RPNA along with other associations, city representatives and residents are concerned about vacant properties especially of this size.  We will be seeking help to fill this store with a needed market, bank or other service for Rose Park.  Please take a moment to send us any ideas you have about what we need in our neighborhood or what you'd like to see go into this soon to be vacant store.

info@rpna.org  also rpna on facebook  facebook rpna

 Earlier this week, Albertsons' parent company announced that they would be closing 18 of the store's underperforming Southern California locations, including one in the Belmont Heights neighborhood of Long Beach. Supervalu-which also owns Osco/Sav-On Pharmacies and Lucky Stores-will be shutting down a total of 60 stores this year, citing steep losses across all of the chains it operates, according to the Los Angeles Times.

The Belmont Heights Albertsons on Redondo Ave. between 6th St. and 7th St. is the only Long Beach casualty of the closures and is expected to be gone by December. Albertsons' other four Long Beach locations-Downtown, Belmont Shore, Los Altos and the one on the corner of Long Beach Blvd. and Willow Ave-will remain open indefinitely.

Though the loss of one store in Long Beach is small comparitively to the number of grocery stores that exist in the city as a whole, Supervalu's announcement is another sign that nationwide, supermarkets are on the decline.

Big-box retailers such as Target and Wal-Mart-as well as smaller, specialty stores such as Whole Foods and Tesco's Fresh & Easy-are slowly chipping away at the market share, drawing in customers with one-stop shops, lower prices and pre-prepared items for busy families with tight budgets. In Long Beach, a reduction in fresh food purchases at grocery stores could also be the result of the rise of increasingly accessible weekly farmers markets across the city.

"The traditional grocery store is something of a dinosaur," Jim Prevor (a food analyst at PerishablePundit.com, a website that follows the fresh food industry) told the Times. "The core question is whether it can be reinvented and re-created or whether we have to have a lot fewer of them."

CONGRATULATIONS To Roger Kavigan whose donation to RPNA won him 2 free passes on JetBlue Airways..... He is planning on going to the Caribbean.  :)

Is your old house one of the vintage homes in Rose Park that is celebrating its centennial birthday this year? If it was built in 1913 or earlier it is turning 100 this year. In Rose Park and Rose Park South Historic Districts approximately 100 homes will turn 100 years old, or older, this year! The 100 year old celebration is enthusiastically supported by local businesses Look Graphics, Alford's English Gardens, and Richco Gates which have supplied a limited number of attractive lawn banners that are available free to residents living in these centurion homes.

Just like Michael and Joey shown below installing their new birthday lawn banner. They moved into their charming 1911 home on St. Louis in 2005 and just four years later received a Rose Park Neighborhood Association House Beautiful award, which recognized and celebrated the fine work the two had done in creating a beautiful home. They love living here for the walk-able neighborhood, the fun things to do nearby and the great neighbors.

Please register your home at the UPS store at 7th & Redondo to pick up your lawn banner. RPNA will need the address and the year your home was built. Membership in Rose Park Neighborhood Association is not required for the banner, but we'd love to have you on board! We are open to all residents of the area, including our neighbors in apartments and condos!

Please share your 100th Birthday Party photos on the Rose Park facebook page! For further information about RPNA and what is going on in your neighborhood, go to www.rpna.org.