The Canyon Creek pool will continue its practice of opening the pool exclusively for lap swimming this 2021 season during the designated lap swim hours from 5:30 a.m. – 10:00 a.m. and from 8 pm to 10 pm daily. If you have previously registered as a lap swimmer, you do not have to “re-enable” your access. Entry to the pool area during these hours is restricted to members of the “Lap Swim” access control group. We ask that you use this time to swim laps or to use the pool for exercise, such as water aerobics.
Members who have not have registered previously are invited to request membership in the “Lap Swim” group by emailing their name, address, and pool access card number to dave.marshall.austin@gmail.com. Allow up to 48 hours for your request to be processed.
Lap swimmers may not permit others to enter the pool gate using their access card. All swimmers entering the pool must badge in. No tailgating is permitted for non-family members. Lap swimmers are asked to abide by 1 swimmer per lane in the 5 lanes of the pool to achieve social distancing requirements.
In accordance with posted signage at the pool entry, all swimmers agree to wipe down any surfaces they touch, such as the entry gate, handrails, pool furniture, and bathroom facilities, using their own disinfecting wipes and maintain social distance while using the Canyon Creek pool. All swimmers further agree to hold the Canyon Creek HOA harmless in the event of injury or infection with COVID-19. The pool is “swim at your own risk” during lap swim hours.
Sunbathing and water play are not permitted in the pool area during the lap swim hours.
Enjoy your lap swimming time!
Regards,
Canyon Creek HOA Board & Spectrum Association Management
The Canyon Creek HOA submitted a membership application to officially join 2222 Coalition Of Neighborhood Associations (better known as 2222 CONA) in January 2021 and the 2222 CONA board approved our membership application on Jan 21, 2021, making our neighborhood the 8th neighborhood in NW Austin to join the 2222 CONA organization. Canyon Creek HOA director, Randy Lawson, was appointed as the representative from the Canyon Creek neighborhood on the 2222 CONA board of directors.
We will now join the other seven 2222 CONA neighborhoods located in NW Austin which will give us an increased voice on issues in Austin potentially affecting our neighborhoods such as governmental outreach, environment, traffic and traffic safety, City of Austin Land Development Code, area development zoning/rezoning/permitting, wildfire mitigation, etc. See more info below on the 2222 CONA organization.
The 2222 Coalition of Neighborhood Associations, Inc. (better known as 2222 CONA) was incorporated as a Texas non-profit in December 2005 and has Federal non-profit status under IRS 501 (c) (3). It is organized and operated exclusively for charitable purposes. 2222 CONA is led by a Board of Directors, with each Director appointed by their corresponding member neighborhood association, acting according to adopted By-Laws.
2222 CONA Member Neighborhoods:
The current member neighborhoods of this coalition represent approximately 4,500 households and includes Canyon Creek, Glenlake, Jester Estates, Long Canyon Phase I, Long Canyon Phase II & III, River Place, Shepard Mountain, and Westminster Glen Estates. Here are links to the websites of member CONA neighborhoods that maintain individual sites:
Starting December 26, the City of Austin curbside customers can recycle their Hanukkah bushes, Christmas, and holiday trees by leaving them at the curb on their regular collection day. Do not dispose of trees in greenbelt areas. All other residents can drop trees off at Zilker Park. The tree drop-off option is provided as an annual partnership between Austin Resource Recovery and Austin Parks and Recreation Department and is offered two weekends in a row at Zilker Park in an effort to keep thousands of trees out of the landfill and give them a second life as mulch. The mulch is then offered for free, on a first-come, first-served basis.
With the 3rd quarter of 2020 behind us, I wanted to give an update on several items that may be of interest to Members.
Vikram Shah, one of our newly elected directors from this year’s Annual Meeting has had to resign from the board due to unforeseen work commitments. We wish him well but this is disappointing news as Vikram was shaping up to be a valuable asset to the community. Hopefully he will be willing and able to serve at some point in the future. In the meantime, the Association’s Governing Documents empower the remaining board members to fill the open seat so there will be a fresh call for candidates going out and we’ll be reaching out to the other candidates from this year’s meeting to gauge interest and try to set up some interviews.
You may have noticed that the pace of repairs and maintenance has slowed considerably in recent months. We made the decision to cut back on our planned capital spending while we waited to see what impact COVID-19 would have on our cash position. Thus far, it appears that Member delinquency is only slightly higher than usual so we plan to gradually resume our planned maintenance and repair spending. If your household’s finances have been negatively impacted by the pandemic and you are unable to stay current with your HOA assessments, please reach out to Spectrum to work out a payment plan. This will allow you to avoid expenses related to collection on a delinquent account.
The last major project for this year is to rebuild the dumpster enclosure located in the community center parking lot. This project is currently out for bid and we are not expecting it to impact the use of any amenities at the community center complex. The basketball court remains closed due to coronavirus restrictions and we have identified a handful of repairs to the gate and fencing that we would like to undertake at some point but this may get pushed to next year. The tennis courts were resurfaced the week of July 20 following the installation of a retaining wall to address erosion and washout issues that were degrading the court surface sooner than expected and we hope our tennis players are enjoying the refreshed surface The pool will be closing for the season on October 31 and we want to thank everyone for cooperating with us on complying with the various and changing restrictions we were forced to implement due to the pandemic. We also want to especially thank our lifeguards this year, many of whom are from within the neighborhood. We do appreciate you all.
The Board did conclude its 2021 budget planning and adopted the new budget at the September meeting. In terms of direct operating expense, it looks very similar to the 2020 budget with a couple of exceptions. We did achieve a significant reduction in our property and casualty insurance premiums by switching carriers and in recent years, have placed a high priority on aggressive management and repair and maintenance of our irrigation system. This has resulted in big reductions in our water expense to the point that we are comfortable reducing the budgeted amount by about $10,000 heading into 2021. The big capital expenses for next year were identified by the independent reserve study and are primarily focused on some much needed repair and renovation around the pool including coping, tile, deck repairs and repairs to the plaster. In addition, we’re continuing to invest in overdue maintenance and upkeep of our landscaping, beds, trees, sod and hardscape including the concrete fence along Boulder Lane. The board welcomes input from Members at any time on other spending priorities which we may not have considered.
Our two primary management targets are: 1) an 80% or better operating expense ratio; and 2) capital expenses and reserve balances driven by the independent, triennial reserve study. With the series of assessment increases these last few years, we finally hit our target OpEx ratio of just under 80%. This has put us in a position to scale back assessment increases to a level in line with our annual 1.5 – 2% operating expense increases. I discussed this at the annual meeting and the feedback from members present was that having to remember to update auto-pay balances annually would be a source of error and likely lead to many unintended delinquencies and late fee expenses. In recognition of this, the board has elected to apply an approximately 8% increase to the annual assessment, bringing it to $526 annually. With this increase, we are aiming to avoid further increases until the 2024 timeframe assuming current trends hold and nothing dramatic affects our ongoing operations.
Finally, allow me to recognize a few individuals for their service to the community. First up is Sohum Sharma, shown here, who, as part of his Eagle Scout project, has done a very nice job constructing a new Gaga Ball pit at the community center. We are certainly grateful for his efforts and look forward to being able to use it when covid restrictions are lifted and this is possible. Congratulations to you, Mr. Sharma on achieving the rank of Eagle Scout!
Next up is current HOA member of the Board and licensed electrician, Mark Weaver, who, this year, has donated countless hours and literally tens of thousands of dollars worth of electrical work personally repairing and installing numerous security cameras, LED fixtures, wiring, conduit, breakers and all manner of gadgets; going so far as to even rent a scissor lift to replace a handful of lights at the pool parking lot with energy efficient LED lighting. Mark, thank you so much for your time and talent donated for our benefit – we appreciate you!
The Canyon Creek Traffic and Pedestrian Safety (TAPS) Committee completed a survey of city sidewalks that includes sidewalk issues reported by our community residents. This survey resulted in the documentation of 80 significant city sidewalk safety issues with sidewalk mismatches noted up to 4.5 inches. The survey found significant sidewalk issues on 26 different streets in our community. A list of these documented mismatches was submitted to the City of Austin in late 2019. Based on our request, a city crew repaired (considered “temporary repairs”) most of these noted sidewalk mismatches in May 2020. Our goal is to make the use of our neighborhood city sidewalks safe for all pedestrians and to offer a safe alternative to jogging on our city streets, which is not only unsafe but also illegal when a sidewalk is available. We will continue to work with City of Austin staff to further improve our city sidewalks.
The CC HOA board is continuing to utilize off-duty Travis County deputy constables to patrol our neighborhood streets to promote awareness that traffic and pedestrian safety is a high priority in our community. These paid deputy constable patrols are in addition to non-paid patrols by other law enforcement agencies such as APD and Travis County Sheriff’s Department. These patrols are performed at random times every week and have resulted in many citations for traffic violations, primarily speeding. The purpose of these citations is for traffic calming and safer, more cognizant drivers, not monetary punishment.
Austin City Council passed a new speed limit ordinance (# 20200611-045) that was signed by Mayor Steve Adler on June 11, 2020. The new ordinance restricts speed limits on all Austin neighborhood streets to 25 mph max after posting of new speed signs unless a different speed limit is determined by the City of Austin Traffic Engineer. The only basic exception is for larger neighborhood streets and major arterials such as Boulder Lane. New speed limit signs will be placed on hundreds of Austin neighborhood streets starting early next year, but central Austin will get priority on installation of the new speed limit signs. We will advise our residents when we get updated info on when CC may get new speed limit signs.
After reviewing the most recent data from the two radar speed units installed on Boulder, the Traffic and Pedestrian Safety Committee finds a couple of stand-out issues. The first is that during the period January 01, 2020 through July 20, 2020 there were 7 vehicles on north Boulder that were recorded traveling between 70 mph and 99 mph. There were an additional 9 vehicles on south Boulder recorded traveling between 70 and 90 mph. This is reckless driving and totally unacceptable behavior! Hopefully most of these egregious speeders are not residents of Canyon Creek. The second observation is that the average number of vehicles recorded traveling daily on Boulder Lane dropped around 40% in mid-March through July 20, 2020 due to Covid-19 related increase in work-from-home and virtual learning. We will continue to monitor this radar speed unit data as it is made available to us from the Austin Transportation Dept.
We have some good news to report! City council member Jimmy Flannigan’s D6 office has awarded funding to our Canyon Creek neighborhood on two different City of Austin mobility/safety fund projects (note: no expenditure or matching funds required by our HOA). Canyon Creek applied for this funding money from this special program, which is called the ¼ Cent Program (city ¼ cent sales tax for mobility improvements), to be used for local neighborhoods. One of the projects is for an additional radar speed unit (“DSDD”) to be installed for traffic calming on Chestnut Ridge Rd in the early December 2020 timeframe (see pic below). The specific location for this radar speed unit is under review. The second project award is for painted white “curb extensions” at the Boulder/Ember Glen intersection (pic of typical curb extensions is shown below) in front of the Canyon Creek Elementary School. We believe these painted curb extensions will offer a visual signal to drivers to slow down and watch for pedestrians at the school crossings before stopping at the posted stop sign. This project should be complete by November 2020.
Reminders:
Respect the right-of-way of pedestrians in our neighborhood – Note: it is state law that vehicles must yield the right of way to pedestrians standing at the entrance of or in crosswalks. To yield, vehicles must come to a complete stop and wait while pedestrians enter, cross and exit the crosswalk.
Drive within the posted speed limits for safety (trying to save a few extra seconds by speeding is not safe or smart and it can cost you a lot of money). Note speed limits are set based on ideal driving conditions so wet roads, heavy traffic or pedestrian presence warrants reducing speed below the posted limit.
If you see someone driving recklessly or if you experience “road rage”, call 911 immediately and report as many details of the reckless driving as possible such as the nature of the event, license plate number, make/model/color of vehicle, location, driver description, etc. Please do not chase or confront the driver.
The purpose of this document is to communicate a defined set of problems, the opportunity/project goals, and methods to address those problems with the Canyon Creek parking lighting.
Your HOA board is pleased to announce the opening of the 2019 pool season and open house for our new amenity center building and pool this Saturday, May 18th at noon. Please join us for a look around, refreshments, or just a swim. Your HOA board and community manager will be available to answer questions until 4:00 p.m.
Please have your amenity key card with you to verify access. You must register your pool access card prior to opening to have access. Once registered, it can take up to 72 hours for access to be granted. If you have not already registered your card, please follow the instructions below to do so at this time. The instructions for renewing your cards(s) are below.
We are looking forward to your enjoyment of the new facility. We hope to see you this Saturday.
Thank you,
Your Canyon Creek Board of Directors
Registering your access cards.
Online: You can renew your access device(s) by going to this link: https://spectrumam.com/pool-gate-waiver/. It is easy to renew your pool card using the following steps:
Select the “pool” option by using the drop-down arrow for the “Type of Device Requesting” button.
Select the “Renewing Existing Device” option.
Enter the pool card serial number(s) in the box that appears.
Fill out the remainder of the form, and press submit when complete.
Be sure to include the serial numbers on your pool cards(s) when you complete the waiver.
Once your pool card(s) have been registered for the 2019 season, you will receive a confirmation email. If you currently reside in our HOA but are not the owner, please attach the first and last page of your lease, as well as a copy of your state issued photo identification when completing the form. If you need to purchase a replacement or additional pool card, you may do so online by accessing your HOA’s website. Share
To ensure all residents continue to have access to the amenities, the Board of Directors has elected to run registration renewal for the 2019 season. Renewals are performed in an effort to ensure the amenity access is only granted to those residents who meet the criteria set forth by the governing documents and the Board of Directors. All residents, tenants included, will be required to register their pool card(s). To complete registration, you must complete the pool access waiver and provide Spectrum with the serial numbers listed on the pool card(s) you wish to register. Options for how to register are below.
Online: You can renew your access device(s) by clicking here. It is easy to renew your pool card using the following steps:
· Select the “pool” option by using the drop-down arrow for the “Type of Device Requesting” button. · Select the “Renewing Existing Device” option. · Enter the pool card serial number(s) in the box that appears. · Fill out the remainder of the form, and press submit when complete.
Be sure to include the serial numbers on your pool cards(s) when you complete the waiver.
Once your pool card(s) have been registered for the 2019 season, you will receive a confirmation email. If you currently reside in our HOA but are not the owner, please attach the first and last page of your lease, as well as a copy of your state issued photo identification when completing the form. If you need to purchase a replacement or additional pool card, you may do so online by accessing your HOA’s website.
In-Person: You can register your pool card(s) by visiting the Spectrum office nearest you. Click here to locate the closest office location. You will be required to have your pool card(s) with you at the time of registration. If you currently reside in our HOA but are not the owner, please be sure to bring the first and last page of your lease as well as a copy of your state issued photo identification when visiting our office.
Onsite: Currently, no onsite registrations have been scheduled. If the Board of Directors elects to host an onsite registration, the dates will be sent via e-blast and posted on your community website. To log into your community website, please click here.
Many Canyon Creek residents have expressed concerns over some noted traffic safety incidents in our community in recent weeks. The Canyon Creek HOA board would like to assure concerned residents that we have also noted speeding and other unsafe acts and we share those concerns. The HOA board has been actively investigating possible solutions to noted traffic issues. In a conversation this month with City of Austin traffic engineers, they have advised that the city will not be taking any applications or considering new traffic calming measures such as “speed humps” for the remainder of 2018 while they review and adopt possible new regulations. However, the HOA board is actively looking into other possible solutions such as permanently installed radar speed signs.
Radar speed signs will not totally cure the speeding and unsafe acts, but it has been proven in traffic studies that they do have a positive general effect in reducing speeding and promoting traffic safety. If installed, these radar speed signs will not take photos of vehicles passing by, but all of the data obtained by the on-board computer system will be available for the board to review and analyze. The board will be discussing this topic further at our regular board meeting next Monday the 14th at 7:00 p.m. at The Church at Canyon Creek (9001 N. FM 620). All community residents are invited to attend this regular board meeting and speak publicly to the board if so desired. Residents can always contact the board through at board@canyoncreek.net on this or any other topic.
Spectrum is now a month and a half into managing Canyon Creek Homeowners’ Association, and I would like to re-introduce myself to those that may have missed the initial postcard mail out. My name is Lydia Gueli, your new Community Manager, and I am delighted to work with your association and Board of Directors. If you need to reach me, please feel free to email Contact@SpectrumAM.com.
Please take some time to register your account on our website at www.SpectrumAM.com. It is a pleasure to represent the members of Canyon Creek Homeowners’ Association, and I look forward to meeting each of you in the near future.
Regards,
Lydia Gueli
Community Manager Spectrum Association Management
Page Revision History:
2020-04-23 (jmw): Page moved to WordPress platform.
