Blogs

After a few damp and dreary days, Lawrence awoke to bright sunshine and blue skies this morning. With autumn in full swing and winter only a few short weeks away now is the perfect time to get out and enjoy the crisp air, changing leaves, and blue skies. Walking through Lawrence along the Spicket River can really make you forget that you are in a city of more than 75,000 people, the resilience of nature is quickly apparent as you explore this active ecosystem in the midst of urban sprawl.

For more than two decades the City of Lawrence has been working alongside a number of other partners to rehabilitate the former Oxford Paper Mill. Paper production began at the mill in 1846 and was the first of its kind in Lawrence. The site once employed as many as 500 people and produced the glossy paper National Geographic Magazine was printed on. In 1975 the abandoned mill suffered two major fires, local residents began to call it “the Dresden of Lawrence” because of its likeness to the German city after World War II.

We want to let you know about a program we’re supporting called the Sandbox Entrepreneur Program. The goal of this program is to encourage as many people from the Merrimack Valley to share their ideas for products, businesses, and solutions to problems – and then help get those ideas closer to reality.

GWL is seeking an Educational Program Coordinator to implement a variety of youth education programs. Reporting to the Program Director, this position manages 10-20 youth employees, works with the Mass Audubon Environmental Education Coordinator, AmeriCorps Service Learning Coordinator, and temporary summer staff to deliver top quality environmental and public health youth programming and to integrate youth into GWL’s community activities and events.

As a part of the Urban Waters Grant Program, the EPA awarded $60,000 to Groundwork Lawrence for the “Spicket River Restoration Partnership”. The grant, one of two given in Massachusetts, is part of $2.7 million that the EPA awarded nationally to 46 organizations in 2012.

2012 Impact Report

Check out this report that features Massachusetts Smart Growth Alliance's with Groundwork Lawrence's and Lawrence CommunityWorks' in partnership the city and N. Canal Coalition and how they are attempting to improve the Lawrence community through the Great Neighborhoods initiative!

Check out the article about Green Team/El Equipo Verde in this weeks Lawrence Vale (in Spanish) and in Siglo 21's audio slide show! Special thanks to Gisel Saillant for writing and assembling these!

Zoning Reform to Inspire Healthy Communities

Join Heather and MA Public Health Association ActFRESH partners at the State House on Monday, March 12 1:00 PM in room 437.

We Are Lawrence!

We Are Lawrence from Nathan Hendrie on Vimeo.

Groundwork Lawrence would like to extend a special thank you to Magid for the glove donation we received this summer. Magid graciously donated garden gloves which our Schoolyard Gardeners at Leonard and South Lawrence East Middle Schools are using this fall to plant, harvest, and clean up our gardens, and plastic gloves which our Urban Adventures youth used to do cooking lessons this summer in our Learning Kitchen. Check out their products at http://www.magidglove.com/.