How do we gauge “progress” without a vision, a plan and a process…

Wednesday nights’ Committee of the Whole council meeting was jam packed with action.  A joyful event kicked off the evening with promotions for three members of the Pottstown Police Dept.

CONGRATULATIONS  Captain Thomas, Sgt. Grimm, and Cpl. Long…

We have a new Police Chief at the helm, a new Captain, who is much revered among his rank and file and people in the community.  The officers who were promoted have demonstrated their commitment to Pottstown and we anticipate that their experience and enthusiasm will reflect in a more balanced approach, to include community policing, and streamlining paperwork that has become the bane of the officers.  

If the police are mired in paperwork then they’re not out on our streets patrolling and interacting with residents – where we most need their presence to be seen and felt.

Among people who know these public servants there is a sense of hope, renewal…

They have our confidence and it’s time to see those crime stats head, sharply, in the opposite direction.

Pottstown Police Dept. announces promotions

A presentation by Genesis Housing and Housing Visions for a proposed 43 unit, low-income, tax credit development in the old Fecera’s Warehouse on Beech St. was moved up the agenda.

You can read the ‘nuts and bolts’ of the proposal for Fecera’s in today’s Mercury News, by Evan Brandt:

43 apartments planned for Pottstown furniture warehouse

In nearly five years, among all the council meetings I have attended, I have never seen a more vocal – downright animated council asking poignant questions of the low-income housing developers.   Absent were Dan Weand and Carol Kulp.

“I’m still not sold,” Borough Council President Stephen Toroney said. “This is the same tax credit that was sought by the Pearl Group and that was for a 55-and-older community and people still came out and protested.”

“I’m not against it, but I have concerns,” he said.  

One of the most insightful comments of the evening came from President Toroney, in response to an admonition by the developers, that the property is failing quickly and has sprung a leak in the center of the roof that is causing water issues that are leading to mold issues.

I can’t quote him word for word, (notes were a bit hasty), but the jest of his reply was based on the fact that since they purchased the Fecera’s building in July, 2007 the current owners, Dave Chawaga and Bill Felton, have not had their “feet held to the fire” for codes violations – that have lead to the accelerated decline of the buildings structure.

That statement holds true for the vast majority of homes, buildings, and their owners in the core neighborhood and scatted elsewhere throughout Pottstown.  There is no impediment to stop owners from enabling their buildings to fall into blight through neglect and, no impetus to do better, except…

The laws have changed, and they have teeth.  In light of the powerful tools available to leaders of every municipality in Pennsylvania, granted to them in Act 90 the Blight and Reclamation Law and in the boroughs own ordinances…

It is inexplicable and inexcusable that the borough remains idle, limping along with an understaffed, under technolog-ized, undereducated codes department, while buildings crumble at an accelerated pace and become dangerous, public nuisances, such as the old Levengood Dairy in the photo below:

Photo by Karl McWherter

This fact of the deteriorating structure, alone, should NOT be the reason to favor a development whose impact on Pottstown needs to be carefully vetted and understood…

To this day, the leaders of the borough have developed and adopted no plan or vision for the future of the community.

We have no road map by which to gauge the best direction for Pottstown.  We’ve no reason to  be assured that this project – or any other development – compliments present goals and contributes to a comprehensive plan for the future of the borough, because there are no goals or comprehensive plans.

While the presentation by the two non-profit organizations was interesting, at times even compelling, in the end – in my judgement…

it served only to delineate the the overwhelming need for the elected officials to lead the way to implementation of a plan for Pottstown.

It is my opinion that Pottstown will remain vulnerable to opportunistic tax credit developers, extractive income investors, agencies that promote group homes for drug addicts and prison parolees, businesses and other enterprises that will not contribute synergy and excitement to High St. or the downtown area – until such time as we have carefully crafted, together, a path to follow that is comprised of the multitude of studies and plans that respected organizations have provided the borough, through the years, at councils request.

The most recent plans include:

Urban Land Institute Study “Transformation Strategies” of 2008, as well as the Economic Strategic Development Plan, by Gannett-Fleming, Inc. (the link to this plan is not functional likely due to the need to tweak the new website).

President Steve Toroney also said that this low-income development is not “magic,” (a reference from the ULI Study that called our leaders to the task of creating magic by the river).

Steve went on to say that the proposal for the Beech St. Lofts – as originally designed for owner/occupied condominiums – including artist space, cafe and retail was, in his opinion, “Magic”… I agree.

Here’s a link to the Beech St. Lofts Facebook page:

https://www.facebook.com/beech.streetlofts?fref=ts

On the basis alone, that council has not taken the first step to develop a plan, I oppose this development and all developments of such magnitude that can set Pottstown on an unplanned and uncharted course into the future.   

Until we posses the necessary tools to measure the viability of developments with established goals and objectives, (the balast in our vessel), we will remain adrift on the sea employing  ”trial and error” as the only means of keeping Pottstown afloat. 

With that said, it is important to note that the question of property taxes also arose at council,  as to future requests by Housing Visions to minimize or alter their taxes in any way.  They replied:  ”No”, there will be no such requests.

But, before tax dollar signs can dance their seductive poses before the eyes of the decision makers in the borough…

This article was posted on Facebook yesterday, it is a must read.  I believe if our council people cannot see their way through the forest, just yet, to understand the need for a plan and a process then, based on the information in the Lockport Union-Sun & Journal News, they should heavily weigh their decision against this information before agreeing to send a letter of support to the State for this project.  Pottstowns School Board would be wise to do the same:

DEVELOPMENT – HOUSING VISIONS

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