Friday's Chicago Tribune gives props to the East Village Association in a profile of East Village that quotes EVA board members Rich Anselmo and Scott Rappe. "It's a lot of work to keep a neighborhood going," Rappe says, referring to the EVA's close association with the aldermanic offices for the 1st and 32nd wards and efforts to achieve national landmark status for the area. Read more at chicagotribune.com/communities . Rappe also mentioned EVA's efforts in an essay on the Polish Triangle for the Wicker Park blog Our Urban Times. Rappe writes: "Locating single-purpose, automobile-focused business at these locations squanders a scarce resource: transit proximity." Read more in the EVA newsletter and the full essay at oururbantimes.com .

… not from here, unless you belong to a CSA or shop at a farmer’s market (Harvest Moon Farms in Viroqua, Wis.) Eco-Tip | By Scott Rappe By simply living in East Village, we have all made an implicit gesture toward sustainable living. Living in an established close-in urban neighborhood — well served by public transit, recycling pickups and local businesses — reduces our collective “carbon footprint” to a level significantly smaller than that of a similar sized suburban community. After installing insulation and setback thermostats, and weatherizing our doors and windows, what more can we do? The next logical step is to take a close look at where our food comes from. Food production is incredibly energy intensive, using petroleum derivatives in every step from field to table. Not only are vast quantities of petroleum used to produce fertilizer (who knew?) and power the equipment used to harvest crops, significant quantities are consumed in the processing, refrigeration and ...

Update: Members ratified the slate at the March 1 meeting. The new EVA board meets at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, March 9 in the Happy Village pingpong room. President's Message by John Scheer  It’s that time of year again for the election of East Village Association officers. And that also means it’s time for the EVA membership to step up and exercise their voting rights one more time and vote for the EVA officers for this next year. The process of officer selection is rather simple and the nominating committee (Rich Anselmo, Scott Rappe & Steve Rynkiewicz) will facilitate volunteers onto the roster. This election process is much simpler than other municipal offices and will be just as important to those of us in the East Village. The March 1 meeting is the annual EVA officer election and this year it should prove to be as interesting as any, if for no other reason but for the new members stepping forward to volunteer their time and energy to be part of the East Village. We have two n...

Ald. Scott Waguespack meets with 32nd Ward residents at the East Village Association meeting in the Happy Village, 1059 N. Wolcott. With the alderman's seat vacant in his neighboring ward, Ald. Scott Waguespack was asked if he was willing to mentor the next 1st Ward alderman. Waguespack didn't rule it out. But as a frequent critic of Mayor Daley, he suggested it was unlikely he'd be asked for advice on a City Council in which 19 of 50 members will be Daley appointees. The 42nd Ward alderman spent 90 minutes with the East Village Association on Feb. 1 discussing issues common to the two West Town and Logan Square wards: A slowdown in commercial development prompted the alderman to ask EVA to meet with the Ukrainian Village Neighborhood Association and recommend the type of development he should encourage on their Damen Avenue border. "The market has given us a kind of reprieve in a good way to look at this issue," Waguespack said. A question on storm-water backup...

Chicago's East Village neighborhood joined the National Register of Historic Places on Dec. 8. Architect Scott Rappe, who chairs the East Village Association's planning, preservation and development committee, tells what that means in the Sun-Times last week and on WLUW (88.7 FM) in an interview scheduled to air at 10 a.m. Thursday. The radio program will be available as a podcast from producer Outside the Loop Radio . A New Year's Eve announcement describes East Village as an "Ethnic (European) Historic Settlement in the city of Chicago (1860-1930)." Its boundaries are Division Street and Chicago, Hermitage and Damen avenues. The City of Chicago created the East Village Landmark District in 2006 . The district is an example of "Chicago working-class neighborhoods developed in the late 1800s and early 1900s," in the city's description . The Illinois Historic Preservation Agency nominated the district to the National Register last year at the city...

By Scott A. Rappe The East Village Association has worked diligently with Ald. Manuel Flores over the past six years. A wide variety of issues has faced the 1st Ward before Gov. Pat Quinn in January appointed Flores to chair the Illinois Commerce Commission. Some initiatives have succeeded: establishment of the East Village Landmark District, contentious within EVA through years of downzoning and land-use debates; downzoning of Leona’s restaurant location at 1936 W. Augusta Blvd.; preservation of buildings at 1916-24 W. Chicago Ave., and steering Walgreens away from the Polish Triangle. Some have failed: demolition of two "orange rated" buildings and loss of the historic Com Ed substation on Division Street. And many more remain incomplete: transit oriented development at the Polish Triangle and inclusion of EVA in the sidewalk café permit process. On Dec. 15, 2009, prior to Flores' appointment, fellow board member Rich Anselmo and I met with the alderman to di...