Fall Leaf Season is Upon Us!

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Welcome to Fall! The leaf season is here and it is our busiest time of year for our volunteers in the park.

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We began our efforts this past weekend with a vigorous raking of the Neal Dow Ave lower side of Westerleigh Park's grass field. We are planning to get the rest of the grass fields on Maine Ave, Willard Ave, and Springfield Ave done as soon as possible so that all the grass can be fertilized (i.e., organic, of course) and seeded. We can use all the help we can get and would appreciate anyone willing to volunteer. Please come by on Saturday's 9am-12pm to help out. As this is leaf season, we will be raking and cleaning up leaves weekly until they are gone.

 

We also restored and repainted the gazebo to get it ready for West Fest (i.e., the Westerleigh Folk Music & Art Festival which has been running for 18 years!). We are adding some final touch ups to complete this work. West Fest was a grand event and there were approximately 1,500 people that came to Westerleigh Park throughout the day to enjoy the wonderful music, kids events/activities, and to shop from the vendors. A special thank you to Julia Aponte and Brianna Nicole from the Community Arts Commission for organizing West Fest 18. We also were able to coordinate our efforts, advocacy, and fund raising to have two brand new water fountains installed in both Westerleigh and Northerleigh Parks this past summer. Each water fountain has a bottle filler station and a separate dog water bowl.

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We were recently awarded a New York City Partnership for Parks $2,500.00 grant to build new retaining wall beds around the front of Westerleigh Park on the corner of Neal Dow Ave and Main Ave as well as Neal Dow Ave and Springfield Ave. These retaining walls will help remove the excess water build up at the street corners to reduce sitting water by stopping some of the run off water when it rains heavily.  This work is scheduled to begin in Spring 2026. We will then be raising additional money to build the retaining wall beds for the corners of Willard Ave and Maine Ave as well as Willard Ave and Springfield Ave.

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We had a wonderful Kids Halloween & Scarecrow Festival despite the inclement weather. We thank all of our community members that donated (i.e., time, decorations, candy, and money), our high school student and community volunteers, and our incredible sponsors. A special thank you to Tony for his DJing/Mcing the event. 

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We are having our annual Christmas Tree Lighting Event on Saturday December 6th from 2pm-7pm in Westerleigh Park. We can use help with volunteers to run the event as well as decorate the park on Friday December 5th from 5pm-7pm in Westerleigh Park.

 

Announcements regarding planned events in each of the parks can be found on our Events Page. We encourage you to check back weekly on the Events and Announcements pages to remain informed. If you would like to donate, please use the Donate page and give what you can. All money that is donated goes back to the park to restore, clean up, support our community volunteer events, upgrade and beautify the park, and to set up the events for the community to come together and enjoy. Monthly donations of $5, $10, $15, or $20 are always appreciated to help fund all that we do for the community year round.

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Sincerely,

The WPC