About Clay County, MO

Yes... GREEN is one of Staley High Schools colors along with black and silver.

But that's not what I was talking about when I said Staley High School was going GREEN... I meant Staley High School is the only school in the four-state region to adopt the green concept, and was one of the first in the country to register the school as a LEED-registered project.

The high school is the fourth high school in the North Kansas City School District located in the northern portion of the district.

All the classrooms have an occupancy sensor system. Which means the lights come on when someone enters and go off when everyone is gone. (What my mother wouldn't have given to have something like that when I was a kid.)

A good percentage of the from of the school is glass. But not any kind of glass, it's the kind that draws heat in.

The geo-thermal heating system is designed to store heat in the summer and use it in the winter.

Low-flow water system that reduces water usage by about 50% were installed in all the restrooms and elsewhere.

There's approximately eighty-nine million dollard of steel in the structure and most of it is recycled.

The large collections pond outside collects the rainwater and it will be used to water the landscaping.

There have been many families moving into the Staley High School boundaries, I myself have had requests for houses in the Staley area.

Here are other tid-bits that are listed on the Staley High School Website:

Have I ever told you my daughter loves music? She has a record collection and most of the contents were purchased at "The Music Exchange" here in Kansas City, Missouri.

Ron Rooks owned The Music Exchange and it was a fixture of Kansas City for decades.

There you would find my daughter in the store in Westport where she would finger through the albums and then after four or more hours would come home with the treasures she'd purchased.

Two years ago Ron passed away as he was setting up his shop after moving to the West Bottoms of Kansas City. He was found in his new shop listening to records.

My daughter says there wasn't anything Ron Rooks didn't know about music. Who sang it, who wrote it and when....... and besides that WHERE it was located in his 250,000 piece collection of albums.

There was an auction that started today for items that Ron referred to as "Americana."

I love a good auction, so I had to go..... with camera in hand.

Dressed in her "Vinyl Saved My Soul" t-shirt off we went to the bottoms and the second floor of 1413 West 13th Terrace.

In a very short time I saw a lifetime collection of Ron's "Americana" which I couldn't resist snapping shots of. You would not believe the wide array of items....... and I couldn't leave without my daughter having a little slice of memorabilia from "The Music Exchange."

The album sale starts next Wednesday....... and there she will be.

When we got home she asked me if she thought Ron was upset that all of his stuff was being sold. I told her I'm sure he was up in heaven watching and spinning records.

So we walked out of there with this great mirror that's engraved that says:

"Remember The Music Exchange"

and a good sized box of all these different pin-backed buttons that my daughter remembered him having at the store that include music, presidential candidates, silliness and rock stars (The Beatles, Duran Duran, Rollings Stones, etc.)

OH how I love Kansas City North.... and the many things it has to offer!

You see I grew up in Kansas City North... before 435.... before there was a Worlds of Fun or Oceans of Fun.... not quite back in the day of Jesse James but before there were what they called "four leaf clover hiways" at 435 and 69 Highway.

Back in the day when I would ride my horse from Claycomo to Randolph Rd without major highwways present.

I'd leave at dawn and return at dusk... and would have enjoyed an entire day of visiting classmates and friends along the way. Those were the days!

Long since past, Kansas City North still has lots to offer homeowers! Your choice of ranches, split entrys or atriums........ it's long been ear marked as THE place to live in Kansas City!

I was sitting on my deck going over a list of things i've jotted down for May blog topics... boy am I behind, it's JUNE! Time to get crackin'!

The weather here has blistering hot and humid which makes for great storm weather!

I'm sure you've heard about the devastating tornados that have his our area lately. The tricky tornado wasn't particular with it's distruction: businesses, restuarants, schools and homes.

The damage was eye opening and sad.

It made me think to blog about a couple of ways that we can make sure, as homeowners, we are prepared for disaster.

Do you re-visit your homeowners insurance policy each year to make sure that you have ample coverage in case of fire or tornado?

A quick conversation with your insurance agent could prevent you from being caught up in a nasty mess.

Another thing you can do is to take pictures of everything in your home and upload the pictures to one of the on-line photo storage sites like Flickr or Photobucket for safe keeping. Then should you need to access your pictures to make an inventory of your possessions they will be right there waiting for you from any computer.

Just a couple of ideas to help you be prepared.

If only money grew on trees...

Did your property tax assessment go up last year? Are you paying higher property taxes?

We have found that some homes are assessed at a higher value than what that home might sell for-some homeowners have taxes much higher than their neighbors. This not only costs you money in over-paid taxes, but may make your house harder to sell! We'd like to help you save money on your taxes by telling you how to contest the assessed value! If you would like complimentary information about the market value of homes in your neighborhood and the average assessed value of homes similar to yours, give us a call! We will guide you through the process. Deadlines are:

Platte County: -April 1st-April 30, 2008

Clay County: -April 1st-April 30, 2008

in Missouri

Tell your friends & neighbors. We can help them too!

Mary Richards 816-420-5060 direct /816-853-9698 cell/text Reece & Nichols Realtors maryrichards@reeceandnichols.com www.kcmoves.com