Residents, Perry Township officials continue court battle over water issues
Eric Morris | Herald-Standard
Star Junction resident Charles Fidel stands on the porch of his New Town Road home, where he has struggled with flooding consistently since the early 2000s.
Eric Morris | Herald-Standard
Charles Fidel points to cracks in his home’s foundation and porch caused by years of water running onto his property due to, as he claims, inadequate storm water management by Perry Township. Constant flooding has caused tens of thousands of dollars in damages to Fidel’s property.
Eric Morris | Herald-Standard
A storm drain on Greenfield Road in Perry Township’s Star Junction, located parallel to and uphill from New Town Road. Area residents say drains are often laden with debris and growth and do little to catch flowing water.
Eric Morris | Herald-Standard
A storm drain located on Greenfield Road in Perry Township’s Star Junction, looking in the direction of New Town Road. Area residents say drains are often laden with debris and growth and do little to catch flowing water.
Eric Morris | Herald-Standard
This picture shows storm water catch basins located on New Town Road in Perry Township’s Star Junction. Residents Charles Fidel and Ted Hutchinson have brought legal action against the township for allegedly failing to maintain adequate storm water measures in the New Town area that they say has caused damage to their properties.
Eric Morris | Herald-Standard
A pipe at the base of Ted Hutchinson’s driveway on New Town Road that discharges groundwater from his property along the side of and into the roadway is what Perry Township officials have called the cause of water issues in the New Town area of Star Junction. Hutchinson contends there is nowhere for excess water on his property to travel due to inadequate storm water infrastructure.
When it rains, it pours. But when it’s clear, water still seems to trickle for New Town Road residents in Perry Township’s Star Junction.
For nearly two decades, it’s been a continuous presence of soggy ground, shifting structures and damp basement walls for Charles Fidel.
Fidel has lived on New Town Road since mid-1994. When Fidel moved into the two-story home, which sits just below street level, his property was in what he described as “fair condition” — a solid ground and a strong foundation, he said.
“I didn’t have any water issues whatsoever,” Fidel said of his first several years at the home. However, by the early 2000s, something had changed.
The problems started after construction performed by Perry Township in front of his home to replace an antiquated storm water system, Fidel alleges.
“Within the first rainfall, I noticed an unusual amount of water coming into my yard. I would get water coming in through my walls six weeks after a rainstorm, and I’m like, where is this water coming from?”
Fidel is one of two New Town Road residents who has brought legal action against Perry Township supervisors for allegedly failing to maintain adequate storm water measures along New Town Road.
Ted Hutchinson’s home on New Town Road has been in his family dating to mid-20th century. As a child, he remembers the property as being dry, never experiencing a water problem. When he returned to Star Junction in 2013, the conditions were notably different, he said.
“When I moved back to take residence of the house over, I noticed there was just a lot of water pooled up in the backyard,” said Hutchinson. When attempting to build a garage on the property later that year, Hutchinson ran into additional problems with groundwater, struggling to remediate a constant flow of water on his property that could potentially cause flooding.
After consulting with contractors, one solution (among several measures implemented) was to run a pipe to the base of Hutchinson’s driveway where water could escape. However, with no storm drain close by, the water runs along and into New Town Road, eroding the shoulder and icing over the roadway in colder months.
Water continuously flows from the pipe, regardless of the time of last rainfall, Hutchinson said. Without a tie-in to the storm drains on New Town Road, there is nowhere else for the water to go, he said.
Through its engineer, McMillen Engineering, the township identified this runoff as the cause of an unsafe condition on New Town Road, according to documents obtained by the residents through a Right-to-Know request, but to date, Hutchinson has not been cited for any wrongdoing.
“There has never been an issue, a citation, anything regarding proper permits that has ever been filed against me (nor) even hinted at from a legal standpoint,” said Hutchinson.
Hutchinson says that he is trying to mitigate his water issues without using a pump that could fail in a power outage and flood his buildings, or putting the water into the municipal sewer system, which is illegal. There is simply nowhere for the excess water to go, he said.
Hutchinson contends that poor storm water management on the part of the township is the cause of the constant wetness on his property due to the removal of drainage ditches when the neighborhood was equipped with city water and sewage in the 1990s. Now, he says, downspouts on neighboring properties run into the ground and connect to a system that no longer exists, saturating the ground and leaving New Town wet year-round.
“The township has said you can’t divert water. Well, it’s not diverting water. Water is being dumped on our property from a system above that no longer exists,” said Hutchinson. “There’s pipes going from people’s roofs into the ground, but they’re not going anywhere. Without (the township) having a proper system here, they can’t even repair this stuff.”
Fidel and Hutchinson say the township’s actions — and in some instances, inaction — has resulted in excessive water runoff, dangerous road conditions and property damage. Feeling their complaints lodged at township meetings weren’t being adequately addressed, the residents took legal action.
Hutchinson, with wife Judelie, filed suit against the township in October 2014 in an attempt to resolve their water issues. Fidel filed separate but similar litigation against the supervisors in 2016, and the two cases were consolidated later that year.
According to a pre-trial statement filed on behalf of the defendants named in the suit — which include Perry Township, current supervisors A.J. Boni and Clarence Johnson and then-supervisor Janet Galla — their stance is that excessive water flowing from Hutchinson’s property following the construction of his garage in 2013 has “runoff onto the Fidel property and saturated the ground causing damage to their property and homes.”
Fidel and Hutchinson do not agree with that assessment.
“They’ve basically dumped everything on Mr. Hutchinson’s shoulder as being the cause of the problem up here,” said Fidel, claiming that the defendants’ statement contradicts pre-trial testimony by two supervisors, as well as documentation from the township obtained through a Right-to-Know request made by the residents’ attorney that indicates the supervisors’ knowledge of inadequate storm water and surface water controls in the New Town area dating to 2006.
In depositions taken in September 2017 in preparation for an impending trial, Galla stated she observed “heavy flooding” in the areas of New Town Road and neighboring Greenfield Road dating back to 2001, and Johnson said he believed there to be a storm water problem along New Town Road in times of excessive rain, adding that the Hutchinson property is not the cause of water issues suffered by Fidel.
However, in an October 2016 deposition, Boni stated he believes there is a water discharge problem on New Town Road caused by the pipe illegally stemming from the Hutchinson property, citing the Pennsylvania Second Class Township Code that prohibits the discharge of water onto a municipal road.
“(I)n my opinion, the water coming out of that pipe is causing the problems that we are having on Newtown Road today,” Boni said in his sworn statement.
Boni said in the deposition that he does not know the cause of Fidel’s problems, that the township has replaced piping at the Fidel property and that issues stemming from water entering the property need to be remediated by the property owner rather than the township.
“(Mr. Fidel) needs to remediate his water. …I don’t know where the water is coming from,” Boni stated.
A 2016 pipe replacement by the township on the west side of New Town Road in front of Fidel’s home alleviated some of the problems, Fidel said, but surface water still runs from the street onto his property instead of into a drainage system.
Boni, Johnson and Galla declined to comment for this story, citing the ongoing civil suit.
Township solicitor Jack Purcell said the township denies the claims made in the suit by Fidel and Hutchinson but declined further comment.
“The court system will decide,” said Purcell. “The fact that the case is in court makes it impossible to get into any of the merits of the case and makes it inappropriate to do so.
“It should be played out in court, and that’s where we intend to do so and are doing so.”
The four-and-a-half years since the start of litigation have proved frustrating for the New Town residents.
The ensuing court battle has left them without a trial date, despite requesting one months ago.
Fidel and Hutchinson, who have cycled through three attorneys and three engineers, have racked up an estimated $85,000 in legal fees and survey costs between the two of them.
Due to excessive wetness on his property, Hutchinson said he has had to make costly amendments to his garage and replace an addition on his home, in addition to a need to replace the block around his foundation, all of which carry a hefty price tag, he noted.
Fidel has an estimate to replace the entire foundation of his home for about $73,000, which he said excludes the cost replacing a damaged porch and sidewalks, estimated at another $20,000. Inside his home, Fidel endures the constant presence of black mold coating basement walls due to water seepage.
“I’m into about $100,000 worth of damages,” Fidel said. “I am into this more than I may ever get back. I just want the problem fixed.”
Fidel and Hutchinson say the water damage sustained to their properties has ultimately impaired the quality of life along New Town Road, potentially depriving them and their neighbors of being able to sell their homes.
“A lot of people, that’s all they have is their property,” Hutchinson said. “And as it gets damaged, they don’t have the ability to fix it, to fight it.
“They just don’t have the ability to do anything. You have to stand and watch it degrade.”