Reminders, Corrections, and Central Presbyterian

Tomorrow is primary election day. Please get out to vote. The polls are open from 7 am to 8 pm.

A correction: Last week I said Val Arkoosh led the pack in quantities of junk mail. I was premature. As of today I declare Brendan Boyle undisputed Master Ruler of Junk Mail, some of it so big, it doesn't fit in my mailbox or bag for recycling (which, in my house, is where all political junk mail goes without reading). Candidates, please don't expect me to believe your pious words about the environment when you send out mountains of junk mail.

I can't declare a winner in annoying phone calls yet. So far the honors go to whoever ordered the exact same survey every week for the last month and a half. Just for the record, I lied on at least one item each time. I've been every age group, a man, a Republican, and from different races. I figure if politicians can lie to me, I should return the favor.

I'll be working inside the polls tomorrow, so I won't be posting a dairy entry. If you vote in 3-3, come in before 10 am and say hi. After that, I head for a polling place down in Pen Wyn.

One other correction. The Municipal Council Meeting on Wednesday night is at 6:30 pm, not 7:30. The agenda's been posted, if you want to check it out. I'll talk more about it on Wednesday.

Now, on to Central Presbyterian Church, located at Stanbridge and West Airy Streets. To refresh your memory, it was built in 1906 of Valley Forge Marble, with large stained glass windows by Nicholas D'Ascenzo, a nationally reknown artist. The church's original congregation had dwindled to 40 members. They shared space with an Hispanic ministry, but they had less than 60 members. Together, they couldn't keep up with the costs of maintaining and heating the structure. The building's been vacant for at least 18 months.

The property was to be auctioned off last Friday (though some notices said Thursday and it got confusing). The Times Herald reported that church members and their real estate broker called off the auction because they'd received several sealed purchase offers prior to the auction. Church members are due to open those bids today and decide the building's fate.

It's thought that two of the purchase offers are from other congregations, which would allow Central Pres to go on being a church. I hope ALL of the offers are from buyers who want to preserve the buidling, and not from developers who, say, want to level that beautiful structure to put up something like a Family Dollar or more horribly cramped stacked townhouses like we'll see at 1202 Dekalb.

As I said in a blog not long ago, it would be ironic that we're putting up Victorian style street light all over town, only to be demolishing our authentically historic buildings.

One Last Winter Chore - Potholes

Before I get to today's topic, I want to let everyone know that Central Presbyterian Church will be auctioned off tomorrow in an online auction between 11 am and 3 pm. You can follow the bidding at Auctionpoint.com. You might remember that I blogged about Central Pres back in February (read it here). The church's stained glass windows were created by a nationally-acclaimed artist, who also designed the windows for the Washington National Cathedral, Valley Forge Memorial Chapel, and historic Riverside Church in Manhattan. Let's all hope whoever buys the place doesn't do so with the thought of demolishing it. That would be a huge loss in and of itself, let alone coming on top of the loss of Montgomery Hospital.

Potholes on Oak Street  

But today... hey, it's the middle of May. Memorial Day weekend is just over a week away. Time to finish off that one last pesky winter chore--filling potholes. Yes, we can all agree that this was a bad winter, especially hard on our roads. We understand that it might take a few months for public works to get around to all the potholes in town, but honestly, now that I'm starting to see efforts at patching these voids, I have to say that the patch jobs so far seem totally inadequate.

I traversed Hamilton yesterday, between James and Airy, which was pretty torn up this winter. Lots of little patches, but only the bottoms of the holes. There are still too many sunken-in spots and too much crumbled macadam around them. You might not break an axle now, but your car's alignment won't last long if you have to travel that street every day. Rocks could fly up and damage your or other cars. On a dark night, you could easily hit a depression the wrong way and lose control. And those crumbled spots will just get worse with traffic and rain.

I was on Buttonwood between James and Sterigere, and Harding Blvd between Sterigere and Fornance. Same problems, not quite as bad as Hamilton, but still, the patches aren't enough.

Every time I've headed downtown the last 2 months, I've had to dodge the growing craters on Swede Street between Pine and Elm. These are right in the middle of the street, so you can't avoid the holes. Lots of people double park in that stretch, making it all the more hazardous. And the half block between the library and Elm is chopped up and bumpy.

One of many bad patch jobs 

I've been hearing from West End residents that the absolute worst place is Oak Street, so I went over to check it out for myself. Between Noble and Buttonwood, it looks like the street was bombed. Shae Ashe sent me the photos of Oak that I'm posting here. Trust me, the images don't do justice to the reality. It's a wonder no one's been hurt there. The residents there have called in to public works multiple times about the problem and so far, they've been ignored.

Of course, I haven't been all over town, so I have to assume there are other bad spots that I haven't seen. If there are potholes that need fixing in your neighborhood, add a comment below or on Facebook or email me--give me the exact stretch of road in Norristown that needs fixing--and I'll update this Diary entry.

What worries me most is that those patches I've seen so far might be all we'll get. That's not good enough. Okay, so maybe we can't afford to completely redo streets, but make those patches adequate enough to level the area, smooth out the bumps, clear loose rocks, and prevent further deterioration of the street. We expect our taxes to pay for basic infrastructure and pothole repair is as basic as it gets.

A few decades ago, people used to say that Norristown was the speed bump on the way to King of Prussia. At the moment, it's literally true.

Being Forced to Trade Down

Council hasn't listed their agenda for tomorrow night yet, and I don't want to waste a whole day waiting for them. Chances are no one will be in to work at Muni. Hall today because of the snow anyway. Plus they're calling for more snow tomorrow night, so maybe the meeting will be postponed again. At least the high temperatures are supposed to be above freezing today through Wednesday. If they get some salt down on the main roads during and between storms, we shouldn't have the impassable streets we had in January.

I told you all about the petition to stop the demolition of Montgomery Hospital last week and I'm happy to report that we already have 182 signatures. Thanks to those who signed. Please keep spreading the word. As soon as we get some decent weather, we'll also round up some volunteers to canvass the hospital neighborhood, to make sure the residents there know about it. If you haven't signed, click on the photo of the hospital on the right of this column.

But Montgomery isn't our only endangered building. On the other side of town, at Stanbridge and Airy, is Central Presbyterian Church. Central Pres, as it's been called my whole lifetime, was built in 1906 as a missionary extention of First Presbyterian at Airy and Dekalb. The exterior walls of Central Pres are Valley Forge marble. The sanctuary is Gothic, with windows by Philadelphia artist Nicholas D'Ascenzo, who also did the windows in Valley Forge Chapel, West Point Chapel, the National Cathedral, and historic Riverside Church in New York City.

But the congregation slowly died off the last few years, and now Central Pres and its large lot are up for sale. It's listed for $490,000 on Loop-Net.

Recently, members of Norristown Nudge  talked to the realtor for the property. The realtor was thinking of putting a Family Dollar store there. if you're like me, your stomach sinks at the thought of this. Why is this a bad idea?

1)  Family Dollar is headquartered in North Carolina. Profits not only leave our town, but leave our state. Corporate stores like this are an economic drain on our town. Most jobs in their stores don't pay a living wage, and there have also been reports of underhiring, where managers are expected to complete the extra work without overtime compensation.

2)  Norristown already has 2 Family Dollar stores, plus 6 other dollar stores in the surrounding area. We absolutely do NOT need another. The ones we have don't give anything back to the community.

3)  We'd once again be forced to "settle" for a trade-down. We gave up the Norris Theater for what? A McDonald's that never helped our town. We swapped a YWCA in a great building for a CVS that also does nothing for our local economy or town image. In fact, it's hurting our image because you only see that store in the news when there's a robbery.

Time and time again we allow realtors looking for an easy sale to dictate what our town will become. Do they look to put Family Dollar stores in King of Prussia or the Main Line? No, only in depressed places like  Norristown, Pottstown, Coatesville and Reading. In doing so, they contribute to the depression. They have a negative opinion of us--they have a detrimental vision in their minds of what should and shouldn't go into our town--and they're the ones determining what Norristown will look like future. If it were up to them, we'd demolish all our buildings to put up Family Dollars, Walmarts, fast food, convenience stores, etc. We'd have no local economy left--no decent jobs, no way to entice outsiders to come spend money in our community.

What's needed are realtors, perhaps guided by Council and our administration, who'll look at vacant buildings as opportunities to trade UP for the good of our town.

I've been in Central Pres's fellowship hall, and it would be a great venue for wedding receptions, reunions, funeral luncheons, and anniversaries--something we don't have much of in Norristown. Most people go outside town for those functions, and we often have several weddings per Saturday in the nice months. We could keep that commerce in town. Here we have an ideal building for the purpose, along with parking for 50 cars. Caterers could be brought in from outside, at least until the kitchen could be re-done. The sanctuary, too, could be repurposed for that kind of business, or could be used as a concert/theater venue. It could be rented to a congregation for weekly services--we have a few congregations who need this, but can't afford the upkeep of the whole building. Possibly the Sunday school rooms and offices could be let out as office space, or for a school of some sort. Nothing says the building has to have one purpose.

I'm sure some of you could come up with better ideas for Central Pres besides a Family Dollar. Any entrepreneurs out there willing to give Central Pres a second life? Let's save the art and architecture.