WASHINGTON, DC -- {PHILADELPHIA, PA April 12, 2007 – Congressman Chaka Fattah (D-PA) got a “lift” today in Germantown.

The Congressman dedicated the new glass-side vertical wheel chair lift at Center in the Park community senior center -- built with a $192,448 grant he developed. Then he joined CIP member Jean M. Montero for the lift’s first-ever ride from the basement activities area to ground level.

The ribbon cutting at CIP was the first of several activities on Congressman Fattah’s visit to Germantown. He continued on to Germantown High School to take part in after-school activities with kindergarteners and teenagers at the busy EducationWorks Beacon Center.

The vertical wheel chair lift at Center in the Park, providing exterior access and a safety exit for limited mobility seniors using the lower level fitness, computer and lunchroom facilities, is one of seven projects completed with the grant created by Fattah, according to CIP Executive Director Lynn Fields Harris.

Other projects funded by the grant from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development have included water treatment improvements, replacement of emergency lighting, floor repairs, bathroom upgrades, and enhanced building security.

Center in the Park, in Vernon Park at 5818 Germantown Avenue, is a nationally accredited community senior center that occupies a century-old former library. The Center has over 6,000 members, including 1,000 homebound clients. Membership is free, and CIP’s mission calls for promoting “positive aging for older adults in Northwest Philadelphia.”

“Center in the Park plays a critical role for our older citizens in Germantown. It’s an extremely busy and popular place but it has needed improvements and upgrades to continue its valuable work,” Congressman Fattah said. “I am proud to be able to direct federal dollars to this facility and to help with the mobility for seniors so they can move around and be alive and contribute. We can see the winning outcome right here as Lynn Fields Harris and her fine staff have been putting these grants to good use.”

C. Richard Cox, CIP Board Past President, thanked the Congressman for steadfast support and multiple grants for the Center. “This is an elevator that we hope we never have to use in an emergency but if we do we know it’s there, thanks to the Congressman,” Cox said.

Fattah was also responsible for directing to CIP a $148,000 grant from the Centers for Disease Control, through the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, for a research project on nutrition, chronic disease self-management and physical activity in a program called “Living Well.”

At Germantown High’s after-school center, Fattah read to pre-school aged children from “A Spendid Friend, Indeed,” as part of “One Book, Every Young Child,” sponsored by the State of Pennsylvania’s PennServe office. The program encourages literacy and a love of books in very young children from poor and underserved homes. Copies of the book, by Suzanne Bloom, were distributed to the children to take home.

Surrounded by 30 eager kindergarten-age children vying for attention, Fattah read from the book, “I like to read. Do you want to hear me read?”

The children, each with their own copies, recited in unison, “I like to read. Do you want to hear me read?”

Also at Beacon Center, the Congressman spoke with under-served and at-risk teenagers in programs that included Peer Mentoring, Peer Mediation Training and Work Readiness. He quizzed the teenagers on their reaction to recent violence at their high school, and heard them describe their filming of a video production on the topic, “All We Ask Is That U Listen.” The video is scheduled for its first screening at the Beacon Center, 81 E. Haines Street off Germantown Avenue, on April 21 from 10:30 a.m. to 1 p.m.

“The children in our underserved neighborhoods, from the youngest to those approaching 21, need every program and service we can provide for them in the crucial after-school hours,” Fattah said. “For youth in the critical ages of 12 and 16, a disproportionate amount of crime and mischief occurs between the end of the school day and the early evening hours.

“The Beacon Center does an excellent job for our young people in turning turn these afternoon hours into productive time,” he said.

The Beacon Center, one of three run by EducationWorks under contract from Philadelphia Safe and Sound and in collaboration with the School District of Philadelphia, provides after-school programs for hundreds of youth under age 21 from Germantown neighborhoods.