Have you looked around lately?

While reading The Acorn last week, I was stunned to see a letter which talked at great length about the beauty of Thousand Oaks, while bashing the look of our fair city. I couldn't help but wonder if they really bothered to look about as they drive between neighboring cities and Westlake Village.

The moment you enter our city several things become apparent. Westlake maintains its greenbelt and sweeps its streets more often. Westlake has far fewer potholes and better maintained streets than any of its neighbors. Westlake is constantly working to improve our streetscape.

With the same fieldstone used on our beautiful new advance street signs, bus stop benches, city monuments and similar stones used as we relandscape the roadsides with pleasing stone walls, I would say the city has a very consistent "look." Add to that the variety of plantings that have been put in and are continuously worked on with a large variety of flowers, trees and hedges--I cannot imagine how one could find our city anything but beautiful.

In regards to the comment that some new buildings do not fit in architecturally with the "look" of our village, I must say, "What?" The city has very strict standards on the style and color of buildings allowed here, as well as regulations regarding signage. The result is the pleasing palette of earth tones that greets the eye at every turn, with a nice balance of influences, from our Mediterranean red tile roofs to our more east coast-inspired buildings.

Our city embodies the beauty and mix of people and cultures that makes California such a wonderful place to live. So I encourage all of our residents to look around, appreciate and enjoy our beautiful village.
Karl Klessig
Westlake Village