Wednesday, January 14, 2015

Board Seeks to Shine Light on Chambery Street Lamp Outages

Ornamental street lamps in Green Meadows West are owned and maintained
by your homeowners' association.
In a letter this week to Green Meadows West neighbors who live on Chambery Boulevard, homeowners' association President David Erbes illuminated potential reasons why ornamental street lamps along that street have remained dark since mid-December, and what your association is doing to fix the problem. Homeowner-members have variously expressed security and safety concerns through communications with the association, the City of Johnston, and the Mid-American Energy Co.

"Residents are very anxious to have the lights restored," the letter reads, in part. "I would strongly suggest that you keep on the exterior lights on the fronts of your homes and garages, from dusk to dawn until the problem is repaired."

Ornamental street lamps in the neighborhood are owned and maintained by the Green Meadows West Homeowners Association. They are a distinctive aesthetic element in the neighborhood. More standard, non-ornamental street lamps found elsewhere in the neighborhood are maintained by the City of Johnston. Exacerbating the reporting problem, when individual homeowners initially complained to Mid-American Energy, customer-service reps there first responded to calls as if they were separate residential outages, rather than a neighborhood-wide problem.

Association Manager Cyndy Rath, working on behalf of the board of directors in late December, subsequently clarified ownership of the street lamps with Mid-American Energy. Because the outage apparently involves an underground power line, the utility company as of January 5 dispatched a sub-contractor to further diagnose and repair the outage.

Company personnel cautioned that such repairs can take from 30 to 45 days or more during winter months. However, association board members express hope that warmer weather and lack of snow may speed the repair. Further updates are pending.

At this time, the outage is not thought to be related to a large municipal storm water drainage project currently underway west of N.W. 86th Street, nor commercial construction on the Northwest corner of N.W. 86th Street and Chambery Boulevard.

If you have questions about this or other neighborhood maintenance issues, please contact Association Manager Cyndy Rath at: 515.222.5206; cyndyrath@knappproperties.

Monday, January 12, 2015

Annual Meeting to be held Jan. 27 at Crown Point Center

The annual meeting of Green Meadows West Homeowners’ Association members is scheduled for 6:30 p.m., Tues., Jan. 27, 2015, at the Crown Point Community Center, 6300 Pioneer Parkway, Johnston.

The association’s officers and board of directors will present reports regarding 2014 activities, and a 2015 budget. Members must be in good standing, with all fees paid, in order to vote. Meeting materials will be mailed to homeowners prior to the annual meeting.

Proxies may be assigned to the board for purposes of achieving quorum, or may be assigned to a neighbor who plans to attend. Those who attend or who return proxies will be eligible for door prizes.

For more info, contact Association Manager Cyndy Rath at: 515.222.5206; cyndyrath@knappproperties.