November 22nd, 2007 – These past few weeks have seen an escalating number of incidents involving the deliberate damage and destruction to private property right here in our Meadow Walk community.

Landscape lighting smashed and destroyed, furniture overturned or thrown in the lake, lawnmowers taken and found a block away, property tossed up on roofs, post lights smashed.

Nuisance incidents, deliberate vandalism, teenage pranks, call it what you will but people are being hurt. The Sarasota Sheriffs Department has been notified and law enforcement officials living in the neighborhood are aware of the situation as well. One officer himself was a victim of this vandalism and believe me he’s not about to let it stand.

Officials tell us this behavior is coming from inside our own neighborhood and sooner or later they will be caught in the act and the parents of these perpetrators will shoulder the responsibility for those actions.

I ask every parent with children of an age where this behavior is sometimes common to have a talk with your children. Everyone in the community suffers from these mindless acts of destruction, let’s put an end to it now.

If you have and knowledge of these or any other incidents, or know who may be involved, please contact any of the HOA board members. Your information will be held in the strictest of confidence. Let’s nip these sort of behavior in the bud, remember this is your community… it’s where we live.

Long serving and former Meadow Walk HOA board member Betsy Dane took time to sit down an write the Sarasota County Commissioners about her take on the ‘affordable housing project’ being proposed for the east end of Palmer Blvd. As President of the Home Owners Association I’d like to thank Betsy for her efforts and ask that everyone in this community take a ‘Que’ from her actions and write your County Commissioners as soon as possible.

Honorable Ladies and Gentlemen:

I am writing you now as a homeowner, and former Board Member, of the Meadow Walk community on Palmer Boulevard. In addition to being simply a “concerned citizen”, I hold a degree in Architectural Restoration from Columbia University as well as a Masters in Business Administration from Fordham University. I have been in banking, primarily in the arena of commercial real estate lending, for thirty years, and am also an active community volunteer, wife, and mother of two children who attend school in Sarasota.

I certainly recognize the need for affordable housing, and, in fact, served on a board dedicated to such a purpose in Dutchess County, New York, for several years. I recognize that the current housing costs are too prohibitive for career service professionals, and that many new teachers, for example, cannot consider coming to the Sarasota schools due to the prohibitive costs of housing. I am also not writing you as a NIMBY complainant, but, rather, as a person extremely concerned about the strains this proposal would put on traffic, infrastructure and home values in an already over-saturated marketplace.

Since the addition of the Tatum Ridge Elementary School, and the construction of communities such as the Enclave, traffic on Palmer Boulevard has nearly tripled in the six years we have lived in Meadow Walk. It is often virtually impossible to leave the community due to the heavy flow of cars and construction vehicles. I am not even addressing school busses, since we all know we can avoid those once we know their schedules.

The noise level has increased, we are experiencing more power outages, and there is a significant concern about the ongoing availability of natural resources. Doubling the Palmer Boulevard housing stock would create an undue burden on an already heavily burdened area. What would be next? The development of the celery fields? The demolition of the Big Cat Sanctuary? The placement of 500 homes on the Sarasota Golf Course or on the farmland at the south end of Raymond Blvd?

This is not a matter of pulling up the drawbridge once I have crossed the river. But with all of the proposed development, with the master planned communities already on the drawing board, why choose a location that is served by a two lane road, that is already over-crowded and almost impossible to navigate at rush hour or at many times during the day?

What made Sarasota an attractive place for many of us to move to is quickly becoming too much like the places from which we moved. I would beg the Commissioners to consider the “big picture” and to consider other alternative locations or, at least, a considerably modified plan,
for the proposal that is on the table now.

Thank you for your attention – I would welcome your comments, and would ask that you please consider the position I have taken

Sincerely,

Elizabeth R. Dane

Ms. Dane:

Thank you for your interest in this rezone petition. Since rezonings are a quasi-judicial function for the Board of County Commissioners, state
law discourages me from responding to your comments outside of the public hearing. Nevertheless, your comments are very important so I am forwarding your email to Sarasota County planning staff and they will make sure it is distributed to other commissioners and becomes a part of the official record. Again, thank you for taking the time to write to me.

Jon Thaxton
County Commission

The largest affordable housing project ever undertaken in Sarasota county is proposed for Palmer Blvd. The proposal would add an additional 1488 homes to the existing 1688 homes in our area.

The traffic on Palmer Blvd. will more then double and our roads will need to be expanded. The home inventory issue in Sarasota County will increase, and what affect will this have on home values in our area. Overcrowding will become an issue in our schools. This should be a concern for all of us here in Meadow Walk.

‘Consider the affects of this project on our neighborhood’

There will be a vote on this proposal by the County Commissioners on August 29th. Please take this seriously and e-mail your county commissioners and voice your concern. This project will not have a positive impact on our community.

Laurel Meadows has a newsletter posted online with a lot of information on the proposed Palmer Place project. You can view thar PDF file by clicking here.

View Sarasota Herald Tribune atiicle by clicking here.

Your e-mail could make the difference.
Below are the e-mail address of our County Commissioners.

The President and Board of Directors of the Meadow Walk HOA urge you to contact these County Commisioners today.