Elections

Erin Lovall:

My name is Erin Lovall. I have been a member of the ECNA Board for six years. In that time I have served the neighborhood in varying capacities, including Board Secretary, Board Vice President, and member of the Old Washington Street Festival Planning Committee, Communications Committee, and Neighborhood Beautification Committee. I have helped plan and/or run numerous neighborhood events, including the Old Washington Street Festival, Halloween on Washington Street, concerts in our neighborhood park, a variety of workshops, neighborhood cleanups, and more. I dearly love our neighborhood and I am passionate about volunteering my time, energy, and talent to create events and spaces for community to gather and thrive. Thank you for considering me for a seat on this important Board.

Jessica Rosales:

My name is Jessica Rosales. I spend a lot of my time making connections in the community and finding meaningful ways to serve. In my work as a Life Coach at the Excel Center, I stay up-to-date on available resources and try to keep a pulse on relevant issues we, the public, face. Marginalized folks are my people, and I dedicate a large portion of my volunteer work to hispanic, queer, and unhoused issues. Our family moved to East Central this past April and have completely fallen in love with the neighborhood. The historic homes, the friendly faces, and family-oriented events are my favorite parts of what makes the east central neighborhood so special. SO much of Muncie’s arts and culture can be found in this area, and I am so proud to live here! I look forward to participating in the neighborhood association wherever I fit best.

Lynn Thornburg:

My name is Lynn Thornburg and I am asking to be re-elected to the East Central Neighborhood Board of Directors for the 2026-2028 Term

I have lived in ECNA for 59 of my soon to be 80 years.  I have been involved with the ECNA for 48 years and with the Old Washington Street Festival since being involved  in some of that planning as the President of the Ladies of St Lawrence!  It was held in October of that first year (1977) and only on Saturday afternoon!! 

I have held every position on the ECNA board except President.  I have walked door to door, both as an ECNA member and many times as Precinct Committee person.  In our early days, it wasn’t all restored homes, so our main efforts were the neighborhood cleanups and traveling the alleys to send  reports to the City.  .  In the mid 80’s and early 90’s, I was a Planner with Community Development focusing on Unsafe Buildings.  I authored the Unsafe Building Ordinance and created the Unsafe Building Hearing Authority.   When those efforts didn’t seem to be as effective with cleaning up the properties and because the ECNA had spun off a NFP Community Housing Development Organization, I quit my day job and jumped head first into the East Central Reinvestment Corporation.  During my tenure as Executive Director we were awarded numerous grants from the Federal Government itself, the HUD grant funding from the Community Developemnt Department, Community Foundation, Episcopal Diocese of Indianapolis, Indiana Arts Council, Knights of Columbus, Community Enhancement,  and other smaller grant opportunities.  ECRC completed approximately 62 projects, most of them total rehabs following 106 Federal Historic Guidelines as well as Section 8 safe housing guidelines.  ECRC collaborated with various other housing development groups, including Flaherty and Collins which we were the NFP partner in the Canopic, Graystone, and scattered site project. 

I held numerous duties with the Old Washington Street Festival, from singing with my family on the stage, performing the Emily Kimbrough mini-play taken from her book “How Dear to My Heart”-a story of her childhood in her home at 715 E Washington Street.

I am a lifelong member of St Lawrence Parish, which had an early start with a priest on horseback riding a circuit which held early services in the Glaser home at the SE corner of Vine and Charles.  The Glaser family were stonemasons/bricklayers and were instrumental in the construction of St Lawrence Church in the late 1890’s.   

We had a COP Shop in the early 1990’s and Block Captains who reported issues and passed newsletters.  We celebrated with a neighborhood cookout at the COP Shop with our assigned police officer grilling the hot dogs.

I currently am the Community Health Worker on the first floor of the Open Door Health Services Clinic on Madison.  We serve many of our ECNA neighbors.  I assist people who need basic necessities like housing, food, clothing, diapers, and other assistance. 

I am the oldest of 8 children, who all grew up walking to school either to St Lawrence, McKinley Jr High, and Central.  We played hopscotch on these sidewalls and rode our bikes down Vine Street.

I love my neighborhood and have worked tirelessly to help bring it back to the good old days.  I enjoy driving past some of the ECRC projects and noticing the families we helped that are still great neighbors, who have raised their children in homes that ECRC made safe, decent, and affordable.  In doing that work, the neighbors noticed the property values raising, with even more private investment.  My family home that my husband Jerry and I bought in 1987 for only $35,000 has increased in value at least 7 fold, as have many of the other properties.  We even were awarded and Althea Stoekel Award for our exterior renovation.   

Numerous members of my family still remain within a 2-3 block area of our family home.  I am a little further east than I have been most of my time in ECNA–BUT, that was a very fortunate event, because my neighbor to the east, Richard Shields,  is the owner of East Central Industries, or the Fireworks Factory as I call it.  Richard Shields has succeeded his father as the owner not only  of that building, but the fireworks place on S Walnut AND, he owns the former City Machine steel warehouse and land that is east of his factory BUT, also he bought the former factory and large warehouse and giant parking lot from Muncie Power Product’s when they moved.  Mr. Shields has been generous with allowing my family to park in his parking lot when we have our large family gatherings.  So, when the neighborhood faced a situation where the storage place for all the Neighborhood Festival equipment and signs, etc.  I reached out to Mr. Shields and asked him if we could use a part of his warehouse on Pershing, which is so handy and close to the Festival grounds.  He not only agreed, he offered his equipment to move it and to plastic wrap it on pallets and allows access with just a phone call.  I would say that is my latest and most rewarding achievement in this past 2 year term.

I love our neighborhood.  I have spent years and tears and joys and sadness and excitement and fulfillment making this place better for my family members as well as my neighbors.  I think I am the only neighbor that is still in the neighborhood and was involved with the first festival and has been involved since the first cleanup and the early organizing of the neighborhood association.

I respectfully ask your support for my re-election to the East Central Neighborhood Association Board.  Thank you so much.

Voting

Voting is open to any dues paying member of ECNA, you may pay your dues here https://muncie-ecna.org/?page_id=261 or at the membership meeting. You may vote via proxy if you are unable to attend the membership meeting.