Hello Members and Guests,
It has been a long and cruel winter and I hope we’ve already had our onion snows and the plans for the spring gardens are now dancing in our heads. What’s dancing in my head is the loss of three months of really good CEPTA meetings on some very important topics. So with that said let's get back to business. What better way is there to spend Tax Day than talking with local elected officials with some ideas on how to save taxpayer money?
Date- Tuesday, April 15th
Time- Doors open at 7PM, meeting starts at 7:30 and goes to ~9PM
Find out what's happening in Emmauswith free, real-time updates from Patch.
Place- Fire Company #1; located at 6th and Broad Sts., in Emmaus
Presenters- Mr. Ron Beitler and Mr. Scott Ott
Find out what's happening in Emmauswith free, real-time updates from Patch.
Questions- please send us an E-mail to ceptapa@gmail.com
This month's topics and speakers are extremely important to what's happening in the East Penn area today. Our first speaker will be recently elected Lower Macungie Twp. Commissioner Mr. Ron Beitler and the topic he will be discussing is the “Hamilton Crossings” Mall TIF (Tax Increment Financing). This has been a major topic in our area since 2009 and is now coming to a head as the LMT Commissioners have announced their desire to bring this to a final Yea or Nay vote this June. This leaves little time for your public input on this immensely important topic.
Please see the below links for a good idea of the overall concept of the plan, and Mr. Beitler's view on the project.
http://www.ronbeitler.com/2014/03/20/development-watch-hamilton-crossings/
Mr. Beitler is asking for as much public participation and input as possible to be addressed to the LMT commissioners in order that they get a good understanding of their constituent's desires. This will be an informative discussion if you live in the East Penn/Lower Macungie area because if the TIF is approved by the LMT commissioners, approximately $12 million dollars of educational funds will be taken from the students of East Penn School District and funneled directly to an out of state, Staten Island developer. This developer wants to take your hard earned tax dollars, money that should be spent locally on education and for fixing roads, to build his for profit shopping center and some local elected officials agree with him.
Now’s your chance to help stop this foolishness and voice your concerns.
Our second speaker will be Lehigh County Commissioner Scott Ott. Mr. Ott will speak about his ideas on how we can better manage the County budgeting process to the advantage of the taxpayer. As a side light to the Hamilton Crossings subject above, Mr. Ott was one of the 6 County Commissioners that voted "No" to the TIF proposal. As a result the County will not be giving your tax money away to build a shopping center for a private developer.
We look forward to seeing you there and please don’t forget to bring a friend or two.