Public Space: How Much Are You Willing to Pay to Mow a Lawn Nobody Uses?

I’ve written in the past about my volunteer work on my township’s Environmental Advisory Council (EAC) advising the township commissioners and staff on environmental matters facing the township.  Historically, they have brushed off our advice.  In the last year or two, however, as some rather self-serving commissioners have cycled off of the board, the board has begun to become more open to the EAC’s suggestions. But there is still some progress to be made.

This is township-owned land that is regularly mowed but is almost never

used by neighbors for any recreational activities. (photo:Google Maps) 

One of the issues that I have been trying to get some action on over the past couple of years has been mowing of township open space properties. I’m not talking about active-use parks and sports fields, which are rightfully very well maintained. I’m talking about areas that the pubic does not actively use. The areas that would be best left as natural open spaces. For no other reason than, “That’s how we’ve always done it,” the township regularly mows township-owned fields throughout our 22-square mile municipality on a regular basis.  Some areas are mowed on a weekly basis and others a few times a season. The current Public Works regime insists on mowing so much land that the township parks crew is unable to do it all, so a mowing contractor is hired. The mowing contract has been a multi-year affair, to the tune of about $90,000 per year.  One of the most wasteful aspects about the mowing contract is that it requires mowing the designated areas on a weekly basis, regardless of whether they need it. So if an area is waterlogged from a week that saw 10 inches of rain, they mow grass that has standing water, often leaving ruts in the grass. Or if we are sweltering in early August without having seen more than half an inch of rain in the past 3 weeks, they mow the brown, crispy grass, leaving a cloud of dust in their wake.  Not very picturesque.

Here's an example of the effort wasted on regularly mowing all open

space parcels. With this slope, this land is not usable for pick-up football

or other informal sporting activities. (photo:Google Maps)

Public Works justifies their mowing program by saying that they have some residents calling to complain when an area is allowed to revert to natural vegetation and is mowed just once annually to keep unwanted woody vegetation in check.  I would not be surprised if many of those callers are the same squeaky wheels that whine about having to pay property taxes to the township.

We can't have it both ways, though. We can't mow every township-owned parcel weekly, regardless of drought or rain-soaked ground, and then complain the township isn't maintaining pavilions and baseball dugouts in our parks. Unfortunately, the expectation in too many heads is that all public areas will be mowed and manicured to look the way that lawns look on TV. Unfortunately, Hollywood lawns often achieve their perfection with green spray paint and are about as genuine as many of their leading ladies.  Golf courses and major league ballparks have been painting their grass for years to avoid any perceived imperfections for their clientele with unrealistic expectations of perfect green turf.

The township feels a need to mow stormwater basins as perfectly as

they would their own front yards. More wasted effort.(photo:Google Maps)

But a municipality is not a business, and it should not try to compete with the appearance of the turf at golf courses and professional ballparks.  A municipality is supposed to maintain publicly owned lands so that they are safe and available for residents to enjoy in a reasonable manner. Mine does a good job maintaining our sports fields.  But  I do not think that driving past an unused  9-acre parcel and expecting it to look perfectly mowed for the 5 seconds you drive past it justifies spending $1,000 per year of taxpayer money mowing it.

This year should be the last for the current mowing contract. Hopefully, when the current commissioners consider the 2017 township budget, they will be decline to renew the mowing contract in favor of doing all mowing in-house and on a less frequent basis.  The best thing for these fields would be to replant them with native grasses and native wildflowers to become meadows that only need to be mowed once per year. Less mowing means cost savings for taxpayers.  And wildflowers and native grasses mean food for songbirds and pollinators. That is the kind of picturesque, low-impact habitat that I want my tax dollars supporting.

Penny Wise and Pound Foolish: Passing Up the Opportunity to De-Develop a Brownfield for Fear of the Unknown

Most of my posts about land use deal with issues at my own end of Pennsylvania, in the Lehigh Valley of eastern PA. But I feel compelled to write about a news article I saw earlier this week in an environmental news feed I subscribe to. The article was about a recent land use decision made in the western PA community of McCandless, located about a dozen miles north of Pittsburgh.

I had no prior knowledge about the piece of land in question, a roughly 33-acre parcel containing a shuttered movie theater surrounded by asphalt. So I googled the site and found a news story from last October about the original purchase deal that the non-profit Allegheny Land Trust worked out on behalf of the Town of McCandless (McCandless was originally a Township until they adopted a home-rule charter in 1975 and thus became known as a Town. It's one of only two official Towns in PA). The site is bordered to the south by Pine Creek, a tributary of the Allegheny River.  According to the Town Manager, the entire site in located within the creek's designated floodplain. That means that almost the entire 33 acres is impervious surface capping a 100-year floodplain. That's bad, because natural floodplains allow water to percolate into the soil. When undisturbed, they have lots of trees and other vegetation to help absorb flood waters. Yes, natural floodplains can help mitigate flood conditions, and this movie theater appears to have had a history of flooding. Many municipalities prohibit development in 100-year floodplains.  I don't know if McCandless has seen the light and updated their zoning ordinances to exclude construction on floodplains since this site was originally developed, but at least they were actively pursuing an opportunity to de-develop (I just made up that word) this property from an abandoned and completely impervious Brownfield into a green park that would help them manage stormwater and downstream flash flooding.

The outline in red is the 33-acre movie theater property in question in McCandless, PA. It's pretty clear that Pine Creek (highlighted in blue) was hijacked and redirected when Rt. 19 was built. It's also pretty clear that McCandless never gave much thought to prohibiting development on floodplains. The movie theater reportedly flooded up to the fifth row of seats (photo credit: Google Maps). 

But I guess this de-development was too good to be true. Because the story that I initially stumbled upon this week reported on McCandless's leaders getting a case of cold feet at the prospect of paying for additional soil testing to fully characterize the environmental condition of the site.  And I have to acknowledge that most lay people would likely get cold feet when doing the environmental due diligence necessary to consummate a major property acquisition like this one. But if I were a McCandless resident, I would hope that my elected leaders would have consulted with professionals to determine whether pulling the plug on this deal was the best way to allay their concerns, albeit the easiest way. Allow me to give you a very brief overview of environmental due diligence for real estate transactions, and then I'll let you decide if the Town Council jumped the gun.

As part of the purchase of any commercial or industrial property, an environmental site assessment (referred to as a Phase I assessment) would normally be conducted to determine whether there are any physical indications of potential contamination or any public records that might suggest historic operations that may have caused contamination. These sale agreements are usually contingent on the results of the Phase I. If a Phase I turns up any reasons for concern, the buyer generally has two choices: either walk away from the deal completely or perform a Phase II investigation (at the buyer's expense).  A Phase II typically involves collecting confirmatory samples of soil and/or groundwater from locations of concern.  If contamination above state cleanup standards is confirmed, the seller is usually liable for any cleanup costs if both parties want the deal to go through.  If the seller refuses to pay for remediation, the transaction usually dies right there. A good environmental attorney can usually craft a buyer/seller agreement that would become part of the agreement of sale and would lay out target cleanup standards and time schedules for remediation. Or the agreement could even document an agreed upon dollar figure to credit the buyer on the sale price in exchange for the buyer conducting all remediation and thereby absolving the seller of any future liability for the contamination that had been identified. Bottom line is that with two willing parties, a buyer/seller agreement can ensure that the site is cleaned up with no residual liability for the documented contamination for either the buyer or seller. This is a simplified explanation, but it is generally how Pennsylvania's Act 2 Land Recycling program works. In my personal and professional opinion, in Pennsylvania, there is no reason that a willing buyer and a willing seller should ever have a real estate deal collapse over the environmental condition of the subject property.

I don't know exactly what McCandless's Phase I turned up for this site, but I have one idea based on an aerial photo of the site from 1957. In the photo below, I outlined the approximate current property boundaries in red, and Pine Creek is approximately highlighted in blue. The round objects located on the property immediately east of the theater site appear to be large above-ground storage tanks. There are no obvious tanks on the theater site in this photo, but there appears to be a pond, which would have to be man-made based on the geology and topography in this area.  A Phase I would also include a chain of title search and a regulatory database search, both of which are outside of the scope of this blog post (which is now vying for the record of my longest post ever). Although the neighboring storage tanks are shown to have some sort of containment berms around them, containment berms are not foolproof; and it is not likely that these 1950s berms were constructed to current containment standards. If the tank shown to the immediate north of the northeast corner of the theater site had leaked and the berm was breached, the contaminant plume could have migrated to the theater property both over the ground surface and/or below the ground surface. Another question would be whether the former on-site pond was filled in with clean fill or if contaminated fill material was used to level the pond prior to building the movie theater parking lot. So based simply on a quick look at one historical aerial photo of the site, there certainly would be valid reasons to perform confirmatory Phase II sampling. 

This is a 1957 aerial photo of the site which shows some large above-ground storage tanks at the property to the immediate east of the current theater property. This photo shows a pond was present on the theater site in 1957. You know what concerns me the most in this photo?  What municipal officials in their right mind allowed a tank farm to be constructed on a floodplain like this? In the 21st century, this tank farm at this location would be called an "epic planning fail." (photo credit: Pennsylvania Geological Survey).

The recent article indicated that McCandless has spent nearly $40,000 on preliminary soil sampling and associated legal fees.  As an environmental professional, I know that you can install three shallow groundwater monitoring wells and collect and analyze dozens of soil and groundwater samples for under $20,000. I don't know how extensive their Phase II sampling was at this site, but I have to wonder what the legal price tag has been so far. Don't get me wrong, because the legal review is absolutely necessary. However, the cost of legal review is not necessarily indicative of the magnitude of contamination present in the field.  In addition to the environmental due diligence costs, after the $1.25 million sale price for the property,McCandless officials estimated they would incur $400,000 to demolish the theater and its parking lots. Based on my experience with my township's Environmental Advisory Council, I can tell you that Pennsylvania has many grant opportunities for projects like this one, such as the annual Growing Greener grant program. So the out of pocket cost to McCandless to de-develop this land would very likely have been limited to one-half of the total cost after the matching requirement for any available grants. 

I think it's hugely unfortunate that McCandless is foregoing the extremely rare opportunity to de-develop a brownfield into a greenfield. They currently have 33 acres of floodplain paved and impervious, which surely must be exacerbating flooding downstream from this site. The seller would be responsible for the costs of any necessary remediation. The Town simply had to conduct a reasonably thorough characterization of the current soil and groundwater quality and work out an agreement with the seller to ensure that any contamination identified at concentrations above the state's residential cleanup standards is cleaned up to meet those standards.  The Town may even have been able to recover some of those due diligence costs through available grants if they had gone ahead and purchased the land and built the park that was originally proposed. While I certainly do not have all necessary information about the environmental condition of the site to pass judgement on the Town's officials, I have seen enough to have to wonder if they are getting their environmental advice from an environmental professional who has sufficient experience with Pennsylvania's Land Recycling Program (such as myself). 

Cleaning up a contaminated site for future use as a park is not necessarily as easy as cleaning it up for future commercial or industrial use. The residential cleanup standards that must be met for a public park could potentially mean a significantly higher cleanup cost than cleaning up to non-residential standards, in which case the seller might have eventually gotten cold feet. Or the cost differential between meeting residential versus non-residential standards could have been negligible as a percentage of total sale price.  However, I would expect this seller would want to bend over backwards to unload a property that is guaranteed to flood and that, hopefully by now, has zoning limitations on its use due to its location in the 100-year floodplain.

De-development opportunities like this one in McCandless are rare. From my experience, there are very few environmental conditions that cannot be successfully managed when both the buyer and seller of a contaminated property have reasonable expectations and are willing to work together. If I was a McCandless resident, you can bet I would have been making myself heard at their recent Town council meeting.

A Trick to Get More Halloween Treats

I started thinking about this post several weeks ago, around the time that all of the drug store chains and supermarkets started stocking their shelves with Halloween candy and decorations.  I was initially thinking ahead to how I can startle trick or treaters walking up to my front door on Halloween night.  Then I realized I probably won't get the opportunity to do that, because I expect I'll be accompanying my daughter as she trick or treats.

My daughter is old enough to trick or treat in our neighborhood, unsupervised, with a friend, and there are ample well-lit sidewalks to get her around the development.  But she prefers to trick or treat with friends in a different neighborhood.  And it's all about efficiency.

She can hit up three times as many houses per hour in her friend's neighborhood of townhouses than she can in her own neighborhood of homes on 0.4-acre lots. At the townhouses, with front-loading garages lining the streets, the average distance between the front doors is about 25 feet. Back home, trick or treaters have to walk anywhere from 90 to 130 feet from front door to front door (side-loading garages require much wider lots). And that's assuming the kids cut through the grass from house to house instead of walking back out the driveways to the street (anywhere from 30 to 70 feet) and then up the next driveway and sidewalk to the next front door.

My neighborhood. Very circuitous trick or treating because of large lots.

Of course this comparison is apples (hopefully candied, without razor blades) to oranges. These two neighborhoods are two different types of homes and two different price ranges. An average of 1,800 square feet of living space to an average of 2,500. And a difference of 0.15-acre lots to 0.41-acre lots.   But my point here is the usefulness of the extra 0.26-acres per lot in my neighborhood. If someone wants to have a swimming pool in their yard, they would need that extra quarter of an acre. But as you can see on the aerial photo above, fewer than 10% of the homes in my neighborhood have pools. And sure, it's extra room for kids to play. And that's important. But for the adults, it seems to me that the more distance between homes, the less likely it is that neighbors will get to know each other. Fewer opportunities to converse. Relegated to waving to the guy two houses away (200 feet away) while at the mailboxes. Bigger homes on bigger lots, with less sense of community.

My daughter's friend's neighborhood.

Much more efficient for trick or treating

in a development of townhouses. 

When I accompany my daughter trick or treating in her friend's neighborhood of townhouses, with front doors just two dozen feet apart, there is a totally different vibe. Many of the neighbors are on their doorsteps or on lawn chairs in their driveways chatting with their neighbors in between groups of ghouls grabbing Mr. Goodbars.

The differences between these two neighborhoods are based on land use decisions that the township made 20-30 years ago when they instituted the current zoning districts with different minimum lot sizes. But regardless of lot sizes, this sort of intense development eats up wildlife habitat. And lawns are a very poor excuse for wildlife habitat. It is crucial to preserve ample green spaces and natural areas in between developments to avoid full-scale sprawl like you see in these two aerial photos. We humans tend to forget that we need trees and natural areas around us to improve our quality of life. My township was primarily agricultural 50 years ago. But as farmers wanted to retire, farms were gradually sold to developers. And some of the best agricultural soil in Pennsylvania has been essentially lost forever. We now have relatively few active farms remaining and have become just another suburb of Allentown, the third largest metropolitan area in Pennsylvania. My township's population is now about 31,000. Our population has increased more than 60% since 2000 thanks to a feeding frenzy of developers fed by a clueless Board of Supervisors.

But at least my neighborhood and my daughter's friend's neighborhood have sidewalks. None of the earliest developments in this township, built from the 1960s up to the early 1990s, were required to have sidewalks. Kids in those neighborhoods have to walk in the street when trick or treating. That's the kind of dumb growth you get when municipal leaders fail to lead and simply cave in to pressure from developers to cut corners.

And back home, I guess my daughter will be trick or treating in the neighborhood where she'll have to do less walking to get more candy. Smart girl.

The Unhealthy American Fascination with Trophy Lawns

Over the past few years we've starting hearing more about how the fashion industry and Hollywood have created unhealthy idealized body types for American women. But this unrealistic ideal is not limited to the beauty and fashion industries.

This Spring I must have gotten two or three pieces of junk mail each week from various lawn care companies that wanted to regularly dispense herbicides and fertilizer on my lawn from now through the Fall. No thanks. I'm happy with my imperfect lawn. In fact, if I could talk my wife into it, I would plant my front yard as a meadow with native grasses and wildflowers and convert my backyard to a wood lot too shady for grass to thrive.  I'm just not willing to pay for unhealthy chemical treatments for my lawn the way some people are willing to pay for plastic surgery, liposuction, tanning salons, and breast implants.





For those who really want a fake-tan sort of lawn, there are even companies that will spray paint your lawn green (http://lawnpaintpros.com) or companies that will sell you paint for either your lawn or your mulch if you are a DIY-er (http://www.lawnlift.com).  Why not?  Golf courses sometimes paint their fairways before big tournaments, and outdoor, "natural" turf football stadiums certainly do it for games later in the season.

Photo:  Good Nature Organic Lawn Care (www.whygoodnature.com)

I suspect that the majority of lawn-obsessed homeowners who are not living under drought-imposed water restrictions simply go through the weekly cycle of mowing low and watering without giving it much thought.  In my observation, most homeowners and most professional lawn mowing services mow their lawns entirely too short for the health of their grass.  Most turf grass experts warn that cutting too much off the length of the grass blades at once and consistently cutting the grass shorter than 2.5 to 3 inches unnecessarily stresses the grass. Stressed grass has shorter roots, so its roots are unable to reach moisture deeper in the soil column. So it requires more frequent watering to prevent browning.

Photo: www-mda-state-mn-us

Lawns may need supplemental watering if they don't get enough rain each week. That can be accomplished on an as-needed basis with a garden hose and a sprinkler attachment. Or, for people who have invested a lot of money in their lawns, an automatic lawn sprinkler system will certainly help you protect your investment. I think automatic sprinklers can also cause a lot of extra work if it's not used with common sense. I have a neighbor whose sprinkler apparently is set to water twice a day, regardless of precipitation. We live in Pennsylvania, not Arizona. So the result of my neighbor's overwatering, and frequent fertilization, is that he has to mow his lawn with his expensive zero-turn radius mower (with a grass vacuum attachment) twice a week. I don't water my lawn, and I mow with my Craftsman mulching push-mower once a week. And I mow to a 3-inch height. My lawn looks lush more often than it looks scorched.  It is far from perfect. But I'm happy with the appearance of my lawn and the level of effort required for that look. I'm not participating in a lawn competition. If my neighbors chose to do so, that's their business. I just hope they are putting that level of effort and money into their lawns because it's their passion and not because they feel like they need to compete with their neighbors for some unrealistic ideal lawn. I wonder whether some of them wouldn't rather be spending their time and money on their families rather than doing battle with Nature over their lawn's appearance. I hope they realize they have a choice.

The Power of Trees to Unite a Community

This is a post about the power of trees. The power of trees to unite a community. The power of trees to provide hope for the future. The hope that trees will unite a community going forward into the future.

This post is actually coming a month late, but I thought it is still worth talking about. Most states celebrate Arbor Day on the last Friday in April every year. Arbor Day was first celebrated in Nebraska in 1872 as a way to encourage communities in the fledgling state to plant trees in the towns that had been treeless prairies only a few decades before. My own community, Lower Macungie Township, PA, was primarily rural through much of the 20th century and focused on agriculture. Since 1971, however, Lower Macungie has gone from 10,521 acres of farmland to less than 3,000 currently. And from 8,814 residents in 1970 to over 31,000 in 2010. That is a 250% increase in 40 years, compared to the U.S. population, which increased just 51% in that same 40-year period. In the first decade of the 21st century, we had the dubious designation of fastest growing municipality in Pennsylvania.

One of the results of the rapid and poorly planned development of Lower Macungie over the past 30 years has been fragmentation. As large farms were gradually sold off to developers, we saw increasing fragmentation of wildlife habitat as well as fragmentation of human habitat. Nearly every large residential development built during the growth years was not connected to the rest of the community by any means other than automobile.  If a development was required to have sidewalks (which did not happen until the late 1990s), the sidewalks tended to dead-end at the limits of the project. No forethought was given to requiring connecting sidewalks to get to adjacent developments or even just to get outside of the development without having to walk the circuitous sidewalks though along the streets that were laid out in patterns reminiscent of a medieval labyrinths.

Photo credit: Sharon Schrantz, East Penn Press

This year the township’s Environmental Advisory Council (EAC), which I chair, initiated our first annual Arbor Day event. I felt that beginning an Arbor Day tradition in the township could be a way to address two concerns I have:  it would add back a small bit of the nature we’ve lost through the past decades of development, and it would be an opportunity for residents from different developments to join together to celebrate planting a new tree in a township-owned open space.

The EAC selected a location for our Arbor Day tree that is near the only elementary school in the township that has sidewalks leading to it and which is safely by foot from at least six different developments.  Had it not been for the school being built five years ago, this area would still not have any sidewalks connecting the surrounding developments.  The location we chose for our Arbor Day tree is an underutilized parcel that the builder of an adjacent development had to donate to the township as ”recreational open space,” primarily because a floodplain separates it from the rest of the development. The parcel is about 6.5 acres if you don’t count a stormwater channel bordering it on one side.  Because the parcel is categorized as recreational open space, the Public Works Department mows it regularly all summer long, whether it needs it or not. In the 10 years I’ve lived here, however, I’ve never seen anyone use the parcel for recreation.

Photo credit: Sharon Schrantz, East Penn Press

Our Arbor Day celebration on April 24 this year opened with a soloist from the local high school chorus (who happens to be my niece) singing the National Anthem, and with local Boy Scout Troop 131 presenting the American flag for the pledge of allegiance. The centerpiece of our celebration was our Arbor Day tree for 2015:  a northern red oak (Quercus rubra) that was placed in a pre-dug hole.  Following a few words from local dignitaries, we asked all in attendance to take a turn with a shovel and toss in some dirt to help backfill the tree. By adding even a handful of soil to the tree’s root ball, everyone present had taken place in planting the tree. And by doing so, they are part of the legacy of hope for future generations of residents who will enjoy the tree’s beauty and shade.

Our plan is to select different locations in coming years to plant the township’s future Arbor Day trees – locations that can be accessed by at least two surrounding neighborhoods so that people from different developments can be drawn to the beauty the trees will offer and enjoy the birds that will also share the trees with the community. H   opefully, the 30 or so residents who attended our first annual celebration this year will seek out future celebrations and will bring their friends and neighbors.

Photo credit: Addison George, Morning Call (www.mcall.com) 

Grass Roots Science Denial Blocks Dam Removal

Science denial is not the exclusive realm of global climate change.  A recent proposal pitched to a neighboring township by a local conservation organization to remove a 111-year old concrete dam was met with a very vocal outcry from locals who want things to remain just as they are.

Here is the link to the newspaper story about the township's decision last month. And here is my perspective:

Wehr's dam and Wehr's Covered Bridge, South Whitehall Township, PA

(photo credit: mcall.com)

Last year, the Wildlands Conservancy, a local non-profit group proposed to South Whitehall Township’s Board of Commissioners conducting a feasibility study on removing Wehr’s dam on the Jordan Creek in South Whitehall.  Wehr’s dam was built at the beginning of the 20^th century to power Wehr’s grist mill, which had stood nearby but was demolished decades ago.  A covered bridge, which also bears the Wehr name, is still in use 150 feet downstream from the dam. The township created a park centered on the aesthetics of the dam and covered bridge.  The Jordan Creek is a popular trout stream which is stocked by the state. But there is really no chance for a native population of trout to subsist in this spring-fed creek, because the dam causes the water in the Jordan to back up, stagnate, and warm up to summer water temperatures that trout cannot tolerate. The South Whitehall commissioners approved letting Wildlands carry out the feasibility study. But even at that preliminary step, a local blogger who thinks he has an axe to grind with Wildlands Conservancy began crying foul and riling up the opposition with accusations that Wildlands practices junk science. Interesting how people who cannot, or refuse to, understand science often resort to claims of junk science or academic dishonesty. In addition to the blogger, some descendants of the Mr .Wehr who built the dam began a petition drive seeking to prevent the dam’s removal.

I heard only one rational voice opposing the dam removal. My friend Mike Siegel questioned whether the Jordan Creek, in the absence of the dam, would carry enough water during summer low flows to sustain a population of fish. That’s because, depending on local groundwater conditions, it’s not unheard of for steams flowing over limestone bedrock to sometimes disappear into a sink hole and re-emerge further downstream out of another sinkhole.  When that happens to a steam, the fish usually just hunker down in deep pools in segments of the creek that have water in the summer months. I didn’t take the time to drive to the South Whitehall municipal building to read the feasibility report put together by Wildlands Conservancy and their engineering consultant. So I’m not sure whether the bedrock hydrology was even considered in the report.  But I don’t think trout would be likely to get stuck high & dry by a temporarily disappearing stream. That’s because trout will always seek out the coldest water, which, in an area underlain by limestone, would be wherever the nearest spring is feeding the creek. Based on the emotional outcry of people opposing the dam’s removal, it doesn’t sound like the stream’s hydrology even figured into the decision by the township Commissioners to turn down Wildlands’ offer to remove the dam at no cost to the township.

While it's refreshing to see commissioners consider residents' wishes in a decision, I think four of these five commissioners voted based on sentiment rather than facts. In this case, a non-profit organization with proven experience in removing low-head dams was offering to remove this mass of crumbling concrete at no cost to the township. Turning away "free" money to remove a financial liability like this deteriorating dam was an irresponsible vote that will cost the South Whitehall taxpayers plenty when they are facing with removing the failing structure in the future.  With this vote, the commissioners chose to blatantly disregard science in favor of a nostalgic alternative reality that the most outspoken people attending the meeting that night wanted to believe.  In doing so, they voted to commit their taxpayers to fight a losing battle against the natural deterioration of pile of rocks and concrete blocking a good trout stream that could be a better trout stream.

The ‪Wildlands Conservancy's study included an underwater survey of the dam, which is not part of the PA Department of Environmental Protection’s routine dam inspection program. So with new data that proved their dam is in poor repair, particularly below the waterline where it is more difficult to monitor, it seems that the majority of residents who weighed in still sided with their emotions rather than science. It seems very much like the climate change stalemate in the U.S. If some people cannot see something, particularly something abstract, they won't believe it. Not even if scientists and engineers have verified the risks.  Here is my favorite line from the Morning Call story:

"The rest of the board sided with Commissioner Glenn Block, who said he wasn’t convinced by the findings that removing the dam wouldn’t increase flood risk."

  

Wehr's Dam, with sign warning, "Danger Dam - No Boating, No Swimming, No Wading." (photo credit: Wildlands Conservancy, as published on LehighValleyLive.com)

I don't know Mr. Block's professional background, but he appears to be neither a scientist nor an engineer. And he clearly doesn't want to allow science to interfere with his political popularity. So actually, South Whitehall's commissioners had the opportunity to do the right thing, although the right thing (IMO) in this case would have been unpopular with the standing room only crowd. So their commissioners voted 4-1 to keep their heads in the sand despite having been shown the risks and having been given an opportunity to avoid the financial burden of maintaining a deteriorating dam indefinitely into the future.  I live in neighboring Lower Macungie, so at least my tax dollars won't have to pay for the extensive maintenance. Or the potential law suit when someone is injured as a result of the dam. I wonder if the Wehr family would be so insistent about no removing the dam if they still owned it and were responsible for the dam’s maintenance costs and liability.