I have been thinking about our living arrangements, and especially how living quarters related to each other, since I was in high school.  I also care deeply that people be able to particpate in governance, and so this isn't my first venture into the public arena in Pine Lake.  Since moving here in 1998, I have served on the Pine Lake Human Relations Council, on City Council, and now on the Architectural Review Board.  

"Anything goes" had made Pine Lake the community I loved when I moved here, yet anything goes had begun to threaten quality of life by about 2003.  As land values went up, speculative builders were bringing us houses that could be found in any subdivision.  Houses were getting a lot bigger, just as we were starting to appreciate that we'd have to live more lightly, and smaller, on the earth to preserve the beauty we have.  

Have we succeeded?  No social policy ever achieves its end; it only reaches the next stage, at which point we evaluate what's working and what's not as the world changes around us.  Current challenges we face are an aging population in Pine Lake as in the US in general, while we have an explosion of younger kids that no one foresaw for Pine Lake 10 years ago; continuing upstream pollution of water coming into the community as well as increased pollution from our own development; ongoing drought; and ever-worsening business conditions around us.

My original term on the ARB was up in January, and I agreed to stay on through the summer of 2009 to provide some continuity because of unexpected vacancies on the board.   My time on the Board is now up, and will look on from outside as it addresses the next challenges and opportunities.

Cheers, Elisabeth