We hope you had a wonderful Fourth of July! Now that we are all back from the long weekend, there are two Heritage Hills meetings this week, and both are worth knowing about.

If you can only make one, we'd lean toward Friday, but more on that in a minute.

So what's going on with the brick walls?

If you've been following along, you know this has been the biggest ongoing story in the neighborhood. If you're just tuning in, welcome.

The short version: the Brick Wall Committee was formed earlier this year to research options for our brick walls and eventually make a recommendation to the full board. That recommendation could have a significant financial impact on every homeowner, so it's worth paying attention to.

As you look around the neighborhood, or even into your own backyard, you likely see many brick walls that look perfectly fine. So it may come as a surprise that the minutes from the April committee meeting, taken as a whole, can read as though repair is not really a viable option, and it's hard not to notice that the discussion seems to be leaning toward replacing all of the brick walls.

A brick wall committee member also submitted a series of questions to the district's legal counsel about the project, and the responses came back in a formal memo. That memo covers the process for obtaining easement agreements from homeowners and the range of ways the district might fund a brick wall project. It is below and it's genuinely informative reading.

Tomorrow's committee meeting is a chance to hear where things stand. We'll be there and will share what we learn.

About Friday's meeting

The board agenda for Friday (below) includes an executive session (a closed private meeting) to receive legal advice on "legal questions concerning walls and fences."

At the June board meeting, a board member noted that he had submitted legal questions about the brick walls and asked that the answers be addressed in a public session. The board president agreed, noting that the brick walls are a big topic, an expensive project and sharing that their goal is to make information more readily available so that whatever is ultimately decided, homeowners can see how the decision was made.

And yet, those answers appear to be heading into a closed session on Friday, where homeowners won't hear a word. (We are hopeful the questions will be included in the board packet, which should be publicly available later this week, though section IX. LEGAL MATTERS refers only to a “Summary of Questions.”)

Executive sessions are legal and have their place. But if you're curious why a topic with this kind of financial impact on every homeowner is being handled behind closed doors after the board has committed to transparency, showing up during public comment and asking exactly that is a completely reasonable thing to do.

Also on the agenda Friday

The board will be looking at several landscaping proposals, project updates on the Willow Creek Trail and the pavilion, and the agreement with the new landscaping company. We'll have a full recap after Friday’s meeting.

We hope to see you there!

Thanks, Friends!
— Jill, Katie & Faith