The Colonial Hills Civic Association

Don’t Forget! The Civic Association has revamped the application requirements for our annual scholarship. In an effort to have more applications submitted and to focus on serving others, especially in our neighborhood, we have come up with a new application – which is available here in MS Word or PDF (or use the links at the right).

We encourage all high school students and those pursuing continuing education to read through the application carefully and let us know if you have any questions. Applications must be submitted by April 1, 2020!

The new application includes areas where you can choose activities based on your interests and comfort levels. Note that there is now a neighborhood project choice. This can be anything you dream up that will benefit our neighborhood, just make sure to get it approved by the Civic Association before beginning!

Last year we were able to reward a total of $3,000 worth of scholarship money and we hope to grow this number each year!

Brrrr…it was cold outside but the judges’ debate over the Lighting Contest winners was RED HOT this year. Snow sparkled on the fine streets of Colonial Hills as the judges marshaled forth to pick their decorated favorites.

As always, there is a long list of worthy contenders, so we honorably mention the following finalists for their heartwarming displays:

• 492 Kenbrook – The judges enjoyed Ralphie from “a Christmas Story”
• 5595 Greenwich – House outlined with lights – no fear of heights – and the Blow Up Truck w/ a tree
• 322 Loveman – Pirate Xmas and flamingos – quirky and fun
• 71 Southington – White lights galore and an angel
• 63 Southington – Artful wreath and lights around the door
• 583 Loveman – The Grinch on the Roof!
• 5671 Indianola – Santa!
• 528 N. Selby – Nicely lit up – even the side yard shed was decked out
• 306?? Colonial – No lights, but a lovely display of live deer in the front yard. How did they do that??!! 😉

Of course, difficult decisions had to be made, and the winners for 2019 are….cymbal crash……

• Most Lit: 290 Colonial – The judges loved the lights, especially those on the roof…
• Most Artistic: 435 Park – So very pretty with a BIG tree dripping with BIG bulbs
• Best Retro: 282 Loveman – The millennials on the judging panel loved the old fashioned Santas!
• Best Front Door – Third Place: 509 Kenbrook – Giant candy canes flanked the door
• Best Front Door – Second Place: 384 Colonial – Lovely garland and wreaths… very classy!
• Best Front Door – First Place: 175 Loveman – Decorated all the way up the drive and porch! Delightful and different
• Best Overall – Third Place: 124 Park – Recognized for the star waaaaaay up there, and the Christmas tree and wreath you see through the windows are charming
• Best Overall – Second Place: 5595 Indianola – Colorful, and so very unique!
• Best Overall – First Place: 287 Loveman – Big Blow Ups and Snow Man and so many other layers of fun – a wonderland… and MUSIC!!

Thanks to everyone who decorated this year. We are blessed to live in such a warm, charming and friendly neighborhood.

(And here are the pics, with photo credits to the Secret Judges – please click the “Continue reading” link below to see these photos)

_01 Most Lit
_02 Most Artistic
_03 Best Retro
_04 Best Front Door – 3rd Place
_05 Best Front Door – 2nd
_06 Best Front Door – 1st
_07 Best Overall – 3rd Place
_08 Best Overall – 2nd
_09 Best Overall – 1st

Continue reading ‘2019 Colonial Hills Holiday Decorating Contest and Photos’ »

Many thanks to Kristin Orban for planning and running our neighborhood Halloween party! We would also like to thank Cynthia Mackenzie and the entire CyMack Group / Keller Williams Capital Partners for sponsoring the event and providing the pumpkin patch.

The sunshine and 60 degree weather made for a beautiful day to spend with neighbors. There were plenty of treats, crafts, and games for all attendees. We could not make this event happen without our neighborhood volunteers. Thank you for spending your afternoon with us.

We hope you all had as much fun as we did and will see you again next year!

(And now for the pics, with photo credits to Emma Lindholm and Janet Keller – please click the “Continue reading” link below to see these photos from the event this afternoon)

_01 Pumpkin Patch
_02 Jack O’ Lantern Disk Game
_03 Bountiful Collections
_04 Happy Party Day!

Continue reading ‘Halloween Party and Pumpkin Patch 2019’ »

By your secret judges (who also took the pics below)

At last, the leaves are turning and have set the stage for our judges’ foray out into the neighborhood to see all of your Halloween decorations. The TRICKED-out houses were a TREAT for our judges’ eyes! Thanks to everyone who put in the effort to make our neighborhood fun for the Halloween Holiday.

An honorable mention goes out to the chained dragon with a skeleton at its feet on 547 Park Overlook, the lovely Cornucopia of Gourds at 385 Park Blvd, the haunted cemetery at 418 Park Overlook, the Welcoming display at 5698 Indianola, the giant pumpkin at 543 Park, the “blow up city with twirling eye” at 293 Park Blvd, and Big cat at the cemetery at 287 Loveman. Kudos to the 200 block of Kenbrook, where there were many cool decorations.

This year, special recognition goes to:

Spookiest: 244 Colonial – The big spiders and the freshly dug grave spooked the judges. Fabulous!!

Friendliest: 290 Colonial – The Nightmare Before Christmas, where everyone was smiling! The judges liked the music and fog!

Most Creative: 322 Loveman – Pirates in the Caribbean theme – so unique! The judges were charmed by the pink flamingos.

Best Effects: 559 Colonial – Dragon’s Lair – This really looks like dragon land y’all.

Best Activity: 363 Loveman – for its Garage Spook House! This category is “tricky” since the activities are usually not running until October 31. So, based on last year (remember the rain?) this spook house was a really fun activity. The front yard is a truly creepy entrance to the spook house with a graveyard and skeletons. Kids (from 6 to 60) were screaming all night!

(And now for the photos (Photo Credits: Secret Judges) – please click the “Continue reading” link below to see these pics which have the following descriptions)

_02 Friendliest, Picture #1
_02b Friendliest, Picture #2
_03 Most Creative, Picture #1
_03b Most Creative, Picture #2
_04 Best Effects
_01 Spookiest

Continue reading ‘Halloween Decorating Contest and Photos’ »

All the candidates for Worthington City Council have now responded to the Colonial Hills – Advocate Together (CHAT) questionnaire, as given in the links below. CHAT thanks all the candidates for their answers to this questionnaire, and requests that you carefully consider the responses from all thirteen candidates, in determining who you will vote for.

The four questions which the candidates answered were:

In last name order, the following are links to PDFs containing the candidates’ responses:

• Candace Brooks
• Peter Bucher
• Paul Dorothy
• Michael Farley
• Doug Foust
• Barton Hacker
• Seth Kraut
• Bonnie Michael
• Eddie Pauline
• Jennifer Rhoads
• Doug Smith
• Michael Troper
• Karen Wilson

And as a reminder, CHAT volunteers continue to canvass the Colonial Hills neighborhood, to request your answers to our initial Colonial Hills – Advocate Together neighborhood survey, which we have left open for you to respond to online.
Note: Please respond online to this neighborhood survey if you have a “No Soliciting” sign on your door, which we honor, and thus we will not be able to talk with you and record your answers when we are out canvassing.

Also please consider joining our CHAT Facebook group and if you have time, we would greatly appreciate your volunteering for activities within the CHAT organization. Thank you!

On Wednesday, September 25 around 2:00 PM, we will begin implementation of the project to convert this CHCA website from http to https, to use Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) encrypted access. Please check back on Thursday, September 26, when the conversion should be complete. In the interim you may encounter periods of unavailability and various error messages as the implementation proceeds thru the various steps. Thank you for your patience.

The Colonial Hills – Advocate Together (CHAT) community-centered organization is now up and running, to empower residents to act on issues that are important to the community. We want to start our work with your input!

Please click on this link to access our brief initial Colonial Hills – Advocate Together survey. We will compile your answers into a residents spreadsheet. And for any resident who is not able to answer online, we plan to go door to door in about a week to try to contact you personally with the same survey questionnaire.

And if you are a Colonial Hills resident, you are also invited to join our organization’s newly-formed CHAT Facebook group to which we will be posting about issues in the future, and where you can further make your voice and opinion heard.

Thank you! It’s your community to protect.

The initial, organizational meeting for the Colonial Hills Community-Centered Development Advocacy organization was held September 4 at La Chatelaine. At this meeting, the group began planning the content of a neighborhood survey, and how it would be conducted: links to a Google Doc via Facebook, Twitter and this website, followed up by canvassing the neighborhood for residents who did not reply online. The following officers were elected:

• Leslie Caruso, Co-chair
• Gail Geree, Secretary
• Dan Bunn, Researcher
• Will Pearce, Canvassing/Communications Coordinator
• Ron Sears, Historian

The second meeting for the organization will be held next week to:

• Finalize the content of the initial Colonial Hills neighborhood survey
• Elect the other co-chair
• Decide on the name for the organization

Please look for the survey in the near future. Colonial Hills is your community to protect.

This blog post could be classified in the “better late than never” and “for the record” categories. It recently came to our attention that we never published on the website the 53-page report from the OSU Winter Quarter 2012 City and Regional Planning CRP 510 course study, considering whether Colonial Hills could be listed in the National Register of Historic Places. So, here’s the report.

Some of you will remember reading multiple articles in the 2012 and 2013 Couriers which described the results of the study and the subsequent initiation of a CHCA project to pursue this designation. In particular, the article on page 7 of the March/April, 2012, Courier (which referred to a concurrent linking blog post that was inadvertently omitted from the website), reported the conclusion:

Colonial Hills appears to qualify for historic district status under the NRHP’s Criteria A and C, and it possesses the level of integrity required for National Register listing. Under 2 criteria, only 1 of which is required to be listed as an historic district.
Criterion A: “associated with events that have made a significant contribution to the broad patterns of our history.”
Criterion C: “embody the distinctive characteristics of a type, period, or method of construction, or that represent the work of a master, or that possess high artistic values, or that represent a significant and distinguishable entity whose components may lack individual distinction.”

And the August/September, 2013 Courier reported on page 4 that the CHCA initiated this National Register of Historic Places designation project. Unfortunately, sufficient and sustained CH volunteer support did not materialize in the 2013-2014 timeframe to complete the project.

Disclaimer: The CHCA is not responsible if you turn off your phone and go down the rabbit hole of reading the entirety of this report regarding urban and architectural planning, and history involving Worthington and Colonial Hills. And after you emerge, if you wish to volunteer to resurrect the Historic Designation project, please attend a CHCA meeting in person to discuss your particular area of expertise and interests. Thank you!

Two public meetings, to which all Colonial Hills residents are invited, will be held on the following back-to-back evenings the first week of September:

1) The Worthington Board of Education (BOE) Property Acquisition Public Meeting, Tuesday, September 3, 2019, 7:00-8:00 PM, Worthington Education Center, 200 E. Wilson Bridge Rd.

This meeting will provide information regarding the 13.7 acre southeast part of the Boundless property at the end of Indianola, that could be used for a new Colonial Hills Elementary School.

Officials will update the public on how the opportunity has presented itself, and what it could mean for the district. Background information is provided in each of these four blogs by Superintendent Trent Bowers on the Worthington School District web site:

• Opportunity Knocks Part One – Current-Situation
• Opportunity Knocks Part Two – How’d we get to this point?
• Opportunity Knocks Part Three – The challenge with the current site
• Harding Property – Opportunity Knocks

The public will be able to provide feedback on the proposal.

2) The follow-up meeting to the August 8 meeting in the shelter house (see previous blog post), will be held to organize the new Colonial Hills Community Centered Development organization, Wednesday, September 4, 2019, 6:00-9:00 PM, La Chatelaine, 627 High St, in the reserved meeting room. You may wish to come early, say 5:30 to 5:45, to purchase dinner or a snack to eat at the meeting.

Resident Ron Sears will lead the first part of the meeting, in which the group will review past issues with the Harding Hospital (now Boundless) property, practice creating high-consensus community position statements for neighborhood needs, and discuss how to communicate these community statements to others involved in development, including governmental stakeholders.

During the second part of the meeting, officers for the new organization will be elected by those in attendance, so that the new organization can carry forward its advocacy for these community statement needs for Colonial Hills residents.