10 Questions about The Villages - 10QV
 

10QV First Episode - Guest - Richard Baier, District Manager

10QV Episode 1 - Richard Baier - YouTube

10QV is a new video series designed to inform, enlighten, and educate viewers about The Villages, its inner working, and its future. Each episode will feature influential and knowledgeable individuals from The Villages and surrounding community. I’ll ask ten questions about issues pertaining to The Villages, recent or upcoming events, or many of the myths and urban legends about this unique community. Intermixed with the interviews will be aerial footage and photographs of the areas of The Villages discussed.

In this episode Mr. Richard Baier, the District Manager for The Villages is interviewed; he answers questions about “the district”, its staff, funding, PWAC, the relationship with the developer, and the growth of The Villages and how these are impacting the residents.

See the YouTube video description for direct links to each of the questions and a full description.

I hope you enjoy it.

And yes, the construction update videos will still be coming out.

Excellent work. Thank you so much. You asked some hardball questions, but did so diplomatically. That's a real talent. Let us all know which interview subjects you have in your sights.

:ho: A tip of the hat to you Sir. Your continuing efforts to inform, enlighten, and educate us residents is really appreciated by my household. Thank you!

Boy is that a lot to digest. Great job. I love how you broke the timeline into segments with titles. Now if I want to refer to a certain topic/question I can just just slide along the time bar and go right to the information I want..

Well done. It’s enlightening to see and hear from those that manage the purse strings. In your questioning you encouraged an open discussion regarding the operation of our hometown. Hopefully, due to your site’s visibility and the regard we have for you, this information will be absorbed into the general knowledge of we Villagers. Thank you for all your efforts.

Thanks for the feedback. The goal is to be fair and honest, my only agenda on these is truth and facts. Sorry it was so long, Mr. Baier was a wealth of information and only a few minutes were edited from the entire interview. I pushed hard to get it out today, Sunday's are one of the best viewing days for YouTube. The next episode will have a little more heads up.

As far as who is next, I have several people in the works and I'll announce them in the very near future. If you have specific people you'd like to hear from or questions you want answers to straight from the horse's mouth, let me know.

Very informative and excellent questions. Regarding lack of public participation in board meetings, the complicated structure of The Villages government is very confusing compared to town I lived in NJ where town meetings were well attended usually. I did not even know the board had monthly meetings in CDD 6 where we live or that our board members were elected on the general ballot. These videos will be an excellent educational resource. Wish the videos had subtitles for hearing impaired.

In the bottom right of the video window click the little (CC) icon. That turns on Closed Captioning. It might move a little fast but you can always hit pause to give yourself a little extra time to read.

Thanks. Going to watch it again with captions as I missed some parts.

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:ho:

Thanks Don. Great job!

Don. Excellent work, as always! I think you covered a lot of great topics, and questions. I do have one question to ask, that I will ask on a PM. Thanks!

Thanks. Signed up for notifications. Once covid is over will start attending and might join the ARC

Thanks for posting this interview. It contains information that is very helpful to us, as new residents.

Great job Don!!! Question, is there any way to find out if there is any future plans to modify the Warm Springs bridge to accommodate golf cars? Would be great to know if this a possibility. Thank you very much.

For those of us who are yet there, plus I would imagine for many who have purchased but don't really understand all of the complicated nuances of The Villages, you've done a great service. Thank you.

Great idea - great job. I wish this could be expanded especially during this pandemic when most of us have more indoor tube time. Video sessions of new resident classes, good golf school, etc. not only would be interesting but perhaps reach more people quicker and help ease some of the local misconceptions.

While expanding what I am doing would be a great idea, I already have enough going on with the construction videos, my business contracts, and now 10QV to keep me busy just about every day of the week. One has to have a little time to attempt to play golf, no matter how poorly I do it.

I hope that 10QV will put to rest a few of the misconceptions about the community we all live it that many of the residents may have. It's doubtful that I'll placate any of the Villages haters or anti-developer crowd that haunt this and other websites. As the show continues and I try to discredit some of the popular urban myths, I have little doubt that these curmudgeons will turn more of their vitriol onto me as the show won't fit their disgruntled agenda. It's already started on my YouTube page comments, to disagree and civil discourse is one thing and I'll entertain these comments, the vile and disrespectful comments, and personal attacks I simply delete.

Great video Don. Lots of useful information. Kudos to you for stepping up and serving in The Villages government. So glad you have your YouTube channel.
:bigbow:

I totally understand how busy you are. I didn't mean to pile more on "your" plate. I'm just wondering why TV can't put out videos instead of having to wait for openings in their classes. Surely someone recorded a session of good golf or resident academy that can be dusted off. Worst case record the next session.

Fair enough. So my question to you is which TV (The Villages) are you talking about?

The Villages the developer - they have nothing to do with the recreation activities, they own the facilities south of SR44 but these are operated by the Recreation Department

The Villages the District Government - this isn't in the budget to record these things, so if we want to do this then there will be additional costs which has to come from somewhere, that will be the Maintenance Assessment that has to be raised to support this.

The Villages the Recreation Department - again, this isn't in the recreation budget and we just can't raise the amenity fee any time we want (See the video The Amenity Fee (part 2) and The Villages 8-17-20 Construction Update - YouTube - bookmarked at the point of discussion) so the only way to fund this would be cut something else, any suggestions?

If the information was posted by the District or Rec Department that would incur additional technology costs not budgeted for, so again the money would have to come from somewhere.

The Villages the community - this is you, I, and everyone else living in The Villages, this is the only real source of resources to accomplish such as task and then these efforts could be posted on YouTube or a social media website - these are free, but the user must endure commercials.

So, the pejorative "they" or in this case "The Villages", comes down to "us", the residents. "We" can make this happen if "We" want it to. Is it a good idea? No, it's a GREAT IDEA!

While I don't have the bandwidth to make this happen myself, I am very willing to share my knowledge and experience with individuals willing to pick up the yoke and make this good idea happen. If someone out there would like to take the challenge, they can contact me directly and we can get things rolling for the good of all the residents.

They is whoever run these classes today. According to your post (I have no reason to doubt you) is us. Thus us is doing it today without turning a camera on or Zoom or the like. How much more would it cost US to add/enhance this feature. In the scheme of things I suspect it wouldn't put a very big dent into any budget however I am very well versed on the term creeping elegance.

I am proud that NSCUDD and District Staff have provided many video presentations that give Villagers in depth knowledge of our operations. I enjoy Dons efforts to educate others and would hope that other entities in the Villages would step up their efforts to do the same.

Advanced Wastewater Treatment - Storm Water Management – Solid Waste Management

view here -> District Workshops

Rick Rademacher
NSCUDD Board Member

I attended the residents academy years ago. As part of that workshop we toured a waste treatment plant and a fire station. What an eye opener. You walk away with why can't other forms of government run this effiencienty. For the benefit of the us the ones flipping the bill. I ignore the naysayers who know it all around here but never invested a minute to get educated but somehow they know it all.