Update: Looks like our headline will pack a bigger wallop of relevance than expected. According to the Borough Council’s meeting minutes, PECO plans to replace gas mains on not only Rodman next year, but Runnymede as well. So much for our nice fresh pavement. Did anyone consult with PECO about their plans to do this? Unlikely.

We awoke this morning to the sound of stone saws carving up the pavement in front of the brand new ramps at the corner of Runnymede and Rodman. The Borough had led us to believe that they would repave Rodman Avenue before the end of this year as part of their overreaching paving program, so it begs the question:

Why work on something that you plan to rip up anyway?

The patchwork applied smoothed out the oddly angled ramp edges, so that the width of a wheelchair could roll with ease into the road. Why they didn’t construct the concrete to match the surface in the first place presents a mystery to us in the first place, but it now looks like the work done at at least six corners just today by at least three or four Jenkintown DPW employees will eventually be ripped up whenever the Borough gets around to repaving Rodman Avenue.

The Borough does unintentionally make for a good argument why we shouldn’t trust them with a wholesale sidewalk and curb repair program. Perhaps this is the real reason for Council’s intransigence — no confidence in its own employees to handle the big jobs. If this is how they manage repaving, perhaps we’re better off.

Or maybe it’s time to clean house and employ people who know what they’re doing.

The Borough won’t tell you, and no longer wants to know

Jenkintown Borough does not know what you paid for their sidewalks, and at some point this past summer, it decided not to care. Up until at least April 1 of this year, the permit form that residents completed before they could proceed with their sidewalk or curb repair, asked for the “Cost of work”.

Apparently that information is not compiled, which is a shame because that number would give us a stark comparison with what the Borough would pay for the work on a wholesale basis. Ignorance is bliss, at least for the Borough.

On September 9, we submitted a “Right-to-Know” request with the Borough for “The total estimate in dollars of sidewalk and curb work performed by residents as a result of the borough’s paving program.”

We received this reply almost two weeks later from Rick Ware, Jenkintown Borough’s Finance Director and Right to Know Officer:

“There is no record of the Borough of Jenkintown that indicates the dollar value of projects as related to this matter. Pursuant to Section 705 of the Right-to-Know Law, an agency is not required to create a record that does not already exist. Accordingly your request is denied.”

Strangely enough, at some point between April first and today, the Borough removed the line item that asks for a “Cost of work.” Here is the form we filed last April.

Here is the form we downloaded today from the Borough’s website. When and why they removed that line item is something we’d like to know.

Last week Walkable Jenkintown filed a Request for Information. We’d like to know what YOU have so far spent on sidewalk and curb repair as a result of the Paving Program.

The permit you or your contractor filled out and supplied to the Borough with your $25 fee included a line item for the estimate provided by that contractor for the total work. If the Borough entered this information into a proper spreadsheet, the total should be readily accessible. Hopefully Borough Manager George Locke will provide this information in a timely fashion.

When we have that number, we can then compare it with the wholesale rate, or PennDOT’s “going rate” for sidewalk and curb construction.

Just to remind anyone of our intentions, we have stated from the very beginning that this policy cost us too much. Besides all the ethical and potentially legal pitfalls, we believe that this policy costs residents of Jenkintown far more than it should and produces results of a much lower standard than it should.

Stay tuned.

In the meantime, enjoy this image of Councilman Rick Bunker’s driveway apron.