I hope this newsletter finds you well. I’m back in the office and playing a lot of catch up this week. I wanted to thank Cindy Cleghorn, Joanne Yvanek-Garb and Jay Handal for their articles updating you on their great work with the Congress of Neighborhoods, PlanCheckNC and the Neighborhood Council Budget Advocates. It was super to come back to open checking accounts for the Neighborhood Councils! A huge thanks to our Funding 
Program Director, Armando Ruiz, who did an amazing job as Acting General Manager while I was gone by not only with holding down the fort, but also ensuring that the accounts were finally opened with minimal drama. Of course, he wouldn’t have been able to do it without the awesome support of our staff so I want to acknowledge and appreciate them as well.
I was sad to learn, however, that we lost two of our long time Neighborhood Council supporters these past few weeks. Chatsworth Neighborhood Council leader, Diana Dixon Davis, passed away on Sunday after 14 years service to the CNC. Please click here for more information on her amazing life. We also lost Pilar Martinez-Byrne,who was a popular Spanish translator for Neighborhood Councils and City Council for many years and just a lovely individual. They will be both be missed.
I’ll have more news to share next week once I’ve sorted through everything. Enjoy the cooler weather this weekend!
Best,
Grayce Liu,
General Manager
Department of Neighborhood Empowerment aka EmpowerLA