Greetings Neighbors,

I hope all of you had a fun summer and are enjoying the beautiful weather and Fall colors.

First, I’d like to offer a correction and apology. In our last newsletter, when extending a thank you to Roger and Shari Wilsey for the wonderful Kentucky Derby-themed event they hosted at their home, Shari’s name was inadvertently printed as “Shirley.” My sincerest apologies to Shari, and I reiterate that a great time was had by all who attended.

One of our esteemed SFL team members, City Engineer, Jeff Sandberg, retired in September of this year. Jeff has been an integral member of our team and I applaud the outstanding work he has done on behalf of SFL. We will miss him and extend our best wishes for a happy and healthy retirement!

We are pleased to welcome our new City Engineer, Justin Messner, a Principal at WSB, our City Planning and Engineering contractor. He brings terrific knowledge and experience to this role, and he has already hit the ground running. You can find his contact information on the SFL website.

Several important projects are underway in SFL resulting in an increase in taxes this year. Projects include: requisite street maintenance, joining the 21st century by digitizing our City records and updating our ordinances, many of which are complex and not entirely understandable in their current form. The Council discussed initiating a street maintenance fund that potentially would mitigate large swings in taxes from year-to-year. However, discussion by the Council and previous input from residents indicate that most do not favor a street maintenance fund. The rationale being that residents prefer to pay taxes as street maintenance is required as opposed to more routinely paying an annual amount that would go toward building a street maintenance fund. It was noted that some residents may pay taxes for a street maintenance fund but sell their home prior to having their street repaired, thus not receiving value from street maintenance reserves. As always, the Council welcomes input from residents regarding their thoughts on this and other City concerns.

You received a letter a few weeks ago after some residents expressed concern regarding three tents that were erected by homeless individuals at the bottom of the hill at the intersection of Robert Street and Salem Church Rd. This situation was a reminder that signing up on the City website is helpful if you wish to receive notification on concerns that may arise in the City. The Council heard from several residents indicating they did not know what was going on and urged that a letter be sent to all residents. This specific situation was resolved by the time the letter could be mailed and delivered. In the future, for similar situations, the City will send email notifications only, not letters to each resident. Please consider signing up for email notifications if you haven’t yet. Your email address is kept strictly confidential and is not provided to other parties.

Wishing you fun and safe holidays, and hopefully a less epic winter than we experienced in 2022!

Kind regards,

Dan O’Leary