WGAL TOWNHALL MEETING TONIGHT9/24/13

[Alex Oreilly]

WGAL annual townhall meeting is tonight.

Who's going???
It's a chance to tell people how Straban and Mount Joy Supervisors are anti-business.

[Alex Oreilly]

At the Gettysburg Fire Hall.

[lifesaver]

Sept 24, 2013 11:24:19 GMT -5 Alex Oreilly said:

WGAL annual townhall meeting is tonight.

Who's going???
It's a chance to tell people how Straban and Mount Joy Supervisors are anti-business.

Well  Alex, they did! Now hopefully these people will attend Straban and Mount Joy township meetings and keep the momentum going.

Especially liked the statement about chicken farms and hallowed ground....
And I would like to buy Phil Murren a beer! 


Traffic lights, chicken farms on tap at town hall meeting




John Armstrong/Gettysburg TimesPUBLIC COMMENT - Janelle Stelson of WGAL-TV, moderator of Tuesday's town hall meeting at the Gettysburg Fire Hall, fields a question from New Oxford resident Amos Stolzfus, left. The meeting was sponsored by WGAL-TV, The Gettysburg Times, and WGTY.

Posted: Wednesday, September 25, 2013 3:06 am

BY JARRAD HEDES Times Staff Writer | 0 comments

Traffic lights in Gettysburg, chicken farms and a potential Ku Klux Klan battlefield rally were a few of the topics discussed at Tuesday's town hall meeting at the Gettysburg Fire Hall.

Hosted by WGAL News 8, the session also included representatives from the Gettysburg Times, WGET and WGTY.

New Oxford's Amos Stolzfus, one of slightly over 100 area residents to attend the meeting, led off the discussion by commenting on what he feels is a lack of synchronization for Gettysburg's traffic lights.

"Why don't they work better together?" he asked. "I drive a truck and it takes me a half hour to get through town."

One of two Gettysburg Borough Council members in attendance, Susan Naugle, said many of the lights are synchronized by PennDOT.

"Some of it also has to do with cameras on top of the Gettysburg Hotel that monitor backups in the circle and other areas," she said. "We know there are backups, but we do have a lot of traffic. We'd love to have a bypass, but that doesn't seem to be in our future."

On a positive note, Cumberland Township resident Dan Ebaugh lauded the fact that many of the crosswalks in Gettysburg now have a countdown, letting pedestrians know how long until it will be safe to get to the other side.

One of the area's latest "hot button" issues, as Times Managing Editor Alex Hayes put it, are concentrated poultry operations.

The two plans drawing the most attention called for 60,000 chickens in Cumberland Township and 80,000 birds in Huntington Township.

"I grew up on a family farm, but I don't think Gettysburg is the place for concentrated animal operations," said Gettysburg resident Tim Funk. "This is hallowed ground."

Hayes pointed out that the newspaper has covered numerous public hearings on the poultry operations including a 19-hour session over several days in Cumberland Township.

"Continue to address concerns with your local and state officials," Hayes said, adding that "many of the decisions made at the local level, are later overturned at the state level."

With one of the top stories in Tuesday's edition of the Times focusing on the KKK's request to rally on the Gettysburg battlefield on Oct. 5, Gettysburg resident Willie Smith urged the crowd to speak out against the group's message.

"That is hatred and we just don't need it," he said. "We don't want it. That isn't the kind of message the children of today should grow up hearing."

In a comment on a national news, Phil Murren suggested WGAL's Janelle Stelson "take a few days off and go to Washington, D.C. to straighten out the politicians."

Murren said he feels President Barack Obama's health care plan is being "forced on people."

"Health care is a very difficult issue in America and the rest of the world," Stelson said.

The meeting did feature praise for the local media on several different items of coverage including WGAL's five half-hour broadcasts dedicated solely to the 150th Battle of Gettysburg anniversary events.

"The National Park Service was great to work with and that experience really gave us an idea for how we can do more program's like that in the future," said WGAL News Director Dan O' Donnell.

Don Hinks, of Gettysburg Electronics and the Gettysburg Christian Book Store, commented on his positive Gettysburg 150th experience.

"We put up a map in our store for 10 days and had people come in and put a pin to show where they are from," Hinks said. "We had people from 18 different countries. I think that shows how the whole world is interested in the Gettysburg campaign."

After a resident, new to Gettysburg after her husband's retirement, said the town should try to actively lure unhappy residents from Maryland, Highland Township's Mark Berg raised concerns about the idea.

"Retirees come up here and their retirement income is not taxed," Berg said. "That is the age when they need services."

Rodney Truscott, who came to Gettysburg from the Frederick area, said "people fail to realize we are paying taxes and paying into the community.

"Any services we need, we're contributing to it," he said.

While he had the floor, Truscott said he found the process of "tax increment financing appalling."

Developers of "Discovery Gettysburg," a proposed 2,000-unit age restricted community planned for Straban Township, are currently asking municipal, county and school district officials to use future property tax revenue to repay an Adams County Industrial Development Authority (IDA) bond, which would fund roadwork, an on-site wastewater treatment plant and help finance a help finance a clubhouse and wellness center.

"In my mind, it's ludicrous," he said. "Let the business people find the financing for it."

Speaking on another project that tried to pay for road improvements through a TIF, Dianne Dudley said she feels the "townspeople should have more of a say about what commercial development should be put in at the Routes 30 and 15 intersection in Straban Township.

A shopping plaza anchored by a WalMart Supercenter had been planned for the site, but little progress has been made after its own TIF committee dissolved.

"What we really need is a big store like Lowes or a Home Depot," Dudley said. "People are leaving Gettysburg and going to Hanover to spend their money."

O'Donnell said the town hall meetings are important to WGAL and its media partners.

"What we do is very important and we can never lose sight of that," he said. "This is our chance to get out there and get the feedback that is so critical to our product."

[davew]

What's the comment about townspeople having say over what's going on at 15/30. Is that to be read as people living in the borough of gettysburg should have more say about what goes on in a township that they don't live in?

[Alex Oreilly]

I'm thinking it was used in general terms of all of us, not necessarily being specific to the boro.

[davew]

That would make more sense, I'd agree with that statement, too. I'll bet if you asked around, you'd find that people would be a lot more involved for pro-development things if the had any clue what was going on and why things are held up.