Supervisor Chairwoman Dona Starr Clarifies the Responsibilities of the Supervisors for Protecting Our Community from the Supervisors Meeting on 2/11/2008
It is unfortunate that several misinformed residents who write letters to the editor concerning various issues in Exeter Township don't come to the supervisors meetings, read the minutes of the meetings or call anone of us on this Board and ask questions about these issues so they can get correct information. Writing a letter with half-truths and in my opinion, lies, to me is only an attempt to politically attack the Board of Supervisors for personal reasons and has nothing to do with the improvement of Exeter Township or the education of our children.
There seems to be confusion about what the duties of the Exeter Township Board of Supervisors and the duties of the Exeter School Board are. There has always been confusion about the school taxes and the township taxes. We've addressed that several times but again, we are responsible for the township property tax. We are NOT responsible for the school taxes. This is the School Board's responsibility.
We are alson NOT responsible for providing schools for our children. That is the School Board's responsibility. It is also their responsibility to plan for future schools.
The Exeter Township Board of Supervisors is State mandated to protect the health, safety and welfare of ALL of the citizens of Exeter and to provide sound fiscal management of our property tax dollars. We are allowed to do that by using Zoning Ordinances. With regard to agriculture and farmlands, let me read a portion of the State mandated Municipal Planning Code. It states, "Section 603 Ordinance Provisions b 5 Protection and preservation of natural and historic resources and prime agricultural land and activities.
g.1. Zoning ordinances SHALL protect prime agricultural land and may promote the establishment of agricultural security areas.
h. Zoning Ordinances SHALL encourage the continuity, development and viability of agricultural operations."
"Section 604 Zoning Purposes. The provisions of zoning ordinances SHALL be designed:
3. TO PRESERVE PRIME AGRICULTURE AND FARMLAND CONSIDERING TOPOGRAPHY, SOIL TYPE AND CLASSIFICATION AND PRESENT USE."
The Exeter School Board comes to us citing National GUIDELINES. They are guidelines and not LAWS that MUST be followed.
We MUST follow State Laws when creating and amending our zoning ordinances.
As Stewards of the land of Exeter Township, we must do what is right and what is mandated by State Law for the future of the entire Township.
Those are the facts.
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Exeter Township Joint Workshop
On Thursday, January 16th, a joint workshop was held at the Reiffton School Cafetorium. The workshop was the first in what could be several such gatherings where the Exeter Township Supervisors, School Board and Planning Commission are pulling together to arrive at a viable site on which to place a new school or to utilize space already within the control of the district. The meeting started at 7:40 .....
Read the full article by selecting the pdf file to the right.
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Exeter Township Joint Workshop |
The genius of our ruling class is that it has kept a majority of the people from ever questioning the inequity of a system where most people drudge along, paying heavy taxes for which they get nothing in return.
Gore Vidal
Much education today is monumentally ineffective. All too often we are giving young people cut flowers when we should be teaching them to grow their own plants.
John W. Gardner
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The following is a statement that was made by Supervisor Dona Starr at the June 11, 2007 Board of Supervisors Meeting. Mrs. Starr was clarifying information as a reply to inaccurate/inappropriate comments made by a resident and another supervisor at the previous meeting.
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I would first like to address Mr. Ken Smith, Exeter School Board Member, on some of his comments and accusations at the last meeting. We corrected the issue of the waving of papers when Mr. Smith was informed that Supervisor Michelle Kircher waved the House Bill and made a statement concerning its worthlessness. We then corrected the issue of the “mud hut” and the Federal Government’s Smart Grant program. Mr. Smith also took out of context something that I said concerning the possibility of new homes on the Bauscher Farm and I would like to clarify that also. I said that if the Agricultural Preservation District was successfully challenged by the landowner and homes were to be built, 8 or 9 upscale homes with substantial acreage would be better than hundreds of homes on that tract.
As a note, I have my associate’s degree as a paralegal.
Second, I would like to address Supervisor Barbieri’s comments at the last meeting. Unlike the private sector he deals with we are the public sector, the local government. We represent the people of Exeter and one of our responsibilities is to be a good steward of the land. Preserving and protecting the prime farmlands is not about money and profits. It is not about the percentages of soybeans or corn that will supplement gasoline production. Agriculture is not only growing crops. Agriculture includes nurseries, horticulture, animal husbandry, poultry farming, and dairy farming. This is about the preservation of the heritage and beauty of our Township. It is about preservation of historic barns and structures. It is about open space and panoramic views. The very reason many people choose to live in Exeter. If we keep allowing large chunks of prime farmland to be gobbled up by uses other than agriculture, what will we have left? Legal challenges will follow citing “path of growth” reasoning and soon there will be hundreds of houses along 562 requiring yet even more schools and making traffic even more unbearable than it already is with no State or Federal grant monies for road improvements in sight. We all know that a new school is needed and we can properly educate our children while preserving our farmlands if the School Board and Board of Supervisors will openly work together. The School Board is responsible for the education of our children and we are responsible for the governance of the Township which includes preserving prime farmlands. Once again, I am not against building schools, I am against building schools in our Agricultural Preservation Zone. In one respect, I agree with Mr. Smith. We should amend and revise the Zoning Ordinance. We should REMOVE all of the uses allowed by Special Exception and Conditional Use from the Agricultural Preservation Zoning District. Everyone knows that allowing more and more uses in a zoning district opens Pandora’s Box and invites legal challenges to that district. By reducing the uses in Agricultural Preservation it will send a very clear message to anyone considering any type of challenge.
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