MPDC Takes Home the Golden Shoe Award at Annual WalkBoston Event

On March 20th, the Madison Park Development Corporation Complete Streets team was honored with the Golden Shoe Award at WalkBoston’s Annual Meeting and Celebration. The award recognized MPDC’s Community Action program “For deep engagement with Roxbury residents to create advocates for a safer, more walkable neighborhood”. Several community residents, youth leaders, and MPDC staff attended the ceremony, where Angela Kelly, Assistant Director of Community Action, spoke about the importance of walkability to community development and health equity in Roxbury, and MPDC youth leaders were featured in a short film about walkability and social justice, which was screened at the event. The event also included remarks by keynote speaker Dr. Beverly Scott, the new General Manager of the MBTA, and opportunities for MPDC residents to speak with Dr. Scott about transit policy.

Our Complete Streets work began nearly two years ago through a partnership with the Boston Public Health Commission, WalkBoston, and MassBike and has since engaged a dedicated team of resident advocates, youth leaders, and MPDC staff who have conducted walk audits and bike audits of the neighborhood, successfully advocated to city officials for improvements to the built environment of Dudley Square (cleaning up vacant lots, installing solar trash compactors, fixing WALK lights, repainting crosswalks, etc.), and promoted walking, bicycling, improved access to transit, and neighborhood beautification as tools for improving community health, safety, and equity.

The team has also been active in mobilizing community participation in the City’s planning process for the re-design of Melnea Cass Boulevard, helping raise neighborhood concerns about the need to make it a safer, well-maintained, more pedestrian-friendly street that better serves the needs of the neighborhood. They have been successful at achieving strong community turn-out and participation at all public meetings about Melnea Cass Boulevard, including the most recent planning meeting in March, which was featured in a Bay State Banner article entitled “Melnea Cass widening project raises resident questions, concerns”.

These efforts are part of MPDC’s new commitment to Health Equity & Community Wellness as one of our five core program areas for our Community Action department. As spring begins, other activities will include new community walking groups, zumba classes, events to promote community access to the Hubway bike-share system through subsidized memberships and bike training, the launch of our second season of a Community Supported Agriculture program which offers residents the chance to purchase affordable weekly shares of organic vegetables from a local farm delivered to Dudley Square, and revitalization efforts in our two resident-led community gardens. All are invited to join us on April 26th and 27th, when as part of National Volunteer Week and Boston Shines, we will be getting the gardens for spring and installing new signs and murals to draw attention to the gardens.  Click here for a flyer.

To get involved with any of our Health Equity and Community Wellness activities, please contact Angela Kelly at 617.849.6234 or [email protected].