Times Chronicle & Public Spirit
Petition seeks better maintenance of roads, walkways
ABINGTON >> A petition signed by 500 residents served as the kickoff for a recent Board of Commissioners meeting.
According to the petition, presented by Brentwood Manor resident Adele Kubel on Aug. 11, “Abington Township is in decline. The area suffers from crumbled sidewalks and curbs. The area has litter and debris on a regular basis. I want the Abington Board of Commissioners and Township Manager to make maintenance a priority. The focus on land development is destroying Abington.”
Kubel, who presented a petition with similar concerns signed by more than 200 residents in November, said: “the commercial areas have continued to decay further.” Noting she sent emails and left messages for administrators for over a year, she said, “No Abington resident should be forced to get petitions to enforce the code for largescale commercial properties.”
“All the major streets have trash in the gutters,” Kubel said in an Aug. 15 interview. “(The township) is not getting commercial businesses to adhere to ordinances,” while “individual residents say they are fined almost immediately for hanging branches.”
“They used to clean the streets more often. I think they are cleaning less,” she said.
Township Manager Richard Manfredi disagreed with Kubel’s assessment.
A public works employee runs “a street sweeper daily,” except on days below freezing, equipment breakdowns or scheduled maintenance, Manfredi said in an email. Under a schedule in place for 15 years, “each street is swept an average of at least three times a year,” and “major roads are swept more frequently.”
Many major roads in the township are state roads, Manfredi said, and while PennDOT is responsible for regular maintenance of state roads, “due to the amount of storm drains … the township cleans them multiple times each month.”
Following her petition last year reported on in the Times Chronicle, conditions at the Town Center spanning the two sides of London Road on Old York Road improved, Kubel said.
The crumbling brick wall behind Target was fixed, potholes were patched and trash cleaned up, she said. “Everything looks better.”
Kubel said she has repeatedly
emailed the township manager, some commissioners and other staff regarding crumbling sidewalks and curbs and trash, but either get no response or, “I’m told they will look at it and send an inspector, but in many areas, they haven’t done anything.”
Manfredi said, “the administration is confident … matters brought to the township’s attention are being responded to.”
In addition, he said, “the township has built a robust system for responding to citizen service requests and issues” which “will be launched in the next few weeks. More information can be found at www. abingtonpa.gov/servicerequesttool.”
A message at that website, which is still under construction, says residents will be able to alert township staff of non-emergency needs by filling out a form, identifying location, attaching a photo and then viewing existing requests.
According to Kubel, an apartment complex that backs onto Old York Road from north of the Edgehill Bridge to Hamilton Avenue was given a year to fix the crumbling curb and got an extension to July, but it still hasn’t been done.
Kimberly Hamm, township director of community development, said on Aug. 26 that code violations concerning maintenance or building code fall under her department’s jurisdiction but that Kubel’s statement was “a bit inaccurate.”
“Extensions have never been issued,” Hamm said. One apartment property was issued a code violation “for overgrowth and the curb.” The overgrowth was cleared and a second notice of violation was issued giving the property owner until July 31 to fix the curb, she said.
The curb has not been fixed to date, she acknowledged, so the township is “in the process of investigating with the solicitor the path” going forward.
Kubel also noted wires sticking out and crumbling sidewalk and curb on the Starbucks property she pointed out in November have not been fixed.
Hamm said markings on the sidewalk there show a PA 1 call has been made marking utility lines before any digging occurs.
Starbucks told the township in April it was “looking to undertake repair and rehabilitation of that sidewalk,” she said. There are questions about a retaining wall dividing Starbucks’ and SEPTA’s properties there, and the “township did pass that concern onto SEPTA,” she said.
“The property owner is still awaiting a reply from SEPTA.”
Regarding concerns Kubel has raised about code violations at apartment buildings, Hamm said, “We do investigate residential and business owners’ properties.
“We definitely have received calls from residents about concerns” at the 100 York Road apartments, Hamm said. “We have not found any violations of township code as of now from a property maintenance and building perspective.”
At the meeting, Kubel also complained of traffic congestion, which she attributed to land development and zoning decisions allowing more commercial and residential development.
Residents are not receiving information regarding future development until it is already planned and under construction, Kubel said.
Under a proposed ordinance
amending the subdivision and land development provisions of the township code, provided by Manfredi’s office, an applicant would be required to send a notice of the first
meeting of the township Planning Commission at which its application will be reviewed to property owners on the same street within 500 feet of the proposed development and to property owners within 250 feet, not on the same street.
As for the petition, Manfredi said in an email, that Assistant Township Manager Tara Wehmeyer “is still reviewing” it.