Hooray! Crews do a clean-up of Palermo's 'back lot'

Positively Palermo has been pointing out the condition of the undeveloped Phase 2 of our Palermo community. That's the open space surrounded by green fencing. The parcel is supposed to have 88 more units — in addition to the six models already built there and sitting vacant — for a total of 94 more units. These would be added to the 117 units already built in Phase 1, so Palermo at full build-out would have 211 units. Phase 2 also is supposed to have 10,000 square feet of retail space, a pool and spa, tennis courts and a dog park. But for years the space has been a big garbage heap. Glass bottles abound. Plastic bags have taken over the shrubbery. The green fence often is blowing in the wind. Now there's a big clean-up going on, with crews leveling ground, moving big rocks, watering the dirt with sprinklers, removing trash, trimming bushes and trees, and generally sprucing up the place. Miss Penny Lane says: Thank you, Enterprise Companies of Chicago for this work.

In the dark

Right now, on Sunday night, all the outside lighting at Palermo is off. It's pitch dark out there even though there's no power blackout. This is a safety concern. During the day, the pool lights are on and in the afternoon the landscaping lights come on even though the sun is shining. Yet for the past nights the landscaping lights have been off completely, or they have been off during some of the time at night. Crazy, isn't it? Miss Penny Lane asks: Why are we in the dark at Palermo?

It's daylight, but Palermo's landscaping and pool lights are on?

For numerous months, residents have been complaining that the landscaping lighting has been coming on while it's still daylight out. Some pool and spa lights, needlessly, also are on during the day. It's a big waste of money and a big waste of electricity, yet nothing is being done to correct this situation. Miss Penny Lane asks: If the homeowners association has money to burn, is it time to lower the monthly $241 dues?

Plastic fields forever?

Winds have been blowing across Palm Springs for days. But even before that, the trees and bushes of the undeveloped Phase 2 of Palermo had been littered with plastic bags for weeks and weeks. Miss Penny Lane says: Why must drivers exiting through the south gate be greeted by this blight every day?

Blackout at Palermo - (UPDATE: See reader comment section for what the Fire Department told a resident about this situation)

Dear Friends, we all had quite a night at Palermo, as the power went completely out for hours. No electricity in our homes, no street lights, and no way in or out of our community. The electric gates were shut and without power, so emergency vehicles apparently couldn't easily get in and we Palermo residents could not get out. Palermo residents and visitors camped out on both sides of the main gate in their cars and did some bonding, according to an e-mail just received. Now that's the Palermo spirit! A silver lining to everything. But Miss Penny Lane must ask: Shouldn't the gates have emergency back-up power for everyone's safety, and where was security tonight?

6/11 UPDATE — The paper reported Friday morning: "Two power outages that began Thursday night continued to affect Southern California Edison customers in the Coachella Valley early Friday. The larger of the two outages initially cut power to about 1,600 customers in Palm Springs at 10:35 p.m., Edison spokesman Steve Conroy said. Just after midnight, power was restored to more than half of the customers affected by the outage, leaving 530 customers in the dark in a neighborhood near Highway 111 and Gateway Drive. Crews hope to restore power to those homes by 6 p. m. Friday ... both outages were caused by equipment problems, but it was unknown if strong winds played a role."

6/15 UPDATE — Please click on the reader comments below. A Palermo resident contacted the Palm Springs Fire Department about this alarming situation involving our health and safety during power outages. The answer may shock you.)

P.S: Miss Penny Lane gives a big hug to the Palermo resident who emailed in the above picture of the scene at the Palermo main gate.

The tree trimming has started. Good-bye yellow plastic tape

Some progress to report. Last week, Positively Palermo pointed out that for two months there has been yellow tape on numerous trees. The police-type plastic tape apparently marked trees for trimming — but nothing was being done since early April when the tape appeared. Now we have some action after complaints here. Crews arrived today, according to a resident e-mail. (See a photo submitted to this site by a resident.) Miss Penny Lane says: Why should such a simple thing such as tree trimming be such a difficult task for Palermo's caretakers to carry out in a timely manner?

Yellow police-type tape has been on many of Palermo's trees for TWO months now

At the beginning of April, Palermo residents began discussing on this community site why yellow tape appeared on some trees. Apparently, the ribbons are meant to mark trees for trimming, although such ribbons also were put on palm trees when the palms were ripped out. It's been two months that Palermo's trees have had yellow police-type plastic tape on them. Two months? Miss Penny Lane says: Any lady knows that one must change her ribbons more often than that.