February 25, 2020

Date: Tuesday, February 25th at 7:30 PM
Location: Melissa & Jarrett’s Home
Attendees: Bill Berg, Claire Coleman, Bryan Crabtree, Bob and Judy Cosgriff, Rich Dudley, Melissa and Jarrett Stark

Opening

Open the meeting at 7:33 PM

Informed the CAC that Angie Chong could no longer take part in the committee. Introduced Claire Coleman as being the advisor for the front entrances.

Confirmed that the CAC saw the budget updates via email.

Common Areas Updates

The team reported no updates or issues with their Common Areas

Front Entrances

Discussed the spring entrances clean up by Premium Lawn and Landscape, as well as, the Northeast Roberts Rd entrance boundary line issue brought up by lot #41.

Discussed the benefits of hiring Premium Lawn and Landscape to maintain our entrances fully vs. a volunteer committee.   The cost is roughly the same and we will save the volunteers valuable time, so they can focus on other Common Areas.

Went over entrance flowers for the spring and fall. Premium Lawn and Landscape can grow specific colors of flowers for each entrance season, specifically for Hickory Farms.  These flowers would be larger than what was previously planted by the volunteer committee.

Cost per 3.5-inch pot of pansies or begonias: $3.50 and it includes the following:

• Your flower selection, color choice and color pattern grown specifically for your community.
• These flowers are more established and have deeper root systems
• Tilling the area and removing previous seasons flowers
• Organic material (soil/pine straw)
• Fertilizer
• Mulch top dressing

Went over spring begonia color choices.  A mix of white, pink and red were chosen at (30) flowers per entrance, placed in an organic pattern.

Went over fall pansies color choices.  A majority of the committee voted the ocean colors over citrus colors.  (30) pansies for the Roberts Rd entrance were chosen and (50) pansies were chosen for Burke Station.  These will be arranged in an organic pattern.

Committee Vote Approved: The committee voted on and approved - Premium Lawn and Landscape installing new entrance flowers/removing old for spring and fall 2020 season.  The total cost for this service will be $490. 

Upper Common Areas – Meadow – Perennials Selection

Discussed the 34 perennials that could be added to the meadow and other areas of the Common Areas (like Crabtree Island, sledding hill & the Woodlands areas).  The team reviewed pictures descriptions of native perennials and sedges.   Then selected which ones they would be in favor of planting.  These selections will be used for this year and future years planting.

Tree & Shrub Selection Upper & Lower Commons

Went over what trees the committee would like to see planted in those areas that already had remediation.

Bob and Judy Cosgriff recommended utilizing Area Landscaping for planting as another bid for tree planting.  Melissa had reached out to them early February and she is awaiting the quote.  She will forward out a detailed proposal once received.

Watering Our Tree/Shrub Investment

The committee discussed multiple watering solutions for the new trees planted.  Which require up to 20 gallons per week for their first two years.  Last year, the CAC utilized generous neighbors water spigots and watered each tree during the drought season.  It was very time consuming and physically demanding.

It was calculated that we would need to water all trees in the tree area at most 26 weeks, for roughly a maximum of 2 hours per week.  This is only during the dry months of summer/drought season with very little rainfall.  Hopefully, 2020 will provide more rain so the water usage would be much less.

The watering solutions & costs discussed were:  fire hydrant meter (no longer offered to HOA’s), installing a well, tying into the Fairfax Water line and installing a spigot, utilizing neighbor’s water (but installing a separate flow meter, so they can get reimbursed for HFCA’s water usage) and utilizing Premium Lawn & Landscape’s watering truck at $55/hr.  The last two: Premium Lawn & Landscape and utilizing a neighbor’s spigot were the most favored and will be brought to the board for discussion and vote.

Adjournment

Close of Meeting: 9:32 PM
Next Meeting: March 26^th at 1 PM at the Upper Commons by the Little Free Library