Minutes of the Oak Terrace Improvement Association- May 4, 2016

Board members present- Tracy Kleinschmidt, Greg Denny, William Yarbrough, Al Johnsonbaugh,
Jeff Keske, Jim Loring, and Colleen Hodges.

Members at large present- Rich Rieck, Jim and Darwin Harms, Ken Hohs, and Alphonso Contreras.

Meeting was called to order by President Greg Denny at 7:00pm.  Jim Harms introduced himself and his son, Darwin.  He is the new owner of the three empty lots on Elmwood.

Minutes- William made a motion to dispense with the reading of the minutes.  Tracy seconded and the motion passed.

Treasurer’s Report- We will have a detailed treasurer’s report available for the next meeting.

Lake Issues- Tracy shared that Lake County had been on the lake mapping the areas for herbicide treatment.  We will be doing a targeted treatment of Oak Terrace’s portion of the lake along with MPRD.  The date will be determined by the company contracted for the service as it is dependent upon weather conditions.  We will notify residents of the treatment dates by email and by postings at points around the lakefront.  Tracy also discussed the implementation of rain gardens as a means of keeping toxins out of the lake.  She, Jim Loring, Greg Denny, and Tori Trauscht visited different sites in the subdivision to begin the process of installing the gardens.  It was determined that the triangle of land at the corner of Lakeview and Hickory would be a place to start.  We are targeting a July date for planting and funding is to be determined.  Other areas of interest for gardens include the triangle at Lakeview, Hickory, and Elmwood,  and the land on the corner of Elmwood and Maple.

Parks- Al will speak with the owners of the property adjoining Beach Park concerning the bush removal and the fence installation.  We will pursue a written agreement with them for this process.  We will need a current survey of the property lines, the agreement of the neighboring property owners, the appropriate permits, and setting up the installation.  We plan to have this project underway by the end of May.

Wetlands- Jim reported a low attendance at the cleanup day on April 30th.  Some work was accomplished.  The subdivision trees were assessed and there are some that need replacement.  He mentioned that the trees are being damaged by our maintenance crews using weed trimmers around the base of the trees.  We will contact Dave Garcia to assure this is no longer happening.  We may need to use fencing to delineate what needs to be mowed and what needs to be left alone.  We also need to monitor the property at Willow and the channel.  There has been some dumping there.

Legal Issues- We are currently in a holding pattern on collections as we stabilize our management by the new accounting firm.  We will begin the process of collections as soon as we have a system set up with the Canty for the accurate billing, monitoring, and collecting of monies owed OTIA.

It was drawn to our attention that the willow trees at Sunset Park need to be removed.  We will contact Bill Grinnell for possible removal by Fremont Township.

A date for Summerfest is to be determined at the next meeting.  We are consider Saturday, August 6th or Saturday, August 13th.  Dina Lepczynski will be contacted for information about the event.
There being no further business before the Board, William made a motion to adjourn.  It was seconded by Tracy and we adjourned at 7:50pm.

Respectfully submitted by Colleen Hodges- OTIA Board Secretary