Mount Pleasant votes to terminate street department employee
It’s the middle of winter and Mount Pleasant Borough is down to two employees in their street department.
At their monthly meeting, members of council approved a motion to terminate the employment of John Tyrrell from the street department due to violations of the borough’s personnel policy.
All members of council voted in favor of the motion except Councilman Richard Cholock, who abstained.
In the most recent snow storm, the borough had the Waste Water Treatment employees team up with the skeletal crew of the street department to get the borough roads cleared of snow.
“I want to commend the street department and the Waste Water Treatment employees for teaming up and getting our roads cleared,” said Borough Manager Jeff Landy. “That teamwork was not necessarily something that was, overall, real prevalent when I first came on board here.”
Councilwoman Diane Bailey said they needed to get the ball rolling now to try and fill the street department position.
“I don’t think we’ll be able to fill that any earlier than the beginning of spring, but we really need to start the process as soon as possible,” she said.
Members of council approved a motion to advertise for the position.
In other business, members of council agreed to advertise the borough’s amended sign ordinance to include a $50 permit fee for individuals requesting to erect a sign on their property.
They also agreed to advertise an ordinance dealing with wireless communication facilities and cell towers.
Solicitor Deanna Istik said the ordinance establishes regulations and guidelines for individuals or business owners who want to erect a cell tower in the borough.
Councilman Fred McCloy said there would be different fees, such as user fees and right-of-way fees, that would be added on to the ordinance at a later date when that information is figured out.
Istik said she wrote the ordinance based on two other ordinances from surrounding municipalities.
Under the police report, Chief Doug Sam said they created new parking permits for residents on Washington Street and College Avenue that will have the address of the person who owns the vehicle as well as a barcode taken directly from the individual’s registration.
Any resident on these streets can pay $15 a year to get one permit for themselves and one visitor’s permit.
Sam will be available Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays from 7 to 11 p.m. for anyone who wants to have the permits printed out immediately.
He added that individuals who can’t make those times are welcome to visit the police department any time to have an officer make a copy of their registration card. Sam will then print out the permits as he has time and will call the resident when the permits are available to be picked up.
In other police business, Sam said they have outgrown their space in the police department and were looking at the possibility of expanding into a nearby office previously rented by a dentist for about 20 years.
The first-floor office has been empty for over a year. Landy said they were hoping to get a tenant in there who would pay the same rate that the dentist paid (between $800 and $1,000), but Mayor Gerald Lucia said he thought it would be hard to find someone to pay that kind of money.
“(The dentist) was there for about 20 years and established, so he was agreeable with paying the higher rent,” Lucia said.
Cholock added that there is water damage in the space that has ruined ceiling tiles and carpet.
Currently the Westmoreland County Drug and Alcohol Commission rents a smaller office on the second floor and had inquired about moving into a portion of the larger office on the first floor for possibly $500 a month.
Councilman John Rogacki said it was a no-brainer to move the commission down to the first-floor office, and block off a portion of that space for storage for the police department.
Rogacki and the rest of the property committee will look into the water damage, what might need addressed, how blocking off a portion of the office might work, as well as the rent possibilities from the commission.
They plan to bring back some information upon which council might be able to take action at their next meeting.
In other business, Landy reported that he is working with a company called Blue Otter to develop an application that would map out all of the street signs, from stop signs and yield signs to street name signs, for the borough.
Landy said they borough has to have all their signs replaced by 2019 and although there is a cost to this, which they don’t know what it is at this point, it will save about six months’ worth of time.
He also reported that they are still waiting for the state Department of Environmental Protection to give their clearance to develop the old Levin property on Bridgeport Street. They should have an answer by the end of February.
Also, a building on the lower part of Main Street formerly known as the Revalo building located across from Lobinger’s Pizza, will be demolished by the county and should save whoever might be interested in that property about $50,000,
Also, the property that formerly held the R & R Restaurant will also be demolished by the county, probably before the end of the year.
“I view this as a positive,” Landy said. “Right now, we are getting no tax revenues from that property and this gives the opportunity to put something new in there and bring in more tax revenues.”
He added that because Westmoreland County owns the properties through the land bank, they can not simply create parking lots.
“What they are looking out, when the buildings come down, if the demolition guy does a half decent job, they can temporarily let people park there,” Landy said.