Borough Council Votes Down New School

Well, well. It looks like the NSNs may finally be getting what they want.

$30M school plan rejected

The school’s fate depends on whether the school board resubmits plans.

By DANNY ADLER COURIER TIMES

Morrisville’s council denied preliminary land development plans during a stormy Monday night council meeting that ended with a spatter of applause from a tired, heavily anti-new-school audience.
The passionate issue to consolidate the district’s two elementary schools and the middle-senior high school into one building has rattled community members with heated and, quite often, polarizing discussions. Monday evening was no different.
The council denied plans for the $30 million, pre-K-12 school because they did not comply with the borough’s subdivision and land development ordinance, which follows the state requirement for stormwater infiltration.
Borough Manager George Mount said he’s unsure what happens next; the fate of the school lies with the school board and whether it will resubmit plans.
The school board’s attorney, Marc Kaplin, on Tuesday said he’s unsure whether the board will do that.
The Courier Times was unsuccessful Tuesday in reaching school board President Sandy Gibson for comment. A Morrisville school board meeting is scheduled for 8 tonight at the Morrisville Middle-Senior High School on West Palmer Street. According to an early agenda, no action will be taken on the proposed building.
The ordinance behind the council rejection requires that a certain percentage of stormwater be infiltrated within 96 hours. The school board was seeking a waiver for that requirement, stating it can’t possibly happen due to the soil on site.
“We don’t need it, but we’re asking for it anyway,” said Kaplin, the newly reappointed attorney representing the school board. Kaplin said that by providing documentation that the requirement can’t be met, he was following the ordinance.
“I think there’s a reason 96 hours was chosen by professionals,” council President Jane Burger said moments before the council unanimously voted down the school’s plans.
Burger said the school board’s engineer, Raudenbush Engineering, did not justify why the school should be exempt from the regulation and that the plans fail to show undue hardship.
James McCann, the borough’s engineer, said the plans complied with everything except the infiltration requirement, adding that more could be done to meet standards.
Jack Raudenbush, the school’s engineer, said the infiltration wasn’t possible due to the low permeability of the soil.
Rich Brahler, a senior transportation planner with the Bucks County Planning Commission, on Tuesday afternoon said that in similar cases, the planners typically need to scale back the scope of the project so they can meet the infiltration requirements.
A Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection spokesman said the local ordinance was created after a DEP model ordinance.
“How aggressively they stick to that will be a measure of how successful their stormwater management is,” spokesman Dennis Harney said Tuesday. “It’s a way of empowering local officials on an issue that hits at the local level.”
Council members also stressed concerns over the amount of traffic the new school would generate.
“It spells disaster,” Councilman Stephen Worob said of having young schoolchildren walking and teenage students driving to the same school.
Those who support the new school say it’s time to start anew, claiming the borough’s existing schools are old and structurally unfit. And at the cost of renovating the old buildings, some say, there might as well be a brand new one standing.
Opponents, though, have crowded public meetings, angered at soaring school taxes and questioning the building’s impact on storm water management and traffic, among other things.
Of the dozen residents who spoke out about the school at Monday’s meeting, not one supported the school.
In May’s primary election, borough residents overwhelmingly voted against the new school by selecting six anti-school candidates to run against three independent candidates this fall.

You know, I was talking to another PSP parent today and we agreed that maybe it is time to let the NSNs have all the fun. I still support a new school. It's also quite clear that the NSNs have no intention of doing the responsible thing by proposing a new way forward. All they propose is Stop The School"™ Longtime House Speaker Sam Rayburn once famously remarked, "Any jackass can kick down a barn, but it takes a carpenter to build one." There are no carpenters at work here.

Maybe this columnist says it best...

Master politicians do more than earn your vote. They win your heart, foolish as you know it is to give it up.

The goal, of course, is to lure the prey -- you, the voter -- to the voting booth. When that happens and you finally seal the deal by casting your vote, the transaction is complete. The wooing is over and it's onto the next phase, the business of government.

With victory comes a need for action, not rhetoric. It's time to put the slogans to rest, whether it's "Morning in America" or "Together We Can." The next test is whether the candidate can harness poetry and translate it, as elected official, into policy...

"What do we do now?" Robert Redford asks that question at the end of the classic 1972 movie "The Candidate." He plays Bill McKay, a lawyer who runs a campaign of hope, charisma, and simplistic slogans. When he wins, the candidate has no idea what to do next.

Wouldn't it be nice for the PSPs to be the ones sitting in the audience heckling the NSNs as they struggle with the realities of governing? The problem is that we, the taxpayers, are going to pay for the for our foolish flirtation with the folly of a few visionless wannabes.