President's Message

By: Dave Peterson, Board President

Today is a beautiful spring day in the Keys. People have put away their winter gear and are transitioning to summer. It’s a wonderful time to be here!

Here is an update on some of the issues the board is working on:

1. Aquatic Weeds. The biggest thing happening in the Keys is the Control Methods Test (CMT). The Water Quality Committee and our team of consultants took a hard look at forecast hydrology and all of the other precursors to the test, and recommended to the Board that we go forward, so the Board authorized all of the contracts necessary to accomplish the test. Crews have been hard at work constructing barriers, blocking culverts, placing monitoring equipment, and performing background monitoring. Herbicide application will be done in several locations within the west lagoon system and Lake Tallac in late May.

This CMT is a large-scale program to help us and our partners in government figure out how to manage the weeds all over the Keys, including the east channel. It benefits us all. The cost exceeds the special assessment we did a few years ago, so the board authorized borrowing about $1M from common reserves to keep the ball rolling. The Water Quality and Finance Committees are working on a plan to fund the shortfall, and we will likely be looking at another special assessment. If so, it will go out for member vote. The good thing is that TRPA is picking up more than half of the cost of the CMT, but our share is still underfunded. More to come on that between now and July.

Boating and water fun are restricted in the test areas, as you no-doubt know. Please help us in urging family, neighbors, tenants, and others to respect the restrictions so that we don’t mess up this costly test program. Recreation will be fully restored in early July.

2. Water Company. The Water Conservation Committee held a town hall meeting in May on our new “Tahoe Keys Landscape Conservation Idea Book”, which was developed with funding and major assistance from TRPA. The book provides lots of good ideas for how to re-imagine our landscapes to be less turfcentric, more water efficient, and more maintenance friendly. I’d encourage all of you to download it from the TKPOA website and take a look. The committee also recommended changes to our emergency order on irrigation to relax restrictions on drip watering, and to allow more frequent watering during the establishment period for replacement turf, as long as the turf area is reduced to no more than 25% of your available landscape area. You’ll see the update to the emergency order in the mail, Keys Breeze, and eblast.

The Water Conservation Committee also recommended that the board hire a design firm to develop a landscape master plan for all of our common areas, so we are in the process of soliciting proposals. Once we select a design firm, there will be an outreach effort to get member input throughout the design process.

Irrigation has begun, and most people are sticking to their assigned time slots, which is successfully spreading Keys water demands around the clock. Our wells are handling the load without problems, and all water served meets all safe drinking water requirements. Success, so far! The weekend of July 4 is usually the peak demand time for us, so the Emergency Order prohibits watering that weekend. Please do what you can to help us “beat the peak” over the holiday weekend.

3. Garbage, Bears, and Trees. We moved the Pavilion dumpsters to the Water Company property on Texas Ave. for second homeowner Sunday service. This has been successful so far. We had a townhall meeting in late May focused on garbage service, because positive changes are afoot to move toward outdoor enclosures with wheeled totes at single family homes. More to come as that program develops.

Bears have come out of hibernation, and are roaming the Keys again. The board in February authorized the California Department of Fish and Wildlife to use our common areas to trap and relocate “Hank the Tank”, and also to tag any others caught. The tagging program

is important to prevent mistaken identity in future incidents. The trapping program we authorized does not include killing the bears; just catch, tag, and haze. So if you see bear traps, please respect the process and stay clear for everybody’s safety.

As many of you know, mature trees have been falling over in the wind throughout the keys. Some damage has occurred, but it’s remarkable that it hasn’t been worse. Many, if not most of the trees are healthy conifers, so it doesn’t appear to me to be pest or drought stress. The wind was horrific this winter, and some of these trees may have outgrown their shallow sand foundations, I suspect. But we do not have an expert on staff, so we intend to hire an arborist for advice on common area trees. My neighbor and I also plan to do so for our private property trees. You may want to have yours looked at too.

Thanks again to all of our volunteers! A special shout out goes to Pete Wolcott, our Water Quality Committee chair, as he’s been working nearly full time for the last year bringing this CMT to reality. It’s an unbelievable sacrifice for the benefit of all of us members, that unfortunately was necessary. Thanks Pete!!