East Whiteland residents and registered Chester County voters we have a very important task this week: to rock the petition to get 2 supervisors added under the second class township code of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania!
We. Can. Do. This!!!!!
Years ago when this township was founded and they formed a Township government there were far fewer people. Over the last 15 years I would say, this township has grown exponentially. It is time to add two more supervisors to the three so we have better representation as residents and taxpayers.
Five supervisors is perfectly attainable and normal. If I am completely honest, I wanted to do this a few years ago and I was talked out of it. I was told it was a mistake. I should have listened to my inner voice because I knew it was right and I believe it’s right for residents now.
We need more representation in our 3 board member municipalities. More representation does not create chaos, in fact, it helps restore order and balance, and we should want that.
And in East Whiteland there are already people who are interested in running for office!
Here is the Google doc where you can sign up to be contacted for an in person visit. The important thing about this petition is you have to sign in person, you cannot do it online so to speak.
This petition can only be signed by legal residents of East Whiteland Township who are registered to vote. If you are not registered to vote, you cannot sign this petition.
“Should two additional supervisors be added to the board of 3 supervisors, creating a board of 5 in East Whiteland Township?”
There’s no hidden message. It’s not like playing the Beatles White album backwards. It is what it is. It is as it is stated.
So come on East Whiteland let’s do this for ourselves. 
3 to 5 supervisors. It’s time to modernize.
Git’ R Done… we can do this this week! It literally takes like a minute and a half to sign and fill in your address. Again, you read the ballot question as presented to you in person and you sign your name like you do your signature for all legal documents. Then you print your name so it is legible along with your legal mailing address in East Whiteland Township as in the physical mailing address no PO Box. And the last thing you do is you date when you’re doing it.
It’s easy and it’s important. We get the government we deserve, and our vote is our most powerful tool. Some people will get very up in arms about this and the thing is it’s not a threat to democracy, it’s about democracy and our right to do this.
Sign of the times taken by someone NOT trespassing.Not my photo, saw it on social media. Corporate welfare bought to you by Governor Josh Shapiro. Residents are always optional in his equations.
East Whiteland Township, Chester County is just a place where most honestly feel government pays lip service for every shitty thing that happens. Well not everyone. Some just ignore us altogether like State Representative Kristine Howard. She literally does nothing and says nothing. Never shows up for anything in her district. But she is BFFs now with neighboring State Representative Danielle Friel Otten whom people elected as a pipeline activist and that didn’t last long as she just wanted to sit at the popular kids table in Harrisburg and is a sell out.
Governor Josh Shapiro is everywhere as he is up for re-election. But he is busy having his literal neighbors dislike him and handing out corporate welfare as that sign in East Whiteland indicates. Yes I can have that opinion while I say I told you so. Shapiro has always been exactly who he is.
If anyone had been paying attention except for some of us, they would have seen it back when he was former Congressman Joe Hoeffel’s Chief of Staff (1999-2003). We certainly saw it when we were starting to fight eminent domain for private gain in Ardmore, PA. It was literally his job to help and/or at least listen to Hoeffel’s constituents. He didn’t and I can distinctly remember him avoiding residents in Ardmore at a town hall meeting in early eminent domain days. The meeting was at a senior center in Ardmore.
Now we don’t really have a viable choice on the other side of the aisle, just Marge Simpson, err Stacy Garrity. That woman was pro-data center until a lightbulb went off and she thought she could maybe get two extra votes and she flip flopped to being sort of against them.
There is one person whom we know cares 100%: State Senator Katie Muth. She is a fierce mama bear for all of us. She cares. She shows up.
I guess I just don’t understand how anyone thinks this data center or any data centers are OK. I also don’t understand one of the East Whiteland Supervisors after finding this video:
Now he is only one of three supervisors. But like with many other municipalities, you have at least one who thinks data centers are wonderful and the hypocrite tree hugger in that video from NBC 10 above that’s on YouTube is the one in East Whiteland. According to this media report and subsequent research, he apparently works for Morris Arboretum owned by the University of Pennsylvania so does that mean Morris Arboretum and Penn are pro data centers?
But the rest of the East Whiteland board? It’s like they are doing fear based governance. They are so afraid of what might happen to them that they’re not thinking about what will happen to the all of us and aren’t I allowed to have that opinion? Shouldn’t the courage of your convictions mean something when you’re an elected official? I mean, if you can’t stand up for the people who elected you why are you in office? What are you getting out of it?
Today, as I was standing outside in my garden, looking into my woods, I was pondering all of this. I will share my thoughts next in a little video, and then I will share some video snippets from the most recent East Whiteland meeting and some other stuff.
I’m sad. I am sad that we don’t matter. I’m sad that our local environment doesn’t matter. And I am fearful we will run out of water and not be able to afford our power. No one has been able to allay these fears and I don’t think they really can and I’m allowed to have that opinion too.
I’ve written about this so many times I don’t know why I’m bothering to do it again but I am.
There are no better advocates for a community than the members of said community. It takes a lot at times, sometimes it’s easier.
But people ask, how do you do these things? You gather together. It starts with that.
I think the biggest problem I see that people have with local governments today are the poor decisions, and trying to hide things from people.
Sometimes it takes a while, but the truth always does come out. But there are things that I don’t understand today that comes out of the mouths of our local elected officials. Elected officials are the ones that are driving the bus of the municipality, yet they can’t contemplate their navels without being told what to do by staff.
Now of course they’re just places where the elected officials are just off. Do we call them corrupt or are they just stupid? I think they are stupid a lot of the times because they think their residents are stupid?
If you don’t like the face of who governs you change it, one of your most powerful tool in a citizen toolbox is your vote, along with your voice.
My friends and I have done it. It’s often a slog. Pure and simple. And while it is great to have t-shirts, catchy phrases and acronyms and lawn signs, that is literally the fun part. The crazy rest of it? It’s like having a second unpaid job you didn’t sign up for.
In East Whiteland and East Vincent and Limerick and Plymouth and West Conshohocken and Upper Merion it’s the blasted data centers. In Chaddsford, Radnor, and Malvern Borough and some other areas it’s unwelcome development.
In Easttown things are a little below the radar right now, but I keep getting inklings that things are simmering.
And Willistown is its own hot mess. You have unresolved major development issues with Rockhill Farm. And the guy who won’t let the township fix a culvert on Spring Road. And every once in a while you have people who pop up wanting sidewalks on absurd roads. In some places sidewalks are helpful, but the can’t be on dangerous roads that are not safe for walking or sidewalks to nowhere right? And the eternal thing of who pays for sidewalks when they are installed is an issue that the sidewalk advocates have no realistic answers to.
Another example I’m going to use today is Tredyffrin – what are these people thinking?
Residents are asking for transparency because everything they get is talking in circles, a non-answer, clear as mud. Like how is a supervisor named David Miller able to just write a check for a big chunk for the park being formed out of Picket Post Swim Club? The Chase Road Park but does that check really buy naming rights? (Watch the meeting)
Just the other day after sharing a concern from a resident in Mount Pleasant, a sitting supervisor, replied the following:
So let’s review: she is a sitting supervisor. Her job is to help her constituents and residents of this township. What I’m sharing is a resident asking for help. What she’s sharing meaning the supervisor is she couldn’t possibly. She can call about a leaky fountain, but she can’t also say to the township manager and traffic safety “Hey, we have a problem and there’s going to be a fatality or a really bad accident if we don’t improve the signage in Mount Pleasant.”
But hey, it’s Mount Pleasant right, so why give a damn?
I see you lazy supervisor and so does everyone else.
I will also note this is the woman who actually lives extraordinarily close to where Megan Nieberle was murdered and did we ever hear a word out of her about that?
Now another weird thing in Tredyffrin. Humble brings up Hans van Mol and he’s a curiosity to me. He likes to play parliamentarian at meetings right? So why does he not recuse himself from Parks and Rec stuff? His mama, Diane van Mol is the chair of the Parks and Rec Board is she not? Isn’t that a conflict if he doesn’t recuse himself? And has he recused himself?
And let’s talk America 250? If Tredyffrin is so proud of their flag why did Sharon Humble have the attitude of a cold wet noodle when Michelle Kichline was there. How could she not recognize Michelle’s service to the township as a supervisor for years, she was a chair and she was a county commissioner and a chair there as well!
Tredyffrin residents are waking up. Residents in other Chester County communities are waking up. Government needs to realize that we are all not sheep on this big bus of life.
This. Finally. People all over now understand what the residents of Mt. Pleasant have been dealing with for YEARS.
Anyway, my cup runneth over in gratitude for Philadelphia regional media digging in to what has been going on for far too long in this historic old neighborhood in Tredyffrin. It is gratifying to know that they care about people in the region enough to hang out and talk with these people for a while because basically no one else has.
Perhaps somewhere up above Miss Mazie Hall and her pal Margaret Collins are smiling? I mean developers could tear down Mazie’s house, but neither predatory developers nor animal house college students have a right to destroy this neighborhood. It isthat simple.
So Tredyffrin Township, it’s time to get off your collective asses and stop ignoring this neighborhood because everyone knows if this was an expensive McMansion district you’d be hopping to PDQ. Yes I am in fact saying that if this wasn’t a historically black neighborhood, this problem would have been dealt with years ago. And by the way, the McMansionette dwellers in the new big huge town houses are not happy with this issue either.
And Villanova University, walk the walk, don’t just talk the talk.
The data center. At this point, people are saying “which data center” because every time you turn around another municipality in Southeastern Pennsylvania, and all across the state are being faced with data centers.
And with few exceptions like our wonderful State Senator Katie Muth, so many elected officials are walking lock step with Josh Shapiro ruining areas one day to center at a time, aren’t they?
This post is primarily focused on the East Whiteland data center. But it’s an insidious problem. I’m going to share a video I found on Instagram from Missouri’s JeffCoHousewife on Instagram- she proved my point about this is just a real estate deal/development meaning data centers.
It’s the new warehouse, it’s the new condo development, it’s the new apartment building. It’s nothing about the good of the community, etc. etc. She also poses an interesting thing about how there the data center operators or want to be developers are packaging their scheme to the Republican majority that is this county in Missouri. That’s exactly what’s being done across the state of Pennsylvania only it’s being packaged for the Democrats, primarily. These data centers are just being packaged to sell, period. You could belong to the purple people eater political party and they would tell you why it was so fabulous for your political party and your constituents.
Let’s get real: they’re bad. Data centers aren’t good for anyone except the developers making money and then the data center operators making money. They suck our resources dry, they pollute our water, our land, our air. And if you want to tell me that it won’t affect real estate values in a community, maybe they should offer the Brooklyn Bridge for sale while they’re at it.
Now I have tons of questions about the data center in East Whiteland, but my voice isn’t the most important one. It’s the thousands of other people.
I will mention, however, that when this first started, I couldn’t understand why people in Malvern Hunt didn’t seem more concerned? I think that’s a question that I would ask board members of the homeowners association at the initial time this surfaced a few years ago, wouldn’t you? Which board members were on the board at the time this was initially proposed? Did the developer at the time a.k.a. Green Fig before Sentinel go meet with them? What was said?
Now, I’ve said before that the Green Fig developer is a glad-hander. His personal career roots are in sales and retail brokerage, correct? He described himself as a stock picker. See here:
Some brokers almost cringe at the term “stock-picker.” It can conjure up visions of reps with frayed nerves and churned accounts.
Not Charlie Lyddane.
“I’m not ashamed to admit that I pick stocks,” says Lyddane, a soloist at Legg Mason in West Chester, Pa. “It’s what a broker is supposed to do. My clients like that kind of help.”
Apparently so. Lyddane reports $1 million in production and $120 million under management. He’s been a broker for 19 years and has never been part of a team….With 400 clients and 1,000 accounts, Lyddane uses discretionary account management as a time-saving technique. “I can’t call everybody when I move stuff around. So I pick investments as I see fit.”
He also wants to tell you he’s a son of the environmentally, friendly, but is he really and remember when he ran for school board as an endorsed Republican?
Here’s an interesting quote from that Patch article years ago when he ran for school board:
Mr. Lyddane has lived in Great Valley School District for 15 years and has graduated two children from the District. A graduate of Union College in Schenectady, NY, Mr. Lyddane has a BA in History and also attended the Business School at Union. He started his career at Xerox. He was Vice President of Merrill Lynch and Legg Mason in West Chester for 23 years. As a real estate developer and investor in Chester County for the past 9 years, Mr. Lyddane has significant experience in budget development and implementation, as well as achieving strategic goals in a timely and cost efficient manner. He also has significant experience in Property Management….According to Mr. Lyddane, “When you are managing shareholder’s money, you must produce a product that is beneficial to those shareholders.
They are not us. They don’t get us and don’t care about us, do they?
Why not simply admit who they are and what they are about except they kind of did that at the meeting last week didn’t they? They were like if you don’t comply, we will make you comply, and if you’re bad, we’ll build a Walmart wasn’t that kind of the gist of it?
Then again, one of these East Whiteland Supervisors also told us who he was last week didn’t he? ⬇️
Nothing about this since at first began has felt normal has it?
Why should we have to deal with this and can we deal with this on an EPA super fund site that was polluted with lithium and more? And what good will the EPA prove in this given the fact that they have been gutted by the Trump administration? And then there is the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection our good old PA DEP? (Somebody explain to me what they do exactly that is substantive because as an adult I’m still wondering.)
I know, I know. The eternal conversation of what do you do with old super fund sites, but is a data center really it?
And neighbors have really worked hard to bring up valid points. And I’m going to turn it over to residents.
Listen to these people who I excerpted out of the whole meeting:
East Whiteland should say no to this giant expansion but will they? I think Peter Fixler the data center apologist will vote yes, I’m not sure about the other two votes just now, and it pains me to say that, but they have to decide whether they’re going to have the balls to say no to something or just capitulate?
And then there are the people that work at the township. My biggest area of concern lies with the assistant township manager. Her name is Catherine Ricardo. I haven’t interacted with her personally, but she always has concerned me. She came to East Whiteland from East Vincent Township where she was the township manager. I’ve always wondered why someone would leave a manager’s job for the underling’s job of assistant manager?
Note what I highlighted. Note her comment as a manager, saying once the zoning hearing board approved something they are locked in to that amount and nothing more. Yes, I’m paraphrasing, but you can read it yourself in the screenshot or the hyperlink by clicking on it. It makes you wonder why she could say that there yet they couldn’t say something similar in East Whiteland when Green Fig kept coming back to the pot for more porridge before even getting a shovel in the ground?
There’s also something about data centers being mentioned in 2022 if you read the same minutes.
There’s this old Parch article from way before then 2011 actually. About Pennhurst before it was sold I guess to the current owners? Read it and tell me if a familiar name shows up, or should I be more specific, a more familiar name sitting on the East Whiteland bench?
I will freely admit I think the Pennhurst site should be cleared of all of those buildings because it was literally a campus of horrors, but that’s not for me to say. What I don’t think should happen there is a giant data center. What I’m eternally curious about is if that land was supposed to be cleaned up because there are toxic issues there as well why hasn’t it been cleaned up and they’re talking about building a data center on top of it?
And whether we like it or not the whole data center issue in East Vincent is something East Whiteland needs to pay attention to in my opinion because East Vincent’s old manager became East Whiteland’s current assistant manager. Actually in the overall scheme of things it might be helpful if East Vincent data center fighters and East Whiteland data center fighters joined forces and then there’s Upper Merion and Limerick also facing giant data centers. And then we move upstate don’t we?
So everyone who says this is a NIMBY issue to people in each community facing this horror show needs to buy a clue. Data centers are being shoved into everyone’s backyard and isn’t that the truth? It’s not NIMBY. It’s everywhere and it doesn’t matter what political persuasion you are if you live in one of these affected areas, we’re all affected.
My final thoughts include still trying to figure out why it is that Green Fig got approved and never did anything except try to change everything after the initial approvals? I will also note that last meeting, Charlie Lyddane was uncharacteristically quiet and why was that?
Above is their proposed Valhalla, but that’s not the residents Valhalla is it? I mean it was former Supervisor Sue Drummond’s idea of Valhalla was it not? Did we ever send her a thank you note?
Aren’t we tired of these discussions of do the opinions of residents matter yet? When do our voices matter here? Do our voices matter?
I think because no one knows enough about data centers, they shouldn’t just be plugged into our communities. Why do we have to havethem? But who am I but a mere mortal and a female?
Along that vein, I will never understand as a plain old ordinary person a site that was a superfund site got approved for a nursing home or whatever that once proposed senior facility was could have the same zoning for a monster data center? Like many other things in involving this topic in East Whiteland, it does not compute.
Here are some links to recent media about the East Whiteland data center issue and other communities somewhat close by and a website that seems to be pure propaganda about data centers in East Whiteland:
PA Rep. Paul Friel and PA Rep. Chris Pielli could have made a difference today. But they didn’t. Why did they sell out their constituents today? We may never know exactly but people keep voting for them so this is on the voters. Obviously they are not in office to serve their constituents.
These two men are supposed to serve Chester County, but did they do so today? My opinion is no. My opinion is they sold out Chester County to advance a data center bill that may or may not be politically advantageous for them. And I am allowed to have that opinion.
There are certain aspects to both of these state reps that I actually used to like, but this shows their true colors doesn’t it and if you were voting in favor of PA HB 2151, you are voting against the best interest of your constituency from one end of the state to the other.
A vote for this bill removes rights from residents and municipalities, boroughs, etc.
Now more than ever find your state rep call them up and tell them to vote no on this. Find your state senator call them up and tell them to vote no on this.
Data centers are an even bigger threat than pipelines in some regards and I didn’t even think that was possible.
Yet here we are.
And shame on the leader leadership of the Chester County Democrats for also ignoring the best interests of all of the residents of Chester County.
It’s time for the boot lickers to go. Friel and Pielli should have Democrats primarying them. This bill is wrong. This push for data centers is wrong.
This is once again why you have to look at the individual candidates, not just their political persuasion when choosing who represents you.
Whether it is a local, state, or a federal election people need to wake up. If this bill becomes a reality, all Pennsylvanians will suffer. It is that simple.
Start sending emails start making phone calls. If you’ve already done it, do it again these people are supposed to represent us not special interests of the governor. A lot of these people are up for election this year.
It’s time to make these political boot lickers work for our vote.
Yes, it’s a dead Rite Aide but if West Goshen has their way TONIGHT they will push to change the zoning and make it a car wash??? Allow me to quote West Goshen Sunshine and Hello West Chester verbatim (I do not think they will mind):
A Sunshine Report heads-up: West Goshen Board of Supervisors will hear a Zoning amendment tied to the former Rite Aid site on Phoenixville Pike at tonight’s annual organizational meeting.
The amendment, if approved, would permit a car wash to open at 1307 Phoenixville Pike. Under the Township’s current Zoning Ordinance, car washes are only permitted by Conditional Use in the C-5 General Highway Commercial Zoning District. This section of Phoenixville Pike is part of the C-1 Neighborhood Commercial Zoning District.
The request is being advanced in connection with a proposed redevelopment by Spotless Car Wash Brands. The site is owned by Peter Kathopoulis, of 92 Victory Investments of Upper Darby, PA.
The meeting is scheduled for 5:00 p.m. at the West Goshen Township building. Approval of this zoning amendment could expand where car washes are allowed township-wide.
No meeting minutes for real for real so trying to sneak it in much West Goshen? There was a blip in November with this but then NOTHING. Can’t find any old minutes or plans and that is anti sunshine (for a change) and sleazy.
I am REALLY familiar with this intersection. Why? Because PECO or AQUA or PENNDOT has had W. King Road Closed for so long between Ship and Boot, I go through there once a week on average. It’s a busy, difficult intersection with others near by that West Goshen because when you cross over it goes towards Fern Hill and the hospital stuff and Greystone development. A spit away is West Whiteland Township and I don’t know any residents who knew about this there!
And let’s talk environmental impacts from car wash runoff?
Oh and look at their traffic study and other comparables …. Maryland AND Virginia??? OH COME ON.
I was asked to be there in person and life got in the way, and I was unable to attend the last Willistown meeting of the year and I am sorry I couldn’t be there. I saw no sewer rats in attendance so it probably would’ve been a nice meeting with the exception of Mrs. Golfball the lone public comment, which I have included. Complete segue but what does one expect when one moves next to a golf club and golf course? And do we really think some golfer meant to hit her with a golf ball? Why doesn’t she just ask them to or put up netting herself near the edges of her property to catch the golf balls so they don’t come onto her property?
Mrs. Golfball was quintessential of the types who move to Willistown and then complain about the color of the sky, the scent of horse and cow manure etc. and don’t get me started about sidewalks on twisty dangerous windy roads that won’t ever work, right?
Sorry, I digress.
Bob Lange gave way more many years than most people ever would to municipality.
He’s done an amazing amount of things for his home community in Willistown, and the meeting this week, reflected that. It was really nice to see some old familiar faces like Andy Dinniman.
I was glad to see that the Willistown Republicans or some Republicans got up to say job well done, especially after the treatment he received for exercising his right to choose his own political candidate to vote for in a presidential election as an American.
Willistown Township social media photo
Again, I noticed that it didn’t seem as if the sewer rats were in attendance, and I will mention them again because in my opinion they are the most horribly rude people consistently in Willistown Township and I would love to know how much money the Township spends per annum on the often frivolous right to know requests that they file? Anyway did they think they were punishing Bob by denying their presence? I am sure they will be back, don’t you?
But back to Bob Lange’s last meeting.
I first met Bob when I came out here to be with my husband. The picture you see in the post above I took in 2012 when I happen to be on the farm one day because he was nice enough to let me take pictures of some of the fields one fall. They were just so beautiful even then getting ready for winter.
Willistown is a beautiful township. A lot of that is down to Bob’s part in the stewardship. For 27 years. People talk about public service, Bob Lange has lived it.
As human beings, we are all flawed. Bob Lange in my estimation has never pretended or pronounced himself to be perfect like a lot of his armchair critics seemingly self-proclaim, but in Willistown you have always known that he cares about the township and acted proactively. And sorry not sorry, the abuse heaped on the supervisors there in general and the manager over the past few years has been astounding and that’s not a positive. (Yes, sewer rats and your motley band of malcontents I am speaking about all of you. You have made yourselves public figures via your antics.)
One of my favorite parts of this meeting was listening to Andy Dinniman. So many pearls of wisdom last night. And he spoke of when we were all still different political persuasions but essentially we behaved better.
Anyway, job well done Bob and thank you and Merry Christmas and we will see you around your farm!
Also Bob? Episcopal Academy has always been a sentimental favorite of mine as a Shipley gal because of some of the amazing friends I still have from there.
