Save Plumstead was incorporated as a nonprofit in Pennsylvania on August 6, 2007. As we say at our website, www.SavePlumsteadWater.org, we are "a nonpartisan movement of Plumstead residents concerned about the conservation and stewardship of our water resources." We have continued to pursue our educational efforts, using the website and emailed notices to alert our membership to informative newspaper articles and events, such as particularly important meetings of the Board of Supervisors, land preservation seminars, and a presentation on well monitoring. Save Plumstead also held a candidates night in October in advance of the election for township supervisors.  We are very close to completing our application and filing for 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status. [Update: Application was mailed April 2, 2008.]

 

On the legal front, depositions from four interveners and a geologist were completed. We received an order for a hearing on January 24, 2008, on the outstanding petitions, including Plumstead Township and Bucks County Water & Sewer Authority's petition to approve their stipulation. It was our hope that the judge would hear Save Plumstead's petition to intervene before addressing their petition to approve the settlement agreement. We alerted our membership and let them know that the public was welcome to observe the hearing.

For health reasons, our initiating attorney, Bob Sugarman, has been transitioning off the case in favor of Jordan Yeager, who wrote the following report:

As expected, Save Plumstead encountered considerable resistance in its efforts. The majority on the Board of Supervisors (acting through the Township Solicitor), the Sewer Authority, and all the major developers in the Township, opposed our efforts.  The legal standards for intervention made it very difficult for us to become a party to the litigation.  Nonetheless, we were able to get a seat at the table.  Looking at the original objectives, the efforts of Save Plumstead were largely successful.

Save Plumstead obtained full disclosure of the terms of the proposed settlement and had a seat at the table, enabling it to strengthen key language.

As a result of Save Plumstead's efforts, the Township produced a hydrogeologic study claiming that the addition of the contemplated sewer lines would not adversely affect well water supplies in the Township. The final agreement also contains well guarantee provisions that protect against well depletion linked to future development tied to public sewers. 

The final Stipulation contains assurances that "the Township will update its existing Stormwater Management Ordinance to insure increased stormwater recharge within the Township" and that the parties will avoid increased infiltration and inflows into the BCWSA system."

Save Plumstead assisted Township residents who had other agreements with the Township and developers to mitigate any adverse consequences from the proposed Stipulation. [See Housley Carr's addition below.]

Finally, Save Plumstead was able to modify the Stipulation to include the following language:  "All new residential housing units within the Sanitary Sewer District shall be required by the Township to demonstrate the infeasibility of individual in-ground, on-lot sewage disposal systems on each individual lot before connecting to BCWSA.  Lack of feasibility does not include the inability to maximize density under the Zoning Ordinance due to the availability of public sewer."* This language was added to protect against increased density as a result of the availability of public sewers.

Housley Carr, longtime Plumstead Township Supervisor and intervener, adds:

The existence of Save Plumstead--and the expectation during the debate over the possible BCWSA settlement at the Plumstead Board of Supervisors last summer that Save Plumstead would likely challenge the settlement in court--was a key factor in advancing the last-night [July 17, 2007] amendments made to the settlement, namely a) requiring that developers in the sewer district first explore on-site treatment methods such as sand mounds and spray irrigation, b) requiring BCWSA to provide $10,000 toward Plumstead's effort to implement an enhanced stormwater ordinance, c) requiring BCWSA to restore the existing wetland basin at Timberly Farms, and d) requiring BCWSA to pay for drilling new wells for any residents near new developments whose wells go dry as a result of new "sewering."

It also should be noted that last Thursday night [January 24, 2008]--only hours after the amended settlement was approved by Judge Heckler--a unanimous Plumstead Board of Supervisors directed the township's engineer to present a draft of a new stormwater ordinance that would include all possible recharge efforts.

As to the Toll settlement, while Toll Brothers initially showed no willingness to provide any concessions, the fact that Michael May was a proposed intervener in the BCWSA matter provided leverage. Toll eventually agreed to make several recharge-related improvements to its Plumstead Chase plan (which borders the May/Carr property), including the elimination of a 54-space macadam parking lot (it will be replaced by a much smaller number of parallel parking spaces along a road) and the provision of the money "saved" from not building the parking lot to plant trees on nearby township open space. The open space currently has few trees, and wooded areas, of course, are best for recharge.

Toll and the township also agreed that the township would co-ease all of the open space at the McGinnis/Plumstead Chase site to ensure that there would be no development of any sort in the natural parts of the site, which include extensive wetland areas.

Tom Alvaré, newly elected Plumstead Township Supervisor and initial intervener, concludes: 

I would add that although we could not reverse the decision of the board to move forward with a sewer deal that expands the sewer district before completing a water study, in the end, the overall effort to fight the deal led to:

Forcing the Board to publicly defend their position that they believe this agreement will put a limit on the number of hookups.  I believe opposition kept the number of sewer units low and confined to developments already needing sewer except for just 175 extra units.  The total number could have been larger.  Forcing them to be specific about and defend how and where the sewers will go gives us future ammo to hold them to it!

Concern for the effort raised by the opposition helped lead to my election, which gives me a very valuable inside seat from which to work to defend the limits of the agreement.

The intervention negotiation was a first opportunity for the new Board of Supervisors to work toward a compromise leading to a new appreciation of the common goals we share in working together in the future toward limiting growth and protecting groundwater in the Township.

To our surprise and dismay, the township, sewer authority, and developers have since attempted to insert language into the final stipulation purporting to limit our future rights, which we as interveners had never agreed to, as the court transcript will show. Jordan Yeager delivered this letter [click here] to the judge. As of this writing, as far as we know, the judge has not yet signed the order giving final approval to the settlement.

Update as of April 4, 2008: Differences over language were settled to the satisfaction of all parties and on March 27, 2008, Judge Heckler signed the order approving the stipulation and agreement as revised. The litigation is resolved.