ABOUT
ABOUT
The Origins of BOB
As an avid volunteer for Louisville Grows’ neighborhood tree plantings, Councilwoman Chappell was inspired by the canvassing that occurred before planting events and thought that the door-to-door interactions could result in something bigger. As a Conservation District Supervisor, she fancied the idea of “greenifying” a neighborhood by adding rain barrel installations and native garden plantings to the non-profit’s tree planting event. However, the idea never took off.
After attending Mayor Greenberg’s Mayor’s Night Out event as a Councilwoman, she realized that the green vision she had could be expanded to include a myriad of city services. All of these city departments were already providing a wealth of services, many of which weren’t being taken advantage of, so why not bring these services to people’s doorstep? Meet them where they are.
When Councilwoman Chappell excitedly told her legislative aide, Amy Luckett, about the idea Amy said, “I think this has been done before!”
Insert Robin Hawkins-Faulkner with Louisville Forward. In 2016, Robin started an event called Building Our Blocks, or B.O.B. for short. The event targeted 11 neighborhoods in West Louisville and “utilized a combination of city data, Metro Council member input, and community interest to identify ‘hotspots’ within targeted neighborhoods to engage Louisville citizens and deliver practical and beneficial on-the-spot services.” The program’s last iteration was in 2017. With Robin’s blessing, we adopted the B.O.B. name for District 15.
BOB’s Vision
Twice a year, in the spring and fall, an area or neighborhood within District 15 is selected to be the focus of BOB. Over months of planning, community meetings, and site visits, we gather data and assess the needs before compiling our final game plan. We know the basics of what we’re able to offer, but since every BOB is different, we’re able to customize our approach to cater to the uniqueness of every community. For example, one BOB may only have residential properties, while another BOB may have more commercial properties. Other communities might have a greater need for housing repairs while another is more heavily focused on traffic calming. It’s not a one-size-fits-all approach.
All of our planning and hard work culminates in one big event day. It’s on this day that we host a resource fair, do a community clean-up, knock out projects like home repairs and tree plantings, and a whole lot more. Mostly, it’s a celebration of the community!
Lucky Horseshoe was chosen as the pilot neighborhood for our inaugural BOB event. We chose this area for two reasons: 1) It is the smallest neighborhood in D15, and 2) It is a neighborhood in the central section of D15, which has the greatest need for services. The first BOB helped us create processes that help us scale and easily implement BOB in other neighborhoods.
See our list of services here.
You’ve met BOB—now, meet Alena
Alena Balakos, a D15 resident, was hired in 2023 as the District’s Program Coordinator and was tasked with leading the BOB project.
As a passionate community leader and someone who knows D15 intimately, Alena was the perfect candidate for the job. Plus, she loves canvassing!
A large part of Alena’s job is community engagement. She’s responsible for organizing meetings, door-knocking, and general communications. She is also responsible for connecting with partners within Louisville Metro, local non-profits, and other entities so that we can exercise the greatest impact for BOB.
If it has to do with BOB, Alena is your gal.
