Urban coyote problems in Atlanta will be addressed with a focus on facts about coyotes and information on community concerns.

Featured speakers will be coyote researcher Dr. Chris Mowry, Chairman, Biology Department at Berry College, and Dr. Larry Wilson, ecologist at Fernbank Science Center.

Date: Wednesday, March 7, 2012
Time: 7:00 P.M. – 8 P.M.
Where: Fernbank Science Center
156 Heaton Park Drive
(across from Fernbank Elementary School)
Jim Cherry Planetarium

RSVP: 678-874-7102

www.fernbank.edu

http://documents.atlantaregional.com/GISDocs/GoogleAPI/TIA.html

President: R. Bruce MacGregor  (Continuing in his office for another year)

First VP: Elliott Kyle  (Continuing in his office for another year)

Admin VP: Mike Hellerstein  (Continuing in his office for another year)

Communications VP: Susan-Anne MacKenna

Susan-Anne MacKenna has lived in Chelsea Heights for 5+ years. She is the Marketing Director for Emory Executive Education at Goizueta Business School. She has become an active member of the Druid Hills community, serving both Glenn Memorial UMC and Fernbank Elementary. In the past, she has served the community in the successful fight against redistricting Fernbank’s school attendance zone and in the successful campaign to renew SPLOST funding for schools in DeKalb County. She has two daughters: a 1st grader at Fernbank and a 4 year old in preschool. Her husband, Rob MacKenna, is a Family Law attorney in Decatur.

Secretary: Ken Gibson (Continuing in his office for another year)

Treasurer: Scott Storbeck (Continuing in his office for another year)

BOARD OF DIRECTORS CLASS OF 2014
Hugh Gallagher
Carolyn Riordan
Miles Hall
Tysie Whitman
(Hugh, Miles, Carolyn and Tysie are continuing as Directors.)

Jeffer Baer
Jeffer, originally from Chapel Hill, NC, is a cardiologist at Emory University. He moved to Atlanta in 2008 from Seattle. He has an interest in neighborhood development having lived in a variety of cities and towns including, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Berkeley and Seattle. Jeffer lives on Emory Circle with his wife Wendy and their three boys.

Vivian Bencich
Vivian lives on Clifton Road with her husband, John, and their young daughter. Originally from North Carolina, she has lived in Atlanta since 1988 and moved to Druid Hills four years ago. She has served as president of the Parent’s Association at the Glenn School for Young Children and currently volunteers on the auction committee at Paideia School. She is a 1992 graduate of Georgia Tech, is a registered interior designer and works at Square Feet Studio Architects which she founded with her husband eleven years ago.

Steven Cappel
Steven and his wife, Katherine Fritts, moved from New York City to their 1923 home on Fairview Road five years ago. They specifically sought a home in Druid Hills due to the neighborhood’s Olmsted pedigree and its designation as an historic district. Steven has an MBA from Columbia and is a former partner of Ernst & Young. Since 2003, however, and with thanks to Katherine’s encouragement, he has been able to pursue a passion: restoring old houses. The interest is not new; Steven holds graduate degrees from Yale in art history, with a specialization in nineteenth-century American architecture.

Tommy Greene
Tommy has lived in Druid Hills since 2006 and currently resides on Emory Drive with his wife, Harvin, and two daughters, Heathie (8) and Lula (5). He is the co-owner of Greene’s Fine Foods in Decatur and Greene Properties, Inc., a design/build company for 12 years which designs and builds subdivision entrances and amenity areas, as well as, outdoor living spaces and swimming pools for residences. His reason for getting involved with the DHCA is to help make our neighborhood sustainable for our children in the future.

BOARD OF DIRECTORS CLASS OF 2013 (Filling vacancies)
Thomas Winn (Returning board member)

Chris Hamilton
Christopher grew up in a historic Geneseo in upstate New York. He graduated from Rochester Institute of Technology and began his career in Connecticut as an industrial designer. He designed everything from furniture, medical equipment to children’s toys. After relocating to Atlanta in 1996, he and his business partner founded Dovetail Craftsmen, a renovation company specializing in historic homes. Chris strives to design these renovations to suit modern families while maintaining the integrity of Atlanta’s established neighborhoods. Chris and his family live in Druid Hills in a 1929 historic home that he has recently renovated.

BOARD OF DIRECTORS CLASS OF 2012 (Filling a vacancy)
Joanna Stroud (Returning board member)

Community concern continues over the presence and impact of coyotes in our neighborhood. (See email below for one example.)
This meeting will include a brief review of similar concerns in other communities (nationally and locally), and what they are doing about coyotes. Wildlife specialist and trapper Chip Elliot will share with us his knowledge and experience of 23 years. An update on establishing a central metro coyote reporting system will also be given.

Email received in early January:

I woke up in the night recently to terrible screaming and fighting sounds, and I ran barefoot into the backyard. A pack of coyotes was there — definitely 3-5 — and at least one had gotten into my neighbor’s barbed-wire pen of goats. A coyote was attacking them.

It was dark back there, but I screamed and yelled and chased them off. By the time I woke the neighbors and they checked on the goats, the biggest of the goats, who is about 60-70 pounds, had puncture wounds in her neck. But is amazingly ok. She obviously was defending the much smaller goats. My neighbor put up more barbed wire, but found the coyotes too persistent and had to send the goats back to the farm they came from, for fear they would be eaten.

I did file a report on the Decatur News page — but WOW — if they are willing to come into a backyard and try to take down a LARGE goat, after hopping over a 5-foot fence topped by barbed wire, there’s no reason to think they wouldn’t attack kids.

Jennifer Palese, Decatur

The meeting is being organized by Decatur resident Christy Bosarge (ckbosarge@gmail.com) and the Druid Hills Civic Association (contact: Bob Ballou — rcballou@bellsouth.net)

Here are the details:

http://www.atlanta.k12.ga.us/Page/413