Positive Governmental Vibes

I had an ambitious list today and got more than 80% of it done. Three list items involved government agencies!

I made contact with the Island’s county noxious weed department after some phone tag. Tansy Ragwort is growing on the property. Not a lot, but it is incumbent upon the property owner to irradicate the plants. It kills livestock. Each year I tear out the plants, bag them, and take them to the dump. I wanted a recommendation for a chemical control. I had a very informative conversation with Jason who let me know that the county would do the spraying for me!!! And they would assess the thistle population and spray for those too, at the right moment. I was all prepared to do this deed myself and am delighted to leave it to the pros!

Next up was the feds. I’ve decided to let go of my PO Box. Today was the last day I had access to it. Two of the three address change confirmations arrived at the house yesterday… As I handed in my keys to the gal who I’d talked to six months ago about this (and she remembered the conversation!), and expressed my concern about the third name variant, she assured me they’d all gone through. We had a delightful conversation, and I got two bucks back for handing in both keys 😂.

My final governmental interaction was with the state. I happened to be on our state’s department of revenue site a couple of weeks ago and was attracted to the “Click here to see if we have any of your money’ button. I did click the button, entered my parent’s names and found about $135. Long story, short, I called today to ask a very specific question. The incredibly kind lady I spoke with was able to combine the three claims into one and simplify the form I have to send back. I do have to upload rather a lot of documents, and a letter explaining a few things, the most significant thing being why I don’t have something like a utility bill in my father’s name at our address… Our address is listed for a couple of these claims. That’s easy… When I put their mainland house on the market, I forwarded his, and mom’s, mail from that house to ours. By then all the utilities were in mom’s name alone. I’ll dig around in the 2017 stuff just to make sure I don’t have what I need.