Madison Park

May 14th, 2007 Minutes of Madison Park HOA

May 26, 2007

Madison Park HOA Agenda
May 14th, 2007
www.neighborhoodlink.com 28210


Welcome

Meeting called to order at 7:30pm by President Marty Doss

41 in attendance, plus one officer and one speaker

Westover Police Division Crime Stats given by Officer Patrick Hairston:
501 Ebb Place- Larceny
110 Hollyday Place- Larceny
5034 Furman Place- B&E, storage shed broken into
5021 Baylor Place- Larceny from vehicle- gas stolen from vehicle
520 E. Woodlawn- B&E
5201 Wedgewood Dr- Damage to property- shrubs and irrigation system pulled up
5037 White Oak Rd- Hit and run to vehicle
5801 Farmbrook Dr- Damage to vehicle
5522 Farmbrook Dr- B&E, garage broken into

Speaker:
Erin Oliverio, Mecklenburg County Water Quality Educator:
?• Mecklenburg County has 3,000 miles of streams and 3 lakes.
?• 90% of our drinking water comes from Mountain Island Lake
?• All waste water from inside our homes goes into the sewer system to be cleaned and put back into the streams
?• Water that washes down the storm drains is not cleaned, it just enters back into the stream system
?• Sugar Creek, Little Sugar Creek and McAlphine Creeks- water bodies don?’t meet the minimum requirements for pollution
?• Suggestions for what we can do to help prevent water pollution:
o Call to report any sewer leaks (call 704-336-5500, they have people on call 24/7. You can also call 311, but 336-5500 will get you to the correct department)
o Don?’t put grease down the drain in your home- grease causes blockage in the sewer lines. It can cause the sewer water to come back into your home
o Pick up your animal waste and dispose of it in the trash. It is estimated that dogs in Mecklenburg County produce 52,115 lbs of waste a day. It is very important to keep this out of the water ways. Some bacteria in dog waste can live for 2 weeks
Remember- ?“we all live downstream from someone?”


Picnic update
This year?’s picnic will once again be at Park Road Park on Saturday, May 26th. The fun begins at 2:00 PM. Please bring a side dish or desert to share with others at the picnic. Drinks will be furnished, hot dogs, and hamburgers. DOOR PRIZES! Don't miss out on this fun annual event. Everyone living in Madison Park is welcome to attend including renters. Please help spread the word to your neighbors. We will also use the reverse 911 calls to invite Madison Park residents. Start your Memorial Day Weekend off with your friends and neighbors! This will be held at the Picnic shelter #2.

Event Sponsor: Dr. Clarke Hammock has said he will be helping sponsor our upcoming Picnic and National Night Out! We welcome him as one of our newest sponsors. He practices dentistry at 202 E. Woodlawn Road, Charlotte, NC 28217. His office number is 704.527.2440. We will have a detailed list of all the business sponsors next month in our minutes and on our web site.

Traffic Calming Request Seacroft Road
Terry VonCannon, CDOT, emailed to say that a resident at 4913 Seacroft had made a request for traffic calming on Seacroft. The current unposted speed limit on the north side of Tyvola was 35 mph. Marty says unposted because he could find no signs. Anyway, Terry said he would lower upon Marty?’s request to 25 mph. Marty made that request. The resident was interested in speed humps. That will probably not be possible because of the 1000 vehicle requirement. Terry suggested perhaps the All Stops, but the intersections might be too close. Marty told him all stops would be fine with the association, but would prefer both intersections be turned into all stops. The reason is coming off of Tyvola you stop at Cooper on Seacroft, but when you get to Halstead, Seacroft does not stop. It is confusing, and Marty says he is always extra cautious to make sure the other person stops. Anyway Terry will let Marty know if the resident, Pete Lodewyk, wishes to work on the petitions for all stops if the stretch of road meets the requirements.

Neighborhoodlink Training
Monday May 7th, 2007 Marty helped the Swan Coalition, which is made of neighborhoods in the Steele Creek Police division work on their web sites at the Steele Creek Library along with Officer Burgess from Steele Creek! Marty has been requested to help another group in the future. That training will take place at the Steel Creek library.

Citywide Community Forum
Marty Doss, Debra Campbell and Eudora Alston attended this police forum on May 8, 2007 . It was a discussion on what the city is doing to prevent crimes and possible what else can be done. Just a reminder to help prevent crime in our neighborhood:
 Pay attention- we know best when things just don?’t seem right. Call 911 for any suspicious activity
 Participate in neighborhood associations. Organized communities tend to have less crime.

Treasury Report given by Dee McCandlish
We have $839.54 in the bank with 69 paid members. We have many members that have not paid their 15 dollars due. It is $15 a year to join. Please pay your dues if you have not done so. You can mail your check to Dee McCandlish at 812 Fairbanks Dr, Charlotte, 28210. We have a lot of fun events planned for this year and need your dues to help pay for them

Welcome to first time attendees

5220 Londonderry Road had a tree fall onto her property that crushed her fence. The Smith Academy school Principal, property manager, and one other official came out to look at the situation. Ms. Harper, the resident, had notified Marty that morning of the problem. Marty was on his way to the store and noticed the school officials in the back yard of 5200 Londonderry Road, (corner of Londonderry Road and Tyvola Road). There was also a tree down behind that home leaning against another tree that is preventing it from taking down lines on Tyvola Road. He pulled into the bus parking lot and walked over to say hello. The principal mistakenly thought Holly Harper lived at 5200 Londonderry, instead of 5220 Londonderry Road, so Marty was glad he stopped. The school thought because of the way the fences were separated between 5220 and 5214 Londonderry that it was an old easement for the school. It is not an easement, and Marty provided tax records of the property lines, along with an explanation that the fences were not placed together because of an underground pipe, concrete drain, and a slight trench that is a county drain coming from school property. Marty knew all this from working on a drain issues behind the same homes years ago for the Talbert family. Anyway, the school made matter worse by suggesting to Ms. Harper that she had her garden on their right-a- way. The school was not going to clean the tree up off Ms Harper?’s property, but they finally did remove it except inside her fence. Marty helped her remove the remainder the following weekend. Marty discovered the tree that came down had very shallow roots, due to the open drain directly behind the large tree. Holly requested he write a letter to Guy Chamberlain at CMS. She is concerned that the other trees behind her home, due to the steep sloping bank and the open trench directly behind them, are all subject to falling on her property. She wanted Marty to document her concerns and observations in case of future problems. This way if she also documents her concerns, CMS has been put on notice of the concern and potential problems.

Area 196 name change, Quality of Life Studies Update
Mark Francis, President of Montclaire, requested our boards meet face to face to discuss renaming area 196. Marty told him we had already discussed it as a board and we voted at our April HOA Meeting to only change the name to Montclaire/Madison Park or leave it Closeburn / Glenkirk. Mark had said ?“that their association was not going to allow us to have our name on another area.?” Marty said fine ?“we will just leave the name as it currently is, and I will work with city council and neighborhood development to get our boundaries all moved to the one area 197 Madison Park Study.?” Marty had already started working on that anyway. Stanley Watkins over neighborhood development said we could possibly do this in the future. He also responded to Susan Burgess that we could possibly do this in 2010. Marty has made both Susan Burgess and Andy Dulin aware of our desires to get the boundaries corrected. Mark Francis had said perhaps we could rename the area Farmbrook/Chedworth. Marty don?’t really see the point of even doing that. It is currently two street names. The point of renaming was to give them some identity and reflect what the majority of the area is Montclaire/Madison Park. Sharon Brenaghan, director of Montclaire, requested Marty have lunch with her on 4/27; this was after his last correspondence with Mark Francis. Sharon had a couple of things to discuss. One was they are going to join us for National Night Out. Marty told her that would be fine, but they will need to supply one type of free food for attendees and some type of amusement minimum. She said they hoped to do their own event in 2008. She also discussed the renaming of area 196 saying they had an identity problem often getting mail from the city as Montclaire South. That is true Marty said, because at the symposium Montclaire South was called during roll call, but not Montclaire. Marty had told her again at their lunch that our board members and members were 100% against not including our name on the area renaming of 196. He went on to tell her our goal was to move the boundary of the 250 homes on the South side of Tyvola over to the area currently 197 called Madison Park, in the future. Anyway their board was going to meet the following week and someone was to get back to me. But, Marty has heard nothing!

Street Light on Glenham. That light should be installed within 60 days that the Craven family requested. Sandy Wise sent an e-mail to Marty on May 7th saying it was approved and the petition was complete. There was a problem with the petition that required one more signature. There was a choice of two poles for the light. One pole required a home at the corner of Seneca Place and Glenham to sign as well. That home would have been within the 75 foot distance from one of the poles. Also we discovered that one home on Glenham and Seneca Place has a Glenham address, however the home according to the tax records should be a Seneca Place address. The Glenham address does not exist per the tax records.

Murryhill/ White Oak street lights:
Matt Magnasco is still waiting to get the plan back from Duke Power. Once he gets the plan, he will present it to the street. He has to get 60% of the street residents to sign the petition in favor of the new street lights. This 60% is not dependant on who signed or did not sign the initial 25% petition

Blue and White Ribbons on Tyvola Road and Seneca Place
Volunteers removed the blue and white ribbons along Seneca Place on April 29th that marked one month after the incident of the shooting of two police in Charlotte. A few days later more ribbons appeared in a couple of the blocks. They were removed once again and a few more popped up. There was a red smiley face attached to one pole with a blue and white ribbon on the final day. Marty was most concerned that someone might see the smiley face and get the wrong idea of why that had been put up. He decided that perhaps the person(s) that put the ribbons up did not know they were violating city codes and were subject to fines. On top of this by the ribbons staying up they were continuing to keep our Adopt A Street out of compliance with our contract with the city. Marty decided after the last incident to write a letter and hand deliver it in the area the ribbons kept reappearing. He figured perhaps someone would know who kept putting them up. Within a couple of hours of delivering the letter, which appears online on our web site, he received an e-mail through our web site from the person that had put them up, Carolyn McCaskill. She did not understand why we had authority to remove things from telephone poles. Marty told her our Adopt A Street contract specifically requires us to keep the poles clean. He told her they were nice ribbons, and under the circumstances had decided to leave them up for 1 month on Seneca Place. This would also give the person that put them up time to removed them or contact us with his or her intentions. We were unsuccessful in locating the person prior to removal and no one contacted us. Even when we removed them on Tyvola during the planned clean up in the wooded section of Tyvola no one contacted us. We left the others on Tyvola until the same weekend of the 29th in the residential zone. Carolyn said she had planned to take them down in 2 more weeks. We had left them up on Horton Court even though they were illegal, since it was not part of our Adopt A Street. Marty noticed the following week those had been removed as well. Anything posted on poles or street signs that are not done by the utility company or CDOT is a violation. Anyway Marty knew the person(s) intentions were good at the time they were initially put up. They actually made him feel good and they were well made! We hope they comforted the police that work in our community as well. Had Marty been contacted prior to the ribbons going up he would have requested that they go up on private property on doors, trees, fences and so forth. This way they could have served their purpose and we would not have been out of compliance with our contracts. If they had gone up on private property they could have remained up until residents desired to remove them. Even things like lost pet signs and yard sale signs should not be put up ever on light poles. You are subject to a fine for doing so.

Susan Burgess Campaign Fundraiser!
President Doss is chair of a campaign fundraiser for the Susan Burgess Campaign on Thursday May 24th, from 5:30 ?– 8:00 PM. If anyone would like to attend you will need to RSVP to Susan Burgess Campaign, 1333 Carlton Avenue, Charlotte, NC 28203-4810. The event requires a minimum $50 dollar Burgess Campaign contribution. The event will be held at Hadco, 101 West Worthington Avenue. Food and Entertainment! You can also RSVP by the 19th, and get your contribution to Doss if you would like to attend, and be put on the guest list at Martydoss@aol.com. Susan Burgess has always been very helpful to our neighborhood and individuals with problems. When Marty seeks her help she never asks if the person is a democrat or republican.

Open Discussion/ New Business/ Concerns

Debra Campbell is still working on getting everyone?’s correct email address. She has requested that if you can please send her an email at with your information:
Dcampbell011@carolina.rr.com. Her Juno account is being closed out!

Charlotte Mecklenburg Animal Control:
There will be another Free Rabies Shots and Spay Neuter Clinic at the Animal Shelter on:
Saturday May 19
Saturday June 9 & 23
Saturday July 14 & 28
For more information (or to pre-resister for the spay/ neuter) call 704-336-4424

The Garden Club will meet Monday May 21 at 7:00pm. Please check the calendar on our neighborhood website for the location and topic.


Adjournment

Submitted by April Mays