April 2017:

Signs of Spring are everywhere at Highland Meadows! The tree buds are beginning to open, and the grass is a lush and beautiful shade of green. 

We are also getting the butterfly garden ready for winged visitors! As a Certified Monarch Waystation, we are preparing to host monarchs and other butterfly species. There have been reports of monarch sightings in southern Kansas this April. Residents of Highland Meadows are encouraged to keep an eye out for the monarchs' Spring migration through Nebraska in the coming weeks and months.

 

December 2016:

Highland Meadows apartments was once again re-certified through the Crime-Free Multihousing Program by the Bellevue Police Department.

Highland Meadows first earned this honor in 2009.  We go through an annual inspection and re-certification. Highland Meadows is the only apartment complex in Bellevue, Nebraska to earn this certification from the Bellevue Police Department.

March 2016:

Highland Meadows' butterfly garden has been certified and registered as a Monarch Waystation by Monarch Watch.

This means that the garden provides milkweed, food, and shelter that will help sustain the monarchs during their migration in North America.



Summer 2015:

The butterfly garden at Highland Meadows was featured in the summer 2015 edition of Butterfly Gardener magazine. This magazine is published by the North American Butterfly Associaiton.

May 2011:

Highland Meadows Manager Margaret Stamp named "Partner of the Year" by Tobaccco Free Sarpy for her efforts at Highland Meadows.

Pictured from left, Tobacco Free Sarpy members and Property Manager Stamp: Hanneka Brown, Margaret Stamp, Joan Friedman, and Dorothy Shamblen.

April 2011:
Kudos to a Bellevue apartment complex for going smoke-free this year.

Members of Tobacco Free Sarpy in March presented a plaque to Highland Meadows Apartments of Bellevue for implementing a 100 percent smoke-free policy in all units as of January 1, 2011. 

Tobacco Free Sarpy presented Property Manager Margaret Stamp a certificate of appreciation for her leadership and support of a safe and healthy smoke-free environment.

Pictured from left, Tobacco Free Sarpy members and Property Manager Stamp: Hanneka Brown, Margaret Stamp, Joan Friedman, and Dorothy Shamblen. 

According to the Adult Tobacco Survey/Social Climate Survey, 85 percent of Nebraskans reported in 2009 that they smoking was not allowed in their homes. That was reported in the Data and Trends on Tobacco Use in Nebraska April 2010.

Because cigarette smoke drifts from apartment to apartment, smoke-free apartments are a great choice. Smoke-free apartments provide health benefits for residents and staff who work in them.  Smoke-free apartments also saves maintenance and rehabilitation costs.

Residents in multi-unit buildings cannot control if they are exposed to smoke caused by their neighbors. Smoke-free policies ensure that residents are protected from secondhand smoke.

Ventilation and air purifiers cannot completely control secondhand smoke. Experts like the Center for Energy and Environment, the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating, and Air Conditioning Engineers, and the U.S. Surgeon General have commented on the need to eliminate cigarette smoking rather than try to ventilate it.

 Bellevue Program Aims to Reduce Apartment Crime

Nov. 3, 2009
Meghan Youker

BELLEVUE (KPTM) — We know crime can happen anywhere, but police say many times, rental properties are an easy target.  Now a fresh effort in

Bellevue

is taking aim at apartment complexes and ways working together can keep the community safe.

From the Landings Apartments to the Southgate Apartments, property owners team up with

Bellevue police to reduce crime in their communities.  "We don't see a lot of crime here but we want to make sure that we never do," said Margaret Stamp of the Highland Meadows Apartments.

Recently,

Bellevue

police evaluated the apartments' security features.  "She took this all part to make sure our screws are long enough and checked our deadbolts, made sure they aren't easily broken into," Stamp said.

She is Jayme Krueger, community–policing coordinator for the Bellevue Police Department.

Krueger says simple things, like deadbolts, lights and trimmed trees and bushes, can go a long way toward making an area safe.  "Apartment complexes do get targeted.  Just because that is where criminals do tend to stay, but also because sometimes, they don't have good lighting, sometimes they don't have good landscaping," she said.

To get a "crime free" certification, apartments have to pass the inspection and do background checks on their residents, among other things.  "We check people to make sure that they're not a felon, sex offender, and their criminal background before they rent here.  And also this is letting them know that once they live here, they can't do anything illegal, or their guests," Stamp said.

Highland Meadows passed with flying colors, but still the complex is making a few minor changes.  "On the first floor, what we're doing now is offering dowels so that if they do decide to open their window a little bit in the summer that they can put a dowel here to keep so that if someone came in from the outside and slit this open, they can't just push this open all the way and get in," Stamp said.

An overall effort police hope will make a difference.  "We're not going to get rid of criminals completely, but we may move them on to the next community," Krueger said.  "Maybe that isn't the best way to look at it, but at least it's making it better for our neighborhoods and our citizens."

A total of eight complexes are currently working their way through the three–phase program.

Managers must also complete an eight–hour training class and hold a safety social for residents.  For more information on how to get involved, call Bellevue police at 293–3071.

BPD Program Helps Apartments Stop Crime

By Jason Glenn, Bellevue Leader

Dec. 30, 2009 

Sometimes preventing crime is as simple as changing a light bulb or trimming a hedge.

A group of Bellevue apartment managers is going through a Bellevue Police Department program aimed at cutting down on crime by making relatively small environmental changes that can produce big results.

BPD Community Policing Coordinator Jayme Krueger was certified this summer to conduct the Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design program in Bellevue. Currently, she is more than halfway through the program with managers for five area apartment communities – The Landings, Overlook Apartments, Southgate Apartments, Pheasant Ridge Apartments and Highland Meadows Apartments.

At the Nov. 23 City Council meeting, Krueger presented the managers of the five communities with graduation certificates for completing the first phase of the program. Highland Meadows has also gone through the second phase and was scheduled to have its safety social on Dec. 9 until a foot of snow forced its postponement to Dec. 22.

Krueger said the main reason the program was developed is that most criminals are opportunistic and move from place to place.

“The idea behind this is that we don’t want them putting down any kind of roots,” Krueger said.

Elements of the program include instruction for apartment managers on how to do background checks on all applicants, how to improve windows, doors, locks, lighting and landscaping, how to get owners more involved in overseeing their properties, and how to encourage residents to take control of their communities.

Krueger said the program is also designed to drive criminals not just from the apartment complex grounds but from the surrounding neighborhood as well. 

Margaret Stamp, manager of Highland Meadows, said she was grateful to get the BPD’s seal of approval for her apartment complex and added that if more apartment managers go through the program there will be fewer locations for criminals to operate in Bellevue.

“The farther we can keep criminals away from our property, the better,” she said.

Stamp said Highland Meadows already had most of the crime prevention measures in place when they started the program, including not renting to sex offenders or felons, and that their residents are vigilant about knowing what’s going on in their community.

Still, she said no place could be 100 percent safe and that the best way to combat crime is to be proactive.

“You can’t ever rubber stamp something as crime-free but what you can say is that an apartment community has done everything in their power to scare criminals away,” Stamp said.

The program is composed of three phases. The first phase is an 8-hour class that goes over all the preventative measures necessary for certification. The second phase is a security survey that assesses how well mangers and owners have implemented the measures. And the third phase is a safety social held at the apartment complexes in which managers inform residents about the changes and encourage them to get more involved in community safety.

Another important element to the program, Krueger said, is to have apartment leases with crime-free addendums that let residents know they can be evicted not only for committing a crime but also for having guests that commit crimes.