Introduce yourself No longer exists posted 3 years ago

Introduce yourself No longer exists posted 3 years ago

Share a little bit about you and your home on Lake Allegan. (Keeping in mind general best practices for preserving your personal privacy on the internet, naturally.)

Hi! We've owned frontage on the lake for nearly two years and live here full time. One of our favorite parts of living on the lake is watching the birds -- the bald eagles and osprey are especially beautiful. We've met with the MSU extension office to make sure that the new landscaping we're doing on the shoreline is helpful, not harmful, and have really enjoyed all the trees and flowers around the lake. I grew up in Grand Rapids and have lived in Chicago (and suburbs), Ann Arbor, and Kalamazoo. I have a research-related job and am willing to hunt for any and all documents related to Lake Allegan property, history, and news. No longer exists commented 3 years ago We moved here three years ago, from St. Joe, Michigan. Before that, we both grew up in Glen Ellyn, a suburb of Chicago. In the meantime, I've lived and raised my kids in Grand Rapids. I've been an announcer on West Michigan radio for over 30 years. Right now, I'm an adjunct at GVSU and have a theatre company Collywobbles Theatre Co. which performs locally. We live in Wildwood which has had a battle recently over short term rentals. We've got a new board and are starting to grow a strong community. My husband Tim works internationally and is a private pilot. We are both very interested in being involved with environmental issues involving our community. Glad to meet you! Carole Catherine commented 3 years ago Hi Carole, I live off the lake a block. I have been a realtor in the area for a long time, now retired. I sold vacation property on Miner Lake who were from Glen Ellyn. Happy to have you on the Lake. I only hope the noise from the ruenovated gun range is not disturbing you too much. It is bad across the lake, which is a long ways away. I believe the water carries and perhaps increases the sound. It is not good here. When they initially called it Echo Point none of us got the connection. I think it only was designed to site in a rifle just before hunting season. Not any longer. Patricia Miner commented 3 years ago Hi, Carole! We have a professional pilot in our neighborhood, too, and there's another one farther east on the lake who lands his seaplane right in front of our house from time to time. It's very cool to watch. Welcome to the association! No longer exists commented 3 years ago Actually, the sound has reduced in our direction. Instead we get sound from the police range. Ugh. I also heard that Kzoo shut down their ranges after the Uber driver shooting so they come up here. I wish it were monitored. or gone. Carole Catherine commented 3 years ago Sandy and I live in Ann Arbor as our primary residence. I retired from GM back in March and Sandy retired as a CPA around same time. We bought in Indian shores in 2007 on the main part of the lake. We now spend much time there. Looking forward participating with this group Tim Miller commented 3 years ago My husband Paul and I moved here in October 2018. We live off of Monroe and our property extends to another subdivision that borders the lake. Paul grew up in the Portage area and left to join the Navy in the late 70s where he retired. We lived in Las Vegas for 20 years and we are still running our Las Vegas home inspection company from a distance. The noise from the gun range does not bother us and was definitely improved from the redesign - we can still hear them but they are muffled and we can only hear them if we are outside. We live on 39th & Monroe, less than a quarter mile from the range. Living in Las Vegas (even the "good" areas) we would hear random gunshots quite often and we were not near a shooting range, they were real shootings. We feel blessed to be away from the crime, sirens, helicopters and airport noise and in the serenity of Allegan forest. We are very interested in preserving the serenity of the forest and the wildlife on Lake Allegan but knew the gun range existed when we bought this property. We are able to co-exist with the gun range. Renee Donohue commented 3 years ago Hi, Renee. Welcome! We visited Las Vegas several years ago and the heat about did me in. Anything above 90 and I melt. I'm a nature buff, too, and was fascinated by the different plants and landscape there, but I'm not sure I could ever get use to not having trees and water. No longer exists commented 3 years ago My husband John and I live on Allegan Dam Rd. We are recently retired. I worked in Human Resources for most of my career, and John worked in the medical field, primarily orthopedics for most of his career. John is a student pilot and enjoys doing triathlons. I am learning to quilt. We have a large family of seven children, (11 with our children's spouses) and six grandchildren. We love the forest and the lake and have enjoyed meeting people in the surrounding area since moving here in 2015. Mary Zick commented 3 years ago Bob and I moved here Christmas of 2011. We are both from this area. I will let Bob introduce himself if he wishes. We are both very private people. I was born in Holland and my family moved to Indiana when I was four. I spent every summer that I can remember half between my grandmothers home in Douglas and my other grandmothers house in Grand Rapids. Once I graduated from high school, I moved back to this area. When Bob and I found our house, I was thrilled! It was on a lake, and it had a mother-in-laws house on the property. Since we both knew the area, we also knew about the contamination of the lake due to industries up river from us. I had high hopes that some day our lake would become one of the Super Fund clean up sites. I am not sure how I feel about the dams they have and are taking out up river from us, but I am glad they are cleaning up the sediment. I am very disappointed to hear that the DNR is turning there back on the lead contamination to the water that is said to be due to the shooting range, if this is true. We live in a house on Babylon Road, and we also own a piece of property on Leverich Lane. Part of our property is in the association, and the other part is not. Upon touring our place before we bought it, we had three "warnings" that were given to us. One, you will be living on a polluted lake, don't let your kids touch the bottom, if you let them swim in it. We are boaters, and our kids love the water. Since we were from the area, we were aware of the Kalamazoo River's reputation. Maybe if they have some kind of dredging crew like they did in Otsego, maybe we could even see if we could pay to have them dredge by our house to take some of the sediment, and make it a little more swimable for the grandkids. Two, the gun range is very noisy, we want to make sure we disclose this before you buy. Bob and I both have our concealed carry permit, and yes, it was noisy before they turned in into Echo Point, but we could live with it. We kind of got used to is. We actually had used the range ourselves. We were very excited when we saw there was going to be an upgrade and had high hopes of this being a good thing. We had even talked about being willing to pay dues to be part of it. However, it is louder than it was before, and even can be heard quite clearly inside our home now. And, due to the loudness, even with protective ear muffs, it is loud when you are there shooting. I was less than impressed, and do not go to it. I am back to thinking of maybe joining Hamilton's range. Maybe they could look into adding some kind of sound absorbing material to make it better? It definitely fits it's name. Third, that we had a neighbor that would cause us all kinds of trouble if we decided to do anything to our property "down the hill" as we call it on Leverich Lane. This person also had major issues with the previous owner, which as we were told, only made the prior owner dig his heals in even more and became an outcast. This had proven to be true. We ended up having to get a lawyer to help us be able to get a permit to add on to our barn because Valley Township was not willing to take this association on. This only made us keep to ourselves even more. Since moving here, we have only strived to make our place better than it was when we moved in. It was over grown with huge trees and no sun light. However, neither of us comes from money, and we are not retired. Both of us work hard at our jobs, and raising our family, so our progress has been slow. As well as we have been able to have my father and my grandmother for a period of time be able to live in the "little house", for which I feel truly blessed. We still have a piece of our front yard that is not done, and won't be until we finish our projects. It's a work in progress. Vicki Tornga commented 3 years ago Hi there, Forrest Linderman here. I thought I'd introduce myself a little and give a bit of background. I joined the Marines right out of High School, spent some time in Iraq (fun stuff), then came home and got an Engineering degree. I work in Holland at a small Electrical Controls Firm and love it. I bought my house 2 years ago on the lake, I live on 118th now. I like doing the small or not so small remodeling projects on my own, and have put myself into and out of trouble a few times, but thats home ownership! I learned a lot in the process. I too am a concealed weapons holder and thoroughly enjoy that fact. I do not want the range shut down, merely brought back to the levels it was at when I moved in, when it didn't sound like someone was building a barn constantly across the street from me. It used to be comforting, now that I can hear it in my home, its annoying. I am also interested in whats going to happen with the contaminants once they remove the Allegan City Dam. Are these just going to wash down stream to effect us and our ground water, I know I'm on a well (I love it), and I think my street is also (not 100% sure). I would like to host or attend a get together for those willing to meet face to face, we all share a vested interest in these issues. Dave, Mary, Anyone else; interested in this? Forrest Linderman commented 3 years ago Comment deletedNo longer exists commented 3 years ago Hi, Forrest. I really appreciate all your conversation on here and look forward to meeting you in person. I'll send you an email - I've got list going of people interested, though a couple are still hesitant to put names out there publicly until the intent of the association is solid, which I completely understand. We'll get there. In spite of the bumpy start, I'm still thrilled at all the support so far for having people around the lake coming together to share info and answer questions. It's a real need. No longer exists commented 3 years ago Hello! We are Janet and David Burgoyne. I am from Allegan but haven't lived here in decades. My husband was born up north. He is a retired Navy Chief and we came back so we could get settled and prep the kids for college here and care for elderly parents. We love our view and the trees. We are on the easternmost part of the lake-creek by M40. We hear constant gunfire all day every day - the person above who said the gun range was used long ago to sight-in guns was correct, my grandfather was William Tange, the gunsmith downtown. I have many childhood memories there. What we have now is a gun recreation center that needs sound berms. Had I known there had been a substantial change to the facility, we might have make a different home purchase. My memory of what it was is what we went by as we were a long distance purchase from the last duty station in West Virginia. I am interested in the gunrange issue should anyone be on a committee or having meetings. My husband restores antique cars for fun, and I garden and make unique jam. :) We hope to make some improvements to our property and would love to see a directory of local contractors if one is put together. Also a lost/found pet section for the community- many animals travel through our property and would like to be able to get them back home before they get hit on m-40. We are happy to be here and look forward to meeting folks. :) Janet Burgoyne commented 2 years ago WELCOME Janet. Sorry you are getting the "noise" from the shooting range. I live on Emma Lane just off Allegan Dam RD. So far we have not had relief from the constant gun shots..I don't think they realize how noisy it is. I don't leave windows open nor do I spend time out of doors. It is a tough time, face covers when you go out of your yard and ear coverings when you are outside of your house. I have retired from real estate and I'm wondering if we will have to disclose the gun range...it is in our Disclosure Form! Patricia Miner commented 2 years ago Janet Burgoyne We have a committee of 10 residents currently working on trying to get the DNR to make improvements to the shooting range to better contain the noise. The committee submitted a plan to the DNR (Mark Mills & Lori Buford) to complete the berms on the east/northeast side of the range and other changes to stop the blast. We are currently trying to get a meeting with the DNR to review the proposal we gave them. The virus and constant shutdowns are making it hard to get together. The committee has been meeting since last fall trying to get help from Rep Mary Whiteford and Sen. Aric Nesbitt. I will let you know the result after the planned meeting with the DNR. Thanks Dave Thompson commented 2 years ago