BY ROBERT L. BAKER
Wyoming County Press Examiner
What started out to be a civil discussion about sewage issues around Lake Carey ended in a blunt decision to end Tunkhannock Township's financial involvement in helping to find a solution to them
Township supervisor Glenn Shupp opened the discussion portion of Monday night's meeting with an update of an Act 537 study that had been in process for a couple of years.
He said he had been apprised of a photocopied letter that had been placed in people's mailboxes which he felt might heighten their anxiety about the government telling them what to do.
"It's only a study at this point," Shupp triwed to assure the people present.
Lake Carey resident John Tidball challenged Shupp on two different sets of figures that had been used to justify a need for a sewer system, and others demanded to know exactly who had been surveyed.
Shupp said he could not and would not release personal information on individual households as that was private but could release info on a larger group of individuals who had been surveyed.
He and Patty Skivronsky acknowledged that Carlton Shupp Sr., a former sewage enforcement officer had made the rounds of some properties and identified those that had been suspected or confirmed as malfunctioning or were properly functioning.
Tidball said the percentage of confirmed failures of individual systems jumped from 14 to 18.6 percent, and the percentage of properly functioning ones dropped from 50 percent to 36 percent over just a couple of years time, and he wasn't buying it.
He insisted on knowing, "Why has the data changed?"
"That's what the study is about," Shupp said. "We're trying to find out."
Tidball said, "There are some who know what they want to be looking for so they can find it."
Resident Cathy Johnson asked that if there was nothing wrong with her present septic system, "Could I be mandated to hook up to the system if it goes by my property?"
Shupp insisted it was just a study.
Alice Stroud, who lives off SR 1001 said that she was told that if she lived along the sewer line route that she would be mandated to be a part of it.
"If they're asking just us people along the route to shell out $5,000 or $6,000 in addition to monthly fees, I'd like to know how we're going to come up with that," she said. "We don't work for Rockefeller."
Supervisor Randy White asked the 40 or so persons gathered if it was true that a petition was circulating to block a sewage treatment plant should the Department of Environmental Protection try to mandate it.
"Is that true?" he asked.
Several people piped up that there were more than 100 signatures already.
"So," White said, "We're helping to underwrite something that most people don't want. Is that right?"
Then he said, "You know, we don't have to continue this."
With that he offered a motion to end the township's involvement in coming up with a 537 plan."
Supervisor Ernie Reich seconded it, and it passed as supervisor Shupp walked out of the meeting.
White than made a second motion to go after the Lemon Township supervisors to get their portion of the study's costs to date, estimated to be around $60,000."
It, too, got a second from Reich.
Posted
Nov 04 2009, 12:45 AM
by
WCEeditor