Meet Your Neighbor: A Volunteer Who Keeps LHENA Running

The Lowry Hill East Neighborhood Association, the civic group for the Wedge, is volunteer-led and governed by an elected board. Its president, Jason Garcia, signed a memorandum of agreement March 16 with CommonBond Communities to advance an affordable-housing development in the neighborhood, one of the more consequential decisions a small neighborhood board takes on.

The association's most visible volunteer effort is its Food Share, which runs about three distributions a month at SpringHouse Ministries, giving out groceries and shopping for young adults aging out of foster care. Volunteers also staff committees that take up public safety, community development and small-business outreach, work that has included neighborhood surveys on the Hennepin Avenue reconstruction and on safety.

Most of that work happens in meeting rooms and over email rather than in public, and it is what allows a renter-heavy neighborhood with constant turnover to keep a civic memory. New volunteers step into roles others vacate, and the surveys, programs and relationships carry forward on the strength of people willing to give an evening a month.

The association holds open monthly meetings, and committees are open to anyone who wants to join. Residents can find meeting schedules and the Food Share calendar through LHENA directly.

(Note: This profile names the verifiable people and programs behind LHENA rather than a single composite volunteer; the association's broader board roster was not independently confirmed at publication.)