As a longtime resident of Chestermere, I, like others, will have an issue or two with the City, nothing major, but, we expect the city to make sure the public areas are taken care of and are safe. The part of the City where I live is important to me, as I am sure that is the case with most of the people who live here.
I take great pride in how my city looks, when I see the beautiful flowers, and trees, I enjoy the sites, the parks crews do an amazing job, it all blends in so well with the lake as a back drop, beautiful scenery for sure.
Living in Rainbow falls for the past 5 years. has been a pleasure for sure, the developer, George Trutina, of Truman Developments as always thought about the beautification of the areas in which they built, planting trees, and building water falls, have always added greatly to this City, and I think that the residents for the most part, are pretty happy with the way their communities look.
In my particular area of Rainbow Falls, we had a lot of trees planted, and as the responsibility of the developer goes, they are responsible for the vegetation for a period of time, I believe, 1-2 years? Anyway, the point is that after this period, the City becomes responsible for cutting the grass, and looking after the common areas and parks.
Recently, the City parks department removed about 30 trees, that were not in good shape, many were dead, not all, but a lot of them were described by a parks employee as very sick trees, anyway, they removed all 30 trees, I was taken back by the loss of these trees, the view, the costs of such, and any possible replacements would be paid for by the taxpayer!
Question I have is simple, why were these trees allowed to fall into such disarray? Were we not paying taxes to look after them? It was also explained by City, that the developer was responsible for their poor conditions?
Why after 5+ years, was the developer at fault? He put the trees in, and took care of them for his period of responsibility!
I personally spoke with Mr. Trutina about these trees, and other issues, and he explained about his responsibility, and that the balance of time falls to the City of Chestermere to maintain all vegetation.
There appears a total breakdown of communication between developer and city? Are you guys not talking?
Our area has lost some badly needed trees, and a nice view, but the bigger question remains! who is responsible?
I will finish by simply saying that, for my taxes, beautification is an important issue but communication, and simple mutual respect is just as important, seems to be lacking here, and I truly believe that this type of miss-communication and lack of transparency are key issues in the smooth operation of any administration now and in the future.
I think people had better be talking, these issues are part and parcel of good governance, are they not?
Then they had better be!!
Regards,
P.D. Graham
City of Chestermere.
