[Happy Villager]

We like having the gates but we wish it were a true gated community. We understand the fact these are county maintained roads so we have to have them open but why couldn't we take over the maintenance ourselves and close the road off to everyone but residents? I can see leaving Morris Blvd and Buena Vista open since they are thru roads but the road in individual villages should be private. We have read CDD 4 has talked about putting aside money in their budget to pay for road maintenance in case Sumter County doesn't have the revenue to do it. If I remember correctly they did put aside $29,000 in their general fund for this purpose but didn't want to have a separate line item for it. The Villages has a population larger than a good size City and can well afford to bid out the road maintenance. The threat that is used to keep the roads open is that FEMA won't help us if there is a major weather occurrence with major damage. I don't see other retirement communities opening their roads in the hope FEMA will come to their assistance. FEMA's response wasn't all that great in New Orleans.