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March 14, 2022
Downey has some really exciting events coming up for the spring and summer of 2022. A date has been finalized for the Touch-A-Truck event, held at Independence Park on Saturday, May 7, at 10:00 am. It will be a great event for kids of all ages.
The Downey Parks & Recreation Department hosts the Concerts in the Park series at Furman Park every summer. This year, along with the outstanding musical performances, we will be adding large-scale games such as Jenga, bean bag toss and Connect Four so that residents can enjoy playing in our gorgeous Southern California weather.
Also, we will continue our family movie nights at Golden Park. For more information and updates, please check our social media pages.
In 2019, Downey held the first Girls on Fire event. There were 100 girls from Downey middle school and high schools who participated in the summer camp. Girls on Fire was geared to help girls deal with unique challenges such as self-defense, cyberbullying, internet crimes, maintaining a healthy lifestyle, self-esteem, suicide prevention, human trafficking, and building healthy relationships.
This year, we will be holding our second annual Girls on Fire Camp from July 25 to July 27. We plan on opening the event to a larger radius, so mark your calendars and stay tuned for more details.
We are always looking at ways to improve our city parks and facilities. Thanks to Measure S, Downey has remodeled fire stations, our library, parks, and streets. Through additional grant funding, we will repurpose and replace playground equipment at Crawford and Temple Parks. We anticipate having a groundbreaking ceremony this summer. You may have seen much activity through our city’s main thoroughfares, a testament to your tax dollars at work and part of the three-year street improvement project to repair 264,000 linear feet of city streets.
Public Works is hard at work planting trees throughout the city as part of the Urban Forest Management Plan. City parks supported by trees provide a respite from the noise, congestion, and other daily life stressors in an urban environment. Healthy parks supported by trees encourage park use and recreation, while shade protects from extreme heat and creates comfortable conditions when people are outside. Our Urban Forest Management Plan has set goals and strategies to ensure that trees continue to increase residents’ quality of life. The goal is to have a tree canopy of 20 percent in the city by 2050. That is a total of 30,000 new trees.
Lastly, I am happy to announce the availability of nearly $156,000 in Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) funds for organizations that provide public services to low and moderate-income residents during the 2022-2023 Program Year. The deadline for submitting applications is 5:00 pm on Wednesday, March 9, 2022.
To apply and for more information visit www.downeyca.org or contact City Hall at (562) 904-7152.
