Amberley Green

Amberley Green is 133 acres of gorgeous rolling hills, old cart paths, and mature, beautiful trees. The day it opened to residents I was able to add another 2.5 miles to my neighborhood runs. They are hilly miles, I'll give you that, but there is nothing better than being able to stay close to home and get my workout in.

This post will explain why I support allowing non-residents of Amberley Village to purchase parking stickers in order to park in the Amberley Green parking lot:

1. Safety

As a woman, when I go to Amberley Green and I see cars in the parking lot with AV identification decals, I know that 1) I may encounter another person there and 2) that person is an easily identifiable Amberley resident. If there are no other cars in the parking lot and I encounter someone, I have no idea who that person is, where they came from, or if they are there for a walk or for mischief. Certainly, a person who lives close by Amberley Green can walk there and I wouldn't know they were there prior to my encounter, but most people don't live within walking distance of the Green. Or if they do, they are Amberley residents.

Great Blue Heron at Amberley Green

Our current ordinance allows only residents to use the AG parking lot. In practice, non-residents park freely on nearby Fairhaven, Burning Tree, or at Adath Israel synagogue and walk across Ridge Road to the Green. This is a ridiculous situation -- the residents don't like it and I don't like being surprised by a stranger on what are usually deserted pathways.

2. Law Abiding Citizens Do Not Pose a Risk

Think about it... Who do I have to fear at Amberley Green? The person who goes to Village Hall and provides their identifying information and license plate and vehicle information to our police in order to buy a parking sticker or the person who enters Amberley Green from Lakeshore Drive apartments in Reading? The person who buys the sticker is not the person who is going to cause mischief on Amberley Green. By limiting parking to residents only, we are creating the parking problem on residential streets and doing nothing to deter crime and mischief on the Green. Criminals will enter Amberley Green either way -- neither more nor less. And, to get back to number 1: Safety -- I would much rather know who is using the Green than not.

3. Amberley Green is an Asset to our community

We have just completed Phase I of the We Thrive! grant process and prepared an invoice to Hamilton County Public Health for $7000. We are now ready to enter Phase II which includes the community garden at Amberley Green, a possible walking path connecting French park to Amberley's Village Hall walking path, and maybe even a Metro bus stop at the JCC, all projects paid for by the remainder of the We Thrive! grant up to $24,000. These are all areas that were identified by a working group of Amberley citizens who have put in countless hours since December in order to improve the quality of life here in Amberley Village by bringing residents together in a gathering place, increasing walkability, increasing access to fresh foods, and identifying ways to reduce smoking and chronic diseases. None of this could have been done without the grant. A condition of the grant is that we develop shared usages with other communities of our assets in ways that will promote physical activity. The most obvious solution identified by the committee is to open up parking at Amberley Green to non-residents. By opening up the parking, we allow others to enjoy walking, running, and other sports-related activities on Amberley Green -- all activities that were identified by our residents as providing enjoyment, exercise, and increased physical activity. We could allow frisbee golf to be played on the old fairways. Arborists could conduct walking tours of our trees. Children could enjoy gardening camp. When we allow land to remain vacant, it becomes attractive to people who want to conduct illegal activity. It becomes overgrown and blighted, thereby decreasing its value to the community. Amberley's long range plan includes development of Amberley Green, so it is in our best interest to keep it attractive and safe so as to obtain the highest value in the marketplace. By using the property we make it safer and also attract people to our community where they may very well choose to live.

What are your thoughts? You can either comment here or send me an email at WolfonCouncil@gmail.com.

Deer Today; Gone Tomorrow

I don't know about you, but I'm enjoying the view out my windows of the snow that fell early this morning. I think all the birds in Amberley have come to my feeders to enjoy the (expensive) selection of bird seed I put out for them. Which has me thinking about the abundance of wildlife we enjoy here in Amberley Village and whether it's recommended to be feeding them at all.
According to the Ohio Department of Natural Resources: "With the exception of feeding songbirds, putting out food for wildlife can hurt more than help."  So, go ahead and feed the songbirds, and by all means, take pictures of all those cardinals, bluejays, titmouses (or is it titmice?), and woodpeckers. But when it comes to feeding the deer, the ODNR has different advice:

Kimo and Amberley deer engage in a backyard standoff

Wildlife, such as deer and geese, are accustomed to our winters here in Ohio. They are migrating species and the deer who live here in the spring and summer, may not be the same deer that are here in the winter. Deer have particular wintering spots and by feeding them you discourage them from going to those spots, that may be miles away from your backyard. The available food resources here may not be what they want or need in the winter. Furthermore, bringing wild animals so close to your house and other species makes them more vulnerable to spreading disease, and attacks from large dogs, or in our own community, collisions with automobiles. Additionally, for all of you gardeners who bemoan the deer  who eat your gardens, "Come spring time, don't expect the deer you fed all winter to find greener pastures. By then, they will have become accustomed to the free meal and think it's perfectly acceptable munching on your garden of delicate spring flowers and tender vegetables."


Why am I bringing this up? I've written about Amberley's deer culling program in previous posts. Council decided to continue with the deer culling recommendations from last year, but resolved to revisit the issue before next winter in order to have ample time to establish a comprehensive, cost-effective plan for the Village. This may involve bow-hunting, or may not, but until then, we are proceeding with sharpshooters in French Park and Amberley Green. All deer meet is processed and donated to the Free Store here in Cincinnati. If you live near French Park and Amberley Green, you will probably want to think twice about feeding the deer and establishing any kind of domestic relationship with them, because you are essentially luring them to your backyard, where they will become a target of our culling program.

So cute, but vicious!

Hello Sunshine!

Ohio law provides for very liberal access to government public records. What that means to the citizens of Amberley Village, during this election season, is that the email address you used to subscribe to the Village e-newsletter must be given to any person who requests it, whether or not that person gives a reason for the request. I have been very conscientious about compiling my own list of address for use with this blog, and I have not asked, nor been given access to the Village e-mail list.

I am adding this quick post to give you a heads up that a public records request has been made and you may be getting an email as a result. If you do not wish to receive this email, then I suggest that you treat it as spam and mark it such, or just delete it with the rest of the junk mail you receive to your inbox every day. Please don't, however, request to have your name removed from Amberley's list. Our e-newsletter is packed with important news of the Village and you will have no other way of getting the information, in addition to meeting notices, if you remove yourself from the list.

Amberley Village has an obligation, under the law, to comply with records requests, and I know that I'm going to try my best to be patient and realize that it's all a part of living in a democracy. Once election season is behind us, so, hopefully, will be the email requests. As for myself, I will continue to collect email addresses the old-fashioned and time consuming way. I feel it is the most honest and direct way to get only information to people who want it and are interested in it.

Learning the Ropes

How does a newly-elected council person learn how to be a council person? They attend newly-elected council person school, that's how! Well, it may not be called exactly that, but between the Center for Local Government, the Hamilton County Planning Commission, the First Suburbs Consortium, and Village Manager Scot Lahrmer, there are plenty of avenues for education. I've spent three Saturday mornings in workshops beginning in December with the Planning Commission's workshop for newly-elected officials. There we learned how the HCPC could assist us in getting projects off the ground through partnerships and grants. In fact, Amberley is using the services of the HCPC to revise the zoning code, beginning with the zoning of the North Site in order to make it more marketable for development. By being a member of the HCPC, Amberley can avail itself of low-cost specialized services and expertise offered by the planning commission.

Council Member Tom Muething practices parliamentary procedure

Last Saturday, four members of council availed themselves of a parliamentary procedure workshop. The workshop was presented by certified parliamentarians. Parliamentary procedure, when used correctly, can aid in expediting meetings. Who among us hasn't experienced attending a meeting where the discussion goes on forever and continues to get sidetracked, only to have us looking at our watch and promising to never attend another meeting? I know, I personally feel as if I've let down my committee if a meeting lasts longer than an hour and a half.

Fire Chiefs from DP/Silverton and Little Miami JFDs

Most recently, the topic of "Shared Services" has been written about quite extensively in the Cincinnati Enquirer. Yesterday, Council Member Bill Doering, former Mayor Merrie Stillpass, and I attended the Shared Services Summit, which was presented by the Center for Local Government and moderated by Hamilton County Commissioner Todd Portune. Shared services is of particular interest to all local governments given the state of the economy and the diminishing revenue of virtually every municipality in Ohio and elsewhere.  During the five hour summit, we had the opportunity to attend smaller break-out groups which explored various aspects of how municipalities could share services. I chose to attend the presentation given by the chiefs of three local joint fire districts. It can take years to form a joint fire district, and though it may or may not even be feasible for Amberley, there is still the option of exploring contracting fire service with other jurisdictions. I spent some time after the presentation talking to the chief of the Deer Park/ Silverton Joint Fire District. He is very familiar with Amberley's police/fire setup and willing to have a conversation with us regarding areas where we can share services.

Commissioner Portune

It is imperative that we begin to think of new ways of doing things in Amberley Village. If the Police Levy that will be on the March ballot passes, we will be able to have a dedicated source of revenue for our police department for the next five years. During that time, however, Council, Village administration, and our residents must be thinking of and finding innovative ways to provide a level of service to our residents that we can be happy with and also doesn't stretch our budget. The Enquirer has been doing an excellent job reporting on this issue. This week, the Hamilton County Sheriff's Dept. threatened to pull police patrols from ten area townships, leaving some without any police presence at all. Townships May Not Have Any Police Presence When They Lose Sheriff's Patrols.  Today, the Enquirer published an editorial stressing the need to discuss local services. Local Services Must Be Discussed. This is clearly the year when citizens will be pressed to decide what kind and how much service they expect from their local government. Amberley Village, Springfield Township, and Addyston will make that decision on March 6th. I predict that many others will do the same in November.

What is "Shared Services?"

Amberley 101

In November, 2011, Council Member Ed Hattenbach and former Mayor Merrie Stillpass appointed fourteen residents to serve on a Village ad hoc Advisory Committee.  The committee was charged with examining the Village's finances in order to determine whether the Village's financial shortfall was due to a revenue shortfall or an expense surplus. The committee has been meeting for three months now, and I, along with other members of Council, have attended several of the meetings. There have been detailed presentations from Chief Richard Wallace, Public Works Supervisor Steve Rasfeld, and Village Manager Scot Lahrmer. Additionally, Mr. Lahrmer presented to the committee a theoretical look at what the Village would look like if the budget was cut by 30% in order to reflect current revenues. The presentations have been both educational and enlightening.

A few things I've learned by attending Ad Hoc Advisory Committee meetings (in no order):

•  Amberley Village staff, from Village Manager Scot Lahrmer, Chief Rich Wallace, Maintenance Supervisor Steve Rasfeld, as well as every single part-time employee, are extremely capable at their jobs and will bend over backwards to fulfill anything they are asked to do by Council and/or the Ad Hoc committee of resident citizens.

• Our excellent, full-time, fire department is possible because when the Village was incorporated, our "founding fathers" had the inspiration to initiate a combined police/fire department. Every single police officer is required to also be a certified fire-fighter and every one of our maintenance workers is also a certified fire-fighter. Because of this unique setup, our force is more efficient and costs well less than employing a separate police force and fire department. Additionally, to contract out the fire department to another jurisdiction would cost at least another $600,000, such is the efficiency of running a combined force. 

Chief Wallace and the Village Manager meet with the AHAC

•  Amberley Village owns its own 911-PSAP  Dispatch service which means that if you call 911 from anywhere in Amberley's jurisdiction, your call goes directly to Amberley Village dispatchers. This means far quicker emergency response time than if the call went first to a Cincinnati dispatcher who then called Amberley Village dispatch. There are only four of these 911-PSAPs in Hamilton County and Amberley Village has one. This is also a source of income for the Village.  This can mean the difference between the police arriving within seconds or minutes to your house in an emergency. A terrific example of our police department's fast response time occurred just two days ago when resident Dave Dahlman arrived home exactly as his home was being burgled. Police Warn of Increase in Crimes in Amberley Village 

•  Leaf pickup is NOT a luxury. One of the comments I heard from residents during the campaign was that they were surprised by the luxury of having their leaves picked up. Since I did not know any better at the time, I agreed and wondered why those with wooded lots couldn't just rake or blow their leaves into the woods. Well, now I know! Amberley is an old community, and we have lots of old trees and woods that generate A LOT of leaves. When residents think they are being helpful by carting their leaves to the back of their property, they are actually creating potential problems for the Village infrastructure. Many of our landscapes are bordered by creeks. These creeks lead to culverts and sewers. Imagine what happens when autumn leaves clog the culverts and sewers. What could have been an easy solution -- raking the leaves to the curb -- becomes a costly problem for the Village. In the future, I know that my family will be more diligent about getting our leaves to the curb. This is not a luxury, but is an important service necessary to running the Village.

• Only 10% of the property tax we currently pay goes to Amberley Village. The majority of the property taxes we pay go to support the Cincinnati Public Schools. Granted, it is to our benefit as homeowners to support the public schools. Even if we never sent our children to public elementary school, there are a lot of residents who sing the praises of Walnut Hills High School, Clark Montessori High School, and the School for Creative and Performing Arts (SCPA). However, the Village also needs revenue to function effectively. 

• Village staff = Village cleaning service. If you go up to Village Hall and notice the cleanliness of the facility, do not ask what cleaning service the Village uses. The Village staff is the cleaning service. If Village Manager Scot Lahrmer wants his office vacuumed, he knows how to use a vacuum!

•  The budget is extremely tight and efficient. A staff wage freeze has been in effect for two years, which, by the end of 2012 will have saved the village $140,000. Open positions, including that of a retiring police lieutenant were not filled. Seasonal help was not hired for maintenance work (you may have noticed this because of the halt of brush pickup during the Fall leaf pickup season). New cruisers have not been purchased in three years.

•  The Village needs revenue. This is obvious. Residents of Amberley Village have not had the opportunity to vote for an increased property tax millage since 1955. It is conceivable that a resident has lived here their entire adult life and never been asked to pay more property tax to Amberley Village. When Gibson Greeting Cards was a major employer in the Village, Amberley had a steady stream of earnings tax revenue, but it has been nearly fifteen years since Gibson left. Our next principal source of revenue was the inheritance tax. This will be gone after this year. The 10 mil Police Levy will generate 1.6 million dollars for the police budget and will be the first time the department has had a dedicated revenue stream. In five years, when the levy terminates, we hope that there are contracts to develop the North Site as well as Amberley Green.

If you are interested in learning more about the way the Village is run, I strongly encourage you to attend meetings.  Every meeting is publicized on the Village website: http://www.amberleyvillage.org/ and all meetings are open to the public. I have been tremendously impressed with the transparency with which the staff has opened themselves up to the residents. Subscribing to Village news is another way to stay informed.  Whichever way you choose -- by email or in person -- you can never know too much about your local government.

Amberley Women's Forum

Mary Lennard, Amy Rubenstein, Ilene Ross, Wendy Saunders

Monday evening was a first for Amberley Village. It was the inaugural meeting of the Amberley Women's Forum. The group was conceived in the week after November's election to address the needs of the women of Amberley Village that may not be served by virtue of women being a distinct minority on Council and all committees, especially the Ad Hoc Budget Advisory committee and the Board of Zoning Appeals. As stated by resident Abbie Youkilis, women often value things differently than our male counterparts. Also, I think we can all agree that the fall election brought to the foreground some of the bad feelings that still exist among residents that have fractured us in the past. We are a small community of less than 3400 residents - 1500 households - so it is essential that we try to get along with each other. My idea is to bring back the village feel to the Village.

Ilene Ross enjoys a cupcake

The meeting took place at the home of former councilmember, Peg Conway, and was hosted by Peg, Amy Rubenstein, Mary Lennard, former mayor Merrie Stillpass, and myself. About 25 women attended, from a cross-section of Amberley neighborhoods. The women also represented a cross-section of ages as well, from women with young children to one woman whose grandchild had just become engaged. What we had in common was a desire to meet other Amberley women and to become informed about the news of the Village. Because there is a tax levy coming up on the March 6th ballot, it was agreed that the group should meet again in about a month, perhaps after attending some of the informational meetings at Village Hall. By now, you should have received a postcard from the Village with the dates of the meetings. The first meeting is on January 24th and is a Town Hall meeting at the JCC beginning at 6:30. Additionally, if you will be out of town on election day, it is not too early to request your absentee ballot from the Board of Elections. You will need to download and print the form and mail it to the the BOA as they are still not as tech savvy as the rest of us.Board of Elections  . 


This Police Levy is extremely important to the Village because it will enable us to fund

our excellent police force. Amberley residents have been fortunate to have not had the need to vote for additional property taxes since 1955, but due to the change in economic conditions, loss in property values, and a severe loss in relied-upon revenue sources from the State of Ohio, it has become necessary to reevaluate that need. As Amberley residents, we have chosen to live in an idyllic community where we have virtually no commercial industry to mar our  views and landscapes. We are fortunate to live on large lots, often surrounded by woods, and receive excellent service from our police, fire, and maintenance departments. Because we only collect earnings tax and no income tax, many of our residents pay only property tax for the privilege of  this beautiful life. The tax levy is an equitable way for our residents to pay our fare share.

Please take a minute to click on the Village website and sign up to receive news and meeting notices. You are welcome to attend all committee meetings and see first-hand what is happening in your local government.  http://www.amberleyvillage.org/.

Elizabeth Kuresman and Nimet Jerusalami

Merrie Stillpass and Peg Conway

The "Wolf" House

Susan and Paula. 

In my post earlier today, I mentioned Amberley residents who move back to Amberley. Sometimes buying and moving into the house they grew up in, and sometimes a different house. But the original house will always be known by the name of those families who lived there years ago. Such is the case of 7404 Willowbrook Lane, which will always be known as "the old Wolf house." Or "the house where all the parties were..."

Well, after 30 years, the Wolfs finally went back for a visit. Scott and I have been living in Amberley for 14 years, and have actually fantasized about owning the house ourselves, but we have our own "Wolf" house now and we like it just fine. But, while I was delivering campaign signs last fall, I happened to run into the current owner of Scott's old house and after I introduced myself and explained my relationship to the house (I had never actually been inside the house), I was graciously invited in for a tour. The current owners, John and Susan Briggs, have renovated the house and it is absolutely gorgeous. When I got back home, I was so excited that I called my mother-in-law right away and told her I had seen her old house and that she would have to come and see it for herself when she came to town.

So, a couple of weeks ago, my husband and I took his mom, Paula, over to tour her old house. Scott's brother Jeff (known to old Amberlyians as "Duffy") also joined us. I can tell you that Paula was thrilled with the care that John and Susan have taken with the house, and she was positively glowing from both the tour and the opportunity to regale us all with stories of raising five Wolf kids in Amberley!

Duffy and Paula outside the kitchen door. Paula wouldn't go in the front door because "no one ever went in that way."

Scott, John, and Duffy. Lots of stories!