Meeting Minutes, December 3, 2014

Preservation Station, Bonnie Anderson, presiding. Start Time: 6:30 PM

Board Member Attendance:

Term ending August 2016		Term ending August 2015
Anderson, Bonnie	x	Karafonda, Mary	x
Boyd, Joe	x	Carson, Ann	x
Ben Sturge	x	Grassel, Kathy	x
Gonzalez, Moisés		McGivern, Elaine	x
Grant, Steve		Sam Kochansky
Spittler, Lee	x	Thornton, Karla
		Trefethen, Salley

November minutes were read and approved.

Guests:  Dave, René, Larry, Zoey, Officer Seidel, John Scheppner, Sean

Dickens of a Dinner—Ann reported a surplus of volunteers for Dickens this year.

Email notices of miscellaneous neighborhood and City goings-on—Bonnie agreed to collate said notices and proposed that once a month she send them to the board.

Crime report—Officer Seidel reported a big jump in auto burglary in our neighborhood, from two in October to seven in November. He advised to take valuables out of the car and put anything tempting, such as loose change, out of sight, and above all to lock up. He said 70 percent of all burglaries happened to unlocked cars.

Tree project—The City will contract out the work of planting; it’s up to the neighborhood to submit signed agreements from property owners who want a tree and pledge to maintain it. The insert in the newsletter did not produce a great number of takers, so Mary Karafonda will knock on doors if necessary to make sure people know about the offer. 

Speeding and lighting issues on Lead and Coal—Larry, who lives on Coal, says an accident involving pedestrians and speeding cars is waiting to happen. As for lighting, he wants street lights similar to what exists now east of the freeway. He read a draft letter to Sen. Ortiz y Pino of what he would like to send under signature of the board. In his letter, he requested that, at the least, studies be conducted to bring attention to the problems. 

Complete Streets—Partly in response to Larry’s concerns, Bonnie brought up Councilor Benton’s Complete Streets plan, which integrates bicycles and pedestrians into the planning every time something is done to a street. Bonnie is writing a letter of board support for Complete Streets to present at the LUCC meeting on Dec. 10.

City Parks and Rec meeting on Dec. 10 re Highland Park—After months of meetings between the City, the neighborhood, and the Press Club, compromises agreeable to all have been hammered out. Ben Sturge added that a newly hired director of the Press Club is not behind this final master plan, but that it’s unlikely at this point that he will be able to obstruct the plans.

Arno development—Ann said Vince DiGregory has built a picket fence and put down gravel for the temporary parking on the vacant lot at Arno and Gold. He now says he would like a letter from the board in support of the temporary parking. The board verbally had agreed not to oppose the parking at a previous meeting, so Bonnie said she would make the minutes of that meeting available to him. Mary Karafonda added that she had spoken with Jim Sutton, a qualifying broker for Unica, as to whether all the parking that Vince DiGregory is planning would be necessary. His answer was yes, that the Albuquerque lofts are not filled because of lack of parking.

Miscellaneous

1. Ann announced the date, time, and place of the memorial service for Mike and Marina Hillard’s daughter Briana, who died in a car crash. Donations are requested to go to Make a Wish.
2. Sean, who works as an audio/visual professional and lives in the neighborhood, had been proposing an outdoor movie night at the garden, which didn’t happen before cold weather set in, said that he is still interested. Lee Spittler said he will look into procuring a surplus projector at his place of employment.

Meeting adjourned at 7:40. Next meeting is Wed., Jan .7, 2015.