Frequently Asked Questions
For New Residents
Frequently Asked Questions
For New Residents
Welcome to the friendly Water Gardens community. This article answers many questions that a newcomer might have when moving into Water Gardens. If you have any additional questions you think would be good for this FAQ list, please click the link below, and submit your question.
Water Gardens waste pickup is handled by Recology. Here is their website: https://www.recology.com/recology-cleanscapes/maple-valley/. Recology picks up garbage usually every Wedn esday. They pickup Recycled waste and Yard waste on alternate weeks. The exact schedule is on the Water Gardens calendar, distributed at the first of each month to all residents. You are permitted to put your waste cans out the evening prior to pickup. They need to be put out of sight by the end of the pickup day. Garbage cans are require to be stowed out of sight of the street at all other times.
During the day, you may have as many visitors as you like. They must park their cars either in your driveway, or on the sidewalk side of the street only. Our streets are narrow, and this permits Fire Trucks and Emergency Vehicles to drive our streets safely. Overflow vehicles can be parked in our overflow areas. There are a few extra parking spaces at the cul de sac at the top of the community, and around our Community Center. Beyond that, there is a large amount of parking outside the lower South Gate, on Witte Road.
Overnight, you are only allowed one vehicle to be parked in your driveway, maximum. It must not extend into the street. Occasionally, visitors may park their cars at the Community Center overnight, but this may be for only temporary needs.
RV's and other vehicles may be parked in the RV lot. There is a rental fee for the RV lot sites. Please contact VIS or a board member for information on how to rent a site.
There are three ways to open the gates: remote controls, gate codes, and directory listings. Residents have remote controls which open the gates, and gate codes which open the gates. Visitors may also use the directory at the gate to contact residents. If you phone is listed at the gate, and they call you, just press "9" on your phone, and the gates will open. Gate remote controls and gate codes are provided by the Gatekeeper, Art Aske. He is on Lot 169, his email address is aha0001@comcast.net, and his phone number is 425-413-2021.
On the left side of this page, go down to the Prospective Residents. You will find the Rules and Regulations, the WGOA Bylaws and the Condominium Declaration. These three documents provide the organizational and legal foundation for Water Gardens. There are other documents and forms on that Menu item as well. In addition, some of these documents are distributed with the phone directory, and are available in a binder in the Community Center.
You have an assigned mailbox, with two keys. The US mail usually arrives about 3pm every day but Sunday and holidays, but sometimes is as late as 7pm. If you go on vacation, you can go to the Maple Valley Post Office, and fill out forms to have your mail held for any number of days you specify. The website for the post office is here, which displays among other things the address and hours of operation:
The Water Gardens newsletter, titled "Life at the Gardens", appears about the first of each month. It is put in the brochure holders on each mail pedestal throughout the community. It is also available on this website via the menu item, "Monthly Newsletter". It has been produced by Joan Calvery, Lot 86, since 2007. There is no cost to you for the newsletter, it is paid for from community funds.
Water Gardens contracts with a 3rd party company (Rafael) to come through and mow our lawns once per week, during the grass growing seasons. The cost of this service is currently $27/month. This is an optional service. If you don't sign up for it, then you are responsible for getting your lawn mowed weekly. You can hire some company other than Rafael, or you can do it yourself.
The Water Gardens email alert system provides timely messages about current urgent issues to those with emails (about 90% of the residents). This system is on the "kit.com" platform. You will be automatically added to this system if you provided an email address, but you can opt out at any time. When you receive an email alert message, simply go to the bottom of the email, where the "Kit" badge appears, and click the word, "Unsubscribe". You will be automatically be unsubscribed.
Activities Committee - The Activities Committee is always looking for additional people to join the committee. The committee meets on the 2nd Monday of each month at 3pm in the WG Community Center. The committee looks forward to having additional community members share their ideas and volunteer in the scheduling, planning, and physical set up for the Activities of the community. The chairperson of the Activity Committee is Lori Mann.
Landscape Committee - The Landscape Committee takes responsibility for the landscaping of the common grounds in Water Gardens. They arrange new plantings, do some maintenance of existing plantings, and arrange for 3rd parties to perform major tasks, such as the trimming of the Arborvitae. They welcome new members enthusiastically. If you are interested in gardening, this is a great committee for you. The chairman of the Landscape Committee is Jeannette Mingo.
Tech Committee - The Tech Committee focuses on documenting and improving the technical information needed to run our Water Gardens community. This ranges from providing technical advice the the WGOA Board, maintaining our website, documenting how our ponds and irrigations systems work, etc. The chairman of the Tech Committee is Eva Hayward.
Tree Accent Lighting And Garage Lights - Not everyone knows this but the reason each home has a tree accent light is because it was a requirement in obtaining our development permit. So having a working tree accent light is a landscaping requirement and not optional.
Garage Lights - When Roger White developed this community, he got permission from Maple Valley to install fewer actual street lights than required, by substituting garage lights for street lights. So these garage lights are part of the street lighting in our community. It was a good choice. But because this lighting is required, then they are the responsibility of the community, not the homeowner. These lights are provided (free gratis) by the HOA and we have gentlemen to assist with their replacement. However if you change them yourself please use 60watt or LED equivalent daylight brightness bulbs. Our light bulb guys are listed in the back of this newsletter.
Tree Accent Lights - Tree accent lights are not free. They will cost $10-15, payable when installed. If you do it yourself use a commercial spike light, (these may be found in the electrical department of Home Depot or Lowe’s). The LED bulb must be soft white, 550 Lumens 7 watt 3000k brightness.
VIS Group is our property management company, and our personal property manager at VIS is Koryn Liberal. You can reach her by sending an email to VIS Group at "info@vismanagement.com", attention Koryn Liberal.