You're Asking The Wrong Questions

If you ask people in Norristown about youth and safety in town, you hear that there should be more youth programs, things for kids to do. If you ask about the arts in Norristown, everyone's for it--they want to see Arts Hill developed and promoted, they want more arts in other parts of town, too. If you ask about downtown, you hear how everyone wants a thriving Main Street, with lots of retail and restaurants and nightlife, and no drug addicts to frighten folks away. If you ask about historic preservation, everyone says, "Yes, we love our architecture."

But when a specific case comes up, you're all asking completely different questions. At the county Town Hall last week, the director of the Carver Center stood and asked for the county's help in keeping the Carver Center open. Apparently he'd been told that, now that PAL is so active, the Carver Center wasn't necessary anymore. I was appalled that he even had to make a case. I've heard certain politicians in this town blame Norristown's crime statistics on the size of our population. They say you have to expect it because we're a city. Yet, when it comes to providing youth with programs to keep them off the streets, helping them become good citizens and contributors to the community, well, they say, one youth center is plenty. According to the last census, 26.2% of our 34,427 residents were under 18 years of age. That's over 9,000 kids. Even 2 youth centers can't cover that many. No one should be asking if the Carver needs to stay open. We should be asking how our leaders can let it close. Do me a favor if you're on Facebook, go to the Carver Center's page and LIKE it as a show of support for them, to let them know we understand the service they provide and the town's need for it.

I've heard some of the same politicians above say Arts Hill is on its own, that Municipal Hall isn't going to support them. From what I've heard, efforts in the arts in other places around town haven't been supported much by Council or the greater community either (though I was pleased to see three Council members at the mixer at ACPPA last month). Yes, I know for a lot of residents, the price of admission to an event isn't in the budget, maybe not even on "Norristown nights" when tickets prices are slashed, but it costs nothing to share events and talk up arts activities in your churches and among friends. Go to the Arts Hill Festival in May and encourage others to do the same. Share news about the arts in N-town on Facebook. Quit asking "Why do I have to be the one to promote the arts?" and start asking "What else can I do to help bring in audiences, and to get artists excited about Norristown as an arts community?"

Downtown? Everyone's great at imagining what Main Street ought to be like, but when issues come up in front of zoning and planning and Council that are detrimental to our vision of downtown, no one shows up or even bothers to email one council member. When Gaudenzia decided to take over a large building of our downtown, partially as a therapy facility for drug addicts, only a handful of people came to the hearings.

In the last 2 weeks, each time I've talked to people about saving Montgomery Hospital, I feel as if I've been put on trial. I'm confronted with everything Einstein has said about the place, as if it's gospel truth. They say the buildings aren't historic and that they're on the brink of falling down, and not one of you has questioned these statements. Not one of you has asked Einstein for proof. Yet when the Preservation Society shows letters from the National Park Service and Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, as well as the expert opinion of architects and contractors, you're skeptical. You say you want historical preservation, but when a specific case comes up, you say, fine, just demolish the place. You SHOULD be asking, what can we do to save the building and give it a new purpose?

When asked, most of us seem to have the same vision for Norristown, but when it comes down to specific cases, we don't ask "What solution best fits our vision and will help us get there?"  Instead, we refuse to get involved, or we take the easy path, and as Norristown gets farther away from our vision instead of nearer, we complain that it's someone else's fault.

County Conversation Summary

Last Thursday was the Town Hall with the County Commissioners. As I said, the turnout was decent, and they said about another 50 people participated through Google Hangout. The 3 commissioners sat at the long table in Municipal Hall--the setup looked as if they were testifying before Congress, but we were assured that it was only so the camera could get them all in.

They began by introducing themselves and the area of concern for each. Josh Shapiro, the chairman, talked about the county's role in human services, particularly for seniors, business and economic development.

Leslie Richards, the vice chair, talked about transportation--the Lafayette Street corridor, the Markley Street project, and improvement to the Main Street parking garage. Also, she said that the courthouse would undergo renovations to save energy and water. She cited Arborheights on Dekalb as a tremendous success, probably not realizing that much of Norristown doesn't even know about that project, and that a lot of people who DO know think it's too dense and hope something like that never ever comes to their neighborhoods.

Bruce Castor is the expert on the county's public safety issues. I've toured the Chester County 911 facility (which is state-of-the-art and pretty impressive) and I assumed Montgomery County had a similar setup. From what Castor was saying, we apparently aren't quite there yet, but are making improvements. When you call the police, the call goes to 911 automatically, which is supposed to coordinate and track emergencies around the county in real time, in case extra resources need to be diverted to one spot in a hurry, or for fire and rescue efforts, or when police departments need to be coordinated for cases like child luring. Castor said our County Radio is being upgraded, and we're close to crime mapping in real time (Chester County has this already).

Then people started to ask questions and present concerns, and I learned a few things I didn't know. For instance, even if a student has lived in the county nearly all of his/her life, and gone through our schools--even if the student has gotten outstanding grades--if that child was brought here an as infant by undocumented parents, the student isn't treated by our community college as a resident of Montgomery County, or even as a resident of the Pennsylvania or the United States. The college treats that student as someone newly coming in from a foreign country. It's actually cheaper for that student to go to Philadelphia Community College than to Montco. Now, I know some of you are thinking that this is the way it should work, but you'd be wrong. Most of these kids don't find out they aren't citizens until they apply to college--and it's through no fault of their own. We should want to keep our best and brightest students in our county, to bring business here after they graduate. The commissioners seem to understand this and said they'd make sure the current policies change.

There was a concern about power outtages--that they're getting longer, that most people can't call 911 during an outtage, and that poor or even middle class residents don't have fireplaces and can't afford generators. Castor said it was too cost prohibitive to bury all electrical lines so the key was to keep trees trimmed back from power lines. He said non-portable, corded phones would still work in outtages. That's where he's wrong. The new fiber optic systems run on electricity with a battery backup that only lasts about 8 hours (though, supposedly the newest systems use an ordinary 12-volt battery which you can replace, giving yourself an extra 8 hours each). I still had copper wires during Hurricane Sandy, so I was the only person among my friends and family who had a working phone, but the phone company let the wires deteriorate so much that the noise on the wire forced me to get FIOS (or maybe they're putting noise on the line on purpose, to get people to switch), so now I too lose my phone in an outtage. And the gentleman who posed the concern was right, the outtages ARE getting longer. I lived in this county 47 years before I experienced an outtage longer than 3 hours. Hurricane Isabel in 2003 put out my electricity for 23 hours. Now, outtages DAYS in length is the norm. There's obviously something very vulnerable about our grid, and the attitude we got the other night--that these events aren't as bad as they seem--didn't reassure us.

Our intrepid Shae Ashe of The Norristown Project, tuned in through Google, and sent in a question asking how the county can help Norristown promote business. Shapiro said 30-minute train service would be coming to our Transportation Center, so hopefully the idea of being able to get a train in and out every 30 minutes would help bring in offices.

Richards said they also want to help Norristown promote home ownership, and that she thought the town had "amazing buildings" that could be promoted, though when I asked her specifics about historical preservation, I got the idea that she liked the concept but didn't want to deal with the reality. If a building's empty, no matter how amazing, she implied that it was okay to demolish it. Though all 3 commissioners said they were committed to keeping the old Jail on Airy because it's a significant landmark building.

Another request was that the county support the development of Arts Hill and address safety concerns in the area, in order to bring foot traffic back to Main Street. Castor said the Sheriff's Department is expanding so there will be visible uniforms on the streets around the courthouse, leaving the police department freer to concentrate in other areas.

All in all, it was a good Town Hall, though I thought they steered the conversation away from specifics so much that I came away feeling that this was all for show. Still, I'm glad they took the time, and I hope they took away a better understanding of residents' concerns. I hope these Town Halls continue.

Theatre, Music, Books, and Herbs

Circle Mirror Transformation 

I took pages of notes at the Commissioners Town Hall last night. I'll try to pare them down to size and post a summary next week. But I have to say, the turnout was decent (though some attendees were our neighbors from elsewhere in the county), and another 50 or so people participated through Google Hangout. We may want to think about live-streaming our regular Municipal meetings.

But let's get down to the serious business of what's going on in N-town in the next 7 days.

Tonight, "Circle Mirror Transformation" at Theatre Horizon (Dekalb and Penn) continues with an 8 pm performance. Also, Saturday night at 8 pm, Sunday at 22 pm, and next Thursday at 7:30 pm. Tickets: $25-31. Call the Box Office at 610-283-2230 or visit www.theatrehorizon.org for more information

Saturday morning from 9 until noon, Certified Enrollment Navigators from the Norristown Regional Health Center will provide free assistance with health insurance enrollment at the Norristown Library, 1001 Powell St. They will also be there next Thursday, Mar 6th, from 5 to 7 pm.

Also on Saturday, from 11 am to 3 pm, Elmwood Park Zoo presents Read Across America. This event will feature a book fair, concessions, readings, and special appearances by the Berenstain Bears and Daniel Tiger. Free with regular zoo admission. For more info call 610-277-3825 ext 222.

Sunday from 10 am to 1 pm, Coffee Talk Artists' Co-op, 507 W. Marshall St, will host an Open Mic. Musicians, writers, poets, and art lovers welcome. $5 at door.

Starting this Sunday, Elmwood Park Zoo will celebrate its 90th anniversary by offering FREE admission to Norristown Borough residents on the first Sunday of each month through December 2014. Residents of Norristown Borough who present a valid photo ID may enter the zoo free of charge after 2 pm any 1st Sunday. Children must be accompanied by a Borough resident. Non-residents will be charged normal admission rates Go to http://www.elmwoodparkzoo.org/event/100 for details.

Nothing scheduled on Monday, which is just as well, considering the weather forecast.

Tuesday, March 4 at 7:30 pm is the usual Council Meeting at Municipal Hall (235 E. Airy). No agenda yet, but last night Bill Caldwell said they'd be announcing when Municipal Meet-and-Greets would be.

Every Wednesday and Thursday in March from 10 am-noon, you can get help creating and updating your resume from Daniel Quinn by appointment at the Norristown Library (1001 Powell St). Call 610-278-5100 ext 141 for an

appointment. Bring your current resume or a written history of your previous employment.

Attention gardeners! Wednesday at 6:30 pm at the Library, Jane Irvin from Penn State will present "Herbs: Where to Plant and What to Grow". Learn what herbs are suitable for your garden space and needs--whether you have a kitchen garden or want to otherwise incorporate herbs into your landscape for fragrance, foliage and more.

Remember to check out the Montco OIC calendar in the right column for more events.

Converse With A Commish, or 3

Tonight is the Montgomery County Commissioners' Town Hall at Municipal Hall at 7 pm. Yes, it's going to be cold out and you'll feel like you'd rather stay home, nice and cozy, watching TV. But this is important.

Still, if you CAN'T come in person, you can still participate. The meeting will be live-streamed using a Google Hangout at  http://www.montcopa.org/index.aspx?nid=1759 . You'll even be able to submit questions, but registration is required for that, and a Gmail account is necessary. They're easy to set up, but do it now and don't wait until 6:59 pm or your questions will go unanswered.

You can also submit questions by email to Commissioners@MontcoPA.org . They'll be answered in the order they're received, so again, you can't wait until 6:59 pm.

I'm going to the meeting because I have redevelopment questions. When I attended the Montco Planning meeting a few weeks ago, they talked in a perky, isn't-this-going-to-be-awesome manner about, essentially, filling in every empty space in Norristown with apartment buildings. I asked who was going to pay for the extra infrastructure needed for the increase in population. I never got an answer. Norristown needs homeowners and businesses to increase tax revenue, not more rental properties. Especially when the construction of apartment buildings inevitably means the use of public funds--developers getting rich using our tax money while Norristown keeps getting poorer.

And if the plans submitted by Elon for the Montgomery Hospital property are any indication, the apartment buildings we'll end up with will be 4-story wooden firetraps, poorly designed and cheaply constructed to maximize their profit.

But there will be other topics tonight. Commissioner Josh Shapiro said, "These conversations with the commissioners are another in a series of ways we are trying to keep residents informed about what we are doing," I think we can all agree that most of us have no idea what the commissioners do, or how what they're doing effects Norristown. We think of ourselves as being governed by Norristown Council and have no idea where the county fits into the scheme of things. We only know that, often, Norristown is treated like a poor and not very bright relation, and that we're sick of it.

So please, leave your cozy home tonight and come out to the meeting. If you can't, watch it and participate through the link above.

Fighting Fire

Maybe you're tired of hearing me talk about Montgomery Hospital, but I have new info that needs to be disseminated, which I'll get to in a minute. First, I want to say that, to my mind, this is one of the most important fires raging in Norristown at the moment. It must be a fire, because so many of you are running from it, leaving it to someone else to extinguish.

Yesterday someone asked me where they could go to read up on the Montgomery Hospital issue, so I've added "Montgomery Hospital" to my Topics List for this blog. Scroll down the right column to find it. When you click on "Montgomery Hospital," every Diary entry that's dealt with it will come up. Other places for information include The Times Herald archives and the Norristown Preservation Society Facebook page.

On to the new info. New to me anyway. I spent some time reading documents concerned with the historical designation of the hospital property. Two years ago, almost to the day, the National Park Service sent a letter to the developer then working with Einstein to convert the hospital buildings into senior apartments. The letter stated that the hospital property "appears to meet the National Register Criteria for Evaluation and will likely be listed in the National Register of Historical Places." It goes on to list ALL buildings on the property, including McShea Hall and the 1975 Horsey Pavilion.

This is one reason the developer backed out 2 years ago. They couldn't raise the funding to rehab all the buildings. The Horsey Pavilion, because of its wide dimensions, is particularly difficult to convert to apartments. They didn't want to take the time to come up with a more viable plan.

Then I read a recent communication from an official at the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, who confirmed that the original application for Historical Register identified the Horsey Pavilion as a "non-contributing component." This official believes that a development plan that included the removal of the Horsey Pavilion "would not jeopardize HR eligibility." So I got my hands on the draft of the application to see for myself. The "H" of the hospital was built in 3 phases, opening in 1939, 1947 and 1958. The laundry building is original, from 1939. McShea Hall was built in 1953 in the Modern Movement style, and since that's fairly rare in Norristown, the structure is also considered significant, but Horsey Pavilion is listed as incidental and can probably go. Had the developer asked that question 2 years ago, we might already have senior apartments in the historic buildings on the site. Without the Horsey Pavilion, a restoration project is VERY viable, and might even be to the advantage of the developer.

At the meeting last Sunday of citizens who are concerned, for various reasons, about the demolition of the hospital, architect Doug Seiler showed several examples of hospitals in New Orleans, Jersey City and Cleveland that have all been converted to apartments. The width of their building wings, along with the widths of Kennedy-Kendrick and Rittenhouse, are all within a range of about 43 to 55 feet. The width of the wings of McShea Hall and the "H" section of Montgomery Hospital is within that range, at about 45 feet--a PERFECT size for apartment conversion. A jobs comparison showed that restoring the hospital will bring more union construction jobs to town, and Doug's cost comparison showed that, with federal tax credits gained from NOT demolishing historic buildings, the costs of each plan aren't that far apart--they might even be about the same--and restoring the buildings would be much safer for the neighborhood.

One more important item. A part of Norristown's code (section 125-2) states:

"If the building is identified as a key or landmark building or is located in an historic district, the Building Inspector shall, within three days, notify the applicant, in writing, of this finding. No demolition permit, exterior or interior, may be issued. There shall be a review period for key or landmark structures of 120 days. The review period for buildings located in historic districts shall be 45 days."

So, if Norristown follows its own laws, no demolition can take place on the property without a 120 day review. Yet Einstein, at the Town Hall meeting, claimed they would begin interior demolition on March 1st. Was a demolition permit requested and issued? If so, why wasn't the law followed?

Rich Montalbano of Einstein also stated at the same meeting that the buildings weren't historic, yet one would think, since he's been in charge of the redevelopment side of the property, that he'd have been aware of the National Park Service letter that his developer received 2 years ago.

That's the latest. I'll update as I get new information. In the meantime, if you're not busy running from this fire, please remind  your council members about ordinance 125-2 and ask them to follow it until the mess gets sorted out.

Banding Together to Promote Norristown

The Diary is a bit late this morning, but I wasn't slacking off. I was at a meeting of the Norristown Business Association.

This is a great group of business owners and volunteer organization coordinators who are, as the title above says, banding together to promote Norristown. If you're a business owner in Norristown, you NEED to join this association. If you're involved with a volunteer group, make sure they have a representative in the N-town BA. We can either network together this way, or it's every man for himself. That's what we've been doing, Norristown, and how's that been working out?

Visit the association's website at http://norristownba.org/index.html, or LIKE their Facebook page or, thanks to Stan Huskey of the Times Herald this morning, NBA now has a Twitter handle, so you can follow them at https://twitter.com/NorristownBA.  For more info on how to join, email Eddie Turner at info@norristownba.org .

Oh, and I need to mention that we met at Casa Bonita International Cuisine restaurant (801 Dekalb). The food was AMAZING. Go try them.  (And if you join the Business Assn, you get a discount).

In other news, the February Zoning Board hearing has been continued until next month, March 25th. So you can stay home tonight. But I will add a reminder here about the Town Hall with the County Commissioners on Thursday night at 7 pm at Municipal Hall. This is VERY important--a chance for Norristown to let the county know what we need, and how we expect to be treated.

Living In A Museum

Maybe the only museums you're familiar with are the American Museum of Natural History and the Smithsonian, and only because you saw the two movies in the "Night At The Museum" series. Or maybe you've been to others, on school field trips, with your family, on your own. I think we can all agree that a museum is a collection of related items that have value, and are considered worth saving so they can to be shared with the world and studied by future generations.

So picture the museum of your choice, and picture yourself living in it. In fact, you own the building. Maybe it's the Louvre and you pass the Mona Lisa each day on your commute. Maybe it's the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, and you bed down next to the Phillie Phanatic. Imagine yourself living among a collection of things that, by their very uniqueness, seem to belong together. People come to visit your museum to see your collection, then buy things in your gift shop and cafeteria.

But what if all the things in your museum were privately owned by many individuals? You hold the deed to the building, but not the collection. And what if, one by one, over the years, certain owners came in and destroyed their objects, leaving ugly holes behind? Or perhaps, after destroying their property, they leave something else that has little value--a Beanie baby for the Phillie Phanatic, a selfie for the Mona Lisa--claiming it's a good trade for you.

What can you do? It's their property. Still, you would have liked the chance to make your case for keeping the collection intact. I mean, you pay for the electricity, security guards, building repair, etc. You should have a say, right? But your managers just let the destruction of the museum continue. No matter who you hire to manage, they don't seem to understand that you own the museum and pay their salaries. They seem to think they work solely for the owners of the pieces in the collection. The managers think they're doing a good job if they can just fill in the holes with SOMETHING, no matter how cheap-looking.

Word gets around about the ugly holes and the worthless objects, and visitors stop coming, even though you still have much of the original collection.

Do I have to point out that the museum I'm talking about is Norristown? We have one of the finest collections of architecture in the entire region--dozens of houses, businesses and public buildings that we could be promoting as a collection worth seeing. Put plaques on historical buildings with a little basic info and a code that links to a website. Imagine visitors coming into town, pointing their smart phones at the plaques so they can learn about each structure--then having lunch or dinner at our restaurants, maybe doing a little shopping, making a day of it by going to the zoo, or later, to the theater. Even if people don't come specifically to see our architecture, I'm willing to bet a lot of folks would still point their phones at those plaques out of sheer curiosity, just to see what comes up.

 We've been saying, since the Norris Theater came down, that we need to preserve our buildings, and that preservation can help revitalize the town. Yet we keep letting valuable parts of our collection be demolished. We end up with vacant lots or cheap-looking construction instead. At Montgomery Hospital, the current plan is to level a strong, beautiful piece of masonry, with an important history, to put up lackluster wooden structures completely inappropriate to the neighborhood. Even our 2009 Norristown Comprehensive Plan recognizes the hospital and other historic buildings around town as being too valuable to lose.

But what to do? The historical properties are privately owned. Sure, in our designated historic areas, we have a few safeguards in place to discourage demolition, but even there, owners seem to be insisting on the right to destroy their property. And outside those areas--downtown for instance--it feels like open season on our buildings.

My thought is that we need a coalition of building owners, concerned citizens, groups like the Preservation Society, and government officials--people who recognize the economic worth to the community of keeping the collection intact. Maybe they can come up with ways to educate anyone buying a historic building in Norristown that their purchase is part of a larger whole, that it's better for business to preserve than demolish.

I think education is the key. The more people who understand what we have, and how it's good for Norristown, the better. The Norristown Preservation Society has begun an inventory of our architectural collection on their "Norristown's Historical Architecture" album on their Facebook page. You can view it and read the descriptions without signing into Facebook (though you need to sign in to add a comment). Just click on the first photo, then on the arrow at the right of each image to page through. They add about 2-3 new entries a week. This is a good start.

Norristown IS a museum. We call ourselves an arts community, yet the one art we have in abundance--architecture--we take for granted. It could be our main selling point. We ought to be bragging about it on our town website and in promotional videos. The more we promote historic buildings, the less likely that their owners will destroy them.