Garage Bids Rejected, No Tax Hike, Insect Invaders

Township commissioners made it official Monday night, rejecting all bids for the new $2 million public works facility at Heather Place.

Commissioners Chairman Elwood Taylor cast the only no vote.

He said characterizations of him being disappointed by the outcry from the Oct. 2 meeting at which many residents spoke out against the project were inaccurate. He said the township had been exploring the issue for many years and this was the outcome and he supports the process.

Nevertheless, Taylor said he looks forward to the alternatives produced by a committee of residents who volunteered to look into the matter.

Discussion of the township budget also indicated that in its current draft form, no tax hike is anticipated, although there was some spirited discussion about the annual cost of sewer service, voiced mostly by the audience.

And our friends in the insect family are really bugging folks in Upper Pottsgrove.

Township Manager Carol Lewis said the township is receiving lots of complaints about the invasive species spotted lantern fly, which comes here by way of Korea and is a danger to trees.

Commissioner France Kazalkovich, who lives in a townhouse development said "I have exactly one tree on my property, and it was covered from top to bottom with these things."

State Sen. Judy Schwank, D-11th Dist., will hold a hearing on this threat on Wednesday, at 9 a.m. and the hearing will be livestreamed on her web site (click here).

In the meantime, Lewis is pursuing a PECO grant to replace the ash trees on public property the township is expected to lose (those that were not harvested for lumber) to another invasive insect, the emerald ash borer.

Before I release you to revel in the live Tweets from the meeting, I would be remiss if I did not share a new term Township Solicitor Charles D. Garner Jr. invented, which talking about the intersection of the zoning ordinance as it relates to farm animals, and the animal control ordinance adopted this year -- "horse densities."

Evidently it relates to a "horses-per-acre" ratio, and not a measure of how dense your horse may be.

And without further ado, here are the Tweets:

There Can Be Only One (Tax Collector That Is)

Diane DeLong

Four folks put their hat in the ring to be the township's tax collector for two years.

But, as the headline (and the Highlander series) tells us: There Can Be Only One!

And the one is Realtor Diane DeLong, who was chose by a 3-2 vote over former Township Commissioners Renee Spaide, Robert Binelli and David Mull.

Commissioners France Krazalkovich, John Bealer and Herb Miller supported DeLong while Commissioners Chairman Elwood Taylor and Commissioner Martin Schreiber, backed Spaide.

The other two candidates did not receive any votes.

Both Spaide and DeLong arrived with supporters in tow, but although Spaide had more at the meeting, DeLong had more where it counts, up at the board table.

When that was over, the board handle a number of routine matters, but in a very lengthy fashion.

They included their continuing efforts to deal with the damage being done by the invasive emerald ash borer, an update on activities at the Althouse Arboretum as well as a review of how the township's finances are structured.

You can find it all here in the fascinating Tweets from the meeting:

Out With the Old, In With the New in Upper

Photo by Evan Brandt

Outgoing Township Commissioner Russ Noll, right, congratulates his replacement, France Krazalkovich, who was unanimously appointed to Noll's seat until the end of the year.

We can't say it came as a surprise.

Longtime Commissioner Russ Noll, who has been on the board for about 15 years, resigned his his last night.

Noll announced in June that he would be resigning, but held off until he sold his house last month.

(Here is video of him reading his resignation letter, in which he gave a shot to the school district, saying rising school taxes are one of his reasons for leaving.)



After Noll finished and the commissioners voted to accept his resignation, an obviously prepared Commissioners Chairman Elwood Taylor presented Noll with a plaque of appreciation for his years of service and read off some of the accolades he has received over the years.

Here is the video of that:



Equally unsurprising was the immediate unanimous appointment of France Krazalkovich to fill Noll's seat until the end of the year.

Krazalkovich, a Republican area leader, sought and won a line on the Republican ballot in May and will be running for his own four-year term in November.

Presuming he wins, Krazalkovich will step down at the end of the year from Noll's seat to assume his own.

The remaining two years on Noll's seat will be filled in November, most likely by someone who runs a write-in campaign.

I wonder of Commissioner Renee Spaide, who was the odd-candidate-out this year for Republican reelection endorsements, will run to fill the remaining two years of Noll's term.

There was no love lost between Spaide and Krazalkovich over the way things shook out during the Republican endorsement season, but she did vote for him Monday night.

Perhaps all is forgiven -- or isn't.

In any case, we'll know when it happens

Monday's meeting also featured presentations by Pottstown Regional Public Library Director Susan Davis as well as John Cover and Donna Fabry from the Montgomery County Planning Commission.

The meeting was rounded out by a very interesting discussion on the invasive pest, the emerald ash borer and the devastating impact it is having and will have on the township's ash trees.

I'll be writing more about that later I think.

That said, here are the Tweets from last night's meeting.

I Think that I Shall Never See...

Thinking of spring, and these blooming callery pear trees on Beech Street, as the cold winter winds blow.

Trees are among the oldest life forms on this planet.

And whether for its spring time flowering, the initials carved in its bark, or its willingness to host your tree house, almost everyone has a favorite tree.

But did you know they are also helping to keep you alive?

This revelation came to me courtesy of Pottstown resident and arborist Alan Jensen-Sellers, who posted a link on Facebook to an article in The Atlantic magazine.

The article had the tantalizing title: "When Trees Die, People Die," 

The Emerald Ash borer is about the size of a penny, but its impact

is huge.

It explored the link discovered between the mass reduction of the tree population by the invasive Emerald Ash Borer and an increase in cases of heart disease in areas where the insect has struck.

Here is the core of what was found:

When the U.S. Forest Service looked at mortality rates in counties affected by the emerald ash borer, they found increased mortality rates. Specifically, more people were dying of cardiovascular and lower respiratory tract illness -- the first and third most common causes of death in the U.S. As the infestation took over in each of these places, the connection to poor health strengthened.

You can read a copy of the study here.

This is a case of a benefit being proven by its absence, which I like to call the "Joni Mitchell Effect," Re: (Don't it always seem to go, you don't know what you've got till its gone...)

Certainly we all know that trees produce oxygen, which we need to live, and take in and store carbon dioxide, which is also a good thing.

They also act like giant cilia in the lungs of the world, filtering out air pollutants.

For example, the trees of Rock Creek Park in Washington, DC remove 63,500 pounds of ozone-forming pollutants each year, which has an annual value of $285,000.
This again from The Atlantic:

The Forest Service put a 3.8 billion dollar value on the air pollution annually removed by urban trees. In Washington D.C., trees remove nitrogen dioxide to an extent equivalent to taking 274,000 cars off the traffic-packed beltway, saving an estimated $51 million in annual pollution-related health care costs.

We also know that trees perform something called "storm water services."

What this means is that when it rains a lot, which is happening more and more thanks to global warming, trees absorb an amazing amount of water.

This saves us money.

How? Well the more water trees absorb, the less we have to deal with in storm drains, damns and stormwater containment basins.

Urban forests can reduce pollution and stormwater run-off.

A single mature tree can absorb up to 100 gallons of water, releasing some through evapo-transpiration and some back into the ground more slowly.

According to the U.S. Forrest Service, urban trees can reduce stormwater run-off, a pollution problem that is expensive to manage, by 2 to 7 percent.

And since planting trees costs less than building pipes and expanding wastewater treatment plants, cities like New York and Portland, Ore. are undergoing projects to plant thousands of trees as part of what is now called "green infrastructure.

What's my point? you may ask

Not much more than to point out that while trees can be a pain, making us rake their leaves, falling on our house or car in strong winds, rooting through our water or sewer lines, they have their good sides too.