JACKSON SQ.—Seafood, body waxing and laundry machines are coming to three ground-floor retail spaces in the Jamaica Plain Neighborhood Development Corporation’s recently completed mixed-use residential/commercial building at 270 Centre St. Restaurant Themistocles Vlahoulis plans to open a restaurant he is tentatively calling Boston Roast Beef and Seafood in October. He told the Gazette that...
Monthly Archives: August 2011
JP Observer: Getting beyond ‘family’ values
During his debate with Sarah Palin in 2008, now Vice President Joe Biden made a correction to his word choice that should have made everyone interested in accuracy and inclusiveness happy, especially Jamaica Plain residents. Criticizing presidential candidate John McCain’s tax proposal for not giving middle-class tax breaks, Biden said, “One hundred million families,...
New nonprofit helps people help themselves
“As much as possible, I’m getting out of the way,” says Jesús Gerena, director of the new JP-based Family Independence Initiative-Boston (FII-Boston). It’s an unusual mission statement for a social-service nonprofit, where intervention and advocacy are standard tactics. That’s because FII-Boston aims to help people help themselves by organizing families into self-sustaining support groups....
Students build bikes in new program
By Alicia Perez, Special to the Gazette BPS students built bikes—one for themselves, one for donation—in a new partnership with Bikes Not Bombs, a Jamaica Plain nonprofit organization, and Roxbury’s Madison Park Technical Vocational High School that launched this summer. The program, called “Strive,” allows special needs students to use their hands and get...
Whole Foods protesters could go to trial
With John Ruch Boston Police District E-13 Commander Capt. Paul Russell said last month that the complaints were granted against three JP residents arrested at a meeting hosted by Whole Foods in June, clearing the way for them to go to trial. Anti-Whole Foods protesters Peter Blailock, Chloe Frankel and Andrew Murray, were arrested...
$1m grant to help homeless vets
The JP-based Volunteers of America Massachusetts (VOAMA) has received a $1 million grant to help homeless and at-risk veterans. VOAMA estimates that there are over 1,000 homeless veterans and over 7,000 veterans living in poverty in Suffolk, Norfolk and Plymouth counties. The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs grant is for VOAMA programming in collaboration...
Beer, wine store coming to Centre St.
CENTRAL JP—A new wine and beer store that will focus on smaller producers is being planned for 488 Centre St. Although the lease has not yet been signed, Streetcar Wine and Beer is slated to open in late October, said Michael Dupuy, the owner. “I wanted to start by talking to as many people...