students and PNC honorees.

Thank you to everyone who attended to ensure this FREE community event was another success! Special thanks goes to our vendors and booths, including:

• Palms Cycle
• LA County Bicycle Coalition & Los Angeles Bicycle Advisory Committee
• Palms/Rancho Park Library
• LA Native
• Education 1st
• Community Police Advisory Board
• LA Coffee Club
• Double Dutch Empire
• LA Department of Transportation
• LAPD & the LAPD Cadets
• Bikerowave
• Anduze
• Choice Group
• Los Angeles Metro
• LA Scores
• Red Cross

And thanks to all our wonderful volunteers!

• Rosemary Valles
• Karen Fratkin
• Nancy Wolf
• Pauline Stout
• Dee Olomajeye
• David Feuer
• Nan Joo Kim
• Hamilton High Students:
  • Erick Morales
  • Pejman Salehsari
  • Abraham Mendez
• California Resource Recovery Association
  • An Vinh Tran
  • Maritza Collantes
  • Judi Gregory
• The Palms Neighborhood Council Board Members

Special thanks to Natasha Ericta for putting together everything to ensure the Bike Rodeo runs smoothly, and Jason Buchalter for ensuring everything was paid in a timely manner!

To see this year’s photos from the Bike Rodeo please go to our Facebook album.

The first meeting of the Ad-Hoc Committee was Wednesday May 22nd at the IMAN Center, 3376 Motor Avenue. The agenda can be downloaded here.

The Committee made a number of suggestions to change the Bylaws, including the addition of new board positions, changes to voting requirements, and additional language on special meetings and elections. Click here to download a “red-line” DRAFT version of the Bylaw changes. For the sake of transparency and community engagement, we encourage you to email your comments and suggestions for changes to the Bylaws to secretary@palmsla.org.

You can download the DONE approved Palms NC Bylaw here.

This annual event is free to the community with live entertainment, free food, bicycle safety course, safety inspection, radar speed tests, a bike giveaway, and much more.  Meet your neighbors, local businesses, bicycle advocates, and local non-profits!

This year it will be a zero-waste event – the PNC is an environmental leader in the City of LA and making this event zero waste sets an example for the whole City.  To help promote this idea, every child will receive an extra ticket for the bike giveaway (2 tickets at most) when they bring in a reusable beverage container to use at the event.  ALSO adults will receive a ticket for a used bike giveaway when they bring in a reusable beverage container or donate a used bike part at the event.

Last year’s event brought out 600 attendees!  Are you a local group / organization / business who service the Palms community and would like to have a booth at our event?  Email neal@palmsla.org and we will provide you a tent, table and chairs.  All we ask is you keep any waste minimal to coincide with our zero waste event.  We also need volunteers to make this happen – please email Natasha at outreach@palmsla.org to help out.

To see pictures of last year’s event go to our Facebook album.

Four buildings in the area have been evacuated and an evacuation center has been opened at Veteran’s Memorial Building, 4117 Overland Avenue. The LA Fire Department encourages displaced residents to call (310) 253-6890 for shelter and incident information.

If you are commuting through the area, Overland Avenue from Venice Blvd to Culver Blvd., and Washington Boulevard from Overland Ave. to Culver Blvd. are closed to traffic. The Culver Shopping Center has also been closed for business.

If you live, work, or shop in this area, please do not go to this area until the LAPD has cleared it. Please follow our Facebook page and Twitter account for updated information.

Please be safe and enjoy your day.

On Sunday May 5th, hundreds of volunteers descended on the campus of Palms MiddleSchool to paint, clean, sweep, plant, and more for Big Sunday, the largest volunteer weekend in the City, and one of the largest in the country. Community members and members of the PNC pitched in, too, helping to make Palms Middle School – our community’s public middle school – to look a lot brighter and cleaner.

The Palms Neighborhood Council recently funded Friends of Palms Middle School to do a beautification along their Lawler Street entrance. This proposal will put security slats and vines along the fencing to protect the campus from intruders and provide a beautiful divider between the school and the community, rather than a fence. You can read about this project here. Palms Middle is considered a “shared resource” of the Palms NC and Mar Vista NC.

PNC President Eli Lipmen (center) with the ‘Friends of Palms’ – Palms Middle School Booster Club & Big Sunday organizers – Martha Cohen, Melanie Bartlett, Sara Roos, and Maura Howe.

Some exciting and historic news: Metro has officially announced that our Expo PhaseTwo station to be located at the corner of Palms/National/Expo/Manning will officially be named “Palms”. Located just feet from the historic location of Palms Depot, the train station that gave rise to Palms, the oldest Los Angeles neighborhood not part of the original city, this station will be an important identifying namesake for our community and an appropriate acknowledgment of the historic importance of rail here.

This was not the original plan, and it didn’t just happen. What started as a discussion several years ago in our Palms Neighborhood Council Transportation Committee became an effort to build a coalition of private stakeholders, local business groups, neighborhood councils, Expo Authority, Expo’s Urban Design Committee, and strong political support from LA Councilmembers Koretz, Rosendahl, and Wesson (and the tireless staff of each of these gentlemen) as well as the Expo Board itself. We want to thank everyone involved, including Metro, for mobilizing the will of the community. A station name may seem like a little thing, but it will shape the perceptions of our community for generations to come.

Metro’s announcement may be read here.

The Palms Neighborhood Council took full advantage of the fact that CicLAvia – a community event where streets are closed to automobile traffic for a few hours – would come through Palms along Venice Boulevard. The day before CicLAvia, a dozen volunteers from Hamilton High School and Culver Palms Church of Christ canvassed the neighborhood to get out the word about CicLAvia to Palms residents as part of the PNC’s regularly schedule neighborhood clean ups.

Then during CicLAvia, the PNC set up two tables along Venice Boulevard at Veteran and Bagley Avenues to speak with stakeholders as they walked, bicycled, skated, or jogged through Palms. We handed out brochures, free PNC bags, and spoke with stakeholders about some of the upcoming events in Palms (like Big Sunday at Palms Middle School on Sunday May 5th and the 20th Palms Bike Rodeo on Saturday May 18th) as well as some of the challenges facing the community. We want to thank all the great volunteers who helped table (Natasha Ericta, Neal Anderberg, Tanya Leal, Charles Miller, Niall MacMenamin, Eli Lipmen, and Andrew Pennington) and all the people who stopped to say hello!

PNC President Eli Lipmen was even interviewed for NPR’s national news broadcast about CicLAvia. You can replay the one minute interview by clicking this link.

To see more pictures of the PNC at CicLAvia visit our CicLAvia album on Facebook.

The Expo Line Authority will be doing construction along National Boulevard, Palms Boulevard and Exposition Boulevard between Clarington Avenue and Tabor Street on Saturday April 27 from 8:00am- 6:00pm and Monday April 29 or Tuesday April 30 from 9:00am-3:30pm. This will cause some major traffic impacts due to full or partial street closures. Please read the notice below or the full notice on the Expo Line website and follow all posted road signs.

Traffic Impacts:

• The intersection of National Boulevard and Palms Boulevard will be closed to all through traffic during the Saturday closure, and traffic will be detoured as follows:
• Eastbound traffic on National Boulevard will be detoured at Motor Avenue
• Northbound traffic on Palms Boulevard will be detoured at Motor Avenue
• Westbound traffic on National Boulevard will be detoured at Bagley Avenue
• Westbound National Boulevard will be closed between Palms Boulevard and Clarington Avenue and all turns onto westbound National Boulevard will be prohibited. Eastbound National Boulevard will remain open, but will be detoured at the intersection.
• Exposition Boulevard between Palms Boulevard and Tabor Street will be closed to all through traffic. Westbound traffic will be detoured at Tabor Street and eastbound traffic will be detoured at Palms Boulevard.
• Palms Boulevard will be reduced to one lane of traffic in each direction between National Boulevard and Clarington Avenue. Turns throughout the work area will be prohibited.
• Parking restrictions will be strictly enforced at all times and signage with specific restrictions will be in place in all construction areas.
• Electronic message boards, directional signage and/or flaggers will be used to maintain traffic flow and safely direct vehicles and pedestrians around the construction zone.

• Coffee with the Council – an informal, open forum to meet with the Council. Coffee provided free of charge to interested stakeholders! Tuesday, April 9, 11am-1pm, Cafe Brasil, 10831 Venice Blvd & Thursday April 25, 11am-1pm, Simpang Asia, 10433 National Blvd.
• Budget Ad Hoc Committee – discuss the PNC budget allocation and evaluate neighborhood grants for funding. Saturday April 27, 5pm, Fire Station, 3690 Motor Avenue.  Agenda.
  
• Palms Clean Up – beautify the neighborhood and outreach to the community through volunteer service – Saturday April 20, 10am-12pm; meet at Fire Station, 3690 Motor Avenue. Download the flyer
• Planning & Land Use Committee – development, over-development, green space, and more – RESCHEDULED – Wednesday May 1, 6pm at IMAN Center, 3376 Motor Avenue.