Residents stifled at third quarry hearing

By TOM KANE

HAWLEY — More than 60 residents crowded into the Hawley Fire House on Wednesday evening, March 14, for the Township of Palmyra board’s third public hearing on a proposed quarry, but none of them got a chance to speak.

The hearing, which lasted for nearly three hours, was a quasi-judicial proceeding with courtroom-like procedures. Presiding as judge was Township Solicitor Jeffrey S. Treat.

“The public will have a chance to speak when the hearings are over,” said Township Supervisor Al Wolf.

Lining up on opposing sides were an attorney for the quarry company, Malti-Malti-Goodwin, and four attorneys representing four separate township residents who oppose the quarry. All four residents live in the neighborhood of the proposed facility.

The meeting was called a curative amendment proceeding, in which the company’s attorney presented objections to several provisions of the township’s zoning ordinance that concerned the mining of minerals. The attorney requested that the township supervisors change three provisions of the ordinance.

“They object to the section that limits the working area to two acres from which rock can be taken,” Wolf said. “They say five acres is more realistic for a quarry and is allowed by the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP). They also object to the provision that prohibits blasting and processing in a quarry of this small size, and they object to the zoning ordinance’s limitation of the operation to 180 days.”

The company proposes to mine 10,000 tons of material out of five acres each year and estimates that it would take 500 trips per year by a truck to remove the material, according to John Seamans, a consultant for the company, who was questioned by the residents’ attorneys.

The entire property owned by the company encompasses 277 acres, and sits a few miles east of Hawley. The trucks would be of the two or three axle type. Seamans said.

“We already have one quarry in the township; we sure don’t need another one,” said James Connor, who lives near the proposed site. Connor objected to the noise, dust, traffic and devaluation of his property that the quarry operation would generate.

“You cannot possibly break even with the small operation that they are planning,” said resident businessman Michael Alexander. “It would take them 65 years to recover their investment. I suspect—and this is speculation—that once they get this curative amendment and the zoning changed, it would be a mere formality to get a permit to mine the entire 277 acres. Only the DEP would be involved in the decision, not the town. It would be out of the town’s hands.”

Wolf said he was unaware that the DEP would do such a thing.

The township board will schedule another public hearing sometime in early April to finish the curative amendment process and then the board will make a decision.

One board member, Marie Ribiero, has recused herself because she works for a group that opposes the quarry, the Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Queen of Peace, which owns a cemetery near the site.