Pontoon Slip Drawing Results – 2011

The 12 available boat slips were awarded to the following residents:

  1. Mite
  2. Howard
  3. Philips
  4. Gauthier
  5. Anderson
  6. Flynn (2nd alternate, originally awarded to McLaughlin)
  7. Patton
  8. White
  9. Alex
  10. Smith (1st alternate, originally awarded to Allen)
  11. Walmroth
  12. Landis

Alternates for any vacated skips are:

  1. Smith
  2. Flynn
  3. Brockman

To: All eligible homeowners in the Strawberry Hill Estates and Strawberry Point Bluffs subdivisions
From: Joint Access Committee for Strawberry Point Bluffs and Strawberry Hill Estates Homeowners Associations
Date: January 19, 2011
Subject: 2011 pontoon slip lottery

The 2011 drawing for the twelve pontoon slips at the joint access park will be held on Monday, February 7th 2011 at 7:00pm in Room A at the Hamburg Public Library on Merrill Road.

This lottery is conducted pursuant to the rules adopted by the Joint Access Committee, in conjunction with the Boards of Directors of the Strawberry Hills Estates and the Strawberry Point Bluffs Homeowners Associations. Although you need not be present to win, the first choice of boat slips will be chosen by those present (or their proxies) in the order of the draw. The remaining slips will be assigned by Access Committee members to those lottery winners who are not present. If you have questions regarding eligibility and other requirements, review the rules on this web site or contact a member of your Board of Directors.

The Lottery Rules have changed for 2011. Please review the new rules prior to the drawing. You can find the modified rules here:

http://www.strawberryhillestates.org/?p=24

Pontoon Slip Lottery Rules and Procedure

PONTOON SLIP DRAWING Process – version 2010-05-25

Strawberry Hill Estates and Strawberry Point Bluffs Subdivisions

In February of each year a drawing will be held to assign the 12 pontoon slips at the boat access to eligible residents. The following rules govern the application and selection process.

Drawing Eligibility:

  1. Participants must be a resident of either the Strawberry Point Bluffs Subdivision or Strawberry Hill Estates Subdivisions
  2. Participants must be members in good standing within their homeowners association (no delinquent dues)
  3. As stipulated in the By-Laws of both Associations, residents will be considered eligible if their dues are current ten (10) days prior to the date of the Drawing. The Access Committee representative(s) will request a list of delinquent homeowners from the treasurers of the respective homeowners associations to ensure eligibility at the Drawing
  4. Participants must own a pontoon boat

Drawing Notification:

  1. In January of each year printed notice will be posted on the neighborhood billboard (located on the west side of Indianola, about 250 feet south of Lisch Drive) announcing the Drawing and advising residents to refer to the website for details
  2. At the same time, a notice will be posted on the neighborhood website advising residents of the date, time, location and rules for the lottery drawing www.strawberryhillestates.org and www.strawberrypointbluffs.org

Pontoon Slip Drawing:

  1. Residents who are unable to attend the drawing must submit an application and their donation to the Park Treasurer in advance of the drawing
  2. Residents who attend the drawing must be prepared to pay their donation at the time of the drawing if they are successful ticket holders
  3. The Lottery will be conducted by member(s) of the Joint Access Committee who are not participating in the drawing
  4. Tickets representing the participants’ names will be placed into a bowl and drawn, by a blindfolded volunteer, in succession until the bowl is empty
  5. A numbered list will be compiled with the names of the residents listed in the order of ticket draw

Pontoon Slip Assignments:

  1. The 12 pontoon boat slips will be assigned to the holders of the first 12 tickets drawn from the bowl
  2. Successful ticket holders who attend the meeting will have their choice of boat slip, in order of the ticket draw. First drawn gets first choice, second drawn gets second choice, etc.
  3. Successful ticket holders who do not attend the meeting will have the remaining boat slips assigned to them by the Access Committee representative after the attending ticket holders have made their choices
  4. The Access Committee representative will retain the numbered list of participants in the event a pontoon slip becomes available due to forfeiture. Forfeited slips will be offered to the unsuccessful participants in numeric order, who then become responsible for their donation

Pontoon Slip Forfeiture:

At the close of the Pontoon Slip Lottery Drawing all successful ticket holders must submit their lottery donation to the Access Committee representative. Slips for
which funds are not received will be forfeited, and that slip will be offered to the next participant on the numbered list. A donation in the amount of $250.00 is
strongly recommended

Slip Utilization:

  1. Only pontoons may be moored in these slips
  2. All pontoon boats must be for the primary use and benefit of the homeowner and his or her immediate family. Any non-resident must be accompanied by the a resident of the association when using the access or pontoon boat
  3. There shall be no overnight mooring of any watercraft outside the 12 designated slips. Such watercraft may be removed or impounded at the owner’s expense
  4. The homeowner assumes all risk of storing his or her pontoon boat at the access and the associations shall not be liable for loss or damage of any kind, including property damage or personal injury arising from or in any way related to the storage of the pontoon boat at the access or the use of the pontoon boat
  5. Each homeowner is responsible for providing posts and for making sure that his or her pontoon boat is securely moored at all times while at the access
  6. No docks or other structures of any kind may be constructed or stored at the access without the written permission of both boards

Pontoon Slip Transfers:

  1. Slips are transferable only from the sale of a home; the eligible homeowner transfers that slip to the new homeowner
  2. Slips may not be transferred, sold, or traded directly between homeowners. A homeowner who surrenders a pontoon slip returns control to the Park Access Committee, which will assign the slip to the next eligible Drawing participant

Appeal Process:

All questions concerning qualifications, procedures, alleged irregularities, or any other part of the process or results shall be submitted to a meeting of the joint boards for resolution, whose decision shall be final and binding

Amendment:

The Boards of Directors of the Strawberry Hill Estates I, II, III, and IV Home Owners Association and the Strawberry Point Bluffs Subdivision Homeowners Association reserve the right to change, modify, or amend these rules, in whole or in part, at any time and in their sole discretion. Nothing in these rules is intended or shall be deemed to grant any person any right or vested interest in a pontoon slip.

 

Fall 2010 Beach Cleanup – October 17, 12 noon

We still need a few strong volunteers, one with a pontoon boat, to take
out the swim raft and dock on Sunday October 17th at noon. An email
went out, and we got *one* volunteer, and he has a sprained foot! If
you used the beach or your kids did, why not volunteer to help. (If you
need a different day, let me know.) It will take about an hour. This
is what we do:

Take the pontoon boat out to the raft, unhook the raft, attach floats to
the chain and leave it in the water, put the marker buoys on top of the
raft, float the raft and marker buoys near shore, and then several
people carry the it off to the side. We just leave the marker buoys on
the raft. The boat ramp dock has wheels, and it’s is a bit easier task
to remove.

One additional thing we need to do is cut the chains shorter for the
swim raft. The reason it can be flipped is that the chains are too
long. I measured how long they should be, and we need to chop off the
excess so nobody gets killed with the flipping stupidity next year. I
have bolt cutters, but will need someone stronger to do it.

Please confirm with Mary McLaughlin via email or phone that you can
help! memc@ieee.org or 734-646-5363.
****************

Thanks!

Mary.

4th of July Parade!

We’re having a 4th of July parade through the neighborhood! It will
start at 10:00 a.m. on July 4th, meeting at the corner of Indianola and
Gallagher, and will be led by Doug Brackman and his antique car! So
please decorate your bikes, strollers, wagons, scooters and anything
else you’d like and participate. We’ll end up at the beach, and the
Access Committee will grill hot dogs and bring the condiments and
soft-drinks. See you there!

More… Vandalism at the Park

—- Summary from Mary McLaughlin on 5/30 —–

Well, for my own sense of things I summarized the discussion on the beach fire pit and sign (roads in another email!). It is attached. The first few emails I pretty much just put the yes/no/other, and then I started putting in some comments, so if you replied first, your comments might not be all in there. Please note, this was just to get my own head around the discussion, so if you don’t think it’s all there, please feel free to make a summary.

But there was pretty clear consensus from what I read. The general consensus — and I use “consensus,” not vote since this isn’t a vote — from the emails as well as one reply at the website seems to be to:

*Not get rid of the fire pit;
*Get police involved whenever there is disruption down there;
*Post the rules so that kids see them, and we have some visual authority we can point to for kids and cops;
*Don’t say that the park “closes”. (Please note that if we decide otherwise on this, we can always print a couple new signs; they weren’t that expensive.)
*See if all of this helps, and then re-evaluate!

So, yesterday, thanks to Cheryl and Don Houston, Chris Brehm (and me!) we put in the swim line and swim platform. And Gary Phillips hung the new signs. And the Grobs fixed and painted all the picnic tables! (By the way, Cheryl and Don painted the metal legs for another one, but someone took the legs from the beach. Perhaps someone thought they were
garbage since the tops weren’t on, so if anyone sees them out on garbage day, please rescue them and we’ll put the tops and seats on for one more down there.)

Happy Holiday weekend!

Mary.

—–Original Message—–
From: Mary Eileen McLaughlin
Sent: Wednesday, May 26, 2010 5:52 AM
To: Neighborhood
Subject: Beach – bad news

There was more vandalism at the beach on Monday evening. People burned the top boards for picnic tables that were in the process of being repaired and painted by Tyler Grob and his Dad, Dave. Tyler and Dave had worked hard, had things set up to finish so we would be ready for this weekend, and were coming back Tuesday with their re-charged screw
driver. They found the burned boards.

Evidentially there were some witnesses of some young men down there Monday evening, and the police are investigating.
—
Mary

——– Original Message ——–
Subject: RE: Beach – bad news
Date: Wed, 26 May 2010 09:02:31 -0400

For what it’s worth, I arrived home from work at about 9:30 on Monday evening and there was a large fire in the park with 5 or 6 vehicles parked outside the park. When we went down to check our boat on Tuesday we found that someone had pulled our pull out bed/couch completely out of the bench frame and they left it in a jumbled mess, laid out on the floor in the boat. Nothing else seemed to have been damaged, but it sure is frustrating to know they are boarding the boats and going through the contents. There was also a fire and small crowd (3 – 4 cars) of young adults last night until after midnight.

There was talk after the vandalism last year of posting signs in the park at the entrance and near the fire pit, with usage hours. Possibly with a 10pm or 11pm curfew on weeknights. Has there been any more talk of that this year?

Gary

—–Excerpts from neighborhood email exchanges that followed——

I agree that removing the fire pit and posting park hours should be a huge step towards reducing the vandalism at the park.

Thanks,
Dave
—
I 100% agree with taking away the fire pit. This has been dealt with for as long as I can remember and enough is enough.
Mary, thank you for updating all of us on this situation.
Tricia Erskine
—
I realize that it is necessary to remove the fire pit, however, let us be aware that we are now considering removing an amenity of our beach park in order to control vandalism caused by a few.
Cheryl
—
I agree with Cheryl. I think we need to consider if there are other options.
Robbie
—
Yep, that’s sad. I’m wondering if any of the parents of the kids who were down there on Monday are on this email list and might want to have a chat. I’m happy to keep it confidential if you have plans to control your kids and I can let people know you do. Or if someone knows if the kids weren’t even connected to kids in our neighborhood that would be good to know too.
Mary
—
I am not sure if eliminating the fire pit is the cure for the vandalism, even though I do think it might help. From our vantage point over looking the park, (I have lived here 4 years) by day, there is nothing we enjoy more than watching children and their parents walking down to the park with their fishing poles, or their swim rafts as they head to the beach. Watching the kids play on the slide, the swings or the volleyball court is always a joy too. All this while some of the boats from our neighborhood are put in or come out at our private community launch, the beach and launch we all pay for and take pride in. What a privilege for all of us to have, to share with our neighbors.

I am not sure if many of you know this, but as nightfall’s, the whole use of our park changes on many evenings and not just on the weekends. We see the kids and the families heading home and then we often see carloads of young adults come into our park. The routine is almost always the same, one or two cars show up, usually outside the chain if the chain is up. They carry their coolers, and their cases of beverages down to the picnic area and the fire gets started. Most of the time a car shows up with a gate key and then the cars gather near the fire pit picnic area and the music starts. This happened almost every single Thursday and Friday night last summer, not to mention the weekends and occasional Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday night. I live here and I see it, I am not exaggerating. This happened last summer until I counted over 50 vehicles in the park and or parked in front of my house. That Thursday night I had, had enough and I called the police at 1:00am. The police came and tickets for minors in possession were handed out. The night the 50+ party, was the same night that several boats were vandalized including mine. After that evening things were quiet for several weeks and then it started up again slowly.

This spring the groups have been reasonable,(6-10) but they are there in our park after dark, many nights. As the weather has warmed, the numbers have started to increase and low in behold the vandalism has started to increase too.

I wonder, If he fire pit wasn’t there, would they still come? My guess is that they would, where else do they have to go, where they can drink in public? I really don’t mind the small evening gatherings and hearing music coming for the park on occasion. What really bothers me is when, they park out front of my house, urinate in my yard and then go on about their business. It also bothers me and should bother all of you, is when the small gathering gets bored and they start to destroy our park or trespass, or steal from our boats.

I don’t have a suggestion on how to minimize the evening usage or the vandalism, I just wanted to share what I have observed and what I have experienced personally.

Gary
—
My thoughts on removing ‘fire pit’– those that are burning picnic tables or whatever will not be stopped by the lack of a ‘fire pit’–they will burn anyway anyplace.
Doug
—
Not only should the fire pit be removed, we should consider putting a light down there.
We can always dig a fire pit if it is missed that much.
Scott and Denise
—
Neighbors:

This is a good discussion.

I’m writing to suggest forming a Neighborhood Watch group. Perhaps the police can conduct and teach us when to speak to suspicious parties and when to call them, if we should gather information. I will call them to set up a meeting or make such a request, unless Mary you have a preferred person you are working with.

I also suggest people register their cars/licence plates with this Watch group.
My thought is when we see cars down there, jot down license numbers and find out who they belong too. If something happens we can contact neighbors saying something happened while your car was there, did you see anything? Then contacting the police when a crime takes place while an unregistered vehicle was present.

I am not sure removing the fire pit will stop fires. Is removing the picnic tables next? Then they’ll move onto the swing set or the fence. Or the woods.

I just spoke with the Hamburg Fire Dept. who suggested that working with the police, requesting patrols, and assuring a community presence may be helpful. He agreed that removing the fire pit probably won’t make a difference.

We are being bullied and I don’t like it. We need to be dilient and alert and hold those accountable.

Thank you,
Maggie
—
I agree with the removal of the fire pit, also. I’m not sure whether posting hours would be beneficial as the culprits don’t seem to be interested in rules. In response to the gentleman whose boast was damaged, it is sad that there is no respect for the property of others. We sold our pontoon boat three years ago due to vandalism at the park. We don’t feel comfortable keeping a boat there anymore.
Tricia

—

Beach Clean-up – Sunday May 2nd, 2010 11:00am

Please come to the beach this weekend to help with the annual clean-up on Sunday May 2nd from 11:00 – 3:00. We’ll pick up any trash, sticks, and someone will mow. Dave Buckland will roto-till the beach area and volleyball area, but we’ll need to rake the sand into place. We’ll pull some weeds and trim back some of the brush.

Last Fall, Dave Howard built a very nice rack where we would like all owners of canoes/rowboats/kayaks/paddleboats to store their boats. There are a few old boats in the bushes near the pontoon slips that look like they have not been used or moved in years. If you’re the owner of one of those boats, please come the to Clean-Up and claim it.

The Access Committee will bring snacks, pop and our tools. Please bring your tools and we’ll pitch in and get this done!

Thanks

— The Access Committee

New Keys for the Beach

After almost 20 years with the same access key, we have discovered that lots of people have keys who no longer live in the neighborhood. Accordingly, the Boards and Access Committee have moved to replace the key with a new, “do not duplicate” key blank. Your old key will work in the lock until Saturday, May 1st, after which time you will need the new key to get access to the Park.

Who qualifies for keys to the park? You must be a “member in good standing” in your association (no delinquent dues or assessments).

Is there a fee for the replacement keys? Yes. A replacement key costs $12.00. This price covers the cost of the locksmith’s fees for the new lock and key manufacture.

Where can I get a new key? New keys will be distributed at the Annual Homeowners Meetings and at the Park Annual Clean-up on Sunday May 2nd, 2010. After that you should call Dave Buckland to arrange for a key.

Pontoon Slip Drawing Results – 2010

The 12 available boat slips were awarded to the following residents:

  1. Patten
  2. Landis
  3. Hesch
  4. Howard
  5. Smith
  6. McManus
  7. Mite
  8. Phillips
  9. Grob
  10. Alex
  11. Larson
  12. Brackman

Alternates for any vacated skips are:

  1. McLaughlin
  2. Walmroth
  3. Allen
  4. Gauthier

PONTOON SLIP LOTTERY NOTICE

To: All eligible homeowners in the Strawberry Hills Estates and Strawberry Point Bluffs subdivisions
From: Joint Access Committee for Strawberry Point Bluffs and Strawberry Hills Estates Homeowners Associations
Date: January 31, 2010
Subject: 2010 pontoon slip lottery

The 2010 drawing for the twelve pontoon slips at the joint access park will be held on Monday, March 1, 2010 at 7:00 pm in Room A at the Hamburg Public Library on Merrill Road. To participate in the drawing, a check in the amount of your donation, made out to

Park Spring Cleanup – Sunday, March 17, 2009 12:00 noon to 4:00pm

SUNDAY MAY 17th BEACH CLEAN-UP

Thanks to all our neighbors who came to the beach and park clean up on
Saturday May 16th. We worked hard, but with the large group it was done
quickly. The kids were playing in the clean and turned up sand the
minute we were done! It was fun chatting too, so for those that use the
park and couldn’t help out this time, we hope to see you next time.

Thanks —

The Access Committee