There are many enjoyable duties associated with my role as your Mayor. First and foremost is the fact that I get to interact with residents each week. Many of you call to express satisfaction with a particular police officer or service worker. Some of you call for clarification on a particular program that we administer. Some of you call with suggestions for improvement. In nearly all cases, our fellow residents present their inquiries in a civil and respectful manner. I’m incredibly proud to serve amongst such a respectful electorate and I’ll never take that for granted. As I pointed out last month, your elected members of Village Council help to foster this same type of relationship. If you attend a Council Meeting, you will note this same respect in our Council Chambers as we discuss budgeting, improvements, new legislation and other important matters.

Speaking of healthy interaction. I want to take this opportunity to commend our Parks Commission and their successful organization of our 2021 “Head for The Hills!” event held last month. Some may not be aware of the incredible amount of planning, logistics and effort that is undertaken to plan this successful event. The Parks Commission embodies what Moreland Hills is all about. Specifically, neighbors stepping up for the betterment of their community. I was amazed as I saw over 150 participants take part in our 5k run, Forest Ridge Hike or children’s “Fun Run.” It was great to see many Moreland Hills residents step into their running shoes and take part in our 5k run which was an “out and back” along a closed section of River Road. As runners, my wife and I were impressed with this route and considered it to be a fairly challenging run. Please plan on joining us next year. This event was only successful due to the efforts of your Parks Commission, the Village Police Department, Village Service Department and members of our Administrative staff who volunteered their time to assist. I’m so incredibly excited to host more events in 2022 which will allow us to gather at Forest Ridge and enjoy our new pavilion. A reminder that all funds that were raised will be going back to the Village in the form of park improvements.

Construction continues on our new pavilion and we are close to completion. We had hoped to have an Open House in late Fall but the tight timeframe was making that event a bit forced. We will be announcing a date in early Spring and will kick of the 2022 season with a wonderful dedication ceremony at our new pavilion.

Switching gears, recently we have had several incidents in the Village that benefited from our use of the CodeRed emergency notification system. As a reminder, residents must register to be a part of this system. In the event of an emergency or critical outage related to a utility, we can send out a notification to all subscribers in the form of a text, email or recorded voicemail message. This system is a great way to distribute critical information to our residents. Often times subscribers are notified of the issue within minutes of the incident. If you have not already done so, and many of you have, please see our website where you can register for CodeRed. Another section of this newsletter highlights this registration process.

While we sometimes don’t like to discuss this issue, winter is on the way. You can be assured that members of our Service Department are preparing for the snow and ice season. We have some incredibly challenging topography and the members of our Service Department sacrifice a great deal of time away from their families to keep our roads safe.

Lastly, a sincere “Thank You” to all of the residents who donated to our annual Employee Clambake Fund. Due to your generosity we were able to provide a wonderful event for all of the employees and their families. Moreland Hills is a special place and your generosity helps to create this wonderful environment. Thanks for all that you do to partner with us in an effort to make this Village the absolute best it can be.