Dear Michael,

September was a busy month around the neighborhood.

Across myHometown communities, September included 30 community and service events, with neighbors showing up throughout Salt Lake City, West Valley City, Ogden, Orem, Provo and Santaquin.

From planting and neighborhood projects to learning new skills and helping families, neighbors found plenty of ways to show up for one another. Here are a few of our favorites.

Want to see what's happening on your street? myHometown runs Community Resource Centers in neighborhoods across the Wasatch Front, with classes, activities, and volunteer opportunities open to everyone. Find your community and take a look.

Neighbors Helping Neighbors

Salt Lake City: Canned with Care

Sometimes strengthening a neighborhood starts with learning a useful skill together.

Over three days in September, neighbors filled The Square Kitchen in Salt Lake City to learn how to safely can and preserve food at home. Salt Lake City Council District 1 hosted the free sessions, and a food safety expert from USU Extension walked everyone through the process start to finish.

People went home with jars they had filled themselves, and with a skill that keeps paying off every time groceries get expensive.

Thank you to Councilwoman Victoria Petro and the Salt Lake City Council for putting this together, and to myHometown Salt Lake City for helping spread the word.

Ogden: A Tree Story

On a street in west Ogden, an enormous Siberian elm had been a problem for years. It had grown right up against Tamara's detached garage, slowly pushing the whole structure over, with limbs stretching across her neighbors' fences and up toward the power lines. Her insurance company told her they could help after the garage collapsed. Not before. She had paid out of pocket to have limbs cut back a few at a time, but the tree kept growing and the garage kept leaning.

Tamara is the neighbor who organizes the block party and shows up at your door with herbs from her garden, so her myHometown Ogden West neighbors went looking for help. They gathered bids, applied to the Cities Strong Foundation Ogden Impact Fund, and this summer a crane rolled down the street. Cutz Treez took the elm down limb by limb and ground the stump as a donation. The wood chips stayed behind for Tamara's garden, and she shared those with her neighbors too. She wrote to us afterward: for the first time in years, she got through the windy days and the rainstorms without worrying, and she can finally repair the garage before winter.

Kindness Starts Next Door

Kindness is coming to a yard near you.

Keep an eye out for Kindness Starts Next Door signs popping up around our communities as a simple reminder that stronger neighborhoods can start with one kind act.

The signs come out of a new partnership with One Kind Act a Day and the Semnani Family Foundation, connecting everyday kindness with the bigger Days of Service effort already happening on these streets.

Help Something Good Take Root

Have an idea for making your neighborhood a little stronger? Or want to help neighbors turn their ideas into action?

Support Your Local Impact Fund

Under "Fund," select your city's fund!

Two New Places to Say Hello in West Valley City

A building becomes a neighborhood hub when neighbors fill it.

West Valley City opened two new city-owned Community Resource Centers this fall: Whitehall and Lighthouse. They join a network that has been growing in West Valley for years, and they are already filling up.

These are the rooms where neighbors take English classes, learn to sew, pick up an instrument, sit down with someone about a financial question, or just find out what is happening on their street. They are open to everyone, and most of what happens inside is run by neighbors themselves.

Whitehall already includes expanded services from the Good Samaritan Foundation and NoMás.

Thank you to Mayor Karen Lang, the West Valley City team, and the myHometown volunteers who have been getting these spaces ready.

See classes at the new location: https://www.myhometownut.com/utah/west-valley-city/central-valley-view 

Little Leaders. Big Momentum.

Leadership starts earlier than most of us think.

In Leader in Me schools, kids learn to set their own goals, speak up, work through disagreements, and look out for classmates. Twelve Utah schools are running the program now. Over time, the goal is 50 schools and more than 25,000 students.

That is a lot of kids discovering that leadership begins with them.

Know a school that belongs on this list?

We are looking for schools ready to bring Leader in Me to their students, especially in myHometown communities. Send us a note at [email protected] and tell us about yours.

A Little Help at the Right Time

Sometimes a family needs one steady hand at exactly the right moment. Through Cities Strong Foundation's partnership with Good Samaritan Foundation and its NoMás, residents in myHometown communities and along the Wasatch Front can access critical family, immigration and housing supports paired with limited case management that is helping families back on their feet. 

Now expanding to West Valley City

NoMás is opening an in-person immigration clinic at the new Whitehall Community Resource Center, 3150 Whitehall Drive. Free appointments are available, which means families in West Valley City no longer have to travel across the valley for legal help.

Good work was already happening. More families were finding it. Now it is coming to another neighborhood.

 Join the Effort

Meet a Couple of Neighbors Helping Us Grow

Welcome, Melanie!

Melanie Anderson has joined the Cities Strong Foundation Board, elected to a term through 2029.

Melanie is Chief Compliance Officer at Merrick Bank and has spent more than 20 years working in banking and community reinvestment. We are glad to have her.

Supporting the Layton myHometown Team

Nicole Cottle is taking on the Layton Impact Fund role.

Nicole helped start myHometown in West Valley City, its very first city. Now she will work alongside Layton's city and myHometown leaders to bring that experience north and help the local Impact Fund go as far as it can.

Bruce Jardine stays engaged with Cities Strong Foundation, with his focus turning more toward Ogden and Roy.

Good Neighbors Make Good Partners

Rancho Markets comes to American Fork

Rancho Markets keeps growing and keeps finding ways to give back along the way.

Congratulations to Eli Madrigal and the whole Rancho team on the opening of their new American Fork store. The Round Up program is expanding with it, and Rancho marked the occasion with an additional $5,000 contribution.

Every time a customer rounds up at the register, those cents go to work in Utah neighborhoods. Thank you for including us in the celebration.

Thank you, Merrick Bank

Merrick Bank presented a $15,000 contribution at the Whitehall Community Resource Center, supporting the Salt Lake City and West Valley City Impact Funds.

Because of how the Impact Funds work, locally raised dollars get matched and stretched further, so this one goes a long way on these streets.

Coming in November: Getting to Know Our Neighborhoods Better

Being a good neighbor starts with knowing your neighborhood.

We are working with the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute on a new Community Data Profile for each of our cities with a clear look at housing, education, the local economy, who lives here, and how neighborhoods are doing.

This November, we will take a closer look at each of our communities: where they are growing, where challenges remain, and where working together can make a difference.

We will share the new profiles next month, and there is much more to come.

See you around the neighborhood.

The Cities Strong Foundation Team