Timberlane and Woodlake

The Great American Clean Up day sponsored by Keep Hillsborough County Beautiful was the reason for the large dumpster that you may have seen at the Timberlane Drive entrance, and it was a success.  Almost twenty volunteers picked up, trimmed and removed brush from areas around the Timberlane Recreation Center and both Timberlane entrances.  The dumpster was almost filled to capacity by the time they were done.  The area around the Timberlane West entrance down to Sunwood Drive was also mowed and trimmed.  Due to the dry conditions, the grass at the Timberlane Drive entrance wasn’t mowed.

Each volunteer received a t-shirt and other goodies, as well as an invitation to a pizza party on Sunday.  Thanks to all of the volunteers who participated, as well as the unknown person who trimmed the hedges and cleaned up the planting beds at the main entrance, prior to the clean up day. 

We have one volunteer, Jack Pooley who tries to keep up with picking up and mowing both Timberlane entrances down to the Lake Rockcallileo, and as soon as we get some rain, Jack will mow the main entrance.  The signs at that entrance are also looking a bit rough, ever since the graffiti was painted over, and he’s also working on getting the signs repainted, and replacing the missing letters.

We still don’t have anyone to handle routine mowing at the Woodlake entrance off of Waters Avenue.  Unfortunately, Hillsborough county doesn’t have the funds or manpower to keep up with maintaining our common areas, and the TWCA just doesn’t have the funds to hire someone to do it.  If you’d like to volunteer to help out, you can contact Raymond Franqui at 813-598-8398, or just head over to that entrance and start mowing.  We don’t have sprinkler systems at any of the entrances, so to keep the grass healthy and avoid damage during droughts, please keep your mower set at a medium to high height when mowing these areas.

Also, Jack doesn’t have a gas trimmer, so if you live near either Timberlane entrance and would like to help trim and edge those areas, he could use the help.  If the area at the end of your street, or next to your house, is looking bad, we could also use your help in picking up the trash and mowing it down.  It only takes a few extra minutes, and not only improves the appearance, but also reduces the risk of fire.  Please help out if you can, and working together we can make Timberlane and Woodlake a better, more beautiful community. 

You may have noticed that although we’re trying to maintain the entrances and common areas of our neighborhood, it isn’t an easy task.  Right now we have one volunteer doing almost all of the work at the Timberlane and Timberlane West entrances.  Since he was ill last month, things have gotten a bit out of hand, but he’s trying to catch up now.  Any resident who has the time and equipment and who would like to help, can simply go to the entrance area at any time and pick up trash, mow or edge an area.

You may also have seen that some people aren’t making our job any easier, and have started dumping yard waste, construction debris and tree limbs alongside the road at the main entrance.  This has been reported to Hillsborough County Public Works, and hopefully will be removed soon.  If you see any piles of trash dumped alongside the roadway any where in our neighborhood, Public Works is the agency to call to have it picked up.  You can contact them at 635-5400, from 8AM to 4PM, Monday through Friday.  New info - You can actually call Waste Management directly aty 272-5680 for illegally dumped items.  The more people who call and complain about this, the better.  

Timberlane Park will be the stage for our first Timberlane/Woodlake Community Flea Market. The event is being organized as a fund raiser to provide maintenance and improvements to our community entrances. BarBque Hamburgers and Hotdogs will be offered with refreshments.

The Town N’ Country Youth Council has come thru for us again and will help us with a Car Wash to and collect donations. After some debate on choosing the site for the Flea Market, Timberlane Park was selected to provide the public the convenience of restrooms,parking and water for our Car Wash.Thank you to the Timberlane Park staff and management for making this possible.Local businesses and volunteers are joining us in our efforts to make this Flea Market a success.If you have any ideas or wish to contribute in any way call the numbers below.

The Flea Market is open to anyone,anywhere and anything being sold (that is legal) so send your registration now,sell your stuff,get your cash and do all this while supporting a good cause.Register by mailing $5 to participate or $10 to participate and have us supply a table.Tables are limited so act now.Mail check to:

Timberlane/Woodlake Civic Association

P.O. Box 260761

Tampa,Fl. 33685-761

For information Call 813 598 8398 or 813 731 0625

Pass the word to your neighbors and

Thank you for your support. 

The Timberlane Woodlake Civic Association is hosting a community party for our residents on Saturday, May 5th from 12:00 noon to 5:00 pm.  The event is free, and will be held in Woodlake Park, at the intersection of Woodlake Blvd. and Somerford Place, and everyone is invited.

There will be music, food, soft drinks and fun activities for the whole family.  We’re going to have a variety of different displays and activities for both children and adults, including;

• An large inflatable bouncing playground with 3 different play stations
• A fire engine on display from the Hillsborough County Fire Department
• The Hillsborough County Sherriff’s Office will be bringing “Bennie the Beetle”
• “Can Do” the recycling robot will be on hand to interact with the kids and deliver his anti-litter message
• The YMCA and the Town & Country Family Center will both have representatives present to explain their programs and to answer questions
• The Hillsborough County Parks and Recreation Department is also providing tables, chairs and a large barbecue pit to grill the hot dogs

This is a chance for everyone in our community to spend an afternoon outside having a great time, all for free.  It also gives all of us a chance to meet and get to know more of our neighbors, find out more about some of the county’s programs, and hopefully contribute to our growing sense of community.  County Commissioner Rose Ferlita may even put in an appearance, if her schedule permits.

So mark down May 5th on your calendar, and stop by for a bite to eat, and to have fun with all of the activities and displays…and don’t forget to bring the kids!   

Despite a few minor setbacks, (like a quick trip to get the paint “shaken, not stirred”, a little spill on the sidewalk, and running out of one color) the Woodlake Entrance Wall Paint Out was a real success.  Looking at the pictures below, you can obviously see a big difference in the appearance of the entrance, even though some sections of the wall facing into Woodlake still need to be completed.  We got off to a slow start, since the 50 gallons of biege paint donated by Hillsborough County had settled, and a trip to Home Depot to get it shaken and mixed was necessary.  But after that, everything went quickly, and with the help of volunteers from the TW Civic Association, the Town & Country Youth Council, Hillsborough County Parks, Recreation and Conservation Department and Star Mortgage, we managed to finish most of both side of the wall, and collect some additional funds from residents who donated on their way in or out of the entrance.  We actually ran out of paint just about when we ran out of time.  After cleaning up, everyone had a chance to eat some pizza before the parents of the Youth Council members started showing up to pick them up.

Weather and schedules permitting, we hope to get back out there in the next month or so, and finish the job completely, including cutting in close around all of the pillars.  We’ll let you know more when we decide on a date.  We’d like to thank Hillsborough County for the donation of the paint, all of the residents who made donations for the column paint and equipment and supplies, and especially all of the volunteers who worked so hard to make this project a success.  Below are some “before and after” pictures of the wall.  To see more of the process and the people who worked on it, go to our Gallery Page.

The wall before any work was done.

The wall after pressure cleaning - big improvement already!

The wall after being painted.

Another view of the long section after painting.

To go to the Gallery Page, click here.      

The next meeting of the TW Civic Association for all residents of Timberlane and Woodlake is scheduled for Tuesday, January 30th at 7:00 PM in the Timberlane Recreation Center, located at 10210 Westgate Drive.

Everyone is invited to attend to find out more about the Association’s latest and on-going projects.  You are invited to ask questions, or bring up issues that concern you as a member of our community. There will be an opportunity to sign up for membership or volunteer for projects, immediately after the meeting.  For more information, contact Raymond Franqui at 598-8398.  

Now that the holidays are past, we’re looking for volunteers to help paint the wall near the Woodlake entrance on Shledon Road.  We’ve already scheduled equipment and a few volunteers to pressure wash the wall on January 20th.  We’re looking for some more volunteers to help with actually painting the wall a week later, on Saturday, January 27th.  We plan on starting about 8:00 am, and finishing whenever the job is done.  We already have a generator and several paint spray guns committed o the project, but can always use more equipment, as well as volunteers to use it.  We hope to add a detail stripe to the wall at the same time, so people who can simply paint the line on with brushes would also be a big help. 

If you can spare some time on Saturday the 27th to give us a hand, please contact the Civic Association President at TWCommunity@yahoo.com, or call Raymond at 813-598-8398.

Well, it seems we have a sign bandit in the area.  Sometime on the 2nd or 3rd of January, someone smashed and destroyed the small announcement sign at the Timberlane entrance.  The Civic Association was already planning to replace it with a larger sign sometime in the next few months, so it really wasn’t much of a loss.  Hopefully the new one won’t suffer the same fate once it’s installed.

Also, 2 small metal framed announcement signs that were posted near the Woodlake entrances have gone missing.  These are ones that the Civic Association uses on a regular basis, so we would like to get them back, if possible.  If you happen to have seen them laying around anywhere in the area, please let us know at our email address, TWCommunity@yahoo.com, and we’ll pick them up.  Thanks for any help you can give us in recovering these signs. 

Unfortunately, we haven’t been ab;e to get together enough volunteers to complete the Woodlake entrance clean-up and painting on December 16th.  This is probably due to everyone being so busy during the holiday season, so we’re going to postpone the project until sometime in late January, to give everyone time to recover and get back to normal.  We’ll keep you posted here when we set a new date and time.  Thanks to those people who did volunteer to show up on the 16th, and hopefully we’ll still see all of you plus more volunteers on the new date.

As of Sunday, December 3rd, the new Timberlane Sign at Timberlane West and Memorial is finally completed and it has it’s letters installed.  One of our volunteers also made a template, and added the Civic Association’s website address to that sign, and also to the two at the entrance on Timberlane Drive (maybe that’s how you found this website?).  Hopefully, having this website’s address prominently displayed at the entrances will encourage even more of our residents to visit this site, sign up and use it to keep up on community events and information.  We are working on a low cost way to distribute a printed newsletter to all of our residents on a regular basis, but still need to work out all of the details.  We’ll keep you posted here on our progress.

Now that the Timberlane Entrances are repaired and being maintained, we’re going to focus on getting the Woodlake and Waters entrance cleaned up and updated.  This includes painting the wall adjacent to the entrance and installing a sign similar to the one at Timberlane West.  We could use some help for this project, which is scheduled for December 16th.  See the article below on the Woodlake Entrance Paint Out for more info on how you can help.