Neighbors, every street light in River Shoals now lives on one map. Open the Owners menu, press Street Lights, and there they are: all 44 lights we rent from Duke Energy, glowing in the color they really shine. Tap one to see what it is and what it costs. If it’s dark, you can report it and get it to Duke in about two minutes.

💡 Why bother? Because we pay for every one of them, lit or not

The lights belong to Duke. The HOA rents them, and that rent is one of our biggest bills: about $2,543 a month, a little over $30,000 a year, or about $5.75 a month from every home. Duke charges the same flat rate whether a light is burning or not, so a dark light still costs us about $1.90 a day and gives us nothing for it. The sooner Duke hears about it, the sooner we’re getting what we pay for.

🌙 What you’ll see

Each dot is a light. Orange ones are high pressure sodium (the warm glow most of our acorn lights give off); white ones are metal halide. A red ring means a neighbor has reported it, and a teal ring means Duke has been told and it’s waiting on them. The row of dots along the top is every light at a glance. The page even knows when the lights come on tonight and go off in the morning.

⏰ Report a dark light in two minutes

1. Tap the light on the map. You’ll see the nearest house, the kind of lamp, and what it costs us.
2. Choose It’s out (or Flickering, On during the day, Damaged) and press Report it.
3. Press Copy the details, then Open Duke’s repair map. Search the address the page gives you, request service, and paste. Everything Duke asks for is already written out, down to the GPS spot.
4. Come back and press I told Duke. Add Duke’s work order number if they gave you one.

That last step is the neighborly part. Once anyone tells Duke, the light shows it, so the next person walking the dog doesn’t have to report it all over again. If a neighbor already reported it, pressing I see it too adds your name instead of starting a second report. When it’s fixed, anyone can press It’s back on.

Case in point: the light at the Rio Grande Place entrance has been dark since October 14. Duke has it on a work order (number 64052403) with a promise to fix it within 15 days. The page keeps a running meter of what we’ve paid Duke for that light since it went dark. If Duke misses its 15 days, the page says so and makes it easy to nudge them again.

💰 Where the money actually goes

The The bill tab breaks it down from Duke’s own August bill. Here’s the surprise: only about 12% of the street light bill is electricity. The other 88% is rent on the poles, fixtures and upkeep. All 44 lights together use about 2,089 kWh a month, roughly what two homes use. You’ll also find the four kinds of light we have (29 sodium acorns, 5 sodium lights in a different fixture, 9 metal halide and one big 250 watt sodium head), and a little “What if Duke switched them to LED?” slider so you can see what that would and wouldn’t save.

🧭 Help us finish the map

Here’s something we learned building this: Duke’s own repair map only shows about four of our 44 lights. So we’re making our own. Lights pinned from Duke’s map are exact; the rest start as faded dots, our best guess along each street, and the Board is placing them pole by pole. You can help: if a light on the map isn’t where you know it stands, tap it and press Not in the right spot?, then tap where it really is. If there’s a light the map is missing, press A light is missing at the top of the map. The Board checks every suggestion and updates the map.

📱 Made for your phone

Spot a dark light on your evening walk? Pull it up right there on the sidewalk. The details slide up from the bottom, and the map stays in view.

👉 Go take a look

Sign in at rivershoals.org and press Street Lights on the Owners menu, or go straight to the street light map. Step by step instructions are in the owner’s manual. A downed line or a pole across the road is an emergency: call Duke at 800.769.3766, or 911.

Thanks for keeping an eye on our streets, neighbors. A well lit River Shoals is a safer one, and now it’s easier than ever to keep it that way. 🌟

Neighbors, welcome to the brand-new RiverShoals.org! Over the past months, your community website has quietly grown from a simple info page into a full owner’s portal — a place that knows you, works from your phone, and puts everything about living in River Shoals one tap away. Here’s a tour of what’s new.

🏠 A front door that knows you

Sign in once, check “Keep me signed in,” and from then on rivershoals.org takes you straight to your own owner’s page — no more wandering through the public site. And that page is genuinely yours: it greets you by name with an aerial photo of your own house as the backdrop, your profile picture, and a smart little strip that shows only what matters to you — the status of your ARC request, your pool-duty weekend, the next community event. More personalization (your own photos, custom backgrounds) is on the way.

💰 Your account, finally crystal clear

The My Account page now shows your household’s full picture at a glance: your dues status front and center, your complete statement history, and any notices that need your attention. If everything’s paid up, you’ll see a friendly green “in good standing — thank you!” If something’s outstanding, you’ll see exactly what and why — no surprises, no guessing. The board can also record approved payment plans right in the system, so anyone working through a balance is treated fairly and their access reflects it. Online dues payment by card is in final testing and coming soon — for now, please keep paying by check as usual.

🛠 Home projects without the paperwork

Planning a fence, a paint refresh, a deck? The ARC request now lives entirely online, and it’s honestly kind of fun: the form shows you the aerial photo of your property, and you can zoom in and draw right on it — circle the spot, sketch the fence line — then snap photos with your phone and attach them on the spot. You’ll get an email confirming receipt, you can track the committee’s review from “My ARC Requests” (with the 45-day response clock counting down in your favor), and photos now display right on the request so everyone’s literally looking at the same picture.

🏊 The pool, the clubhouse, and the good stuff

The clubhouse page has the full rental rundown — rates, the checklist, and the correct hours (7am–11pm, with your door code active the whole window). A new Pool Committee page lets volunteers sign up for weekend pool-check duty, see the whole season’s schedule, and even track who’s holding the pool keys — so “who has the key?” is never a group-text mystery again. (Want an easy way to pitch in for the neighborhood? Joining takes one click.) Pool fob and gate access info each have their own clearly marked pages, side by side.

📣 Actually staying in the loop

The Social Committee now has real tools to keep you posted: community announcements that appear on this News page, highlighted at the top of your owners menu, and (for the big stuff) on the homepage itself — plus email updates straight to your inbox and events posted to the shared Social Calendar. Add the Resident Forum, the For Sale marketplace, and “Ask the HOA,” and there’s no reason to hear about the fall festival after it happens ever again.

🗳 Your voice, counted

Community voting happens online now — secure, tied to your property, one household one vote, with results you can trust. Want to do more than vote? Applying to join the board or any committee is a two-minute form. The board reads every submission.

🔒 Quietly serious under the hood

You won’t see most of the security work, which is the point: modern password protection, optional two-factor authentication for your account, encrypted sign-ins, and a tamper-evident audit trail on sensitive actions. The whole site works beautifully on your phone — most of it was designed phone-first, because that’s where neighborhood life happens.

🧱 And for the board…

Behind the scenes, the board and committee volunteers got a serious upgrade too — a whole toolkit of, let’s call it cool stuff to manage: finances, rosters, committees, requests, and records, all organized and audit-logged. Less time wrestling spreadsheets, more time actually improving the neighborhood.

💛 Standing on strong shoulders

A heartfelt thank-you to Mike King, who built the original River Shoals website and the rock-solid foundation all of this stands on. Every new feature here is an extension of work he started.

👉 Go take it for a spin

Sign in at rivershoals.org, tick “Keep me signed in,” and poke around your new owners page. Spot something broken, confusing, or missing? Tell us through Ask the HOA or email the board — this website belongs to all of us, and it’s only getting better from here. Welcome home. 🎉