Program areas at Highland Park Improvement Club
Food Distribution - Beginning when the Governor issued the Stay Home order mid-March of 2020 and using Covid-safe protocols, HPIC worked with Seattle Public Schools, West Seattle Food Bank, Cascadia Produce and more to provide free lunch plus weekend shelf stable food to all who came to the site. The program at its peak operated 5 days/week and distributed an average of 600 lunches per week. This program ended when the fire of June 25, 2021 destroyed our building and all the food stored within.
HPIC Rebuild - on June 25, 2021, the Highland Park Improvement Club suffered a fire in the early morning hours that started in an alcove outside the building. Thus began the HPIC Rebuild project - a time of collecting insurance, planning with the community, including our first Virtual Town Hall 10/13/21 to talk with the community about the fire (40+ attendees) and hiring an architect for the Rebuild project.
Highland Park Decanted + Building Tours to showcase Volunteer remodel work - while the building was closed (except for Food Distribution) during the pandemic, a small group of skilled volunteers worked to remodel the building and Highland Park Decanted was held outdoors as a celebration and offering limited tours of the work accomplished. Over 100 people attended. This event, celebrating the planned re-opening of our soon to be remodeled building, took place on May 22, 2021 - less than one month before the fire that destroyed our building.
Other program services - 01-14-21 Day of Service (Neighborhood Clean-up) 20 people; Neighborhood Garage Sales (7/10/21, 8/14/21, 9/11/21) with total attendees in the 100s.
Live-streamed music from HPIC - 4 special performances live-streamed from HPIC during the pandemic shutdown with covid-safe precautions for musicians and sound people. 20 to 50 devices were logged in during the performances, with additional attendees in each location. The last live-stream from HPIC was June 5, 2021 - the program ended when the fire of June 25, 2021 destroyed our building.