Board doubles support of PAID to $20K
POTTSTOWN » With a 5-2 vote Monday, the Pottstown School Board voted to double its contribution to Pottstown Area Industrial Development, better known as PAID.
PAID hired Peggy Lee-Clark in May as its newest executive director. Lee-Clark, who had been a member of the PAID board of directors, first serving as interim director after Steve Bamford left in January to take a job in Allentown.
As a stand-alone nonprofit entity with rotating leadership among borough council, the school board, The Hill School and the Montgomery County Redevelopment Authority, PAID is Pottstown’s primary economic development agency.
The school board, at member Thomas Hylton’s request, had held off on voting on the increased contribution until the PAID presentation made at the joint meeting of the school board and borough council on June 20.
Only three members of the school board attended that meeting — Hylton, Vice President Emanuel Wilkerson and Kurt Heidel — but a PowerPoint version of Lee-Clark’s presentation was shared with the school board prior to the vote.
Hylton said PAID had been useful in the past, but “not so much lately.”
However, given that LeeClark just started and the
“I’m willing to take the chance for one year to see how it goes.”
Thomas Hylton, Pottstown School Board member
increased contribution will help PAID raise $150,000, which will then be matched by the Pottstown Area Health and Wellness Foundation, “I’m willing to take the chance for one year to see how it goes.”
Noting that the pending purchase of Pottstown Memorial Medical Center by the non-profit Reading Hospital Systems could put the biggest taxpayer off the tax rolls, Hylton said Pottstown should do everything it can to encourage development and shore up its eroding tax base.
But Wilkerson and board member Katina Bearden were not willing to take that chance.
Bearden said that although she agrees with PAID’s mission, she could not justify using money from the education budget for non-education purposes when the district is so cashstrapped.
David Miller, who is a candidate for the school board and was following the meeting on Twitter, agreed with Bearden.
“The line item should be ZEROED out. Not a core function of education and therefore should not be budgeted,” he Tweeted.
Borough Councilman Dennis Arms, himself a former Pottstown school teacher, agreed with Miller, also on Twitter.
“Agreed, how can a district that cries about not having enough money all the time spend money on something that has yet to improve the town?” he posted.
Hylton noted at the meeting that Arms had sent a letter to the school board, outlining his opposition to the request for increased funding.
“How can a district that cries about not having enough money all the time spend money on something that has yet to improve the town?”
Dennis Arms, Pottstown Borough Councilman