June - Balcones Woods Neighborhood Association

Balcones Woods
Newsletter
June 21 Swim team Champs meet at UT
September 8 Board Meeting, 7PM, Clubhouse
Sept 20 Casino Night, 7PM, Clubhouse
November 11 Board Meeting, 7PM, Clubhouse
Maintenance project manager
Contact: maintenance@balconeswoods.org
June 2014
The Blue Wave Swim team is off to a great start! We started practices back
on April 28 in some real cold water. The team has braved the cold water
and cooler May. We have had two home swim and two away meets and
are looking forward to finishing the season strong.
Our team is comprised of 196 children from our neighborhood, ranging
from 4 to 18 years old. We have an awesome coaching staff, many have
been with our team for years. In her second year as head coach, Lesley
Murray is doing a nice job building up confidence and improving the
stroke technique of our young swimmers. The Blue Wave eight-member
coaching staff is rounded out by Huddie Murray, Juli Zamora, Sandy
Pobst, Shelby Kiser, Christy Olsen (swimming her final year on the
team), Young Jae Hur and Dan Murray.
They all work so hard for our kids.
We hosted our first swim meet May 17
against the JCC Piranhas. When the meet
started it was 58 degrees. Over 68% of our
team had improved times from trials held
two weeks before. The team swam fast and
won the meet 460-124.
In the next home meet on May 24 against the tough Twin Creeks Texas Twisters, we had over 57% time improvements and won a close competitive meet 317.5 – 278.5. Several of the relay races were the closest we’ve seen.
The third meet, Avery Ranch, on May 31, against the Redfish and Westover Wild Orcas was a tri-meet. Nice Blue
Wave swimming and sportsmanship! It was a close meet until we got to the breaststroke. Then the Blue Wave’s
strong performance expanded the narrow lead to over 80 points in both the breaststroke and butterfly. Blue
Wave: 314, Wild Orcas: 219, Avery Ranch: 64.
The fourth meet, at Great Hills on June 7, was the undefeated Gators against the undefeated Blue Wave. We
swam fast, but the Gators swam a little faster: Gators 313, Blue Wave 280.
The season will round out with a “Fun Tri-Meet“ at our pool with the three original members of the AAL (Austin
Aquatic League), Westover Wild Orcas, Great Hills Gators and your Balcones Woods Blue Wave. Please come and
support our team on June 28.
We want to thank many in the neighborhood who sponsor our team (many for a number of years). Our sponsors
and volunteer parents make it all happen!
GO BLUE WAVE!
Jack Butler, 2014 BW Blue Wave President
Balcones Woods Admin. Board
board@balconeswoods.org
President, Chris Grunska
Vice President, Dan Dworin
Op. Committee President, Ray Spivey
Co-Secretary, Robbie Chance, Rachell
Jackson
Board Members
Robbie Chance
Jason Childs
Dan Dworin
Rachell Jackson
Jodi Schrobilgen
Operating Committee
bwoc@balconeswoods.org
President, Ray Spivey
Vice President, Harrison Smith
Treasurer, Allison Dady
Secretary, Evelyn Saucier
Directory, Frank Cedeno
Newsletter, Rachell Jackson
Maintenance, Dennis Cecil
Neighborhood Watch, Joe Zygarlenski
Pool Personnel, Scott Dady
Fire Prevention, Joe Zygarlenski
Social, Rosa Bowen, Peggy Miller,
Annette Bohne, Jeannie Pinkman, Dan and
Jane Burstain, Victoria Field, Darla Smith,
Nancy Norman
Sports Courts, Carol Lockley, Darla Smith
Swim Team, Jack Butler
Website, Victoria and Nick Field
Welcoming Committee, Elaine HeinzkeHennig
Youth Social, Jennifer Heinzke, Allison
Dady, Leah Gibson, Sue Rubio, Kristen
Dugan, Shelly Mitchell, Holly McKee, Erika
Knox
Board and Operating Committee Meetings
At the Operating Committee meeting on May 6, Bill Hennig reported that the
spring clean-up day was well attended by neighborhood volunteers. There was
a lot of work to do in the commons area and the pool area to prepare for Splash
Day, the formal opening of the pool. Thank you to those who showed up and
made it happen. Darla Smith discussed the resurfacing of the sports courts
completion. Online reservations and paper sign-up for the various neighborhood resources was reviewed.
The Balcones Woods Board met on May 12. Balcones Woods residents are encouraged to attend these meetings. You can also drop an email to the Board
members or to Operating Committee members. If you have matters of concern
or interest, please send a note to the Board at board@balconeswoods.org
or the Operating Committee at bwoc@balconeswoods.org.
July Fourth Neighborhood Parade
Our annual Fourth of July parade and celebration is coming up. We’ll assemble
for the parade in the commons area parking lot at 8:45AM. Bikers and walkers
will gather in the parking lot; motor vehicles will assemble along Alhambra,
near the parking lot. The parade starts at 9AM. Prizes will be awarded for best
float, car, bike, stroller, pet and costume.
After the parade, have an ice pop. The pool opens at 10:00AM and games begin
at 11:00. Prizes awarded for family relay, big splash, belly flop, water balloon
toss, and watermelon scramble. Multiple prizes will be awarded in several
competitions.
Volunteers are needed to decorate, take pictures and judge the parade.
Please contact Jennifer Heinzke at youthsocial@balconeswoods.org
Congratulations to 2014 Graduating Seniors
Eric Abernathy, Anderson Hich
Katie Beckham, Anderson High
Balcones Woods Club, Inc.
Erin Buergner, Redeemer Lutheran
11204 Alhambra
Alayna Enos, Anderson High
Austin, TX 78759
Carter Hanson, Anderson High
Website: www.balconeswoods.org
Aaron Marshall, Anderson High
Balcones Woods Club, Inc., takes no respon- Matthew Michaels, Westlake High
Madison Mullins, Anderson High
Christy Olsen, Anderson High
Layne Powers, Anderson High
Alex Schultz, Liberal Arts and Science
Academy
Garrett VanderStoep, Anderson High
Alex Veteikis, Anderson High
sibility for the content, promises made, or
the quality/reliability of the products or
services offered in all advertisements.
Newsletter
For comments, to submit articles or for ad
information, please call (512) 342-1982
or e-mail newsletter@balconeswoods.org
Neighborhood Resources
Spanish Tutor, middle/high school: Allison Assunto, allisonassunto@gmail.com; 512567-8010
Pampered Chef consultant: Pat Stivers, 512-970-6679, pamperedchef.biz/patstivers
Avon representative: Lou Ann Devetter, 512-345-9713
Arbonne Representative and personal trainer/wellness coach: Michelle Spears,
spears.michelle@gmail.com, 512-514-3067
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Meet your neighbor
Eye Surgeon & Founder of the Eye Clinic of Austin
By Tom Henderson, MD
My wife Janice and I bought our first home in Balcones
Woods in the summer of 2005 based primarily on location — it is close to my practice, Eye Clinic of Austin, located at Far West Boulevard and Mopac. We quickly realized how fortunate we are to live in such a close-knit
community, and we absolutely adore the camaraderie
that comes with living in Balcones Woods.
Revolutions in Healthcare Technology
The ability to cure and prevent disease wherever possible improves each year. Revolutions in healthcare
technology allow us to see structures of the eye so
clearly that we can detect disease earlier than ever
before. I cannot imagine practicing without the advanced equipment that is available today.
When time allows, Janice and I enjoy traveling and experiencing new activities and restaurants while away from
home. Janice enjoys gardening and keeps our yard looking wonderful year-round.
The Five Rules
Upon moving to Austin in 1982, I founded the Eye Clinic
of Austin and it has grown over the years to become one
of Central Texas’ leading eye care centers. My staff and I
practice on five rules:
• Try to treat each patient the way you want a member of
your family treated;
• Try to do it right the first time because it is easier than
doing it over;
• If it’s not broken bad enough, don’t try to fix it;
• Be nice and tell the truth; and
• Expect excellence of yourself and deliver it to others.
They don’t care how much you know until they
know how much you care
Someone once told me, “Doc, they don’t care how much
you know until they know how much you care.” This
continues to ring true today. My team and I make patient
care and understanding a top priority, and we work hard
to ensure that our patients really feel like a part of our
family — because they are.
Tom and Janice Henderson
I may be considered a rare breed by some because I
love what I do every day. My passion for patient care
and providing the most advanced ways to cure and
treat eye disease is never ending.
One of my many long-term patients recently said she has
been “going steady” with me for a month longer than the I summarize our patient care as, “Advanced Eye Care
thirty-two years she has been married to her husband. I with Old Fashioned Caring from Award Winning Docfeel so much gratitude for the special relationships I have tors.”
with my patients.
List Your Small Business
List your services and skills in the Newsletter. Drop a note to newsletter@balconeswoods.org describing what you offer,
like yard work, pet care or babysitting.
Support our Newsletter advertisers.
They invest in the neighborhood.
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Real Estate Boom in Balcones Woods
By Dan Burstain
Did you hear that BOOM? No, that wasn’t a transformer
blowing. That was Balcones Woods crashing another
price barrier. We are into the $200/sqft arena now
and, in my opinion, any house in our neighborhood
could sell for over $300,000
— many closer to $400,000
and above. All of Austin is
booming and with our
neighborhood's great
schools, access to 183 and
Mopac, proximity to the
Domain and new employers
like Apple, we are smack
dab in the middle of a highdemand area.
tin is still more affordable than many other large cities.
The current median price for a home in Austin is
around $226,300, which may seem high but is less
than half what a house costs in Los Angeles or New
York.
Why all the craziness in the housing market?
Builders are working fast and furious, but they are only projected to build about 10,500 homes this year and,
of course, none of those new homes will be in Balcones
Woods. So for at least the next year or two, we can expect housing in our neighborhood to remain in a
seller's market, driving prices possibly even higher.
How long will the housing market craziness
continue?
To predict real estate growth, you look at population
growth which, in turn, is driven by job growth. There's
no sign of either slowing down. Texas is projecting
more than 30,000 new jobs in 2014 and another
30,000 in 2015. Every day, 110 people are moving to
the Austin metro area, and the inventory of available
homes is at a 13-year low.
It really is quite simple. Demand is significantly exceeding supply. For the past decade, the Austin Chamber of Commerce has been actively recruiting businesses to move to Austin, focusing primarily on those in California, the Upper Midwest, and the Northeastern
states. These efforts combined with our businessfriendly environment and relatively affordable cost of
living make Austin a hot spot. In the past decade, over
300 companies have moved to Austin and for the past
four years, Austin has topped Forbes’ annual list of
“America’s Fastest-Growing Cities.” More than 80,000
people have moved here in the last two years. These
new people have bought up all of Austin's excess housing inventory. Last year, 2013, was the highest sales
year on record for the Austin area.
So although you might be grimacing as you read your
property tax bill while waiting in bumper-to-bumper
traffic, enjoy the fact that your home equity wealth is
significantly increasing on a daily basis.
If anyone would like more information on this data or
a free market analysis of your home, I would be happy
to help.
Dan Burstain, Realtor® , JB Goodwin Realtors
Dan@JBGoodwin.com, (512) 588-3260
Although demand has driven home prices higher, Aus-
Easter Egg Hunt
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Sport Courts Resurfaced and Ready
for Play
By Darla Smith
The Balcones Woods Sport Courts were recently
resurfaced and look great!
It is the perfect time of year for outdoor activities
so take advantage of your neighborhood park.
Basketball and volleyball courts are open on a
walk-up basis.
A sign-up sheet for the tennis courts is located
right next to the gate. In the near future, we will
pilot an online sign-up system for tennis court reservations. Watch for an e-mail blast along with an
announcement on the website.
Resurfaced basketball court
Fledging Owl
JOE REYNOLDS
30319 Live Oak Trail, Georgetown, TX
Phone #512-635-0261 E-MAIL
01jrey@gmail.com
Bathroom Remodeling Kitchen Remodeling
Tile Floors, Wood Floors. No job too small.
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Austin’s Recycled Reads
By Gregory Smith
Recycled Reads is Austin Public Library’s bookstore.
Located at 5335 Burnet Road, one block north of North
Loop, Recycled Reads is a hidden gem for parents,
grandparents, school teachers or really just anyone
looking for a bargain in used books and media.
and DVDs priced from $1 to $2 with cassette tapes
for 25 cents.
Vintage books are mostly sold online, and magazines
are not sold.
Store Hours
The store is open Thursday noon to 8PM and FriChildren — the store has a large kids’ section filled day through Sunday noon to 6PM. Call the store
with hardback and paperback books as well as a
at (512) 323-5123 and ask if they have the book you
reference area, for example: Geography, History,
want!
Animals, Science, etc. The pricing for all children’s
books is 50 cents. Kids’ paperbacks that do not have Donations and Bargains
the title on the spine are 25 cents. The store also
The store accepts donations and receives
has young adult books and a kids’ colits inventory from the Austin Public Lioring station with crayons and colorbrary Warehouse.
ing pages.
Adults — adult hardback books and
To make your money go far, Recycled
paperbacks priced from $1 to $2. The
Reads is the place to shop! No sales tax
store stocks encyclopedias, dictionareither because their prices already inies and thesauruses, civil war, literaclude the tax. I tell grandparents to give
ture, large print, mysteries and relitheir grandkids a dollar and let them
gion sections just like a library would
choose their own four books. Such a deal,
be organized.
huh?
Board games are $2.
Comic books and graphic novels.
As you can tell, Recycled Reads is a real hidden gem in
Bookmarks, magnets and even greeting cards! The Austin. See you there!
only items not sold are magazines.
For more information and to see upcoming events, go to
Media — DVDs , vinyl records, CDs, Blu-ray discs
www.recycledreads.org.
Sections of the store
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Heat Exhaustion and Heat Stress: Who’s
at Risk?
Watering Restrictions and Schedule
Contributed by David Vaughn
Hose-end sprinklers: before 10AM and after 7PM.
Even number address on Sunday; odd number address
on Saturday.
Prolonged or intense heat stress can be fatal to anyone,
but people older than 60 appear to have the highest risk
for death from heat illness, especially if they are frail or
have pre-existing heart disease, respiratory problems
or diabetes. To a lesser extent, babies and young children – especially those left unattended in cars or enclosures – people with a history of alcoholism and others
using certain drugs and medications are at high risk of
heat illness.
People most at risk of heat illness from exertion include
athletes, military personnel, manual laborers, farm
workers and people who have diabetes or are obese.
Anyone who is not used to high temperatures and humidity may become ill during exertion.
Automatic irrigation: before 5AM and after 7PM.
Even number address on Thursday; odd number address on Wednesday.
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Then and Now: Balcones Woods Remembered
By Angela Hicks
Every now and then, I think about then and now. In
1973, my family and I moved far outside Austin’s city
limits into a new neighborhood called “Balcones
Woods.” It was a small barren network of streets sandwiched between two rock quarries. Research Boulevard (183) was just another lonely state highway, with
not a single traffic light between Burnet Road and Highway 620. It was actually an improvement on “Old
183” (now Jollyville Road), which was peppered with
mobile home parks and auto salvage yards.
boards (regular and high-dive), but the quarry had a
Tarzan rope swing.
My brother and I had more fun as other kids moved
in. We built forts out of discarded construction materials, squashed pennies on the railroad tracks, and signed
our names in wet cement sidewalks. However, our fa-
My family settled into a modest brick house on Balcones Woods Drive, as colorful flags waved potential neighbors into the model
homes. My brother Jimmy and
I waited patiently for our future friends to arrive because
there really wasn’t much to
do. We frequently rode our
bicycles up to Henry Griner’s
full-service Texaco gas station
located at Angus Road and
183. He added a convenience
store, Griner’s Grocery, to
compete with the nearby UAngela, 1973
Totem.
Jimmy. 1973
vorite activity was Wilderness Exploration. We traveled on foot, by bicycle, and via mini-bike. Our range
was impressive, considering the area was mostly wooded game trails. Our territory stretched from Balcones
Village to the north, IBM/Burnet Road to the east, and
Lakewood Drive to the west (another swimming hole,
before it was christened Bull Creek Park). Of course,
there was no Arboretum, no Loop 360, no MoPac, no
Northcross Mall. There was a lot more wildlife around
back then: deer, armadillos, civet cats, rattlesnakes,
The neighborhood pool didn’t exist yet, but M.E. Ruby’s scorpions, toads, tarantulas, jackrabbits, roadrunners,
quarries did. The north quarry was quiet and picturand more.
esque, already filled with water and a few ducks. ReAs fun as it was, I couldn’t wait
to move out when I was finally
18 and independent. I spent the
next three decades living a great
life in the Zilker neighborhood,
during some of Austin’s best
years.
Unfortunately, through death
and tragedy, I’m back in my
Angela, 2014
markably, the south quarry was still in business. Our
childhood home on Balcones
windows rattled from the dynamite blasts that occaWoods Drive. But as much as things have changed,
sionally sent stone shrapnel into our backyard. The
some things remain the same. The train still rumbles
activity ceased when water flooded in, actually abanthrough like an old friend. The woodpecker still visits
doning Euclid dump trucks where they were
the same perforated utility pole. The front porch is still
parked. The south quarry became our favorite swimdraped in jasmine blossoms (a gift from the Welcome
ming hole, even after the Balcones Woods pool was
Wagon 41 years ago). And sometimes, I can still see my
finished. Sure, the neighborhood pool had a two diving mom waving to me from the front porch.
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