Fruit Heights City has made special arrangements with Wasatch Integrated Waste for use of the Landfill for the next 2 weeks. For the next 2 weeks the Landfill will be accepting GREEN waste from all residents of Fruit Heights free of charge.
The City has also made arrangements for 4 containers for green waste within the city – but as big as these may seem, they won’t hold more than 1 or 2 large pine trees, so you may have better luck just taking large amounts to the landfill. Please do not put any other waste into these large containers.

If you have any wood that is cut into firewood length and you do not have a use for it, please place it by your curb and label it “free” so that others in our community can take it and use it if they wish. If it is not claimed within 2 weeks, city crews will assist in the removel of this firewood. Please do not put any wood on the curb that is too little or too big to be reasonably used as firewood.

Also, the city is in the process of trying to get some smaller dumpsters for other garbage – waste other than green waste that is a result of storm damage. Please no mattresses, couches or other normal large items. If there are smaller dumpsters next to the larger ones, please use these, if not – just stack other storm damage waste next to the large dumpsters. If your insurance will cover the disposal of this type of waste – please do not use the dumpsters as there will already be a huge demand for these. Please have this waste taken to the landfill.

Also, the city is trying to get a count of how many trees we have lost within the city – many of you got that count yesterday, so if you could pass that along, we would appreciate it.

Thanks for all your help – we have a great community and your service to one another one of the things that really makes it great!

Eileen Moss
Citizen Corps Council Secretary

The local gym lost their 400 lb. sign. The Smiths sign blew around and landing in another direction. People’s garages peeled off, windows broke and the stop signs bent in half. It has been quite a ride. The cleanup effort has begun. In neighborhoods with older trees there are piles and piles of tree parts on the curbs.

One thing that impresses me is how some people PREVENTED worse damage. One neighbor turned his trampoline upside down and anchored it with bags of water softener salt. Smart. Another neighbor put tires between his garage doors and back the cars in to prevent the garage door from blowing in.

CJ Johnson who is in junior high decided he’d go to school. He was hanging onto a fence and narrowly escaped blowing away when another neighbor gave him a lift home. He somehow made it to junior high until noon. Generators were keeping the power on but most kids didn’t come and everyone got sent home. The entire district canceled school on Friday. We think that’s smart (too bad Weber State didn’t cancel classes – one student got seriously injured when debris hit him!)

The wind didn’t die down or slow from about 2am until noon. It was making the house rattle and it was noisy and fierce. We watched the fence in our backyard gradually come lose and blow away.

One neighbor planned to pool together and pay for one person to come through and fix all of the fences. We definitely hit our homeowners deductible of $500.  We got to test our equipment. The lantern didn’t have batteries. The hand crank radio was too much work to keep going (but it worked well while the batteries were charged). My cell phone had enough juice to make it, thanks to a product called Zaggsparq that holds 2 whole charges.

A few days before the storm I left the lights on my mom’s car (didn’t know they were turned on). Someone had one of those jumper cables that doesn’t need another car. Some of them actually charge cell phones and other electronics. I know what will be on my Christmas list this year!

It’s good that no one we know was seriously hurt. We love seeing neighbors out helping each other and talking. In my next post I’m going to give an update from the city. Thankfully we didn’t get snow or rain storms next, but this will certainly be a storm we won’t forget.

What damage did you see and how did your house do in the great wind storm of 2011? Are there any tips or lessons learned you can share with us?

We have a new baby this Halloween and if we didn’t already have our family costumes picked out I’d be tempted to do this. My husband Stephen would make a great chef.

Stephen and I could both dress up as chefs (or I could be an oven) and say, look what we cooked up! It would be fun for a baby announcement or even the front of a Christmas card. I’m trying to think what our son could be – a fork?

Here’s where you can find a Lobster Infant Costume (they have a few varieties, including bunting). You can find more baby Halloween costumes here.

Last year one of my favorite family costumes from our neighborhood was little red riding hood (Ella), the grandma (mom), the wolf (dad) and 2 sheep (the twins). Hopefully I remembered that right!

It’s great how everyone is decorating their houses – I hope to post some pictures. We put some black crows near our door. It really takes people off-guard and scares them because they think they are real. I wish I could find more.

What are your ideas for dressing up for Halloween this year? I can’t wait to see everyone when they come trick-or-treating or at a party!

I was interested in what the city said in the most recent newsletter: “The topography of Fruit Heights is such that it becomes a challenge to get the water to drain out into a city street.” The city also asks neighbors to “work together to get the water to drain out to the nearest public street.” They say homeowners are responsible to take care of the problem and when there is a problem between neighbors they should work “to come up with an amenable solution.”

We’re still getting our basement back in order and many are discussing ways to prevent or remedy this problem. One way is to take the gutter drains that currently go underground and extending them out to drain into the yard. So much water can come down at one time that it overwhelms our sub pump and ability for the drains to handle the water.

If you have suggestions of what’s worked for you, please share them in the comments.

Fruit Heights is a great place to live. Full of responsible and respectable people (Mrs. Utah lives here). There is just one retail complex in our small city. There is something it that bothers me every time I drive or walk by.

Maybe they call it the Rock Loft because as you walk to shop there you might get a few rocks in your shoes. That’s because the parking lot is not paved.

Surely the real housewives of Fruit Heights should not have to continue to dirty their Escalades or high heels on the mud on their way to lunch at the Bun Basket or to shop for a new outfit at the Hidden Closet.

I blame the city. Surely there are codes that haven’t been enforced. Codes that say a business has to pave their parking lots. The businesses may say they can’t afford it. I’m really not sure what the issue is. I’ve lived here for 3 years and I’m sure they’ve been in business for much longer than that. These are higher end businesses but the dirt parking lot leaves a bad impression on them and on our city which is otherwise very well kept.

The Three Little Monkeys (children’s book store) that is right there has a paved parking lot. Is it  too much to ask that the Rock Loft parking lot gets pavement too?

For information about voting districts see my post for Fruit Heights voting times, dates and facts.

SAVE OUR SECRET BALLOT
VOTE FOR CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT A
ON NOVEMBER 2

On November 2nd, Utah voter’s will have the opportunity to vote on Constitutional Amendment A which protects our right to secret ballot elections.

Democratic leadership in Congress has publicly stated that ending the Secret Ballot is one of their highest legislative priorities for an after-election lame duck session. They have already scheduled a session to start November 15th to address the Employee Free Choice Act, also known as Card Check.

NOTE: Card Check legislation would eliminate secret ballot voting in employee representation elections. This means that any business with ten or more employees could be unionized without an election. Technology companies are being targeted.

The Free Employee Choice Act would allow union representatives to gather signatures from employees at any time or place in support of unionization, without oversight or supervision. No election or notification to employees would be required. Even if employees asked for a secret ballot election, unions would not have to honor their request. If union representatives gathered signatures from 50 percent of workers, the business would be unionized.

Secret ballots and elections are a basic tenant of democracy.

In the case of unionization, secret ballots allow for private decision making apart from voter coercion, union intimidation or peer pressure.

Without a secret ballot, unions could pressure employees into supporting unionization.

Secret ballots are essential to protecting workers’ ability to make choices in the best interest of themselves and their business.

Constitution Amendment A is essential to protecting democracy in Utah and deserves to be ratified by voters in November.

Please pass this information to your friends, family – and employees if you are an employer.

Contact us at info@utahtech.org if you have any questions for comments.

CALL TO ACTION: Thank you for voting FOR Amendment A on November 2nd!

Related articles

• Lawmakers push to keep secret ballots private

Editor’s Note: I’ve been baking more than usual lately. These sound like the perfect snack for this time of year. I also linked to my favorite new crock pot blog at the end of this post.

As far as I know most people plan to send the kids out trick-or-treating on Saturday not Sunday. Have you heard differently?

Volunteers are needed until Sept. 30. You can work Tuesday or Wednesdays from 7-8:30pm and Saturdasys from 9-10:30am. If you adopt a plot you can work on it on your own time table.

Call April Clark at 801-544-3089 for more info.

What if you got bit – would you know what to do? And how do you avoid getting bitten in the first place?

This article gives you the lowdown on what to do from the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources: http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/home/49868755-76/snake-utah-snakes-oliver.html.csp