Per the City of Takoma Park: The City of Takoma Park has partnered with LiveStories (FORWARD) to administer $2.1 million in COVID relief funds to the community. This opportunity will provide a one-time $1,000 direct cash assistance to eligible households in the City to assist those negatively affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

LiveStories (FORWARD) is hosting two in-person application events for individuals who do not have access to a computer, smartphone, or internet-enabled device or would like additional assistance.

In-Person Application Events

Date: Wednesday, December 7, 2022
Time: 3:00 pm – 8:00 pm
Takoma Park Maryland Library
7505 New Hampshire Avenue,
Suites 201-208

Date: Thursday, December 8, 2022
Time: 10:00 am – 1:30 pm
Takoma Park Community Center
7500 Maple Avenue
Azalea Room

Get in-person assistance with your application!

Eligibility Requirements and Documents

To qualify for the Direct Cash Assistance payment, individuals need to meet the following criteria:

• Household annual income must be less than $50,000
• Must be located within the boundaries of the City of Takoma Park, Maryland (address cannot be a PO Box or an address that leads to a shipping center as their physical location).

Prospective applicants can document their housing eligibility with the following:

• If your household qualifies for and receives government assistance from SNAP, TANF, WIC, SSI/SSDI, you can upload a copy of the qualification/benefits letter that shows your current address. If you receive benefits from another program that is not listed, you will be able to enter that information for review by City staff.
• You may provide a government photo ID, OR a lease, OR a utility bill, OR a tax document.

Prospective applicants can document their income eligibility with the following:

• If you, or someone in your household, qualifies and receives government assistance from unemployment, SNAP, TANF, WIC, SSI/SSDI, you can upload a copy of the benefits letter and this will automatically meet the eligibility requirement that the household’s annual income is below $50,000.
• You must submit income documents for ALL HOUSEHOLD MEMBERS THAT HAVE INCOME. You may provide tax returns from the previous calendar year, OR paystubs from within the 60 days prior to application submission, OR 60 days of bank statements prior to application submission, OR a combination of the above documents.

Visit the Direct Cash Assistance webpagefor more information on the program.

A Takoma Park man is $50,000 richer after purchasing a winning scratch-off game at the 7-Eleven located at 8101 Fenton Street in Silver Spring. Full story below courtesy of the Maryland Lottery:
An enthusiastic Maryland Lottery player from Takoma Park has won the occasional three- and four-digit prizes, but was taken aback when he checked a scratch-off and realized it was worth $50,000. The 61-year-old player, describing his experience on Nov. 18 when he claimed his prize at Lottery headquarters in Baltimore, said he “almost fainted.”

“I thought it was a mistake,” he said. However, it was the real thing: a top-prize win on the $5 Power Spot Multiplier game. His previous personal-best Lottery scores were in the $250 to $1,000 range. The Montgomery County man plans to share his winnings with his wife and adult children, coordinate a celebration dinner and pay some bills with his prize. After that, he plans to keep playing Lottery games, focusing, as always, on scratch-offs. He says they have “more luck.”

Sharing in the winner’s scratch-off fun is 7-Eleven #22921 at 8101 Fenton Street in Silver Spring. The Montgomery County store management earns a bonus of $500, equal to 1% of the prize, from the Lottery for selling a $50,000 top-prize winning scratch-off.

Update: Due to a continued mechanical issue at the Piney Branch Indoor Pool, it is anticipated the pool will remain closed until Nov. 1.
Per Montgomery County:
The Piney Branch Pool in Takoma Park reopened this week after being closed for 30 months due to the COVID-19 health crisis. The pool is located at 7510 Maple Ave. in Takoma Park. The main entrance is on Grant Avenue, across from the Takoma Park city offices. For more than 40 years, the Piney Branch Pool has served a diverse and intricate area of southern Montgomery County. The 25-yard indoor pool, which is attached to Piney Branch Elementary School, serves recreational swimmers, those wanting swim lessons, seniors, scuba lessons, kayak clubs, water fitness and high school swim teams. The pool features six lanes at a depth of 3.5 to 10.5 meters, plus two slides and backstroke flags.

Piney Branch Pool is operated by the Adventist Community Services of Greater Washington in conjunction with Montgomery County Recreation. The pool also is available for private rental events The 25-yard indoor pool, which is attached to Piney Branch Elementary, is home for recreational swimmers, swim lessons, seniors, scuba lessons, kayak clubs, water fitness and high school swim teams. The pool hours are 6:30-9 a.m. and 4-8 p.m. Monday through Thursday. On Saturdays, the pool is open from 8 a.m.-4 p.m.

A $25,000 “Pick 5” lottery ticket was sold on September 27 at the Sunoco Gas Station at 6907 New Hampshire Avenue in Takoma Park. The ticket remains unclaimed as of today, October 3. According to the Maryland Lottery, “Draw game winners have 182 days from the date of a drawing to claim their prizes, and scratch-off winners have 182 days from the announced end-of-game date.”

Additional information about recent local winners below courtesy of MDLottrry:
Players across the state won more than $29.6 million in the seven days ending Oct. 2
Players in Frederick and Lanham who became Maryland Lottery millionaires were the state’s biggest winners last week, while two other players in Parkton and Middle River each landed prizes of $100,000 or more.

In all, 36 winning tickets worth $10,000 or more were sold or redeemed in the seven days ending Oct. 2, and the Lottery paid more than $29.6 million in prizes during that span.

Winners of prizes larger than $25,000 must redeem their tickets at the Maryland Lottery Customer Resource Center in Baltimore, which is open by appointment only. Prizes of up to $5,000 can be claimed at any of more than 400 Expanded Cashing Authority Program (XCAP) locations. All Maryland Lottery retailers are authorized to redeem tickets up to and including $600. More information is available on the How To Claim page of mdlottery.com.

Here is the weekly roundup of big winners:

Scratch-off Prizes Claimed Sept. 26-Oct. 2:

$1 Million Prizes

• Million Dollar Mega Multiplier, 7-Eleven #11571, 9464 Lanham-Severn Road, Lanham
• Show Me $1,000,000!, Sheetz #704, 7301 Executive Way, Frederick

$100,000 Prize

• Ravens X5, Cheema Brothers BP, 17 Carroll Island Road, Middle River

$50,000 Prize

• Gold Bar Bingo 3^rd Edition, Main Street Liquors, 907 South Main Street, Hampstead

$10,000 Prizes

• $100,000 Crossword 6^thEdition, Royal Farms #052, 2410 East Joppa Road, Parkville
• Bonus Bingo X20, Brown’s Discount Liquors, 908 East Patrick Street, Frederick
• Bonus Bingo X20, Hillendale Beer and Wine, 10117 New Hampshire Avenue, Silver Spring
• Ca$h Bonus, Montgomery Plaza Liquors, 6227 Baltimore National Pike, Catonsville
• Money Rush, 7-Eleven #23705, 1527 Forest Drive, Annapolis
• Money Rush, Three Road Liquor, 13704 Brandywine Road, Brandywine
• Money Rush, Harris Teeter #487, 44900 St Andrew’s Church Road, California
• Money Rush, Economy Liquors, 9352 Lanham-Severn Road, Lanham
• Money Rush, Camp Meade Shell, 463 North Camp Meade Road, Linthicum
• Money Rush, Billiard Plus, 8140 Liberty Road, Windsor Mill
• Ravens X5, Quick Mart, 4225 Annapolis Road, Halethorpe
• Show Me $1,000,000!, 7-Eleven #11537, 1313 Francis Avenue, Baltimore
• Show Me $1,000,000!, Clinton Crossing Exxon, 8915 Woodyard Road, Clinton

FAST PLAY and Draw Game Tickets Sold for Drawings Sept. 26-Oct. 2:

BONUS MATCH 5

• $50,000 ticket sold Oct. 1 at Hob’s Citgo, 7115 North Point Road, Sparrows Point (unclaimed as of Oct. 3)

FAST PLAY

• $172,210 High Roller Blackjack ticket sold Oct. 1 at Royal Farms #185, 118 Mount Carmel Road, Parkton (claimed)

KENO

• $15,035 ticket sold Oct. 1 at Seabreeze Restaurant, 27130 South Sandgates Road, Mechanicsville (unclaimed as of Oct. 3)
• $12,504 ticket sold Sept 29 at Subworks Pizza, 5319 Pulaski Highway, Perryville (claimed)

MEGA MILLIONS

• $10,000 ticket sold Sept. 23 at Weis Market #111, 630 Baltimore Boulevard, Westminster (unclaimed as of Oct. 3)

PICK 5

• $50,000 ticket sold Sept. 25 at Ingleside Food Mart, 1022 Ingleside Avenue, Catonsville (unclaimed as of Oct. 3)
• Three $25,000 tickets sold Oct. 2 at Express Food Mart, 4901 Marlboro Pike, Capitol Heights (all unclaimed as of Oct. 3)
• Four $25,000 tickets sold Sept. 30 at New Market Service Center, 29233 Three Notch Road, Mechanicsville (all unclaimed as of Oct. 3)
• $25,000 ticket sold Sept. 26 at Speedy Convenience, 7101 Darlington Drive, Baltimore (unclaimed as of Oct. 3)
• $25,000 ticket sold Sept. 27 at High’s #007, 9414 Scott Moore Way, Perry Hall (claimed)
• $25,000 ticket sold Sept. 27 at Sunshine Ethio, 6907 New Hampshire Avenue, Takoma Park (unclaimed as of Oct. 3)

POWERBALL

• $50,000 ticket sold Sept. 28 at Lobby Shop 2, 1 North Charles Street, #6, Baltimore (unclaimed as of Oct. 3)

RACETRAX

• $27,163 ticket sold Oct. 1 at Travel Centers of America, 7401 Assateague Drive, Jessup (unclaimed as of Oct. 3)
• $11,156.10 ticket sold Oct. 1 at Veirs Mill Exxon, 12245 Veirs Mill Road, Silver Spring (claimed)

Feature photo courtesy of Google Maps.

The Takoma Park Street Festival will take place Sunday, October 2, from 10am-5pm on Carroll Avenue in Takoma Park. The event will feature live music, over 150 street vendors, and food options from Takoma Park restaurants and food trucks. For the music line up and vendor list, visit the event’s website.

Per Main Street Takoma:
”The popular Takoma Park Street Festival returns for its 41st year of music, vendors, food and fun in Takoma Park. This year’s festival takes place on Sunday, October 2, 2022 from 10:00 am-5:00 pm on Carroll Avenue in Takoma Park, MD to Carroll Street, NW in Takoma, DC. Festival goers will enjoy the day exploring over 150 vendors booths, live music from 18 local bands, food trucks and more. Takoma’s unique shops, restaurants and cafes are all open and welcoming visitors.”

Per the City of Takoma Park:
The Takoma Park Street Festival is a little over a week away for its 41st year in Takoma Park on Sunday, October 2nd and will fill the streets with music, artists and makers, community groups, green companies and great food.

Local Music:
The event will kick off with a drum circle at the Gazebo Stage (all welcome to join!) and then move into 18 performances on 3 stages, offering a mix of soul, blues, roots rock, reggae, folk and more for a day of local music. For the first time in festival history, the event will kick off with a kids’ set by multiple Grammy award-winning duo, Cathy Fink and Marcy Marxer. For the entire line up check out the festival WEBSITE and the attached graphic.

Vendors:
Over 150 booths extend all along Carroll Avenue. Repeating the success from last year, booths will be on one side of the street only to create a spacious, enjoyable stroll from end-to-end. The festival starts at Eastern Avenue, NW on the Washington, DC border to Philadelphia Avenue in Takoma Park, MD with work from local artists and makers including art, jewelry, stationary, home decor, clothing, personal care products, plants, and much more. Community groups and green companies participate as well with info to share. Visitors may explore Takoma’s unique local shops along the way.

Food:
There will be many great food options from Takoma restaurants, food trucks and festival food favorites all to be enjoyed on the Takoma Streetery on Laurel Avenue. The Takoma Park Farmers Market runs during the festival with 25 additional vendors in an adjacent parking lot. Entrance to the farmers market is at 6931 Laurel Avenue.

Festival Entrances:
Entry may occur all along the festival route, but there are two main entrances at either end of the festival:

(1) Carroll Avenue at Eastern Avenue, NW: Take Metro’s Red line to the Takoma station or park in the Metro parking lot. Entrance is 3 blocks away.

(2) Carroll Avenue at Philadelphia Avenue: Free parking lot hosted by the TPSS Co-op at 201 Ethan Allen Avenue. Festival entrance is .5 block away.

Per Main Street Takoma:
The Takoma Park Farmers Market Annual Pie Contest is scheduled to take place on Sunday, September 18th on Laurel Avenue in Takoma Park. Bakers are invited to enter their best pies made using seasonal ingredients available now at the market – both sweet or savory. Celebrity judges taste the pies and winners are named in the following categories: Best Apple Pie, Best Peach Pie, Best Other Pie, Best Kid’s Pie, Most Unusual Pie, Yummy Mess Award, and Professional Baker.

Each year about 50 pies are entered and have included classic pies to creative uses of market ingredients. Following judging, the market slices up the pies and sells them to the public to raise money for the market’s Federal Benefit Match Program. Tickets for pie slices will be sold inside the farmers market which is adjacent to the event.
Schedule:
Sunday, September 18
Pie Delivery: 11:00am-11:30am
Judging: 11:30am-1:00pm
Winners Announced: 1:00pm
Pie Slices Available: 1:00pm

CONTEST RULES

Per the Takoma Park Police Department:
On August 13, at approximately 1:00 am, Takoma Park Police responded to the 6900 block of New Hampshire Avenue (Sunoco gas station) for an assault that had just occurred.

Units arrived to find a victim who had been assaulted by an unknown male subject.  The victim stated that while exiting the Metro bus in the area of Larch Avenue and New Hampshire Avenue, he was approached by an unknown male subject last seen wearing a black face mask, black hooded sweatshirt and black pants with colorful shoes.  An altercation occurred and the subject hit the victim over the head with an unknown object and then fled on foot in an unknown direction.  Officers canvassed the surrounding areas with negative results.  The victim was transported to a local hospital to be treated for non-life threatening injuries.

Investigation continues under case #220034810. Anyone with information about this crime is asked to please call us at 301-270-1100.

Feature photo courtesy of Google Maps.

Per the City of Takoma Park:
The Takoma Park Folk Festival is returning in-person on Sunday, September 11, after two years of virtual performances due to COVID-19. “We’re calling it ‘regroovinate,’” said Debra St. Charles, this year’s program chair. “It’s a combination of regeneration and groovy … and it represents that we are rejoicing and rebuilding.”

“It’s very exciting,” added Gordon Nimmo-Smith, who oversees sound engineering and logistics. “All of us on the committees love producing an in-person festival and engaging with our audience.”

Music will begin with the DC Labor Chorus at 10 a.m. and run through 6:30 p.m. at Takoma Park Middle School. As always, the festival will be free, family-friendly, and filled with music, crafts, food vendors, and community information booths.

However, none of the activities will be held indoors. “To provide greater safety from COVID, we are using the school grounds, but not the inside of the school,” explained festival Chair Robin Stearn. Without indoor access, the festival will have four stages rather than the typical six performance venues. But the two “absent” stages will have time slots on the others. “It’s complicated, but we’re working through the logistics,” St. Charles said.

Subtle differences in the program will be evident to long-time visitors this year. “We’ve really tried to present a more diverse lineup… with more people who have not performed before and more styles of music,” St. Charles said.

Among festival first-timers are New Orleans-style blues Sol Roots, award-winning singer-songwriter Jillian Matundan, and bluegrass group No Part of Nothin’. Also, world music group Project Locrea, which won a 2022 Washington Area Music Award, will introduce festival attendees to its fusion sound that jumps across jazz, African, Asian, and Latin American traditions.

Visitors looking for singer-songwriters will be pleased by the return of Michelle Swan and the lush sounds of Quiet the Mountain, a new band of veteran guitarists Christian Alfonso and Jimmy Stewart. Plus, the festival also will welcome a youth rock band, sitarist Sambarta Rakshit, the Washington Revels Maritime Voices, and much more.

The festival’s non-musical activities will be intact, though renovations at the school have led to changes in the festival’s geography, according to Nimmo-Smith. “We will have the full crafts show and about half of the community tables on the basketball courts, and the kids’ games on the tennis courts nearby,” he said. “The Field Stage will return to Lee Jordan Field below the school, opening up more space for the audience.”

Providing the weather cooperates, the festival’s organizers expect a large crowd. “I’ve really enjoyed seeing live music again,” said Stearn, “and I know many other people feel the same way. This is a time for us to celebrate—not just music, but crafts, community groups, food, and friends. It will be so good for all of us to come together again.”

This article was featured in the August 2022 Newsletter. Visit the Takoma Park Newsletter webpage to see the full list of past newsletters.

Per the City of Takoma Park:
An annual event hosted by the police department to bring the community together as a whole to increase awareness of safety and crime prevention; to support locally-based businesses, groups and organizations; and to strengthen relationships among the community members and between the community and location police department.

• Police Vehicles on Display
• MD National Park Police Horses
• McGruff the Crime Dog
• Child ID Kits and Fingerprinting
• Music/Dance
• Dunk Tank/Basketball
• Face Painting/Moon Bounce
• Games & Prizes
• Food & Ice Cream

For more information, visit National Night Out – Community Policing.

Street Closures and No Parking Information

The following roads will be closed, and/, or there will be no parking on August 2, 2022, from 3:00 pm to 10:00  pm:

Maple Avenue from Philadelphia Avenue to Lee Avenue – closed to
traffic from 3:00 pm to 10:00 pm.

Streets Closures on August 2, 2022, from 3:00 pm to 10:00 pm:

• Maple Avenue at Grant Avenue – closed
• Hancock Avenue at Grant Avenue – closed

*Residents from 7513 Maple Avenue and 7515 Maple Avenue will be unable to leave or return to their residences during this time.**

No Parking on the following streets on August 2, 2022, from 3:00 pm to 10:00  pm:

• On Maple Avenue from Philadelphia Avenue to Lee Avenue
• No parking on Lee Avenue from Carroll Avenue to Maple Avenue
• **Reminders** for no parking will be placed 48 hours prior to the event.

Lee Avenue will be a detour route; vehicles trying to access Maple Avenue from Philadelphia Avenue will need to go up to Carroll Avenue and make a left onto Carroll Avenue, and another left onto Lee Avenue to access Maple Avenue. It will be the same for vehicles trying to access Philadelphia Avenue from Maple Avenue.

Takoma Park Police are asking for witnesses to come forward if they have any information regarding a shooting that occurred this morning in front of the Advance Auto Parts at 6300 New Hampshire Ave in Takoma Park. Per the Takoma Park Police Department:
July 16, 2022
At approximately 11:07 this morning, a shooting occurred in the 6300 block of New Hampshire Avenue (parking lot of Advance Auto Parts store). Upon police arrival, one male adult was suffering from a gunshot wound. The victim was transported to a local hospital with life-threatening injuries. More info will follow when PIO is updated. Investigation is active.
If you witnessed this shooting, or you have any information about this case, please contact the Takoma Park Police at 301-270-1100.

Investigation is active.  If you witnessed this shooting, or you have any information about this case, please contact the Takoma Park Police at 301-270-1100. pic.twitter.com/5k9T62HN48

— Takoma Park Police (@TakomaParkPD) July 16, 2022