Thanks for your concern, but whatever...
As expected, at the meeting on Thursday the neighborhood was "informed" about what was going to happen in the park and no input was sought. It had the air of a science fair air to it (without the proud parents) -- the LCRA brought a bunch of easels with posters explaining the dangers of trees, regulations, schematics of EM fields around wires, satellite photos (a couple of years out of date) with trees marked for removal or "trimming" and a blowup of the contract (form the 1930s) that granted them the easement (for $200!) The opposition (i.e. a neighborhood activists) had a simple wooden model of some poles and wires and a table with a petition.
LCRA had a bunch of people at the meeting with whom we could talk. I kind of felt bad for most of them, since they were just poor shmucks doing their job after hours (and referring any but the most trivial questions to their supervisors). I did not feel much sympathy for the suits, though. They had absolutely no interest in accommodating the concerned neighbors. They wouldn't consider alternative approaches (like trimming every couple of years like they've been doing in the past). They said they would work with the park's department to try to provide other type of shade -- like a little awning over a bench is going to have much of an impact in August in Texas. I’m not really holding my breath.
The good news for us is that they're not cutting down any of the oaks, which is what's mostly in our part of the park. They will only be "trimmed" (I don't know if that means 6' off the ground or what). The western part of the park, though, is going to get decimated. They're taking out most of the shade trees along the path.
I went by and took some pictures since I plan plan to do some before-and-after comparisons. Someone had hammered a little white cross next to each tree marked for the chainsaw. It’s a veritable cemetery.
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When the LCRA people were talking about working with the Parks department, they used terms like "suitable vegetation". I got the distinct impression that their "suitable vegetation" was ground cover and shrubbery - i.e. nothing that would provide any shade...unless you were willing to crawl around in the dirt to get beneath the bush.
Your park situation is really irritating - another example of bureaucracy not being able to think outside the box.
Jennifer said that the work has been postponed until at least Wednesday since there is going to be a meeting tonight involving our Todd Baxter (our House Representative) and LCRA. It's an ellection year, so who knows, maybe we get lucky.
That is correct there will be a meeting this afternoon to basically find out whether our efforts as a community can save any of the trees that they originally intended to remove. The trimming will be so severe on the oaks that they will probably die as well.
Here is some info about upcoming meetings to get the latest news.....
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Regarding: Gracy Woods Tree Removal Controversy Decision
There will be two meetings today.
The first, at 2:00 PM at our state Capitol, in Representative Todd Baxter's office, where a decision will be made about the level of tree removal.
Meeting attendees will be:
Representative Todd Baxter as well as people from his office Tom Coburn and other spokes persons for the Gracy Woods Neighborhood LCRA Officials, Engineers and spokespersons
The second meeting will be today at 6:30 PM at 11800 Bittern Hollow, one of the park entrances, where we will gather to learn about the outcome of the 2:00 meeting, above, in Representative Baxter's office.
Meeting attendees will be:
Representative Todd Baxter
The Gracy Woods Neighborhood Community
Media
Other Officials
The meeting will disclose the level of tree removal. At this point, LCRA plans to remove the trees on Wednesday, March 17th first thing in the
morning. We are desperately hoping to change this.
We invite you to join us this evening at the 6:30 meeting.