BOD Attendees: Rick Graap, Jenna Cohen, Jim Wezelman, Janice Johnson, Joel Katleman, Tony Luebbermann Association Attendees: Lamarshell Karnas lot 87, Nancy Barlow lot 22, Jack Patyk lot 61, Chris Maglione lot 43, John Tierney lot 30 1. Approval of BOD minutes from May 9th BOD meeting and May
25 BOD Meeting.
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| Hi, David, Again thanks for your presentation and hanging around for 2 plus hours for discussion, and thanks for backing up Bill Malaby after the very discourteous question by one attendee. Some additional questions on reflection: *The written county standards are 24' width and 8' shoulders, and these have to be met prior to takeover. Yet, your presentation related that this would not apply to our 18-20 foot roads and the cul-de-sac roads which are only 12-14' wide. If this exception is a written policy, we need to review it. If it is an exception with no written policy, then lowering the standards would also apply to any other HOA seeking to have the County take over roads, if this project was approved. I can see nothing but downsides for the County in the future were this to happen, but correct me if I am wrong. There is no written policy on any exceptions. The standard does apply, and any exception must be noted and reviewed on a case-by-case basis. Generally the deciding factor would be "is there any public benefit"? In this case, my summary to the director would say that there is no public benefit. This type of review / acceptance practice has not shown to be an issue. It happens so infrequently. As previously noted, I can only recall one other time (Summerhaven roads) where a group of formerly private roads were accepted. The county has and allows this process so that new developments can be accepted into the system. This is primarily to ensure planned development. Historically, while we have little formal responsibility for wildcat development areas, in the long run the public cost of dealing with unrestricted development is very high (not just roads, but flood control, zoning, hazards, and non-delegable duties, etc). Much of the area is still public R/W even if it is not accepted for maintenance. *Shadow Hills is the HOA roads up for repair, and you stated it would be a one year project. How was it that these roads (which are clearly meeting all the County criteria) were done by the County in the first place? Will the road repairs planned include the cul-de-sac roads there also, or just the through roads? Is there a joint financial responsibility between S.Hills HOA and the County? History: Shadow Hills was accepted in phases in 1979 and 1980 having been constructed to the county standard at that time. There was a subsequent chip seal in 1994. Shadow Hills will likely by a multi-year project since there are so many miles involved. To do this in one year would mean that all of our chip seal funding for that maintenance district would be used in one area; generally not acceptable. This is all county funded; no joint responsibility. All of the county maintained streets here will be treated the same. That HOA did consider funding the difference between a chip seal and asphalt paving for their benefit. They ultimately elected to not do that since their road base is in reasonable condition. Additionally, Shadow Hills was developed after Cat #8, which was done in 1974, now 32 years ago, and to my knowledge, no major repair has been done. Because of this chronology, one has to question why S. Hills is being re-done before Cat #8; appreciate your clarification. History: CAT 8 public roads accepted in 1975 having been constructed to the county standard at that time. There was a subsequent chip seal in 1989 and again in 1994. There is no magic formula that tells us what/when to do something. Age is but one factor. The crummy reality is that everything in Pima County needs some level of work. We are currently working on re-establishing a pavement management system which will provide some tools for decision making. But much of what we do is qualitative vs. quantitative, and related to how well or poorly a road is performing. Perhaps the fact that CAT 8 had that chip seal in 1989 has helped extend its longevity. In Cat #5, as in S. Hills, all the roads are of County specifications and, I assume, will fall under County maintenance. It does appear that maintenance has been done rather recently (?). History: CAT 5 roads were accepted in 1960 having been constructed to the county standard at that time. There was a subsequent chip seal in 1989 and again in 1994. It appears that each of the subdivisions noted here were last chip sealed in 1994 (we must have had a good year). All of the subdivisions (with the exception of the private roads in CAT 8) were privately funded and constructed to the county standard at that time and were then accepted under the county maintenance system. In short, there appears to be a read hodge-podge of road development, the reason for which is not at all clear to me. Would appreciate your clarification of these disparate observations around this area. Thank you for your consideration. The reason for a hodge-podge of road maintenance is very clear to me. The choice of the county to not fund a reasonable preventive maintenance program means we fall behind every year. The county's stated priority is its capital improvement program (the 1997 bond program and now the RTA). Just like maintenance on a car, you need to do some periodic treatments to preserve its life. We are currently only funding a PM program at about 25% of the needed level. Until we fund a program, we will not make headway, and we won't even keep pace. Rick Graap |
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Dear Neighbors, The County must see a public benefit in order to take over a private road, and other than the folks in Shadow Hills feeling less guilty about driving on our roads, I can see no public benefit and I doubt the County will either. Our roads are not as wide as the county requirements mandate, and even though the County representative David Cummings said this could be overcome, I personally do not see how the county can change the rules for us and not for everyone else. The estimate given by Mr. Cummings was lower then the one we are getting from Sunland Asphalt; however it is for a lesser product that will not last as long. The estimate was incomplete as it did not include any work for relocating the utilities. The residents of all private roads would be required to deed
some frontage to the county (maybe as little as 5 feet or as
much as 15 feet) and this would reduce the usability of the affected
lots. If any of the lot owners did not want to give up their
property then the county would not enter in to any agreement. The one fact in favor of the County takeover is the Homeowners would no longer have to pay for any road maintenance. The county would take over that responsibility. As you can see from Camino Miraval and Camino La Zorrella, the county maintenance is sorely lacking. In fact David Cummings admitted that the county, because of a lack of funds, is now on a cycle to do major maintenance on their roads every 33 years. Ann Day, our County Supervisor, would need to support us, and even go to bat for us in front of the Board of Supervisors. I had the opportunity to ask her opinion on this matter and she flatly told me she would advise against it. In fact her neighborhood has researched this option and came to the conclusion that it was a waste of time. The advice of their neighborhood board of directors president was "time is of the essence" and every day we wait our cost to do our roads is rising with the cost of petroleum. In summation we could have an unknown delay while we determine
how much the county takeover would cost us and then if the county
would even consider it (remember the public benefit, or lack
of). In addition, we would deed the county a portion of our lots
(lessening their value), so we could have the county maintain
our roads as they do Camino Miraval, every 33 years. Chris Maglione |