Holiday Party and Officer Updates The holiday party was a great success. The meeting room was again packed to capacity. The business meeting was lively and fruitful. We are pleased to welcome Nelly Ramirez as our new Austin Neighborhood Council Delegate! We would also like to announce that Doug Tabony has decided to retire as Newsletter Editor and Webmaster. THANK YOU Doug for your 12 years of service to COVNA!!!
Enjoy your new refrigerator magnet with this greeting and all the COVNA information you need to stay to stay connected with our neighborhood. Please join COVNA. Your membership fee of only $10 supports our mission of advocacy for our neighborhood and our sense of neighborhood community. COVNA officers stay involved in Austin neighborhood organizations such as Austin Neighborhood Council (ANC), South Austin Neighborhood Alliance (SANA), Kitchen Cabinet meetings (Ann Kitchens, Place5 city council member advisory group), and receive notices from the City of Austin that could affect Castlewood and/or Oak Valley residents. COVNA holds formal meetings as needed to help solve problems. Fortunately, in recent years, issues have been minor and we have been able to spend most of our resources on building neighborhood relationships with our parties and celebrations. We have about 400 rooftops in our neighborhoods with a historic participation of approximately 30%. Our goal for 2016 is an increase in membership to at least 50%. Working together, COVNA neighbors can assure the quality of our special neighborhood in South Austin. We look forward to a great year ahead!
Ron Mattison 2015/2016 COVNA President
I want to thank each and every one of you for having given me the chance to produce the COVNA newsletter, website, and manage the email list for the past 12 years. Matt Janiga took over the email list last year. Ross Ciomperlik will now be acting as Newsletter Editor and Webmaster with an official open election planned at the Spring Fling. I'm sure he will do a fine job. It's wonderful to see younger residents of our neighborhood take an interest in the neighborhood association. I've enjoyed the work. It has been fun to look up unusual celebrations and anniversaries and find pictures to match. It was especially satisfying when people sent me articles, too rare an event. I produced 10 four page newsletters per year until the last several years. Since then, most have been flyers which have had enough room to cover the necessities and have allowed me to procrastinate even longer than usual. Doing the web version of the newsletter allowed me to use splashes of color, add extra articles, and make stories more interesting with pictures. Our website gave me a forum to produce the Neighborhood Bird Guide which lets all who are interested see and hear most of the birds in our neighborhood. The email list, except for a few bumps in the road, has been very helpful for neighbors in our area to provide and ask for information. It has served to keep subscribers up-to-date on roadway issues, criminal events, lost and found pets, and other important matters. Please support Ross by submitting articles and ideas that he can use. Remember that he is the editor and not supposed to be the reporter. His email address is rciomper@gmail.com.
Doug Tabony
An aggressive and sophisticated phone scam targeting taxpayers, including recent immigrants, has been making the rounds throughout the country. Callers claim to be employees of the IRS, but are not. These con artists can sound convincing when they call. They use fake names and bogus IRS identification badge numbers. They may know a lot about their targets, and they usually alter the caller ID to make it look like the IRS is calling. Victims are told they owe money to the IRS and it must be paid promptly through a pre-loaded debit card or wire transfer. If the victim refuses to cooperate, they are then threatened with arrest, deportation or suspension of a business or driver's license. In many cases, the caller becomes hostile and insulting. Or, victims may be told they have a refund due to try to trick them into sharing private information. If the phone isn't answered, the scammers often leave an urgent callback request.
Note that the IRS will never:
For more info visit www.irs.gov/uac/Tax-Scams-Consumer-Alerts