Embedded Files
Press Release about CA Audubon Certification 11/12/2014
Submission Documents to ISC Audubon for Certification, October 2014
Audubon Newsletter about the Colonial Acres Initiative, Oct 2014
Audubon Certification Background Information, July 2014
The Colonial Acres Homeowners Association Board has approved a plan to seek our Community to be certified as an Audubon Bird & Wildlife Sanctuary. This tracks with the CA Golf Course Certification that is in place now, one of the few certified courses in the country, and therefore serves as a natural extension of the eco-system throughout our community.
The requirements for certification are relatively simple and will not require any Colonial Acers’ homeowner to change, alter, or do anything special on their property. We will focus our efforts on the common areas in the community (i.e. pool area and entry way). However, we are also looking to leverage what, in some cases, may already exist. Residents that currently maintain birdhouses, feeders and birdbaths will help us achieve certification.
Our goal is to make this a community effort which is engaging, fun, educational and rewarding for our residents. We see this as a positive and meaningful project for the whole community. Your help and willingness to be involved will make a difference towards us receiving certification!
Certification also has “marketing” benefits. Feedback suggests this may have a 10% to 15% positive impact on property values and will serve to further distinguish Colonial Acres as a unique, socially and environmentally conscious community. Once certification is secured, we can use the Audubon Certified Logo on our website and seek to communicate this distinguishing certification throughout the greater community. The board believes the benefits of certification - both hard and soft - greatly out weight the small fee we will submit with our application.
Steps towards certification include:
1. A review of our current environment and development of actions to address some core areas, many we may already have in place. To accomplish this we are asking neighbors to complete a short self survey (to be sent July 16th, 2014).
2. Creation of a physical map depicting the locations of items such as birdhouse, feeders, and water sources. This information will serve as a baseline of our current environment and will be based from the survey information.
3. Develop education session(s) for families and children to educate our community about local bird/wildlife, plants and actions to promote and protect them (i.e. building birdhouses, bird watching/identification, bird photography, native plants). Please let us know if you have any ideas for this or resources/skills to help us achieve this.
Additional details about the Audubon certification we are seeking is available at http://www.audubonnetwork.org/programs/workbooks/BWSP.pdf
Joe Benoit, Association President, July 15th, 2014
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