Is anybody but me concerned about the sofas and other furniture appearing in front yards, not to mention garage doors totally painted with a brightly colored mural. You might also notice an awful lot of ''cars for sale'' sitting on the streets. 19th is starting to look pretty trashy and we don't seem to have street lights at night anymore, at least on part of the street. Just concerned. Don't we have rules about such things?

Concerns

To address some of the concerns:

1. Furniture/Sofas in front yards - unless it is 3 days before Big Trash Day, they are not to be in the front yard. I think they can be on the porch but maybe not. I'd advise you to visit www.okc.gov and click on Action Center and report it. They can send you a notification in the mail about what they did to address the problem.

2. Totally painted murals - as it is a choice of any resident who owns a home, they can paint their house, front door, back door, garage door, or shutters any color they want to. While I have personal preferences, I would not want anyone to advise me that I've painted something that they don't like. As long as it is not against a City Ordinance, they are free to paint it what they choose. There is always the opportunity to create a ''Urban Conservation District'' which overlays current City Ordinances and restricts things of this nature.

3. As for cars for sale, that one is difficult. It is hard to say whether they are really selling the cars (like an open car lot) or just driving it around trying to sell their car. You can report that one, too, to www.okc.gov. They might not do anything but let us know on this discussion page.

4. The street lights have been mentioned but PLEASE report them to the City Action Center at www.okc.gov. Contractors were doing work along 19th and adjoining streets to replace water lines but I'm not sure of the problem. The more voices we have, the faster the problem gets solved.

5. There are no ''official'' rules as we are not a Home Owners' Association. HOA is different than Neighborhood Association (NA) in that it is cumpulsory and required dues are paid every year. NA is voluntary and not required. We have the ability to get together and discuss, volunteer, coordinate, and report, but the City has the real ''teeth''. If they can't do anything about it, most of the time, we don't have any authority to take any action.

If you would like to bring these up at the next General Meeting on Monday, March 12th, 2007 at 6:30 pm at St John's Methodist Church at 1755 N Meridian, please come and volunteer to help change things. Can't do it without you!