MacArthur Heights Neighborhood Association Board Meeting

April 13, 2010 – 6:30 PM at Gary Van Calster’s home, 1935 Knotty Pine Dr.

Present: Special guests Nick Sparacio, John Wilson, and Alderman-elect Brian Danzinger. Also present Julie O’Connell, AnitaLaClair , James Andersen, Paula Lees, and Gary Van Calster.

John Wilson from the Green Bay Coalition started out the meeting by explaining his mission for Earth Week. He is in charge of finding volunteers to put decals on the storm drains in our area. These are adhesive decals and are applied directly onto a clean drain and sealed with a mallot. We suggested that he contact Southwest High School and our new alderman, Brian Danzinger said that he might be able to find volunteers at various schools that are involved in environmental projects.

Anita read the treasurer’s report and said that we currently have $539.24 in our account. She also reminded Gary that the application for a city grant will be available online in July and is due in August. We should receive $1,000 in September.

Nick Sparacio from the Green Bay Planning Dept attended our meeting to talk about the proposed bike/pedestrian lane. James Andersen explained his concerns about the traffic on Hazelwood and why we should pursue a bike/pedestrian lane for this street and also Wood Lane. Nick explained that the white lanes are not being repainted because they are not legally recognized by the police. He also said that a bike lane has to have two 5 ft. lanes (one each way), and a pedestrian lane only needs one 5 ft. lane. Nick crunched the numbers and said that Hazelwood is wide enough to accommodate a bike lane (2 ways) and a pedestrian lane, with 2 feet left over. The cost shouldn’t be an issue and he said that he would be our advocate in our request for a safer Hazelwood. Nick will talk to Dave Hansen and find out what his hesitations are on this issue. It was dismissed rather quickly when James Andersen brought it up to Hansen.

Gary talked about our progress on the newsletter and reported that the Military Avenue Business Association will pay $50 to have an insert in our flyer that will include special offers from the businesses on Military Ave.. We also have gotten a few ads from some local businesses and expect to reach our $250 that we are trying to raise. Thanks to Gary for all the running around he has got to do to make this a reality.

The board members briefly discussed our third redo of the MacArthur Heights Neighborhood sign and it was unanimously voted in as our choice . James Andersen said that he would inform Melanie about our decision to proceed.

The annual meeting is set for May 12 at 6:30 PM at Harmony Café. We will provide soda, coffee, water and cookies. There will also be 4 Bullfrogs tickets as a door prize.

Gary told the board members about his meeting with Bill Landvatter, director of Parks Dept. Bill will put in a new slab and paint the shelter at Beaver Dam Park along with getting electrical installed by the time our Ice Cream Social takes place in July. Bill also discussed with the Gary the alternative of putting in “green” bathrooms at a much lower cost.

We are still trying to come up with a cheap sign that can be made for when we have neighborhood events. We discussed the different ways to construct a sign and thought maybe one of our handy members could come up with something. Our alderman suggested that we use plexiglass with our advertisement slid in between. Also Anita suggested that the sign be low to the ground in case of a windy day.

Since Paul took care of our web site and he is no longer on the board, we are looking for someone with some computer skills to handle our SmileNWave account.

Finally our alderman-elect, Brian Danzinger took a few minutes to express his thoughts about neighborhood associations and is very interested in keeping up with us and our concerns. He said that neighborhood associations are good for the community because neighbors get along better when they know each other and there is less crime.

Our next meeting will be the annual meeting, May 12, 2010.