Closer to Home--Our PA-13 House Race Finally Gets Some Press

Replying to a set of questions posed Friday, Hershey said that the two biggest issues facing voters in the 13th District is over-development and rising property taxes. "We have an influx of residential development -- especially in London Grove -- which eats up our open space, congests our roads and drives up our property taxes." He said he has worked with municipalities to get them the tools they need to control development and preserve open space. He also supported the property tax relief plan that was passed by the state legislature this year.

Rising property taxes is a major problem for farmers too, and Hershey said he has supported conservation measures which provides tax incentives for farmers who preserve their land.

Aware of the problem of odor control at large mushroom composting operations in his district, Hershey secured a $250,000 state grant for the Chester County Conservation District to research ways to reduce odor.

"The composting businesses have a responsibility to be good neighbors with the rest of the community. It is important that they utilize technology to control the odors produced by composting. I was the first public official to call for all new composting operations to be conducted indoors (such as the bunkers now in use by some composters)."

Houghton is running on a platform of curbing rising school taxes by protecting open space, farmland and watersheds. He says that growth must occur in a sensible planned fashion. Residential growth creates the need for new schools. As chairman of the board of supervisors, he said he fought to keep residential development out of the Agricultural Preservation District. He also would like to increase state funding of education. The state currently contributes only 36 percent of the cost to educate one student, one of the lowest rates in the country. He also supports more commercial development to ease the burden on homeowners.

I received the mailing from Art Hershey, and I found it very interesting that he is using the Open Space initiative successes which were bipartisan in nature from our township and others to hitch his wagon to. Tom Houghton campaigned tirelessly last year for the re-election as Supervisor of one of the architects of the East Nottingham Township Open Space initiative, and if he was not able to do more in his OWN township in the relatively short amount of time he has held the office, it is certainly NOT due a lack of commitment on his part to using Open Space initiatives to balance the needs of farmers and residents who want to maintain some Open Spaces and slow down the rate of development.

Further, lack of jobs and employment on this end of the county is going to eventually strangle us if gas prices rise again and stay high. We need more jobs here. The plan to add more commercial space is much-needed. We are rapidly becoming a commuter community.

Yes, Art Hershey at least paid lip service to support of the East Nottingham Township Open Space Initiative in 2004, when it passed here in Nottingham Township by a handful of votes. But his own biggest supporters at the polling place were telling everyone not to vote for it. I was there and I saw it with my own two eyes and ears.

No one township supervisor has the power to determine the growth rate of their township in an area which is undergoing rapid development and change such as Southern Chester County--all you can do is try your best to control and manage the growth--so Hershey's mailing was full of distortions, if not outright lies.

Should this type of unethical campaigning be rewarded with more votes??

Hershey refuses to meet his challenger--now THAT is shocking arrogance!

"In the past, Hershey has appeared at Meet the Candidate forums held by retirement communities, but this year he has been ‘too busy’ to attend," Schoell said.

Hershey’s campaign manager, John Scarpato, said the reason for the state representative’s absence is that he is very busy.

"He has the responsibilities of a sitting legislator," Scarpato said. "That cuts out three days a week. He has been contacting voters directly."

Representatives from the League of Women Voters, the organization that has been setting up candidate debates this fall, said they have not been able to get an agreement with Hershey to participate. Scarpato said he had recently been in contact with the group and asked the organization to provide dates that could work for a possible debate.

Hershey attended a Meet the Candidates night at Ware Presbyterian Village in Oxford when he was running against Nancy Cox back in 2001, according to Ware resident Ben Ribaudo.

This year, when his office was contacted, officials were told that "scheduling would not permit him to participate." Ribaudo said he tried to get Houghton to appear because "half was better than none." But Houghton’s office was late getting back to him.

Houghton’s campaign office said that Jenner’s Pond Retirement Community tried to schedule a Meet the Candidate night with both candidates, but once again Hershey said he was too busy to attend.

Maybe he doesn't want to face questions about why he is misleading his constituents about Tom Houghton's support for Open Space and Smart Development.



This is the Tom Houghton '06 Website--If you want to know where Tom stands on issues important to the residents of our district, this is the place to go.

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