The Sanatoga Post

Alliance logo.

LOWER POTTSGROVE PA – Former township Commissioner Thomas Troutman this week became one of the newest members of the Pennsylvania Energy Alliance, which promotes the use of nuclear energy as a clean, safe, reliable and affordable way to produce electricity.

Troutman’s membership was announced Tuesday (June 23, 2009) by the alliance via its account at Twitter, the popular online short-messaging service. Township Manager Rodney Hawthorne also joined the alliance earlier this year.

The alliance formed during January 2009 in response to 2008 polling done within the state to gauge residents’ feelings about nuclear energy generation. Not all who become members have their affiliation trumpeted on Twitter, but the group has done its best to promote its ties to individuals of significance in Pennsylvania business or politics.

Related:

• Hawthorne Joins Energy Alliance
• Limerick Nuclear Plays Role In Poll Results

Logo image from the PA Energy Alliance

Editor’s note: This story resulted from a tweet received at The Sanatoga Post’s Twitter account. Feel free to follow us on Twitter @jzlomek.

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New facade of the 422Corridor.com website, being used to promote the merits of a land use plan from King of Prussia to Reading.

POTTSTOWN PA – Advocates of proposals to institute driver tolls on U.S. Route 422, and use the revenues to pay for road and mass transit improvements that reduce the highway’s increasing congestion, have turned to high-tech tools to spread the word about benefits of their plans.

Avoiding daily back-ups like this on Route 422 is one goal of the DVRPC's proposed master plan.

Automatic e-mail campaigns, website make-overs, and the introduction of new discussion software all are intended to help spur the buzz for what Montgomery County (PA) planners and others hope will become widespread public acceptance of what they consider as inevitable: that users of 422 must – some day – pay for that privilege.

Tonight and tomorrow night, (Tuesday and Wednesday, June 23-24, 2009) however, drumming up support for various components of what is labeled as the U.S. 422 Corridor Master Plan will be more along the lines of personal interaction.

The Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission (DVRPC) earlier this year issued a master plan draft to mixed reviews. Now it’s holding a second round of sessions to solicit more comment on and fine-tune the document. Public attendance is welcomed at DVRPC open houses being held:

• from 6:30-9:30 tonight at the Pottstown Middle School, 600 N. Franklin St., Pottstown PA;
• and during the same hours tomorrow night at the Spring-Ford Area High School, 350 S. Lewis Rd., Royersford PA.

These events have been added to The Post calendar.

The master plan, proponents say, is intended as an outline to deal with various land use issues that begin in Valley Forge and King of Prussia, and stretch west along the four-lane highway to Reading and Wyomissing.

Explosive residential and commercial growth in the corridor during the past 20 years has planners peering anxiously ahead to the next 20. They suggest that a coordinated plan which looks at the corridor as a whole, rather than township-by-township, could forestall future traffic nightmares, preserve open space, and save energy.

Consequently, the plan is expected to cover regional, not just local, zoning and land development; automobile, bus and train usage and potentials; and, perhaps most importantly, how to cover the cost of implementing them. Imposing a toll on those who travel Route 422 is one possible source of funds, and has been a hot-button topic with some commuters since the idea was first floated.

Keeping the public aware of news about the plan, and encouraging supporters to convince others of its value, are driving the use of technology in DVRPC’s publicity efforts. Last week it distributed e-mails to those who previously expressed an interest in mass transit through the corridor, reminding recipients of the open house meetings.

Earlier this month it re-designed and re-launched a website, 422Corridor.com, to provide more information and statistics to demonstrate the need for the master plan. And the website uses social networking and chat software supplied by Ning Networks so that people can talk, argue, and attempt to convince others of why the plan should or shouldn’t proceed.

Related:

• Route 422 Toll Meetings Next Week
• 422 Repairs, Delays Start Tuesday
• 422 Proposal, Like Traffic, Creeps Ahead
• Got A Route 422 Idea? Time To Air It
• Train Service On The Front Burner Once More

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Pro volleyball contests can be found on both sides of Lower Pottsgrove.

LOWER POTTSGROVE PA – The township will be surrounded, it seems, by volleyball nets.

Two huge events in what was once considered just a summer beach sport are scheduled to occur within the next 32 days on Lower Pottsgrove’s western and eastern borders.

The 18th annual Pottsown Rumble Volleyball Tournament gets under way Saturday and Sunday (June 20-21, 2009) at the borough’s Memorial Park on King Street. It will be followed July 25 and 26 by another tournament at  Limerick Community Park, Swamp Pike and Ziegler Road. Both are professional-caliber contests expected to attract players from across the country.

• These events have been added to The Post calendar.

In Pottstown, The Rumble is a two-day doubles event billed as the toughest grass tournament in the nation. Along with competition at all tournament levels, it also offers fireworks, food and clothing vendors, an on-site massage therapist, and high-energy music throughout the weekend.

Players will vie for a total of $17,000 in prizes, with the largest prize of $4,000 in the men’s pro division.

The Rumble began in 1991 as a one-day event featuring under 200 players on 40 nets, organized by just three people. It now has an executive board of 12 volunteers and a workforce of 40 people. The event has grown over the years into a two-day tournament with 90+ nets and more than 1,200 players.

In Limerick, what is being billed as the 2009 “VolleyBrawl Tour” – jointly sponsored by the Norristown (PA) Crush, the Lititz (PA)-based Susquehanna Smash, and Baltimore’s KOG Volleyball teams – is a newer affair. It’s actually the second stage of a three-tournament event.

First-place finishers in each division of the VolleyBrawl series will win a prize package valued at more than $200 and the potential of free entry into the US Open volleyball tournament.

For more information on The Rumble, call 610-367-2779 or send an e-mail to the organization. For more information on the VolleyBrawl, send an e-mail to a team representative.

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LOWER POTTSGROVE PA – Just a week after the Pottsgrove School District Board of School Directors called upon the state to stop spending money on student exams it said Pennsylvania didn’t need and couldn’t afford, the Rendell administration did exactly as asked. Who knew the board’s members were so powerfully connected?

Not.

District offices on Kauffman Road, Lower Pottsgrove PA.

Some within Pottsgrove may indeed be well-hooked to the Harrisburg cognoscenti. But it’s unlikely the directors’ vote last week had anything to do with a decision by Education Secretary Gerald Zahorchak – reported Monday (June 22, 2009) in The Pittsburgh (PA) Post-Gazette newspaper – to temporarily shelve plans to create graduation competency exams for Pennsylvania high-school students.

Zahorchak wrote letters to the chairman of the Senate and House education committees, the newspaper said, which announced no money would be spent on test development for now. Zahorchak said he hopes to forge a consensus on the politically touchy subject.

“Some lawmakers were upset when Zahorchak’s department signed a $201 million contract to develop the tests before they approved a testing method,” an Associated Press report noted. However, it added that work may proceed on other contract provisions, including development of a model curriculum, teacher training, and tools to monitor student progress.

Legislators weren’t the only ones angry about the so-called Keystone Exams. School district officials and boards across the state were up in arms about both their high cost and the diversion of state education funds many thought should have been put into local programs.

Pottsgrove school board members wanted to be counted among that group. Director Robert Lindgren, during the board’s regular meeting last Tuesday (June 16, 2009), distributed a draft resolution to his colleagues that put the Education Department on notice of their opposition. It was unanimously approved with little discussion.

Administration officials have argued that the tests currently used in many school districts’ tests aren’t adequate.

Related (to the Pottsgrove School Board meeting of June 16):

• What It Takes To Run A School District
• Store Opens At Upland; District Anticipates Revenues
• District Honors Retiring Teachers

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LIMERICK PA – Not to be outdone by Lower Pottsgrove (PA) Township, its municipal neighbor to the west, the Limerick (PA) Township Parks and Recreation Department has scheduled three free musical concerts for Sundays in July and August at Limerick Community Park, Swamp Pike and Ziegler Road. On the agenda are:

• July 26, 6 p.m., Barbone Street Jazz Band;
• Aug. 2, 6 p.m., Red Hill Jazz Band, sponsored by Phoenixville Federal Bank and Trust; and
• Aug. 23, 6 p.m., Flower Power Band, sponsored by Ambler Savings Bank.

These events have been added to The Post calendar.

For more information, call the department at 610-495-6432, Ext. 150

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It's costlier if it gets this far.

SANATOGA PA – Lower Pottsgrove‘s solicitor also has become its bill collector of last resort, and the township Board of Commissioners earlier this month approved a fee structure that ensures whoever catches up with delinquents is adequately compensated.

Commissioners on June 1 (2009), during their regular twice-monthly meeting, unanimously approved a township ordinance that sets fees which can be collected by attorneys working on Lower Pottsgrove’s behalf in attempting to collect delinquent taxes, liens, fines, penalties or other past due payments.

Having done that, the board immediately turned to Solicitor R. Kurtz Holloway and his law firm, Wells Hoffman Holloway and Stauffer of Pottstown, and asked them to pursue a portfolio of outstanding amounts.

“Kurt, you collect us some money here,” board President Bruce Foltz said as he officially signed the ordinance into law. “We’ll do our best,” Holloway responded.

The law allows any attorneys – not just Holloway – assigned by the township for collection duties to charge those being pursued $125 per hour spent in the process. The additional costs would “pass through” and be tacked onto the amounts being collected, and would not be directly paid by Lower Pottsgrove, township Manager Rodney Hawthorne said.

Township resident James Prendergast, 1304 Walnut Ridge Estates, during an earlier meeting on the matter pressed Holloway to estimate how much time on average an attorney might spend to collect an outstanding account. “I’d only be guessing, and I won’t do that,” Holloway responded, noting that some of those who owe reply immediately to an attorney’s letter, and some don’t.

Prendergast, who is running for election to the board in November, later indicated outside the meeting he considered the $125 hourly fee excessive compared to debt collection costs of firms other than lawyers.

Hawthorne reported the list of amounts owed to the township now totals tens of thousands of dollars, with its own collection attempts yielding only limited success.

Related (to the Lower Pottsgrove Commissioners’ June 1 meeting):

• Chief’s Concern: Daytime DUIs
• New Equipment Highlights Fire Report
• State OKs Police Consolidation Study
• Keeping Their Eyes On The Pump
• Bateman Trail Cut Into Open Space
• Township Reconsiders Charitable Donations
• PennDOT Set For Meeting On Bridge Work

Photo by Clipart.com

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The popular Bill Koss Combo is the opening act of Lower Pottsgrove (PA) Township's Sanatoga concert series.

SANATOGA PA – The annual free Summer Concert Series of the Lower Pottsgrove (PA) Township Parks and Recreation Board launches this Sunday (June 28, 2009) at 6 p.m. in the band shell at Sanatoga Park, 200 S. Sanatoga Rd., with the return of what board members say is a perennial crowd-pleaser: the varietal music of the eight-piece Bill Koss Combo.

• These events have been added to The Post calendar.

Township residents and their guests are invited to “bring the family, and a beach blanket or chair, and enjoy a night of family-friendly concerts under the stars.” No reservations required. The concerts are sponsored by Exelon Nuclear’s Limerick Generating Station.

Also scheduled for later in the season are:

• July 12 – Barbone Street Jazz Band, world-class jazz musicians specializing in jazz and swing of the 1940s and 1950s;
• July 19 – Flamin’ Dick and the Hot Rods, ’50s and ’60s Rock ‘n Roll party band;
• July 26 – The Mango Men, beach and Jimmy Buffet-inspired band;
• Aug. 1 – The Left Edge, classic rock band;
• Aug. 9 – Ernie and Neal, a kids’ band; and
• Aug. 16 – The Pottsgrove Community Band, local community band.

In case of rain, concerts will be re-scheduled for the following Monday at 7 p.m. To find out if an event has been re-scheduled, visit the township website or send an e-mail, or call (610) 960-1314 after 5 p.m. the scheduled day of the event.

Photo from the Bill Koss Combo

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Erin Zlomek.

PHOENIX AZ – Erin E. Zlomek, formerly of Sanatoga and a 2002 graduate of Pottsgrove High School, was the gold medalist Sunday (June 21, 2009) in two swimming events held at Arizona’s Grand Canyon State Games. Zlomek finished first in her age group in both the 50- and 100-yard backstroke.

When she was a Pennsylvania resident, Zlomek competed for teams at the Pottstown (now Freedom Valley) YMCA and former Sunnybrook pools. She has lived in Phoenix since 2006, where she is an economic development reporter for The Arizona Republic newspaper. She holds bachelor’s degrees in journalism and Spanish from Virginia Tech.

The Grand Canyon State Games are the Arizona equivalent of Pennsylvania’s Keystone State Summer Games, which will begin late next month. Both are multi-sport Olympic-like events for contestants of all ages and abilities.

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