Say Good-bye to Police Chief Rick Drumheller

Photos by Evan Brandt

Pottstown Police Chief Rick Drumheller was all smiles after announcing that he will retire in July, 18 months earlier than expected.

Drumheller got the best kind of goodbye from
Pottstown Mayor Stephanie Henrick last night.

In case you weren't online last night, or checking my Twitter feed on your phone (and why not?!?), you may not know why this man is smiling.

Police Chief Rick Drumheller announced he is retiring 18 months sooner than everyone expected. His last day will be on July 6.

I will miss him.

From what I could see, he was a gentle soul for a police chief and truly cared about the community where he worked for 30 years.

And he had the nicest way of telling you he wasn't going to tell you anything whenever I asked him about a crime investigation he wasn't ready to talk about.

He doesn't have a new job lined up, or a problem at work. He said "I just know in my heart its time."

Click here to read the Mercury story I wrote last night.

The other significant news event from last night's meeting is the consideration of a resolution from Pottstown Borough Council opposing the planned YMCA closure in June.

Council will join a number of government and community organizations opposing the closure, including Pottstown School Board, the Pottstown Metropolitan Area Regional Planning Committee, the Pottstown chapter of the NAACP and, perhaps as soon as next week, the Pottsgrove School Board.

Also weighing in was Don Smale, a member of the task force Philadelphia Freedom Valley YMCA put together to make recommendations for easing the closure and finding new homes for the programs -- but specifically instructed NOT to recommend keeping it open.

Here is video of what he had to tell council:



Council President Dan Weand said he went through a similar experience when an Ohio-based company bought Stanley Flagg Brass in West Pottsgrove.

"They mismanaged it, ran it into the ground but kept taking the money out of it and sending it back to Ohio. Then, when they had failed to invest in any upgrades at the plant, they said 'well, you don't make money anymore, so we're closing you down,'" said Weand.

"We called it mining for gold by the executives. This is the same scenario I'm seeing out of Y," he said.

Council will vote on the resolution Monday.

Of less immediate, but perhaps no-less--important significance was the naming of four people to to the board of the newly created Pottstown Land Bank.

They are Cheryl Chiarello, who also serves on the Pottstown Blighted Property Review Committee; Twila Fisher, who head's The Hill School's Hobart's Run initiative; Deb Penrod, a member of the Pottstown Planning Commission and the board of the Pottstown Regional Public Library and Andrew Monastra, a local attorney and member of the Pottstown Downtown Improvement District Authority.

And with that, I'm headed to bed.

Here are the Tweets and videos from the meeting: