Groups hope to obtain grant to continue upgrading Hollister park
Groups hope to obtain grant to continue upgrading Hollister neighborhood
A Dunne Park Collaborative has been put together between four agencies that will create a work plan to apply for a planning grant next year, with the hope that more agencies will be joining in during the coming months.
“It started from the old project,” said Lisa Faulkner, executive director of First 5 San Benito and leader on the Dunne Park Restoration Project from 2010.
The Youth Alliance, then Hollister Youth Alliance, received a Health Trust grant for planning and advocacy in the neighborhood. They worked with the city to improve a few minor infrastructure issues at the park, including replacing restroom facilities.
“We went around the neighborhood and asked what was keeping people from going to the park,” Faulkner said. “At the same time, Obama was coming up with the Promise Neighborhood platform.”
The Promise Neighborhood is federal grant program that runs on the assumption that “intergenerational poverty takes more than one thing to change it.”
“Opening up an after school program or a computer center is not enough to resolve the issue,” Faulkner said. “It takes the whole neighborhood to participate.”
Faulkner said the grant itself, which would be $500,000 for planning, is not complicated but the work is beginning now so that the vision of all the partners can be incorporated into one plan. The agencies involved include First 5 San Benito, Youth Alliance, the Hollister School District and Salud Para La Gente, with presentations being made to other agencies in the coming weeks.
“We are doing preplanning and we want to make sure everyone is represented,” Faulkner said.
The group met for the first time on March 29 to discuss primary prevention for change with a presentation from the Prevention Institute.
At the first meeting they looked at prevention to see what gaps there are in the community. The meeting focused on some of the issues such as low breastfeeding rates and improperly installed car seats.
They will meet once a month through September, when the grant application is expected to be online.
“It isn’t the type of program we could do at the last minute,” Faulkner said.
The grant includes three components, starting with an educational pipeline from prenatal to career education. It also looks at healthy families and looking at ways to make the community members feel needed.
“We want a pipeline of partners to create a continuum of solutions,” Faulkner said.
If the planning grant application is successful, the group would receive $500,000 and have a year to 18 months to put together a plan of programs that would benefit the community. The next step is to apply for an implementation grant, and there is up to $20 million available for that phase of the grant application.
First 5 San Benito will sponsor the coordination of the monthly meetings. The Youth Alliance staff members will engage the community and go to county or city meetings to keep public officials cued in on the project. Salud Para La Gente’s staff is paying for the work plan. The Hollister School District is involved because the grant application requires that the work plan benefit a school.
R.O. Hardin and Calaveras schools are both in the target neighborhood.
“Our major task at hand is really to increase communication and breakdown any silos between the agencies,” Faulkner said. “San Benito has a lot to gain even if no grants are awarded. If we are planning collaboratively, it leads to more seamless services. I’ve seen increased connections and communication. It brings about really good things for the community.”
