CV PHYSICAL APPEARANCE

     Here are just a few questions about the appearance of the Village as one takes a walk around.
    First, I would like to commend some of the associations who have some wonderfully different landscaping, a mix of colors and a well kempt look. I would like to remind other associations that while everyone keeps chatting about resale value, part of it is curb appeal and some associations have dead and/or skimpy bushes, dry dusty and bare areas and it just is not appetizing to the eye.
     Second, we come to the responsibility of UCO and WPRF as we talk about the swales, the grassy areas that abut the perimeter roads and the winter appearance of the lakes and waterways. Take a walk along the Dover area and look at the grassy areas beside the road and on the road side of the Dover wall. It looks scruffy, weedy, matted in places and there is a niche where some pathetic little tree is struggling to survive with bare branches along with a very few flowers. This tree needs help. These conditions of scruffy swale areas persist throughout the entire Village. Take a walk around and check on it for yourselves. It seems that most of the concern for landscaping appears to be at the two entry gates and four corner areas and they are doing quite well, but people also ride and walk around within the Village and attention needs to be paid there.
    As far as the waterways go - what will happen to the edges, the shorelines as the water recedes in both size and depth and more of the drowned greenery and flora will be exposed. Already there are very ugly areas of floating mats of whatever was there before. In one area the mat was so thick that it supported a ball! There are tall dead and brown reeds that should go. We are not the Everglades and while we must be careful of the geo tubes, etc. we can look better and must look to do better and to remind the maintenance companies that as the lakes get smaller, the areas that need to be trimmed better will be growing.
     It is a pleasure these days to be able to walk around with a welcoming sun and clear and refreshing air, but let us keep the physical plant as attractive as possible as well. And along those lines are the perimeter walkways, particularly along the Dover area where they are as bad as they were before the so called paving job and I have seen too many people walking along and then suddenly tripping and holding on to companions to avoid falling. I have done it myself as the walkway is so unevenly raised and broken in some areas. We do not lift our legs as high as we used to and our eyes are not as good as they used to be so why leave these pitfalls in place for so long? Is it not time that we fix this before someone actually does irreparable harm to himself/herself? I know we hear all sorts of woes about contractors backing out but enough is enough. I cannot believe that in all of our area and the larger area composed of more of south Florida that there are no reliable and trustworthy contractors for this. Threatening a company to do their job is not a solution either as they will not exactly be in a great and giving mood when they do their work so we must find a contractor who is honest, capable and willing to do the work and has references that we check out carefully as well. Enough time has gone by on this issue.