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| December 2004 | Recent Issue |
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THE HOLIDAY SEASON Whether you celebrate Christmas, Hanukkah, Ramadan, Kwanzaa, or Yule, we wish you and yours a marvelous season of hope, peace and joy whatever your faith, and a very happy and prosperous New Year. Santa Claus and his elves (with candy) will be visiting our neighborhood once again this year. Show your community spirit by saying "hello" to Santa and show your support for the Fairfax County Fire Department, by coming out on Saturday, December 18, about 3 pm (listen for the siren). Please plan to be outside to welcome Santa around that time and get a few goodies to put in your stocking! The friendliest rivalry in the Washington area takes place during the Holiday Season when neighbor vs neighbor contend in the annual Stratford Landing Home Decoration Contest. As always, there will be only four first place winners: (1) prettiest; (2) kid's favorite; (3) most original; and (4) best looking during daytime. Make sure that everything is ready by the night of Friday, December 17, when the judging begins. Afterwards, the prestigious Stratford Landing winners sign will proudly acknowledge your feat, and as an expression of our gratitude, you will receive a gift certificate. (We have discontinued judging by the community-at-large due to low participation in recent years; however, if there are places you think the judges should consider, you should feel free to call Leah Gunter, 703-799-1631, with your input.) HALLOWEEN A lot of wonderful people
helped to make the Halloween Parade a great event for the kids.
Lots of volunteers, both adults and youths, came and gave their
time and enthusiasm on a wet, but thankfully not rainy, afternoon.
We were able to include lots of games for the children thanks to
all the volunteers. The SLCA would like to thank Beth Bates, Terri
O'Connor, Sheila Gonsalves, Tracy Luke, Carrie Myers, Tara Quaadman,
Katie Savage, and Kim Zuber for all their help. In addition we enjoyed
having neighborhood youth be a part of our event. Thanks go to our
youth volunteers Camille DiFolco, Rasheeda Gregory, Django Szilagi,
Ruby Szilagi and Chris Young. We would also like to recognize Josh,
Luke and Zachary Belanger and Django Szilagi for helping with set
up. Luckily, they were out playing "wall ball" and helped
carry boxes, pumpkins, food and drink over to the playground! A
great big thank you goes out to everyone involved. We also want
to thank those of you who attended and brought your children and
grandchildren. As the saying goes, "a good time was had by
all." (Leah Gunter) ANNUAL MEETING RECAP The officers of the Stratford Landing Citizens Association elected by acclamation at the Annual Meeting on October 28 are shown on the final page of this Newsletter. We received a favorable report from our Auditor concerning the Association's finances, printed below. The SLCA budget for fiscal year 2005, also printed below, was adopted unanimously. We also received a presentation by Officer Greg Kotteman, Crime Prevention Officer at the Mount Vernon Station of the Fairfax County Police on the Neighborhood Watch Program. This community used to have a very active neighborhood watch, but we have let it slide. Now we are preparing to reactivate and reinvigorate it. More about that later. Our Candidates Night
allowed all three of our candidates for the U.S. House of Representatives
to make their cases to the voters for their support on Election
Day. The candidates were very appreciative to our Association for
giving them this opportunity. If we can get all of our candidates
for public office to show up at our meetings, WHY DO WE HAVE SO
MUCH TROUBLE GETTING OUR OWN MEMBERS TO MAKE THAT EFFORT? For those
of you who came, THANK YOU. For those of you who didn't, shame on
you. We had to wait until after 8 pm, more than half an hour after
our scheduled start-time, for enough of you (10% including proxies
by the provisions of our new by-laws) to show up before we could
start our business meeting, meaning that we had to cram an hour's
worth of business into forty minutes, and we still had to telescope
our refreshment time into about ten minutes. We are thinking about
ways of increasing the attendance at these meetings, and your suggestions
would be appreciated. September 29, 2004 Mr. Rick
Edgerton, President Dear Mr. Edgerton: This date I completed an audit of the records of the Treasurer, Stratford Landing Citizens Association, for the period 1 October 2003 to 30 September 2004. In my opinion, the recording and accounting methods of the Treasurer, SLCA are adequate and appropriate and provide a true reflection of the Association's financial condition. No errors or discrepancies in the account were discovered. The opening balance as of 1 October 2003 was $3,230.35. Income during the audited period was entirely from members' dues, and totalled $6,840. Disbursements for the year were documented $4,782.79. The closing balance of the Association, as of 30 September 2003 is $5,287.56. Homer E. Schott
COMMUNITY DIRECTORY At the Annual Meeting, it was pointed out that the major imponderable about this budget was the new and updated community directory we plan to publish next year. In past years the Directory has actually made money, due to the sale of advertising. However, last time we published, in 2001, the project didn't quite break even. We don't know how we will fare this year. We really could use some volunteer help with this project, to assist in data verification and processing, advertising sales, composition and editing, and other functions. Please call Rick Edgerton at 703-360-2813. SCHELHORN ROAD The Supervisor Hyland's task force to study the issue of so-called "cut-through traffic" on this street has met twice: on September 15 and October 20. Our next meeting is scheduled for January 12, 2005. If you have friends in neighboring areas, they may not be aware that this issue is on the table. Please pass the word. The more community interest there is in this issue, the less likely that we will be saddled with an unacceptable resolution. LITTLE HUNTING CREEK DUCK BLIND This issue has gone away, at least for the short term. The hunter who built the blind is a sportsman of the old school, and did not want to cause problems for the community or stir up controversy. When he was offered a site for his duck blind elsewhere, he dismantled his blind in the Creek and moved out. We are still pursuing a permanent solution to assure that the issue does not arise again, possibly with someone who is less tractable than our last hunter. We believe the County has the authority under current law to ban hunting in the Creek, but the County Attorney is attempting to verify that. The issue is that the Creek is a navigable waterway, most of which are under State, not County, jurisdiction, and it is not perfectly clear that the County has jurisdiction over navigable waterways totally within the County. Hunting is already prohibited on both shorelines of the Creek. We have not yet written to our State legislators, contrary to what I previously reported (I drafted the letters, but they were never sent; our legislators know about the issue). We hope it won't be necessary to pursue State legislation, but if we have to, we will. THE SWEET LIST Since we do not currently have anyone who has volunteered to serve as our Consumer Affairs representative, we have not recently updated our "Sweet List". We believe that this is an important community service, and regret that we have nothing new to provide you. If you would like to assume the responsibility yourself, I would love to hear from you (703-360-2813). In addition to maintaining the "Sweet List" and taking input from your neighbors about who should or should not be on it, you would be our representative to the Mount Vernon Council of Citizens Associations Consumer Affairs Committee, which usually meets monthly. You would also be a member of our Executive Committee, which also meets monthly. MEMBERSHIP DRIVE If you have not yet paid your dues, please give your $10 to your Block Captain. If you don't know who that is, call Mary Lou Hoffman. Block captains, if you have not yet turned in the dues for the members on your block, please turn them in to Mary Lou Hoffman as soon as possible. Mrs. Hoffman may be reached at 703-360-7267. Dues must be paid, or this will be your last Newsletter. When we have received input from all of our Block Captains, we will proceed to prepare our new Directory. (Mary Lou Hoffman) RONALD PRATER Ronald (Ron) Prater, former Treasurer of the Stratford Landing Citizens Association, passed away on November 17. We express our sincere condolences to his wife, Ellen and their family -- three children, and eleven grandchildren. Ron will be missed by all of us. There will be a memorial service for Ron at Aldersgate United Methodist Church on Saturday, December 11 at 11 am; his funeral service will be held at the Arlington National Cemetery Colombarium on January 28 at 11 am. The family requests that, in lieu of flowers, donations in Ron's memory be made to either Grinnell College, Iowa, or to Aldersgate United Methodist Church, 1301 Collingwood Road. NEIGHBORHOOD WATCH Many of you heard our local Crime Prevention Officer, Greg Kotteman, speak at our Annual Meeting about how Neighborhood Watch can improve public safety and reduce crime. We are planning to restart Stratford Landing's Neighborhood Watch Program. Our program has been inactive for several years and residents have expressed interest in restarting it. On Wednesday, January 19, 2005, at 7:30 pm, we will have a meeting at Stratford Landing Elementary School to discuss implementation issues. We have invited Officer Kotteman to speak to us about how other communities operate our programs. We request that all Block Captains attend, and strongly encourage all other residents to attend also. At this meeting we will brainstorm about the type of Neighborhood Watch/Program we would like in our community. Programs can range from something as simple as designating a neighbor to contact for public safety issues to regular organized patrols. It is up to us to determine what type of program we need, want, and are willing and able to implement in Stratford Landing. If you want to get more information, please call Alan Rubinstein at 703-360-2141. (Alan Rubinstein) LOCAL VAMPIRE STRIKES AGAIN! Yes, the Vampire needs blood! The Stratford Landing Blood Program is having problems meeting its quota for its bi-monthly blood drives, and it needs your help. For the benefit of new residents of our community, I'd like to point out that Stratford Landing has been running its own blood drives at Inova Mount Vernon Hospital for eleven years, being the only citizens association in the Mount Vernon area with its own program. Most drives are run on an erratic schedule from ever-changing community churches and community centers or from bloodmobiles at varying times and locations. If we as a community are to continue the current arrangement, we must have your support. Meeting and chatting with old and new neighbors, plus delicious donuts, make this a pleasant experience. Inova Blood Donor Services, as well as Red Cross and other blood donor services, have a constant need, which has been intensified by the more stringent requirements donors have to meet. But this is necessary to keep the nation's blood supply safe. Restrictions brought on by the danger from blood-transmitted diseases like "mad-cow" disease, malaria, and numerous other diseases to which our world-traveling Stratford Landing donors could be exposed, contribute to the shortage. Also, our long-time donors are moving away. If you have ever been a blood donor, you KNOW that there is almost always a shortage, some times more acute than others. You KNOW that your donation can save a life. If you have never given and are willing to try, what better place can you find than within the Mount Vernon Hospital Donor Center. It's convenient, too. The dates for donations, all on Saturday mornings, are set for the year 2005. They are: February 5, April 9, June 4, August 6, October 1, and December 3. Why not mark them down on your new 2005 calendar. Or call Jack Shawn at 703-780-4752, get on his list of prospective donors, and he will remind you. (That's a promise!) Donors may give every eight weeks. The above dates were set with that in mind. If you would rather give at another time, check with the Donor Center, open Mondays through Thursdays from 9 am to 7 pm. It's best to have an appointment. Call Ana on 703-664-7229. Be sure she knows you are from Stratford Landing. THANKS. (Jack Shawn) MOUNT VERNON GENEALOGICAL SOCIETY The next two meetings of the Mount Vernon Genealogical Society will be held at the Hollin Hall Senior Center, 1500 Shenandoah Road, on Tuesday, December 21, 2004, and on Tuesday, January 18, 2005. Both meetings are at 1 pm. Meetings are free and open to the public. Call Harold McClendon at 703-360-0920 for more information. This newsletter is published bi-monthly (normally February, April, June, September, October, and December) by the Stratford Landing Citizens Association, Inc. for the benefit and information of its member residents. All members may submit items for inclusion in the "Other News" and "Personal Items" sections by submitting them to the President or Secretary in writing by the 20th of the month preceding publication. The next issue will be circulated about February 2nd. Other contributions to this publication are welcome, subject to editing. Unless otherwise attributed, the President is responsible for the content of this Newsletter. The following are the members of the Executive Committee, which meets the first 2-digit Tuesday of each month but August in open session. This newsletter is published bi-monthly (normally February, April, June, September, October, and December) by the Stratford Landing Citizens Association, Inc. for the benefit and information of its member residents. All members may submit items for inclusion in the "Other News" and "Personal Items" sections by submitting them to the President or Secretary in writing by the 20th of the month preceding publication. Other contributions to this publication are welcome, subject to editing. Unless otherwise attributed, the President is responsible for the content of this Newsletter.
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