Vineyards Neighbors

The Plan for Greenspace upgrade

Jan 13, 2006

Hello Neighbors,

I wrote this information a while back and have not edited it for the newsletter. But I wanted to give people an idea that we do have a plan to update the areas and thank all the folks who have contributed to the effort. Watch this area for updates. Thank you.

Remaining work for green spaces
-Removal of the six trees along Indian School road
-Fix leak of backflow valve and replace locks. Purchase of spare sprinkler heads.
-Removal of four to six more trees in the green spaces.
-Rock replacement, anywhere from one hundred and twenty to one hundred and eighty
tons plus the cost of spreading.
-River rock moving and securing.
-Replacement of grass in river rock area. Fill dirt and grass
-Removal of fifteen to twenty bushes.
-Eventual replacement of four to six trees
-Eventual replacement of ten to twenty bushes.
-Either the killing of the thirty-six stumps or grinding down below grade. Many of the
stumps can be killed and then covered with rock or hidden with new bushes saving
the cost of grinding.
-Culvert covers
-Safety sign replacement & Trespass sign replacement
-Wall repair
A word about the vegetation in the green spaces.
-The end result has to be an amount of vegetation that the HOA can afford to maintain over the long term. The cost for maintaining each tree is about two hundred dollars per year. The current cost of grass and bush maintenance is at about eight hundred a month. All contractors must to be licensed, bonded and insured for one million. And we now know we need two contractors for the green spaces, one for trees and one for grass. That leaves us with four hundred a month to equal the amount we were spending on the previous contract. Hopefully we can reduce that amount, but if we have to pay it, at least we are getting the full treatment for the green spaces. Four times twelve months is four thousand eight hundred to spend on tree maintenance per year. That means that we can afford to have twenty-four trees per year to maintain. That is eight trees per green space. This is a significant reduction in the number of trees (sixty) that we were trying to maintain. Since numbers don?’t always tell the whole story we may have wiggle room to add a few more trees, but not many. I think twelve trees per area would be ideal. The drip system can be discontinued. It is not necessary for established trees and bushes; new growth can be watered with adjusting current sprinklers. With all the problems that can occur with a sprinkler system the simpler the better. I am of the opinion that we keep to maintaining the areas as good-looking retention basins. That is all we have funds for and all we are required to do. Any extras should be as a separate project(s) funded separately.
A final word about cost. We are now a year and a half through a three-year plan to overhaul the green spaces. The replacement of major parts of the sprinkler system and the problem I had in finding a landscape crew last spring puts us about four to six months behind. But in keeping with another priority of this board, this overhaul, is taking place without an increase in dues other than necessary to keep up with the yearly inflation rate. I want to thank Tracy for saving us from disaster last winter by kindly allowing us to use her maintenance crew a la carte, which was already overbooked. Thanks to Classic Grass, if they hadn?’t shown up I?’d still be trying to find a landscape crew. I want to thank Ron Dobbins of SRP for the excellent and ridiculously low cost consulting/field work he has done. No one knows more about all types of land maintenance then Mr. Dobbins and his assistant. We should make a note to his supervisor. Last but not least I want to thank the board for their support in taking this drastic but necessary step in the ?’04 summer. We are in good shape financially with about $20,000 in reserve after squeaking by last spring with about $4,000, praying that nothing expensive would come along. From here forward
the community should see steady progress toward a lean, clean common area with the funds necessary to maintain it indefinitely.

Update January 13th 2005.

We are getting a bid on tree removal Tuesday January 17th. We should be seeing SRP trimming trees off of the trees on Indian school within a week or two.