Gainey hosts community Christmas Party

ED-GAINEY_1771
ED GAINEY

Residents of Homewood received an early Christmas treat of a free dinner and raffle. Anyone who attended was immediately eligible to win prizes varying from fruit baskets, to bicycles and for the lucky few, a 52 inch television. All prizes were compliments of local businesses, private individuals and political well wishers of Pa. state Rep. Ed Gainey. In addition to the raffle, an open to all holiday dinner was provided for more than 500 people.
The event ended up killing three birds with one stone. First, as a way for Gainey to raise community awareness of his efforts on behalf of his district; second, as a way for city and county Democrats to show support for Gainey as well as Homewood; and third, as a way for community organizations to bring themselves to the people.
Organizations such as Cease Fire Pa., Alma Illery Medical Center and Community Empowerment Association were just a few of the many organizations trying to raise awareness of services available to the residents of the blighted and oft maligned community. A community that, in recent years, has been seeking to create a new renaissance; a new moment in which to resurrect itself back to past glories when Homewood was a safe and sprawling community with businesses open up and down Frankstown Avenue amongst many other once prosperous streets.
In essence, the dream of a new Homewood is one that resembles old Homewood of the 50s and 60s. Residents like Rashad Byrdsong of the Homewood based Community Empowerment Association sees that day coming soon but aren’t eager to see it come if the price to pay is gentrification.
“What we have here is people from this district coming together to celebrate our community, celebrate history and celebrate a new direction for the Homewood community. But we want to make sure that we are actually a part of the renaissance here in Homewood,” he said. “So often historically in a lot of communities like this, families are uprooted and pushed out, but we want to make sure all of the development that comes to this community, the people in the community benefit from it. So here is a coming together of stakeholders: Community organizations, non-profits, regular residents and elected community leaders.”
Among such community leaders was Pittsburgh City Councilman Corey O’Conner. “This is great, Ed does a great job in the neighborhood and at the state level and I know a bunch of us that helped sponsor it were happy to come out and help him,” he said.
And while Mayor Bill Peduto couldn’t physically attend, Valerie McDonald Roberts, chief Urban Affairs officer in the mayor’s office, was also elated to attend and send a message on his behalf.
“We’re here representing Mayor Bill Peduto who is definitely an ally of Homewood and Gainey and to make sure the residents have a holiday party,” she said.
Gainey, who personally called every ticket number for over two hours of raffled gifts, approached the night from the perspective of a gardener who was charged with the responsibility growing a community as a garden with seeds of love.
“This was inspired out of love for this community,” he said. “I know the more we bring our community together, the more we do to improve our community, the more we improve our community the better we are, the better we are, the more accomplished we are, the more accomplished we are the more we can do for one another. This is about building a relationship and letting the community know that we love them, and if you plant the seed of love than you will grow more than you could ever benefit from.” Although police were on standby outside, the night went off without a hitch and their role was purely spectatorial.
 
 
Follow @NewPghCourier on Twitter  https://twitter.com/NewPghCourier
Like us at https://www.facebook.com/pages/New-Pittsburgh-Courier/143866755628836?ref=hl
Download our mobile app at https://www.appshopper.com/news/new-pittsburgh-courier

About Post Author

Comments

From the Web

Skip to content