Halloween with Madrona

I was special guest costume judge at Madrona's pre-Halloween warm-up party last weekend. Great time was had by all! There were some great costumes!

Board Meeting and School Tour

Before our board meeting last week we met with the Facilities Manager for District 46 who took us for a tour of the new school. Its quite nice and spacious, with lots of nice touches. Its nice to see the progress they are making towards opening this fall

Animals in the Wetlands

Recently I have been noticing and getting complaints about people walking pets in and around in the wetlands at Valley Lakes and in other developments as well. The village inserted as standard verbiage into most of the relevant HOA declarations the following.

Section 8.17 of the Valley Lakes declaration lists prohibited acts: "No Unit Owner, Occupant, or Person shall be permitted:" and if you read down you discover that section item J reads:
(j) to bring or allow to enter into a dedicated wetland any dog, cat or other animal or pet.

The above was placed in the declarations for Valley Lakes specifically because the Army Corps of Engineers required it because of the wetlands studies that Pritzker (the original owners) had to go through.

While the declaration does not specifically prohibit a member from entering the wetlands, it does prohibit dogs (and minors). I would like to discourage residents from wandering at will through the wetlands and prefer to encourage them to think of them as "off limits". In Valley Lakes there is a walkway through a portion of the wetlands with plans to add more in the future, but members are encouraged to stick to those areas and not wander at will through the wetlands. The area up near Valley Lakes 2 (Behind the CVS) tends to be high ground and as such is dryer and already criss-crossed with trails which I think encourages them you think they are open to member access. In Madrona Prairie Walk and Lakewood we have a path system set up that hopefully encourages you to walk your dogs on it

It's ultimately up to your HOA board to create a policy to determine how to manage access to this area, however in no circumstances would it be okay for a member to bring a dog with them. I would encourage the HOA to post "No Trespassing signs" (as required by the declaration and wetland maintenance agreement on file with the Village in most cases) and make sure all of the residents knew that if they were going to go out in this area that they should ensue they do not cross these areas.

I would also ensure that a sign was installed facing into the property along the perimeter anywhere there is a path that indicated that was the limit of the property. This puts the burden on the Association to mark it's own property line (again, as required in the agreement) and put the burden on anyone choosing to go back there to stay on HOA property. I would also make sure it was clear to residents that dogs are not allowed in these areas. I would also discourage members from entering these areas until sufficient restoration and preservation efforts have been put forth to sufficiently protect them. The ones between Valley Lakes and Valley Lakes 2 for example are after all some of the highest quality wetlands in the area.

I know that the Valley Lakes HOA who own the Mud Lake wet lands is in the process of developing a wetland maintenance plan for the Mud Lake wetlands that will protect this area for the long term.

I would encourage all HOA's to carefully review their declarations and implement polices to protect these wetlands.

Save the Date-- the First Mayor's Run/Walk-- January 6th in Madrona

A friendly year end reminder for the first Mayor's Run/Walk on January the 6th. I have mapped the route out for those of us with the inclination to know what's going on beforehand. It will be in Madrona starting at the park. So here's the schedule of events:

• We start at 7:00am with a jog/run of 1.83 miles at about 11 minute mile pace. The intention is to take it easy so we all can keep up (mainly me, given my lack of exercise over the holidays).


• We return to the starting point where those who want to walk will be waiting, and those who want to walk and cool down after running can stroll with us.


• Roughly 7:30am we walk the same route which should get us done by 8:00am.


• At 8:05 am drag Mayor back to his car and attempt to revive him.

Couple of guidelines, if its raining or snowing, we are going to take a rain check, there is no need to be out in bad weather, and its also not safe either. The other thing since not everyone is as energetic as us, and may be still asleep at 7am on a Saturday morning, we should keep the noise down. We are not inviting any bulls, but lets hope the guy in the picture had some good foot speed.

Halloween Contest at Madrona

A few weeks ago I was the special judge at the Madrona HOA costume party, and this group of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs were the winners of the most creative costume award by a long long way! The names of the winners were Katie Smith, Audrey Rehm, Logan Smith, Morgan Monahan, Millicent Rehm, Michael Monahan, Madelyn Monahan, and Lanie Smith.

New Trustee Named

Last night I appointed Michael Blum (looking very serious in the picture at the right) to the vacant trustee spot that was filled by Patty Blauvelt until her resignation two meetings ago. Michael was approved by a 5-0 vote. Michael is the President of the Madrona Homeowners Association, has lived in Round Lake for 3 years. He grew up in Lake Zurich and went to Western Illinois University he is also a member of the Round Lake Planning/Zoning Commission He is married to Jennifer and has two daughters Madison and Mikayla. Mike has worked for Hewitt Associates for 8 years as Customer Service Client Manager he manage 90 associates.

I have tried to recruit a new type of person to our village boards and commissions and I am very happy to have had the opportunity to bring Michael on to our board. He is the first trustee from Madrona and I am excited to finally have representation from this important area.

The Daily Herald weighs in on the appointment here.

I was just counting up how many people I appoint to boards and positions in the village and I came up with 33 positions, and you know what? I have appointed 32 of them. The exception is Ed Amman who has now served on the Round Lake Planning/Zoning Commission for 7 full terms and is a few years into his 8th. Just so you know what that means, each term is 7 years long so he is over 52 years of service to the village.

Route 60 Commercial Development

A long time reader Graham Little emailed me and asked about what's going on at 60 and Arden. So since I needed a post, I thought this was an excellent topic for the blog.

When the Lakewood homes development was on the drawing board, we were faced with a few choices. The major choice was the boards insistence that there be a significant investment in 60 and the new Cedar Lake Road. The second choice was our insistence on 30 acres in commercial set asides. At that time the village had a grand total of 43 acres (Fairfield and 134, Madrona, Bright Meadows and Wilson Road) of available commercial acreage so this was a substantial gain.

We could have demanded more commercial, but at a trade off for the Route 60 and Cedar Lake road project. In addition we originally wanted 40 acres together, but logistically this was not possible, so we settled for the the split site that currently exists, with 11 acres at the corner of 60 and Cedar Lake called Cedar Commons and the 20 acres on the South side of 60.

The project called Cedar Commons had a checkered history with the original developer being sued in every county in the area for all sorts of things it seemed like, and of course us having nothing happening until Lakewood could extricate themselves from the contract to market what is today Cedar Commons.

In the last few months we have made some excellent progress on the 26 acres and in fact are very close to getting final approvals for 26 acres of some very attractive stores and offices! This proposal has 192,000 sq ft of retail and office, along with a new signalized interesection. I am very excited by this project. The graphic above is of one of the proposed buildings as of a few weeks ago.

If anyone wants me to email the two PDF files of the development plans please email me and I will send you a copy.

Madrona School Site

The Madrona School for District 46 is taking shape! This is looking at it from the south.

Road Improvements Along 120 and Curran

I have seen some interesting comments about holding developers accountable for traffic issues. Coincidently I got some pictures of the road improvements that we insited on from Pulte and Centerville as a result of their residential and commercial projects. Centerville assumed responsibility for management of the roadwork project. The roadwork was essentially completed on Friday with the final installation of landscaping and grass mat.

I would like to make a couple of comments about past developments that I was involved with and the traffic issues that we held developers accountable for. As a general rule of thumb traffic improvements rank in the top 3 issues we want to address from a potential developer.

• Lakewood Homes-- They were required to do away with Bacon Road, and build from scratch the intersection, the extension of Cedar Lake northwards from 60 and then dedicate the remaining right away for the Cedar Lake Road extension. Off the top of my head Lakewood forked over in excess of $5 million dollars for traffic improvements from 800 homes.
• Madrona Homes-- In some respects we are not seeing the benefit from the traffic improvements from them yet, but hopefully the foresight the village had to make them set aside the 300 foot right away for the 120 bypass comes to fruition. In addtion we also set aside right away for the Cedar Lake Road extension from 120 to Townline Road. In partnership with Neuman Homes at Prairie Walk they also were required to improve Townline road which is a free benefit to District 46's "sometime" new school. I have no idea how much money the right away is, but its substantial based on roughly 800 homes.
  

I do wish that more could be done to route 60 specifically the light at 60 and Petersen. I did get a copy of the Lake County Transportation Plan for 2006-2011, and intersection improvements are slated for 2008. If the counties traffic refererendum had passed the intersection and many other needed improvements would be here much sooner.

More Bike Racing Today

Interesting day today, I am going to see the 1 day Inaugural Grayslake Cycling Classic at Prairie Crossing in Grayslake. It's Chicagoland's newest and most unique criterium, featuring a fast, flat horse-shoe shaped 1.1 mile course! There are all sorts of age group and gender related races throughout the day with the professionals riding last around 4pm.

I have often thought the village of Round Lake should sponsor a race, although my thinking was a 5K run through Round Lake's neighborhoods, the logistical problems are bigger then you would imagine. How do you cross Fairfield, and 120? I think it would be cool to race right down Cedar Lake through Bright Meadows, Madrona and into Lakewood, or then up to Valley Lakes. Although that might be a 10K. The other thought I had before one of the parades is run the Round Lake Mile...start at Washington and Cedar Lake and run north of Cedar Lake right over the hill and down into Round Lake Beach. Be kinda cool with all the people lining the route waiting for candy. I tried convincing the park district about that one, but no takers there!

I also thought of a beat the Mayor race for charity, but that might be to charitable, judging by my slow run this morning!

Nice Article on Blogging in National Magazine

Did a couple of things yesterday village related, but the most important one was the Madrona Homes HOA meeting I attended with Chief Metaxa last night. Good crowd and some nice give and take discussion wise on some important issues.

I got some nice ink on the blog from a national magazine American City and County Magazine. This magazine along with Governing are the two I read cover to cover every month. I have learned quite a few things from them. I was flattered to get interviewed and of course even more interested when I discovered they used my quotes prominently in the article. The link to the article is here.

I noticed my traffic has increased a little bit as well because of the article I would guess, which is always nice to see. I can't imagine articles on backstabbing at Stormwater Management, and the use of flags has caused the spike so it must be the magazine.

The Winners of the 2nd Annual Blog Giveaway!

I had 38 entries to the contest I announced a few days ago here. Which is almost double what I had last year. I had a good time with my draw system. I also think this is a nice idea to raffle off stuff that I win as Mayor. By the way cash I keep! Not that I win any of that!

Please note the picture has nothing to do with this post other then he is diving into a pool, he appears to need to workout and he should spend some cash on new shorts!

For those of you fascinated in the elaborate double blind system used to determine the winner. I sorted the emails by arrival date, the first email to arrive was number 1, the last to arrive was number 38. I then found this website and generated three random number between 1 and 38 which were 11, 4, and 14, then I counted down to number 14 on the email list and lo and behold I had a winner.

So with out further ado the winners of the prizes are:

• Family Pool Pass for the Round Lake Park District (you better have kids) valued at $135 dollars. The winner is Jeff Weiss of Madrona Ridge
• One Year Membership to the Round Lake Park District Fitness Center (Value $235)
  The winner is Mike Vanata of Valley Lakes.
  
• $50 in Rec Bucks, good for any Park District program and the winner is Paul Hollingworth of Bright Meadows.

Lets all hope I can get some more goodies to be distributed to my loyal readership.

Bike Parades & Boat Parades

The Round Lake Area Queens and I partied on a boat in the middle of Round Lake while judging the second annual Venetian Night. Earlier in the day I judged the First Annual Madrona Home Owners Association Bike Decorating and Parade. I was unable to get pictures of the boats because of the darkness.

Who Scheduled All This?

Ran at the track already in preparation for next weeks Illinois Masters Championships. I am currently watching the prologue of the Tour de France which will ease the transition from my World Cup obsession which only has 5 games to go.

So today I am judging the Madrona bike decorating contest (which seems appropriate for the opening day of the Tour de France) at 10, then racing back to watch the England vs. Portugal Quarterfinal, then off to race sail boats at 1 then back home to watch the Brazil vs France Quarterfinal.

Then its off to 2 neighborhood block parties, and if that's not enough I am judging in the 2nd Annual Venetian Night on Round Lake and then enjoying the fireworks afterwards!

Report from the Lake County After School Coalition

I received the following letter today from Chief Raymond Rose of the Mundelein Police Department and State Representative Kathy Ryg who are Co-Presidents Lake County After School Coalition. If you recall I talked about Liz Nelson a Madrona Resident a few posts ago and her involvement with this organization. The village sent Police Administrative Director Mike Recupito to attend the program by the way.

Thank you to those of you who attended or supported the Town Hall Meeting on Underage Drinking Prevention on April 11. We received significant feedback from members of the community; including children, parents, school officials and community leaders.

The next step is crucial:
We need your help to prioritize these needs and develop an action plan. Our Action Planning on Underage Drinking Prevention meeting will take place on Tuesday, April 25th, from 6:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. at Carmel Catholic High School (One Carmel Pkwy, Mundelein). Refreshments will be served at 6:00 p.m.

Please join us to help decide what the root problems are and the solutions we can implement to prevent underage drinking. It is not enough for one or even a few members of a community to take a stand against underage drinking, we need everyone. We sincerely hope that you will attend this Action Planning meeting and encourage others to as well. Please feel free to forward the attached brochure to other interested parties. For more information visit www.lakecountyafterschoolcoalition.org or contact Theresa Loerch at (847) 680-5909 or e-mail kathy@kathyryg.org.

Please do attend if you can, I have the complete flyer as a PDF available here if you want more details on the program.

Town Hall Meeting on Underage Drinking

On April 11th there is going to be a Town Hall meeting sponsored by the Lake County After School Coalition. One of our residents Madrona Resident Elizabeth Nelson will be one of the moderators for the event which will address the very serious issue of underage drinking.

The program is for parents, grandparents, teachers, officials, youth and community members to voice concerns about and move towards solutions for preventing underage drinking. Alcohol is the leading cause of adolescent death; more than all other illegal drugs combined.

The event is to be held on April 11th 6:30 pm 8:30 pm (Refreshments served at 6:00 p.m.)
Carmel High School One Carmel Pkwy, Mundelein (East of intersection of Rt. 176 and Hawley St.)

Ms. Nelson works for the In Touch Prevention Services which is an alcohol, tobacco and other drug (ATOD) prevention program offered through a partnership of the Lake County Health Department and Community Health Center and the College of Lake County. The program is funded in part by the Illinois Department of Human Services.Their mission is to reinforce individuals, families and communities to lead healthy lives. Staff provides training, consultation and resources on topics such as alcohol, tobacco, drug prevention, life skills, parent effectiveness, youth development, community mobilizationn and program development.

Bike Trails---An Update

Loyal reader Brad Ogilvie asked me a question a few weeks ago about bike trails. I wrote some of this way back in October but I think some of it bears repeating. The Lake County Forest Preserves have a project called the Millennium Trail which is a trail network connecting an area from the Indiana border to Milwaukee.

Here in Round Lake the trail is coming sooner rather then later, when it does come it will go up through the south side of Valley Lakes, across the back of the new Ryland Development and then it will go up the Com Ed right away into Round Lake Beach. One of the alternatives that I am pushing is a connection throughout the Synnesvedt property to the new Nippersink Forrest Preserve off of 120. If that's the way it goes then we want to explore a way to get some connector trails across 120 and into Madrona and the down all the way to Lakewood homes. We are not sure how right now, but I am going to figure out something. In addition I want it to connect to the future downtown development district.

Chairman of the Hospital Task Force Named!

A few weeks ago when I spoke at the Round Lake Chamber one of my central tenets was the need for a Hospital to serve the general area. I have been stunned by the number of emails I have been receiving from people with positive comments and encouragement. In addition some local residents have stepped up and offered to help.

One resident that stood out is Al Villasenor and I have asked him to chair the taskforce. He was gracious enough to accept. Al was born in Chicago and raised in Skokie, IL. Al and his family moved to Round Lake Beach in 1997, then subsequently to Round Lake in 2003. Currently, Al serves as the treasurer of the Madrona Village HOA. Professionally, Al holds a B.S. in accounting from DePaul University. Al has served as the Controller and CFO of two local corporations with annual sales exceeding $3 million each. After many years in the corporate world, Al seized an opportunity to help individuals of all means set and reach their investing goals as an Investment Representative with Edward Jones Investments.

Hopefully we will have some positive feedback and news that we can relay to you in the near future.

The Year that was-- 2005

2005 was the year of the Rooster, and here in Round Lake we have plenty to crow over. We have two new Trustee's Brian Brubaker and Bob Del Prato a new Police Chief in Cliff Metaxa and a new Director of Public Works Davis Clark. Some of the other highlights are:

• We finally adopted a new human resources plan that encompasses employee reviews, job descriptions a fair an equitable pay plan.
• Restructuring of the Police Department is well under way, with a modern efficient and more effective police department starting to emerge.
  
• We are moving full speed ahead on the Downtown Development Project and hope to have it done by 2008 (our 100th anniversary)
  
• We have familiar faces in new places with Terre Eyzk moving up into the Chair of the Planning Commission (my old seat), Hans Zigmund moving up into the Chair of the Architectural Review Committee (ARC) and Steve Skinner moving from the ARC to the Planning and Zoning Commission, former trustee Dale Multerer is now the president of the Police Board.
• Sean Gillette led a wonderful group of people who planned and organized the second annual Streets of Summer festival this summer. Lonnie Brooks headlined and 1,000's attended!
• New commercial development is coming online at the Centerville Commons on Route 60 and Cedar Lake Road, Curran Commons at 120 and Curran, and more development at the corner of 134 and Fairfield to go along with the CVS Pharmacy. More will be happening in 2006 as well.
  
• The construction of a new $7 million 35,000 square foot Police and Public Works Station on the corner of Bacon and Townline road. This facility is big enough for our current population and for our future needs. It was designed and built so it can and could expand if needed in the future.
• Many of the housing projects that we have been hearing about for sometime are finally complete or nearly so, with Valley Lakes, Madrona, Lakewood Homes, Bradford Place, and Silver Leaf Glen reaching that point.
  

On a personal note I am thankful for the opportunity you gave me in April 2005 to lead the village for another four years. Serving as Mayor is the single most rewarding thing I have ever done in my professional life, and I thank you for your support. I aim to make Round Lake the best possible place it can be.

Sewer and Bonds--101

Reader Tim Latta asked a question about the sewer and water bonds that we sold for $3 million a few years ago. To set the stage I need to talk about the bigger picture for a bit. Round Lake developed a comprehensive plan that visualizes its natural borders as Fish Lake Road to the West, and Chardon Road to the South. This comprehensive plan was completed and adopted in late 1999 and early 2000 and had some clear ideas of what the vast majority of the land West of Fairfield and South of 120 would be (we call this our Southwest Quadrant by the way). The land use was primarily commercial and industrial with some residential in the mix as well.

Over time the village has consistently moved forward with this plan. However since 90% of the land in the SW Quadrant is not annexed to any municipality its fair game to any village or the County for development of any kind. I have told you what Round Lake intends to do in the area. But there is another player in the area, Volo, Volo's comprehensive plan involves commercial and industrial development along the Route 12 corridor, and homes starting at Gilmer and 120 going east to almost Fairfield Road. If I were the Mayor of Volo, I would pursue this path as logical for the goals of Volo by the way. I believe that Volo, building homes, in the area we have planned for commercial and industrial development in the SW Quadrant would be counter to Round Lake's future best interest. The other player is Lake County, they are not to be trusted, but they have not shown signs of doing residential development in the last few years out here since the Tanneron Bay and Brooks Farm development.

A major key to development is bringing sewer and water to a parcel. Because if you want to build homes or industrial parks and or office parks you need sewer and water. Septic fields are not the greatest of either of the these for development purposes. So over the last three to four years Volo and Round Lake have been attempting to bring sewer and water to this area so each village can execute its comprehensive plan. The Ryland parcel which was just approved by the village board allows us to get our sewer and water to the SW Quadrant at last.

The village board recognized how important this project was to the long term future of the village and was willing to spend money to do it. Bringing sewer and water from behind the housing behind the CVS at Fairfield and 134 was what $2.5 million of the bonding was for. The project runs south from behind the homes along the right of way for Com Ed, until it crosses Nippersink where it takes a short turn westwards to line up with Dawn Marie. It then proceeds south along the street until it reached a vacant parcel of land we own, and at that time, was the end of Round Lake's corporate boundaries. As Ryland came on board we were able to get them to shoulder the additional cost of bringing the sewer and water the rest of the way to 120 and Wilson. In addtion to funding the connection to the sewer line for the residents of Dawn Marie. All this is a long set-up to answer the question.

This sewer connection has a service area, which bascially covers the SW Quadrant service zone mentioned above. This service area contains a maximum amount of capacity, in other words how much sewage can flow through the pipe. So what is done to ensure that the capacity is not used up is that there is an engineering calculation done that allocates sewer throughout the entire sewer service area. Since the village paid for the sewer to come to the area it should and will get paid for the costs of building the sewer this form of payment is called "recapture". So the $2.5 million we spent to bring sewer to the SW Quadrant will eventually be returned to the village in the form of this recapture. As a parcel gets developed and hooks on to the sewer line, they repay the village the recapture fee which is calculated by a complex formula designed to "recapture" the village investment. This sewer protection zone also has official legal protection via the Lakes Region Sanitary Sewer District (the relevant sewer district in that area) so even if there is development in the area that occurs in Volo or in the unincorporated areas of the county that attaches to our sewer, the village gets paid recapture.

Alert readers will notice that we used $2.5 million of the $3 million for this project. The other $500,000 of the bonding was used to improve and upgrade from an 8" to a 16" line the main north south sewer line that runs down to Madrona and Lakewood homes, but is in the older part of the village along Cedar Lake Road and Goodnow.

Over time, and a municipality can afford to take the long view, the bonding money will come back to the village, and with the renewed push for the 120 bypass, and the increased interest from the parcel owners inside the SW quadrant to do something, I believe the payoff will be quick for the village.