good evening council run books eight fifty five b bout wrote the nation i'm here again to talk about the budget not been doing some closer reviews and i just like to call your attention to a few matters now i know the budget has not been approved it's under consideration and that decision won't be made until later this month but there are some items on here that i want to call your attention to only because i feel they deserve your attention the first thing is under public safety i didn't realize they were paying eighty five thousand dollars for two police cruisers that seems to me like a lot of money unless we're buying b m w s and my feelings are that if we look at an extended service life for our vehicles in other words we maintain them and and improve our maintenance on them there's no reason why those vehicles could problems so i think if we could save the cost of one vehicle every year had been nice little savings the other thing is the speed reduction program i like you have wondered whether or not this this program is really working at all because we poured thousands of dollars into various speed reduction programs and i have seen i have yet to see any kind of a progress report what's the average speed in peter's township i mean are we were doing anything are we affecting any change have when we have we've been able to cut the number of police officers we have on traffic patrol because there are fewer car speeding i think that that needs to be examined do we need to do we need to go ahead and have  speed bumps place everywhere across the year the other thing that comes to mind is the traffic impact plan update is that something that could be done in house are we planning to do that in house you know we don't have the ability to do that  fifty two that was manufactured went into service in one thousand nine hundred sixty and they're still going strong and they anticipating keeping them in the inventory until two thousand and thirty so why can't we keep our truck going for another year or two the vehicle fueling station that one really scratch i've got my head scratching on that because we plan to replace that tank even though we're considering going to natural gas systems for our motor vehicles my question is why don't we test that time like a hydrostatic type of test and see whether or not it still is safe and then continue to use it because i hate to see us put i new tank system and then rip it out five years because we've gone to natural gas i don't think the two are compatible if i'm not mistaken and then lastly the the field and turfing system i'd really like someone to take a look at whether or not we need to for fin light the the the soccer fields i don't know that that would be enough serry thing to do given all the other expenses that we've got in the community but again just simply to bring to your attention some of the things that have crossed my mind when i review this budget and i hope that you'll keep an eye peeled toward improving and saving some of the money that we might otherwise not have to spend thanks old stork here if i understand we have a prisoner release system in washington county nonviolent minimum security type of prisoners in the in the in the jail can be released to the community to do work within the community you know i'm for unfinished business dating michael and the five new business and five a request by nick cannon's greg lake improvement and restoration committee released funds preside of the lake restoration project budgeted two hundred thousand one hundred thousand from peterson nordstrom the five hundred thousand there's been already received from state funds through senator put his office approximately thirty thousand built into the kitty from ten sales the girls biking projects picnic and various fundraising letter is that we last year we were successful feel will be successful in getting that sol with that in mind we are requesting that we we bring in one hundred thousand dollars from and because of the engineering cost at this point is somewhere between two hundred fifty and three hundred thousand dollars now at this engineering cost is is that the planning of all the all of the engineering contractors this isn't just a this will not be done the way north park lake wise where they where they empty the lake and then for a couple of years before they can make back in but they they were able to do this and i think it was almost twelve a child and i have a thirteen million dollars and we can't afford to do it that way so we will probably from the all of our understanding what we have in that lake is basically the same material there is no biological problems we don't have anything as speeding a little share of tears creek questions mr chairman likely get it done well the only question i would have is get some clarification on where you're at with the the army corps or a federal grant we've talked to the army corps of engineers and we have indicated that in spite of the fact that the federal funds have been locked up and they can't get the federal onsets that i guess concern i have this the engineering study is all done and then the the work doesn't occur and the township has put money out without anything happen on with just a funding that you've obtained without if you don't get the federal money or so that's what the police is and i think our concern was that we originally agreed to fund this portion of it providing that all of the funding was in line and the project was going to be finished and i'm not sure you're hearing those assurances tonight that you have enough capital at this juncture to fund the entire project well you got are you going to remember that we would be going into this in moving into this to spend this kind of money if we didn't they were pretty well sure what we were what money we lewis said i think we did agree that it's on the project was moving forward we would begin to contribute what we committed by i would tend to like the idea that we not release one hundred percent of the money at this point as you move forward and that's why i was asking if you need it so much to get started or what your objective was we keep telling them that that didn't help us get the money i have a couple questions for you how much is this engineering study going to cost for right now we've got bids from two but thirty thousand dollars that you that you ranged and then i thought you said there was there were a couple other there was a couple other there was a half a million dollar committed the engineering stu the finances of the money that came through senator pity's office came to d c and has been deposited with the redevelopment authority they are managing that grant money money how much is that in four hundred thousand because that's a four thousand yen and in that can't be touched i take it oh yes yes there will be available in the media do the engineering study would be available to the engine project that they planned that well i was talking with you about is more than the engineering study whatever this whichever firm is chosen will also manage the project as it goes because none of us on the committee will maybe wally as he was an engineer but i certainly wasn't i was a chemist playback plant and so we're not i'm not competent to handle the front as the engineering goes forward as the  detail planning what we have is the general overall plan at this point which is a very good day says for what needs to go forward but it's not finished plans so that it does construction documents drawings specifications need an expert firm to be able to draw those up and get them out for big nala that sort of thing obviously all that all put it in the two hundred seventy thousand or three hundred fifty thousand dollar beds that they did on project management yes there are there is included it's not simply the initial engineering it's it's a much bigger job that they would be asked to do which be would  include managing the project as a cause following three hundred fifty thousand worst case scenario would get it to the point where you get equipment at the site  build the whole thing would be a matter of i would imagine two to three years ok so if they started engineering january first when you anticipate the next phase  you would need additional funds my guess would be next summer they really begin but i say guess and that's all i can say at this point are not knowledgeable enough to noon until we get more specifics from professional thousand dollars sitting in a vat available to you take four hundred grand yeah i don't really engineers very well we have our promises for most people at this point we need to be able to move ahead that we need so you're looking for a sign of commitment on our part  not just too willing to jump on a front right now and throw money at it until we get more of an assurance when he asked this question business might benefit them if we think about it we've set the eighty thousand for but they are not entitled as part of the escrow on these that we have done would we be willing to do that so that they could show that pledged escrow are you saying to move the transfer into an account the jointly owned is that what you're saying that's what that process includes would be council decide and we've never done anything like that in point that anything something that escrow it's sitting there and a very simple condition of its releases that the project moves forward need to spend some money right now why not take it out of that spend the money that would be at least in my mind some kind of evidence that the project was actually moving and you're trying to you're trying to say at least appears to me trying to stop piles of money here  would council be amenable to releasing part of the money contingent on next year seeing where else you go i mean you're speaking to people who have released money to penn dot to pay for two projects that haven't happened good evening any samuel has three or four buffalo ridge road i hope the seedling is the last time you have seen me you probably feel the same to thank you and mr sylvester for allowing me the opportunity this evening i'm i'm actually not here representing the homeowner's association but i am here representing myself and my wife and  we were we were stunned especially i was stunned as has bill massey could probably tell you i'm on the phone with him probably every month and a half making sure that that both we and the people who live in our community are abiding by how the regulations and ordinances and then to find out that we are cited for encroachment was for me just i really was stunned it forced me were to research how this could actually have happened because everything that we know is that we went through the right steps along the line and what i discovered actually was nothing less than shocking it's going to get better and grow this is the period from two thousand to two thousand and three peters township approved plaques that gave ryan holmes was our building permission to begin construction of face four in the hidden valley state's plan we are part of a natural woodlands overlay which means that it's a green concept that you all put together and the one thing that a natural woodlands overlay does not provide you is a place to dump dirt the houses are very close together and if if there is a place that you need to dump dirt you have to haul it away rather than how weigh the earth and waste i might add  the builder deliberately moved the peters township post marking the limit of disturbance to have illustrations to this that i will show you the builder then leveled and i mean level half acre of trees and a in a designated conservation natural woodlands area built a makeshift road to get there and use the area behind three zero four three or six and three zero eight buffalo ridge road is a dump not a fill if we're working on the honor system here it would be impossible for anybody to tell that somebody is not within the ordinance of where they're supposed to be and that's what happened in the end we were dupe before we were due to the township was d now in our natural woodlands over later something called the limit of disturbance which means no homeowner nor any builder is allowed to go over this limit of disturbers it's to guarantee that there is a natural conservation area into all of the footers everything to be dug out from up the street and dumped it complete with all of their waste products in and everything that they you know scrap materials and stuff it in our backyard land their post was deliberately in the wrong location and i need to there's been a little bit of questioning about this as well but i put this up here as a page where's here's one township took control of the land their post was deliberately in the wrong location and the earth with waste mission was dumped up to twenty feet high over roughly a half  on the erosion a map which also gives it to the graphical outlay i know on our particular line there's supposed to be a thirty foot differential from the street to the back of our lot from the street to the back of our  peters township post and we were all told each one buyer was told that the township posts were set by surly we didn't need a surveyor backyard we didn't need to state our backyard there's a peters township post right there that they said this is where your property goes to additionally additionally we are signing this is something i was new to some people but we are signing something called we received letters stating we were in violation of the dieter's township zoning ordinances for clearing conservation land and using it is just an extension of our backyards something that clearly happened we moved to present day i can give you an illustration i actually invited all of the at our members council as well as mr ball to come out and see this because you really do have to see it in doing the research that's what happened it took me having to go back and find pictures from two thousand and two before we ever even moved in to find out what had happened our backyard so now now we're here we are each year requesting that the township in its empathy for our situation transfer this land to the homeowners at three o four three zero six and three zero eight so we can own and maintain this land as we have the past eight years we've basically genesee in this request on the fact that every ordinance violation occurred on the townships watch before any of us considered even buying these i have been sometimes the lone voice in the public standing up for them i believe they are fair i believe they trust people i believe they operate on the honor system and when you're dealing with somebody who pulls a stunt like this the honor system is out the window additionally and this is key our decision to buy these locks perhaps life's biggest monetary decision was based on a falsified boundary market placed on the is extraordinarily unique specifically it sets no precedent as to the swimming pool slash lance slash shared slash concrete patio issue at three fourteen buffalo ridge road  the peters township post at that property is and has always been in the correct place furthermore that property was state eight months before their swimming pool construction began these are two separate issues regarding the issue of collecting signatures of every homeowner in the estates of hidden valley in order to complete such a land transfer we strongly feel this does not apply in this unique case by pierce township ordinance and by peers township plant both state that the home owners and hen valley were promised forty percent open space our plant has forty three percent open space it is still completely completely within councils authority to transfer land as long as the open space total is still at or above forty percent which it would be finally for the township this is merely a strip of land that has no productive use and would need constant maintenance to each of us the strip of land means everything as this land in the belief that it was ours weighed heavily in our decisions to move to peter's township we each one of the yard for our kids none of us would have considered these lights had the limit of disturbance actually been as it is depicted on the planet we would make no change into parvathy no trees would be cut down as the builder already did that unlawfully ten years ago we were requesting this land so the council me right this wrong as it is the unequivocal power to do so in closing we are steadfast in our position and i have to add especially our wives that when this meeting ends the owner of this land will be the maintainer of this land as for the past eight years we have all paid to cut through fertilize and water this land that was not ours to us this just adds insult to injury and we have mr mrs siegel mr mrs crewe and my own wife i'd like to thank you for your consideration we deeply hope that you will recognize the unique but none the less egregious injustice that has been done to us and show your empathy and truly hope you will grant us the ownership of the strip of land thank you if you have any questions or want to discuss and ellen make a comment since i did happen to go on and look at this property mysteries is absolutely correct in stating that if you went and looked at this property the way it currently exists there would be no reason in your mind to even question the fact that that was part of the property it was created for the same level it was seeded it was great you know there's nothing i don't i don't believe that there were any surveys him in that area we want people close to anybody and nobody requested a server and none of the three has requested a survey and we were all told that the  township poster sat by serving so why would you spend three hundred dollars on a survey when there's a stake right there with the peters township name on it and it's right on the border of grass and force all right just to give you a little bit of this the red line is would our g i s shows is a problem but it is at not are you can see how it's closer to the road or if you take there's a yellow line it's hard to see basically cuts through here one in that ok because i live in a similar situation in our situation and it's obviously different than yours i will tell you there was some confusion for me on that because on the final plan there's a labeled on the final plan is dedicated to peter's township and some of the parcels in our plan have that and some of our parcels on the final do not have that label we didn't know what if we owned any earth township on any so computer's township and i don't think we've ever been anywhere words felt more like home where we've enjoyed the property we've enjoyed the location the people and now now we're dealing with with this and to be honest you're the only people who can right this wrong for us because the same way that we were full the township was deliberately misled forest and it was level so i said to that point mr johnson what the township have recourse against the develop matter is based on if the calculations are correct and that forty percent open space is all that's not all is the minimum that needed to be kept the process could have been averted completely if the developer would have compensation but in truth the property is value and all i'm trying to get to is you know i understand completely how you feel i truly do and i'm very sympathetic to that because again i say that you know i live in a similar community but we have to be careful that whatever the determination is in my opinion we don't create some situation that now there's an expectation because once a plane is approved a plan to print the way it's presented us in the national i don't even have i should have had this data and put in the first i was supposed to mention this in august and it was the very day that mr bott i met and he said rather than go and to i would paraphrase but if there's a way that you can retroactively do a survey alteration request which is to make it all legitimate which is what the builder should have done in the beginning but it wasn't so we're now coming to you in lieu of the builder not doing that deliberately deceiving everybody we're actually coming in asked if we could to actually do  lot alteration requests so that everything is legitimate i mean we're that we're now the three families who are trying to do it by the book the way that it hasn't been done so i fear and confusion as to whether or not we have the ability to to give the land anyone well i understand you are well that's the basic issue here and the rest is all flop and you're concerned with the presidential aspect of it terms of other situations initially talked about months ago with the potential permitting we place structures to stay for an extended period of time or again granted some kind of license to use  of the property as opposed to transferring the property while while i'm appreciative of that i'll tell you there are three women right now who will take this microphone and tell you that as a complete we just have use of the land and we get to maintain it but but it's not it's not our land it's not any and i will tell you as they will and i don't know how many of you i know probably mrs merrill sympathize with this gentleman who had the final say on when you bought your house you or your wife again so when you start to explain to a wife when they're going around looking at houses well here's the backyard and here's where our property ends and then the rest of this new start in explanation that's a nonstarter they go to next because wives have plans for a backyard this is where i want to do this is where the kids are going to play this is that as soon as there's there's something dividing the backyard or a property issue you move on that really is a liability if we ever had wanted to sell our house or worship had to sell our house that would that would really diminish a lot if people rises to the misrepresentation so people bought it on good faith the request is that it is something that could be within councils for great to to correct something that was done at no you know we're not we're not diminishing required open space we're taking a small piece of it they still have the amount of open space that was added to the other that that's not really an issue that we should have room for so i just think that's fit to start to and just give away property it is not the way we should go i just don't think i think once you start on it slippery slope people are going to be coming in there and say well we thought we had this we were told this i'm not going to i don't want to arbitrate all those issues and i understand you know this is a very serious thing i mean i appreciate i have children and i have a swing set  backyard and i've litigated having to remove a swing set for clients of mine which i thought was kind of asked and i but you know it was in our township but i just think that once you get into that doing that then mohel the builder that's not entirely true with all due respect if somebody was overseeing that you cited us for for a swing set being six feet over a property line but somehow it was missed for eight years that a half acre of natural conservation woodlands was leveled and turned into a dump and sold to people i mean to go for a job you were sixteen and completely miss aware of that play that's why i am here i know it and i plan it it's no disrespect to you i mean i said at last with your position and you know what meant but i just don't think that that's the way to god was to start giving up open space and  line and we were walking on township land without knowing about it because the boundary by the way there isn't an ordinance it says it every quarter is supposed to have a post so the township is walking away from their own ordinance violations again two things i want to add number one if you can you know only i'm a fighter when i think the truth desire my side i'll fight to the death if somebody else comes up we can show you pictures in a timeline and research into the record deeds office signatures from the people who were there saying which was the elysium that that actually was property owned by another property owner was in part of this development the property that on that then why spent researching this and trying to trying to state my case and i'm coming to you not saying we're right i'm coming to you saying we were wrong and the reason we were wrong when the homeowner who had permanent violations swimming pool two fences shared a patio past it is a side issue but if there is any issue or anything in your mind where you can jump to real good say my gosh we can right this wrong i know that i would appreciate it my wife would mr mr screw good mr siegel would even if it means but what's contemplate someone i mean you have to see the injustice here if you don't see the injustice here i mean i i'm sorry that you curious spoke and i think most of us are probably sitting here thinking if we don't feel this if we can get into a position in the cell bars we're willing to work out some sort of arrangement that we have characterized as a license to use the property and i think we need to move on tonight that's our position that he would want us to ask the solicitor to help to act in agreement with the senate and that will follow that i believe di i think it's a tough frank said it well it's a pandora's box of opening up and and regardless of what whether you think you're the only person that's going to come before us there's been plenty of issues prior and there will be the townships ordinance i mean the township four separate examples and i have written down where in this particular instance they broke their own ordinances before we even walked a lot if you say we're in now we're getting we're getting we have to pay the price for and you know this big and i would have said nothing to you this isn't what we're looking for and we would have continued at that time there are lots of lovely places to move in the future township and we w in two thousand so we also applied for a variance that about three quarters of your signatures are on forces you reviewed aerial photographs property boundaries everything nobody mentioned anything about encroachment more extending i gan i sincerely sympathize because i am acutely aware of how those developments occur and how you live in a situation like that and i'm acutely aware of the fact that i agree with you that it sounds like peter's creek and if everyone is aware there's an issue at this point with clarity and not willing to sign off on the resolution they also passed out a letter companies for this insurance as long as part of our overall insurance biddings and we decided not to switch the on the long term disability because at the time we had a number of cases going on significant savings there and that's why every recommending that we should be or might have just introduced in the first issue is on the health insurance and dish this year we do so and so let's take the seventy nine thousand dollars in savings and then do what you need to do to get to competition between you p m c and high mark in which you say u s health care because everyone knows the insurance market is crazy right now and this this passion up another opportunity to potentially save concerns me you know i definitely want to the you know me from other ways as well first off i am with mcmanaman insurance group and the proposals that you may have seen on the docket reflect rates from your current carrier u and you pm c as opposed competitor that's not the only competitor we went to we went to them all when i spoke to mike several months ago they said we'd we'd like the opportunity to come in and see what we could do with their rates so we did because of the high mark you p m c battle that's going on right now came back with the most favorable rates in excess of a hundred thousand dollars in savings now the thing that they do in the health care insurance business is they are slow to respond because you have a certain set of timeline times guidelines that you have to work and for enrollment and renewal that course we're really bumping up against that right now the carriers are slow to release their of the new rates so that if you want to go to a competitor you're really working against the clock and of course that's where we are over and above any union contracts that might be in place but i think it's important for you to recognize the fact that while we were working those timelines we did go to every carrier to get competing quotes and the best that we got was  while hi mark was willing to adjust the rates downward on the first go around from you pm see they are somewhat limited because your in a member program through your homework and i don't know if they are willing to go down any further if you decide to maintain status quo because of the union contracts i would encourage you to pursue the member organization that you're going to go back to high market and say look you can see really wants our business and they're willing to give us in excess of one hundred ten thousand dollars this year and savings they're not going to make it up next year that's not how they do the carriers do business or they wouldn't ever have cut clients coming back to the employee benefits proposal that we presented to the township was a net savings of about thirteen thousand one hundred dollars more importantly well that doesn't sound like a lot more importantly the carrier is giving a three year a guarantee so you're looking at fixed costs for three years which is in this business it's kind of hard to get three stay like that the difference and it's a two year guarantee did you go back to them and ask if they would lower it and go to  proposal from the minutemen i'm going yes all right then and then i i personally object to them i think that as far as the health care you know we talk you talk about go back to high marking you've got some numbers from them example we want to take advantage of the low rates for the health care plan passed that we can write but this other thing i think the consensus is everybody wants to build it please let the other people have an opportunity to make  surprised that you know that was just tough talking i was happy but i was surprised the bidding process for employee benefits and that's what we're talking about here there's like a dozen carriers and western p a they're all national carriers but there's of a dozen maybe fourteen and we want to them all now if there's five other guys just like pat smith goes to those carriers by law they have to get the exact same rate they can't give this guy a penny off and not give it to me so when you say putting it out for bid ultimately we already did that for you by going to all the carriers and bringing back the best possible pricing and get rate guarantees that doesn't mean i'm opposed to what you're suggesting i'm just telling you that your probably only going to improve upon customer service from this point forward price wise you either got the best or you're within a couple dollars of the best what you see on that spreadsheet that's just that's just the nature of these so it's really intimate really a matter of who wants if they're playing ball all right story list this is as you know we've had over the last two or three years various state various federal laws reform laws that have come into play this is with the latest that we now have to adopt  frankly it has little or no meaning to our plan because of the way our our plan is structured but it's dealing with rollovers from of from  there were three partners in this project and the first partner was penn dot the second partner was the washing county and the third was a township and when the project was bidding came in well under what it was by did  penn dot kept their full share washington county kept its full share and the beneficiary of the fact that it came in lower was peter's township so there is a as well it should be that's correct  so any cost overruns on the project go back to the township because we're we're the last party so that you know to the extent that the pole gets moved in there's any cost to it that would be a township that extent you put a guard  around it will be on the township but you'll see though is when you go out there that hole is very very close to the road and then if we are now the owner of one to a drill which we are there for their agreement is with the fire company we have a fairly good working relationship with comcast comcast have to move their line it's not clear if if the power company needs to move that pole because of their lease with us whether comcast eat that cost or not i don't know but one of the things that we did was approach comcast because what we have up there is a fiber to ask them to look at it and look at the possibility of moving our fiber in conjunction with moving their fiber and their to come from the contractor cheaper than we can do it enough to do then have the contractor do this does not to flick withstand the request that we have for  the act like processing plants and pipelines pressers are not considered part of the act which we would be limited in controlling and and the basic thing is basically everything's in use by right that through this year but i think i know it's been delayed to all east next year because i think part of the controversy that's been caused by all the municipalities contacting their legislators to remove those sections that this is going to be a color fight p c and dollars to try to have enough communities there to show the legislators that you know this is a pretty broad position not just a couple of minutes powers for performance measure for some time it's a program where they say they set performance standards and measurements across the board for all types of activities participating in this and they are trying to get some of the smaller communities to do this i think it it's as it is a very good program would provide us with a lot of good data and maybe a more formal structure and how we can do performance  there's an environmental law from that's working on that so we sent to them to the last item i have here is to you know we had some discussions with representative martin and some of the council members opposition to that i think we do talk about this but let me say what happened today i talked to mark today called me and quite frankly which is rare and eight i told him of our situation he told me quite frankly he hasn't seen a distribute the final map because they want to show him quite frankly which is ridiculous but it was approved today and he said what we need to do is an act their resolution telling them that if they do it as is shown that we will follow a little bit of kind of goes like this where as appears to actually pounce on those with great dismay that the state legislature is considering a redistricting plan that includes splitting peterson and shift into two parts one remaining in district forty in the other going to district thirty nine where as the council appears timeship is absolutely opposed to the proposed redistricting as it puts one third of the township into a district with little or no little or nothing in common with huge township whereas there is no legitimate reason for splitting peters township and legitimate reason being to maintain the numerical balance between legislative districts whereas such division appears township is a violation of article two section sixteen of the pennsylvania constitution which specifically states that no county city town borough township or ward shall be divided on less absolutely necessary and underline that where it is illegal division will cause irreparable harm to the township now be it therefore resolved the council here by serving notice that it reserves the option to take every i don't know what with the staff at the last meeting do you do we need to explain the sections that would be separated do you think people generally understand well that we can we can put that in areas that says section or district b and b