Greetings Members,
I wanted to give you an update on the Special Assessment District or SAD for Six Mile Lake levied in 2013 for the purpose of eradicating/controlling aquatic invasives which expires in early 2018 at the end of five years. I, personally, feel that it has been a success and hope that you do, too. PLM, our lake management company, was out last week surveying our lake and will perform a treatment this week. While other lakes and communities struggle around us over this same issue, we have the luxury of enjoying a lake that might have a very different look today but for the actions of a couple of very astute board members who identified the noxious weed back in 2007 and alerted the rest of us to take action which eventually resulted in the SAD.
The SAD has allowed all of us to do our part monetarily for the benefit of Six Mile Lake and all who own property here or use the lake for all it’s resources. Will the eurasion milfoil return if we discontinue treatment? We all know the answer is yes. After a few years will Six Mile Lake descend back into the weedy mess it was before treatment? Will there be other invasives and noxious weeds we’ll be combating in the future many of which we don’t even know the names of today? We could wait and see but the answer is probably that we should extend the SAD into the future in order to keep Six Mile Lake as pristine as possible. Can we do it with a much lower dollar amount than we initially started with? I have been in discussions with Echo Township Supervisor Bill Derenzy about this and we think we can. Dave Daniels has also been discussing our situation with Dave Grimm, South Arm Township Assessor.
At the board meeting in June, we appointed Jeff Rogers, who sits on the South Arm Township Planning Commission (as well as the SMLA board), as our contact person with Cliff Bloom, the environmental attorney that represented the Six Mile Lake Association prior to the SAD being instituted in 2013. We have some questions we would like clarification on and feel that Cliff is the guy to steer us in the right direction should the SAD be extended.
Back in 2013, we had specifically indicated that we wanted one assessment per property owner if the parcels ran contiguous to each other. By way of explanation, let’s say Mrs. Smith owned three 50′ lots with three different parcel numbers. We wanted only one assessment for Mrs. Smith. Instead, Mrs. Smith got three assessments so she was paying three times…one for every tax or parcel number she owned. There were eight of us who got double or triple tax assessments because we owned multiple contiguous properties with separate tax or parcel numbers. Last year, I combined our two parcels. Although, Kelly and I will continue to pay two assessments until 2017, when or if the SAD is extended, we will only pay one assessment. If you are one of those seven other property owners who are paying multiple assessments please note that you will need to send a letter to your assessor with the parcel numbers you wish to combine preferably sooner rather than later should you decide you want only one assessment.
Stay tuned to the website for further developments on this issue and do not hesitate to call me or any other board member with concerns or questions and feel free to comment below.
Until next time,
Cherie