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Tag Archive for: Place

Bistro to Go – Together We Find Community

Featured, One Northside, Place

Nikki Heckman is founder and owner of Bistro to Go. Established in October 2007, Bistro is much more than a restaurant, it’s known as a community staple. We sat down with Nikki to learn a little about her story and how Bistro came to fruition. 

Nikki, a Manchester native, will always have a passion for the Northside. “The community is really diverse. It’s a place where I played [growing up]. The Northside is the first place I wanted to be.” 

After serving food to the community at Allegheny Center Alliance Church for many years, she was encouraged to open her own restaurant.  “People from the community helped me build this [Bistro] out.” The first day Bistro opened, they brought in $3,600, far exceeding expectations.  Business continued to pick-up, but like most start-up companies they amassed quite a bit of debt.  

Despite her financial woes, Nikki never stopped caring for the community. “In the middle of my crisis I did what I’ve always known, take care of people.”  Looking back, her experience in the restaurant industry, with the church, and in working with the homeless and area non-profits, all led to serving the community through Bistro to Go. “I couldn’t have planned or imagined that would happen out of me just opening a restaurant.”

Now, Bistro has grown to 45 employees all with living wages, between $15 – $35 an hour with full benefits for those that work over 20 hours a week. Nikki empowers her employees to think for themselves and contributes to a diverse workforce. “I have learned that we can impact these emerging communities, diverse in every which way by working together with respect. I believe in them [the Northside community]. That’s the kind of place I want Bistro to Go to be.” 

For Nikki, the Northside is family. “These are my mothers, my brothers, these are my sisters. The lines go away. I have made a commitment to this community. This community has my heart.” We couldn’t agree more, when you come into Bistro to Go, you feel welcomed. 

Bistro to Go is located at 415 East Ohio Street, Pittsburgh, PA 15212.

October 1, 2019
https://onenorthsidepgh.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/Bistro-.jpg 3483 4076 Bethany Hester https://onenorthsidepgh.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/OneNorthside.png Bethany Hester2019-10-01 13:11:132019-10-01 16:00:04Bistro to Go – Together We Find Community
Doug Oster, Everybody Gardens

Somali Group Transforms Vacant City Lot into Garden/Farm with Adopt-A-Lot Program

Place

Abdulkadir Chirambo smiles easily, especially when he’s talking about the vacant city lots the United Somali Bantu of Greater Pittsburgh have converted to a huge farm like garden. As president and spokesman of the organization, he gets serious when asked what brought him from Kenya to the Pittsburgh. “Peace, education and changing life,” he says with conviction.

Abdulkadir Chirambo is president of the United Somali Bantu of Greater Pittsburgh, he’s seen here with Shelly Danko+Day who is the City of Pittsburgh’s urban agriculture and food policy specialist. The group has transformed a three quarter acre area that was formerly vacant city lots into a garden farm located in Pittsburgh’s Perry Hilltop neighborhood.

The Somali Bantu includes people from many countries — among them, Kenya, Brundi and Congo. Those that spent their lives farming in their home countries longed to continue to work in the soil here.

The elders of the bantu have guided Chirambo and others, teaching them the traditions of growing. At the beginning, in 2016, Chirambo tried to understand the results of a soil test as the elders stood nearby. “All they did was get a pen and dig it to the ground and said, ‘hey something will grow up from here,’” he said with a hearty laugh.

Abdulkadir Chirambo is president of the United Somali Bantu of Greater Pittsburgh, here he hold beans harvested from the garden. The group has transformed a three quarter acre area that was formerly vacant city lots into a garden farm located in Pittsburgh’s Perry Hilltop neighborhood.

The nearly acre site they farm Pittsburgh’s Perry Hilltop neighborhood was transformed from vacant lots through the city’s Adopt-A-Lot program run by Shelly Danko+Day. Pittsburgh’s urban agriculture and food policy specialist oversees the program, which started in 2014. Currently there are 151 lots covering 11 total acres that are used for a variety of different purposes. “It’s a way people can access vacant city owned lot for food, flower or rain gardens,” she says.

With the group in its second year, the large, lush garden is brimming with tall corn plants, dwarf okra, squash, tomatoes, tomatillos, peppers, lettuce, cabbage, potatoes, cucumbers, beans, carrots, collards and more.

This is a showplace for the program, but with over 7,000 vacant lots in the city, it’s just a start. “People are so excited about adopting these lots,” Danko+Day says with a smile. “I love seeing the flowers growing and the communities involved people out enjoying the space that was once just a vacant lot.”

Each garden throughout the city is different; in Homewood that group of gardeners has erected a hoop house to extend the season. Other lots are used for flowers to beautify the neighborhood and some gardens deal with storm water more effectively. “A lot of communities doing a lot of really unique things, she says. “They are like snowflakes, every one is different.”

Anyone can adopt a vacant lot, don’t need to be residents of the city and the program is free. After submitting an application through the city’s website, Danko+Day works to draw up an agreement to assure the lot will be used for the right purpose.

Standing in the middle of the Somali garden as the late afternoon sun drops over the trees, she reflects on the success of this small farm. “The Somali come from a farming community, she relates, it’s been 20 years since they have land to grow on. To see what they have done with it, is amazing, this is one of my happy places for sure.”

As the elders work in the shade repairing some garden machinery, Danko+Day looks over at them and continues.

“They were really concerned with passing the farming traditions to the youth, she says. The fact that I can help provide this for them is a real joy for me. Many of them were born in refugee camps and didn’t ever have a chance to garden.”

The beans here are harvested to be used dry. Some of the lettuce plants, grown in long rows, are allowed to go to seed. They will be saved and planted again next year. The group has been holding a market to sell its fresh produce on Thursdays from 3 to 6 p.m.

“For the future I’d like more sites like this, Danko+Day says. My area of interest is food policy and making sure that people are fed. We have 63,000 Pittsburghers who are food insecure. Having more gardens like this and more communities that do this kind of work is going to help to reduce those numbers.”

Emily Persico is a food policy intern with the city working on a master’s degree from Yale. She’s spent her summer with Danko+Day learning about the program and watching these gardens grow, changing neighborhoods.

Emily Persico is a food policy intern with the city working on a master’s degree from Yale. She’s spent her summer with Danko+Day learning about the program and watching these gardens grow. Here she holds a small pear shaped tomato. The United Somali Bantu of Greater Pittsburgh has transformed a three quarter acre area that was formerly vacant city lots into a garden farm located in Pittsburgh’s Perry Hilltop neighborhood. Okra is just one of the many crops grown in the garden.

“It can bring the community together,” she says. “Today were standing here among five men who are all working this land. We’ve seen it. They have the market where people come to the spot and see it as a source of pride. It’s cool to see that transformation.”

As Chirambo walks through the garden looking at all the produce he talks about the journey of learning to garden. “The last two seasons I have learned a lot. Last year, the first zucchini I picked, I pulled out the whole thing,” he said laughing.

The group has worked hard to improve the soil, adding organic matter and removing stones and bricks. “It was hard, I realize it’s not an easy job,” Chirambo says. “I was wondering how my dad did this for life.”

There’s a lot of fun though too. Children play and work in the garden, running, digging and carefully planting seeds.

“Three weeks later, when you come to the door, you see all the ground is green,” he says.

“The best thing for me is I’m in America. I’ve got a good education and I also learned the background of my culture,” says Chirambo.

The United Somali Bantu of Greater Pittsburgh has transformed a three quarter acre area that was formally vacant city lots into a garden farm located in Pittsburgh’s Perry Hilltop neighborhood. This lettuce has been allowed to go to seed. It will be saved and planted next year.

If there’s ever peace in his country then he’ll have the skills to help his homeland and beyond. “I have an opportunity to make a difference all around the world,” he says.

Date Originally Published on August 7, 2019

SOURCE:  Everybody Gardens

August 21, 2019
https://onenorthsidepgh.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/somali_pittsburgh_vacant_lot_garden_1.jpg 499 720 Bethany Hester https://onenorthsidepgh.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/OneNorthside.png Bethany Hester2019-08-21 15:02:192019-08-21 15:37:53Somali Group Transforms Vacant City Lot into Garden/Farm with Adopt-A-Lot Program
Jesse Descutner, assistant Main Street manager for the Northside Leadership Conference, stops on Foreland Street in Deutschtown near Allegheny City Brewery, on of 14 businesses participating in the We Like Bikes! initiative. (Nate Guidry/Post Gazette)(Nate Guidry/Post Gazette)

North Side initiative marries well-being of bicyclists with businesses

Place

A plan that has been gestating for several years within a bicycle advocacy group on the North Side finally has hatched.

The We Like Bikes! campaign is the first grassroots, multi-neighborhood initiative in the city to marry the well-being of bicyclists to that of businesses.

The Northside Leadership Conference hired Jesse Descutner in May 2018 to be the conference’s Main Street assistant.

“The conference gave me liberty to push this program through,” he said. “It became a passion project for me. I’d love to see this project cut and pasted all over the city.”

Mr. Descutner, a 2016 graduate of the University of Pittsburgh who commutes to work most days by bike from his home in Bloomfield, went door to door asking business owners to sign up. Would they keep bike repair tools — tire pumps, tire levers, chain tools, screwdriver/wrench multi-tools and patch kits — on hand and put a red We Like Bikes! decal in their storefronts letting cyclists know the tools are inside? And could they also please let cyclists use their bathrooms and fill up on water?

“I was amazed that every business I asked said yes,” he said. “Some businesses are even talking about offering incentives to cyclists, like discounts.”

The Northside Leadership Conference’s Walk Ride Northside committee began devising this plan several years ago, but implementation was left to first one intern then the next. None ever got the momentum to complete the project, said Jerry Green, a member of the committee who, with his bike activist wife, Donna Green, cycles throughout the city and region several times a week.

“Jesse has taken the bull by the horns,” he said.

We Like Bikes locations

Mr. Descutner has signed up 14 businesses so far. A $1,000 grant from One Northside, a Buhl Foundation initiative, paid for decals and tools, provided by Bear Dog Bikes in Allegheny West.

“We wanted to make everything North Side, but we want people in other parts of the city to come and know they can get assistance,” Mr. Descutner said. “We have a reliable network of businesses now. My goal is to expand up into Observatory Hill.”

The businesses are on a map at pittsburghnorthside.com.

Alexandria Shewczyk, a spokesperson for Bike Pittsburgh, said We Like Bikes! is a worthy model for replication in other neighborhoods.

“Businesses that show they care about the biking community can bring people into their shops,” she said. “More businesses are reaching out to us to have bike rack installations for customers or employees.”

Naomi Ritter, the manager at Arnold’s Tea, a participating business in Deutschtown, said the original owner, Verna Arnold, had the idea to be bike friendly several years ago. Ms. Arnold retired and sold the businesses to Claudy Pierre last year.

“She put in an application to be bike accessible, and so we’re in the process of getting a bike parking station outside our shop,” Ms. Ritter said. “We’re on a corner by a bus stop, and we get bike traffic from the Strip District and Downtown.”

Jamie Younger, owner of Young Brothers Bar in Marshall-Shadeland, said he talked to the Walk Ride committee several years ago about the many bicyclists who passed his Woods Run Avenue business en route to and from the Ohio River trail.

“I see a ton of bicycle traffic, and I thought it would be a mutually beneficial relationship between businesses and bikers to bring them in, refill their water and let them use the bathroom without having the pressure of making a purchase,” he said.

The longer-term payoff would be that these cyclists become customers, he said.

“Sometimes people would come in and say, ‘My bike broke down, can I leave it here and pick it up tomorrow?’ We had some guys biking from San Francisco to New York get caught in a heavy rainstorm. They ended up coming in, eating and drinking, and we put their bikes in a pickup to their destination in Lawrenceville.”

That got the wheels turning on the plan. But the trail’s proximity was just part of the mission.

“We want to make a connection between bicycling and local economic development,” said Nick Ross, chair of the Walk Ride Northside committee. “We want to cultivate healthy local business districts. Eight thousand people use the North Shore trail, so how can we help bring people up to the local businesses?”

“A lot of people from the North Hills park at Millvale to ride the trail, then leave,” Ms. Green said.

Signs that point people to businesses off the trail would help, she said, noting that there is a city process with signage that’s cumbersome.

An example of how businesses and bicyclists can bond is the relationship the Walk Ride committee formed with Penn Brewery in Troy Hill. The brewery, a We Like Bikes! participant, sits beside the trail that parallels Route 28.

“The manager at the brewery said, ‘Why don’t you meet at my place?’ ” Ms. Green said. “We started meeting there and we see bikes all the time there now.”

Originally published on August 12, 2019

SOURCE:  Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

August 13, 2019
https://onenorthsidepgh.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/We-like-bikes.jpg 798 1140 Bethany Hester https://onenorthsidepgh.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/OneNorthside.png Bethany Hester2019-08-13 12:13:262019-08-13 12:14:20North Side initiative marries well-being of bicyclists with businesses

Northsiders gather to celebrate reopening of historic fountain

Place

Community residents gathered together for a ribbon cutting ceremony to celebrate the reemergence of the historic fountain, listen to the sounds of the Pittsburgh Banjo Club, and eat light snacks and refreshments from Bistro To Go and The Priory.

The ribbon cutting represents the first step in a series of ongoing improvements to Allegheny Commons Park. Next is the North Promenade, which runs along North Street from the fountain to the Washington Monument. Photo: Ashlee Green

The fountain’s reconstruction took “decades of work and decades of patience,” according to PPC CEO Jayne Miller, and reflects its previous 1868 design. According to a press release, it features a “50-foot basin with a large, Grecian vase and one centered main jet surrounded by smaller jets around the base.”

Miller thanked the Northside residents in attendance and said the fountain is a symbol of the revitalization happening throughout the Northside neighborhoods.

Originally published on May 6, 2019

SOURCE:  The Northside Chronicle

June 25, 2019
https://onenorthsidepgh.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Northeast_Fountain_Opening_2019_Ashlee_Green20190502_0376_web-e1561477522311.jpg 400 600 Bethany Hester https://onenorthsidepgh.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/OneNorthside.png Bethany Hester2019-06-25 12:04:322019-06-25 12:04:32Northsiders gather to celebrate reopening of historic fountain
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Employment

  • From Our Kids: The Employment InstituteSeptember 19, 2019 - 3:49 pm
  • Pittsburgh’s new Financial Empowerment Center offers free advice and education in underserved neighborhoodsApril 19, 2019 - 11:14 am
  • College degree? Many Pittsburgh-area jobs in the next decade may not require one.April 19, 2019 - 11:09 am

Education

  • One Northside Youth eXcel Youth Council Summer 2019October 1, 2019 - 2:12 pm
  • Nate Smallwood, Tribune-ReviewArt project in Northview Heights helping children express themselvesJuly 30, 2019 - 12:02 pm
  • Kidsburgh: Programs Offer Golf Lessons & Life Lessons For All KidsJune 4, 2019 - 4:43 pm

Place

  • Bistro to Go – Together We Find CommunityOctober 1, 2019 - 1:11 pm
  • Doug Oster, Everybody GardensSomali Group Transforms Vacant City Lot into Garden/Farm with Adopt-A-Lot ProgramAugust 21, 2019 - 3:02 pm
  • Jesse Descutner, assistant Main Street manager for the Northside Leadership Conference, stops on Foreland Street in Deutschtown near Allegheny City Brewery, on of 14 businesses participating in the We Like Bikes! initiative. (Nate Guidry/Post Gazette)(Nate Guidry/Post Gazette)North Side initiative marries well-being of bicyclists with businessesAugust 13, 2019 - 12:13 pm

Safety

  • Northside Highlight: Calvin M. Hall Public Safety CenterDecember 10, 2019 - 1:52 pm
  • HOPE Diversion ProgramNorthside Highlight: HOPE Diversion ProgramDecember 10, 2019 - 1:38 pm
  • A foundation of hope: Pilot program boasts success in aiding at-risk juveniles on North SideJuly 30, 2019 - 12:20 pm

Health

  • Northside Highlight: Unshakeable MotherhoodMarch 11, 2020 - 3:01 pm
  • Corporate Citizenship award winner: Allegheny Health Network provides resources to Project DestinyApril 19, 2019 - 1:08 pm
  • North Side health and wellness program to be created with $250K grantApril 19, 2019 - 12:59 pm

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