The Sanatoga Post

Bursich offices on East High Street.

SANATOGA PA – Work by Bursich Associates’ engineers in surveying Collegeville PA property, on which the Wegman’s Supermarket at the Providence Town Center shopping complex was built, earned the firm its second consecutive award in the 22nd annual plat competition conducted by the Pennsylvania State Society of Land Surveyors, Bursich Director of Business Development Brian Fraley announced Wednesday (March 23, 2011).

Competition participants are judged by the society on the quality of their submitted plats, or plans, for a property that consist of maps drawn to scale and showing property lines, topography, streets and roads, and other information used by municipalities and contractors. Bursich won a similar award last year, also related to Providence Town Center.

“Receiving this award for two consecutive years is a testament to the quality of our surveying and drafting team,” said Dane K. Moyer, Bursich vice president of operations. “This is a great honor for all of us.”

Bursich is an engineering, planning, and land surveying firm founded in 1972 and headquartered on East High Street in Sanatoga PA. It specializes in road and bridge design, water and waste water facilities, land development, storm water management, high-definition laser scanning, and land surveying.

EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION WITH KIDS ITS GOAL – The first of several seminars scheduled at Pottsgrove Middle School, North Hanover Street, Pottstown PA, intended to help parents effectively communicate with their children, opened Wednesday night (March 23, 2011) with guest speaker and session leader Mark Good of Philadelphia. “Happy, Healthy, Safe and Kind: How to talk to your kids about anything,” is a three-workshop series targeting parents of children between ages 5 and 18. Other sessions are scheduled for April 6 and 27.

Photo for The Post by Aimee M. Herbert, Aimee Marie Photography

POTTSTOWN PA – An architectural firm’s failure to add electrical wiring for computer stations at the center of the library in the still-being-built Ringing Rocks Elementary School, and to plug in the scoreboard in its gymnasium, is costing the Pottsgrove School District more than $13,000 in construction change orders.

Message sign outside Ringing Rocks Elementary School.

The extra expense was unanimously approved Tuesday night (March 22, 2011) by the district Board of School Directors, but not without grumbling over what was described by Business Administrator David Nester as “just an omission.”

Directors conceded they would have had to pay for the necessary materials and installation costs had the library and gym power assemblies been included when drawings for the school expansion on Kauffman Road were final. But, for the library computers at least, directors expect the district to demand reimbursement from Lancaster PA-based Gilbert Architects of added costs they said taxpayers shouldn’t shoulder.

The library’s concrete floor has already been poured. A channel must be cut into it, conduit and wiring laid, and the floor re-sealed before the central station is operational.

Without the work, board President Michael Neiffer noted, “those computers are going to need really long-life batteries.” “And we’d have to have a battery-operated scoreboard, too,” director and board Secretary Philip Keogh said.

The cost of bringing electricity to the library unit was said to be $12,826. Powering up the scoreboard will cost far less, about $700, Nester reported. And yes, he added, the district is making a list of “these oversights” to bring to Gilbert’s attention and payment.

Several other change orders also were approved, almost all of them minor, according to Nester. Board member Jodi Adams was absent and did not vote.

The board’s agenda included an update on progress at Ringing Rocks, but Clerk of the Works Tom McGrady was unavailable for Tuesday’s meeting, district Superintendent Dr. Bradley Landis said. Instead, board members have been invited to arrive about an hour before the start of their April 26 meeting to tour inside the school construction zone.

“We’d like that,” Neiffer said.

Related (to Ringing Rocks Elementary School renovations):

• No Power For Ringing Library Computers ‘An Omission’
• Blasting A Possibility, But Not Yet, At Ringing Rocks
• Few Change Orders, So Far, At Ringing Rocks
• Rigs Arrive At Ringing Site To Drill Deep For Geo-Heat
• Exterior Demolition To Begin At Ringing Rocks
• Digging’s Done, Now Real Work Starts At Ringing
• Ringing Rocks Ground-Breaking Set For Thursday
• After Month’s Work, Pius Deemed Set For Ringing Pupils
• Ringing Rocks Bids Accepted, At $1.5 Million Less
• Final Words On Ringing Rocks: Okey-Dokey
• Ringing Rocks Gets Final Plan OK
• Borrowing Authorized For Ringing Rocks Project
• Pottsgrove Signs Pius Lease For Ringing Students
• Pottsgrove Authorizes Pius Lease For Ringing Relocation
• Call Goes Out For Ringing Rocks Construction Bids
• Board OKs Ringing Rocks’ Preliminary Plans
• School Vestibule Design OK; No Decision On Rocks’ Relocation
• Ringing Rocks Plan Approval Held Until May
• Ringing Relocation Decision Deferred Again
• Township Legal Move Saves District Time, Money
• Economic Tales, Exec Sessions, And Long Night At Pottsgrove
• Geothermal Now ‘Locked’ Into Ringing Re-Build
• How Estimated Costs For Ringing Shape Up
• Less Is More In School Project, Planners Learn
• Bids Sought For Ringing Project Asbestos Removal
• Ringing Relocation Decision Possible In Two Weeks
• Restaurant, Ringing Projects Win Conditional Uses
• Ringing Rocks, Restaurant Hearing Topics Tonight
• Pottsgrove Student Enrollment: Up? Yes. Down? Yes Again
• Green Discussion At Ringing Results In Red Faces
• Pottsgrove, Archdiocese Still Discussing Pius Lease
• Ringing Rocks Relocation Discussion Set For Tonight
• In The Ringing Rebuild, Whither Pius?
• Ringing Rocks Relocation Plan: Modulars At MS
• Ringing Rocks Construction Cost Hearing Tonight
• Planners OK Ringing Rocks Land Sketch
• District Sets Dec. 3 Hearing On Rocks Budget
• Pottsgrove Asks State Help To Pay For Ringing Re-Build
• As School Opens, Progress On Ringing Rocks’ Project
• Surprise Enrollment Spurs Demographic Interest
• District Assembles Ringing Rocks Planning Team
• District OKs Architect Negotiations
• Consensus On Ringing Renovations: $16M
• Ringing Rocks Proposals Aired Tuesday
• Ringing Rocks Re-Examined April 14
• Pottsgrove To Trust-But-Verify On Ringing Plans
• Ringing Rocks Plans Take Another Step
• No Shortage Of Ideas At Pottsgrove Meeting
• Weigh In On Pottsgrove Renovations
• Framing The Rocks Discussion
• Response Mixed To Pottsgrove Improvements
• District Invites Public For Study Results
• A Different Rocks, But Only As A Concept

Related (to the Pottsgrove Board of School Directors’ March 22 meeting):

• No Power For Ringing Library Computers ‘An Omission’

VISIBLY BETTER DIFFERENCE ON THE NORTH END – The appearance of the gateway corner at North Charlotte and Mervine streets on Lower Pottsgrove (PA) Township’s west side (above) has taken a dramatic turn for the better. A combination of township pressure, area residents’ outrage, and a new real estate broker’s interest in finding a buyer for the former Citgo gasoline station, 1258 N. Charlotte St., has resulted in removal and clean-up of several unsightly elements outside. Six-foot-high piles of what once was gasoline-contaminated soil, and from which weeds and even a tree had begun growing, have been leveled and removed (below). A broken and fallen, and then partially disassembled, pole sign is gone too. Glass and other debris that littered the entrances to the property has been swept up. The corner’s not yet perfect, its neighbors say – they’d like to see a new business there, or have the property merged into that of the North End Shopping Center on its east side – but most agree the place looks far better than it did seven months ago. That’s when the township Board of Commissioners began exploring legal options to condemn and seize the parcel. Commissioners earlier declared conditions at the site an emergency safety hazard.

Related:

• Life’s Less Unsightly At Infamous Township Corner
• Legal Research Sought For Seizing Old Gas Station
• Light Pole Topple Further; Removal Due Soon
• Township Declares Fallen Light Pole A Hazard
• Township Explores Seizing North Charlotte Property
• Charlotte Street Lot Condition Frustrates Board
• Corner Attracts Commissioners’ Attention

PREPARING FOR THE SEASON’S START – Young lacrosse players (above) who are members of the Pottsgrove Falcons Lacrosse Club took practice Tuesday night (March 22, 2011) in the southwest parking lot outside Lower Pottsgrove Elementary School, 1329 Buchert Rd., Pottstown PA. Coach Kris Gucwa (right) and several other coaches and parents were on hand to oversee and teach new moves and field strategy, and offer plenty of encouragement, to the competitors of all ages. Registration for the club’s U9, U11, U13, and U15 teams was held last December (2010). Now they’re getting ready for games scheduled to begin in early April, and continuing through June. The tams are a regular sight during weeknights at the Lower Pottsgrove school, but games are scheduled to be held on The Hill School fields at 860 Beech St., Pottstown.

THINK OF THEM AS ECONOMIC ENGINES – Bright blue, wheeled recycling bins issued to property owners in Pottstown PA lined the sidewalk Tuesday morning (March 22, 2011) on North Washington Street, awaiting pick-ups from the borough’s recycled materials hauler, J.P. Mascaro and Sons of Norristown. Recycling not only helps reduce the waste stream, according to the state’s Recycling Industries Congress, but it also employs about 52,000 people across Pennsylvania in collection, reuse, and remanufacturing businesses for a total annual payroll of about $2 billion. Annual gross sales of recycling-related goods and services top $20 billion a year, it added. The congress, which consists of business owners involved in waste collection and recycling, announced the statistics as it met last month in the Capitol East Wing Rotunda in Harrisburg.

SANATOGA PA – A local company called Smith Lignelli LLC, whose principals include physicians of Pottstown Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery Associates Inc., has won preliminary land development approval from the Lower Pottsgrove (PA) Township Board of Commissioners to construct a professional office building on one of the remaining open lots along Heritage Drive in Sanatoga village.

Solicitor R. Kurtz Holloway during an earlier Lower Pottsgrove board meeting.

Board members unanimously approved the project for medical offices on land at the west side of Heritage, across the street from Cappelletti Pinter and Co., during their March 7 (2011) meeting. The pad site was initially planned for a restaurant that never materialized, Assistant Manager Alyson Elliott said. President Jonathan Spadt was absent and did not vote.

Following the decision, Solicitor R. Kurtz Holloway repeated his intention, first announced in January, to voluntarily remove himself from the possibility of representing either the township or Smith Lignelli in future discussions on the project. Members of the surgical team have previously been clients of his firm, Holloway said, raising the potential for a conflict of interest.

The project had been approved previously, but was returned to commissioners for review because of minor changes in parking, lighting and landscaping features, Elliott said. The board accepted all revisions.

Holloway suggested Pottstown attorney David Allebach be employed as alternative counsel on which the board can rely to represent its interests, he said, at rates no higher than what Holloway’s firm charges the township. Commissioners agreed.

Allebach will guide the township on matters regarding future development and financial security agreements with Smith Lignelli. As usual, Holloway added, those costs are attributed to the developer, so the township can expected to be reimbursed in part for Allebach’s work.

Related:

• Commissioners Approve Heritage Drive Office Plan
• Potential Conflict Causes Township Solicitor To Opt Out

Related (to the Lower Pottsgrove Board of Commissioners’ March 7 meeting):

• Commissioners Approve Heritage Drive Office Plan
• Buchert Ridge Added Sewer Capacity Gets Board OK
• Proof Lower Pottsgrove Loves You: Tax Bills In Mail
• Emergency Team Took What February Threw At It
• Board Orders Long-Delayed Drain Repairs … Or Else
• Commissioners Again Reject Boulevard Name Change
• To Those Who Dug Out, Lower Pottsgrove Salutes You
• Commissioners Approve Park Trail Bid Advertising
• Sprogels Run Park Project On Commissioners’ Agenda

POTTSTOWN PA – By order of an inner driving force, something he cannot fight, Philadelphia area resident Dennis Ryan is a conceptual fine artist who paints, draws and prints about topics others usually won’t go near: psychological disorders – anxiety, phobias, depression – with a primary focus on obsessive compulsive disorder.

Why paint about mental disability? Besides raising public awareness on the debilitating effects of mental illness, Ryan said he also finds them profoundly interesting.

Conceptual fine artist Dennis Ryan, with painting titled Sensational, outside his studio

That interest goes on display beginning this week in Pottstown PA. The Gallery on High, 254 High St., Pottstown, on Saturday (March 26, 2011) will open its newest exhibit, a collection of Ryan’s works titled “A Journey Through Anxiety,” which continues through April 23.

Ryan creates his art in a studio that’s located in the land where Amish buggies roll. He said he finds plenty of inspiration to create art and paint from the cow-filled, countryside pastures on Philadelphia’s western outskirts. This home base, he said, also puts many art galleries in central Philadelphia and Lancaster PA within easy striking distance.

He grew up on the south side of Easton PA, where his art skills began to develop during early childhood. Ryan moved from his hometown while in his high school freshman year, and consequently lost many lifelong friendships. In solitude, his central focus turned to art.

At age 18 he entered the military. Ryan chose this untraditional path for an artist to help right his life’s direction, and to get money for secondary education through the GI Bill. While in the Navy, even though he said drill sergeants and chief petty officers tried to strip his individuality, Ryan continued to express himself and create artwork at every opportunity.

In boot camp, he was chosen to paint the company flag, and then also to paint a wall mural in the Naval Hospital on base. Once on the ship, he even graffiti stenciled his job symbol — of a Gunner Mate Missile Tech — onto the back of his military uniform jacket, surprisingly without consequence.

After the military, he went on to fine art studies at the Pennsylvania College of Art and Design in downtown Lancaster, PA, and then on to Millersville University in Millersville PA, where he completed his bachelor’s degree in the arts with honors.

Ryan is creative by nature, according to Gallery On High Director Cathy Paretti, and has a passion for drawing, printmaking and painting. With artworks on permanent display in Great Lakes IL, Easton, and Newport RI, “he approaches the creation of his art with a focus on line, shape and color. The art’s concept is vital to his work,” she said. “After all, he is a conceptual artist.

“He likes to experiment with how line can define itself in the form of the written word, like a signature, and also how the same line can encapsulate and create form, Paretti added. “Silhouettes are a recurring theme in Ryan’s fine art, as he enjoys their presence and ambiguity.”

Unlike other shows at the Gallery on High, Ryan’s will open without an artist reception. The reason: he and Paretti said they wanted his show “to be experienced by everyone in a personal way.” Gallery hours are Tuesday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., and Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

A small exhibit, running concurrently with “A Journey Through Anxiety,” will display the artwork of several people who participated in an earlier workshop conducted by Ryan with the help of Erika Hornburg-Cooper, executive director of the Gallery School.

The workshop was held in partnership with Creative Health Services of Pottstown, and involved people wo have been clinically diagnosed with an anxiety disorder. They “found the workshop to be a helpful tool in understanding what they experience on a daily basis,” Paretti said.

Schools and other groups interested in seeing the exhibit are encouraged to contact the Gallery on High by e-mail, here, or call 610-326-2506 to arrange a tour.

HARRISBURG PA – Although Pennsylvania’s retirement fund for teachers is in serious financial trouble – creating budget problems for local school districts like Pottsgrove, Spring-Ford and Pottstown, as they struggle to make required payments and still keep spending plans balanced – there are even bigger battles ahead over the retirement fund covering the state’s general employees.

More people now collect retirement payments from the state than work for the state, The Pennsylvania Independent online news service reported Monday (March 21, 2011), as it covered a state House Appropriations Committee hearing. Worse yet, The Independent reported, the gap between active employees and retired workers is expected to grow even more in coming years.

How Pennsylvania deals with what it foresees as a major shortfall sometime in the future, whether it changes the plan or raises taxes or does something else, are among topics the committee s exploring.

• Read the story by reporter Darwyyn Deyo, titled “Twenty-five percent of state pension plans unfunded” and published Monday by The Independent, here.

The local districts, and others statewide, are being required to annually pay ever larger amounts into the state teachers’ retirement fund to ensure its solvency in future years. The fund isn’t growing as quickly as experts predicted, primarily because the poor economy has hurt investment returns.

Walnut Woods in Boyertown

BOYERTOWN PA – A free health workshop covering the topics of “long-term planning” and “living life without limits” is scheduled for Thursday (March 24, 2011) from6:30-8:30 p.m. at Walnut Woods, 35 N. Walnut St., Boyertown PA, by Pottstown chiropractor Dr. Niraj Patel.

Seating is limited, and reservations are requested. For more information or to reserve a seat, call Laura at 610-367-6616.

Patel operates the Chiropractic and Wellness Center, 1143 High St., Pottstown.

Photo from Walnut Woods