Wednesday, August 27, 2003

By Mary Niederberger, Post-Gazette Staff Writer

Georgene Bemis grew up in a comfortable home built by her father on Custer Avenue in the clean, quiet Baldwin Borough neighborhood of Lafferty Hill.

She so enjoyed her childhood there that as an adult she bought a home with her husband, Sumner, several blocks away on Agnew Road, where they have raised their four children over the past 25 years.

"I came back to this hill because it is so lovely," Bemis said.

Similarly, Kristen Buechler is raising her 6-year-old daughter in the home her parents built 40 years ago on Michael Drive in the same neighborhood. "It's so quiet here, so safe and so nice," Buechler said.

	Kristen Buechler with daughter Angeline, 6, outside the Michael Drive home Buechler's parents built 40 years ago in the Lafferty Hill section of Baldwin Borough. (Tony Tye, Post-Gazette)

There has been so little change in the neighborhood during the decades the women have lived there that it almost seemed to be forgotten by the outside world.

But in the past year, residents have felt under siege by two proposals for major developments on adjacent tracts of land -- proposals they say threaten significant changes to the quiet streets that hold their well-tended homes.

To engage in the battle for their neighborhood, residents have formed the Baldwin Citizens Alliance.

The alliance members are fighting against what they say will be the negative effects of the plan to build 158 town houses and 69 single-family homes on 58 acres of the former Holly Hill golf course and a proposal to build a thoroughbred horse-racing track, casinos, shops and hotels on a 635-acre tract known locally as Forty Acres in the adjoining Hays section of Pittsburgh.

Residents are particularly perturbed about their borough council members, who they say have deserted them in the battles.

"The coal dust, the pollution, the traffic. You get bombarded, and all of a sudden no one is looking out for you," Buechler said.

At a council meeting last week, members of the coalition demanded that council take a public stance on the racetrack and strip-mining proposal and forward their stance to city and state officials. Council members said they would discuss the request at their next agenda session.

Borough Secretary Ann Scott said that despite residents' frustrations, borough officials have met in private with city and DEP officials and addressed issues that would affect the health and safety of the community.

Before a racetrack could be built on the Forty Acres property, developer Charles J. Betters of Beaver County must get a thoroughbred racing license from the state Horse Racing Commission. He is competing with several others for the license.

Another blow

	Click photo for larger image of map.

Residents said they had barely recovered from the shock of the racetrack and casino project when they found out that Betters planned to blast and strip-mine coal from the site before it is developed.

"I am not looking forward to this development," said Bemis, whose home along Agnew Road sits in front of the section of the Forty Acres parcel that would hold a parking lot and part of the proposed racetrack.

"The racetrack was bad enough, but the strip mining is too much. We are going to have blasting, water and air pollution, traffic and probably mine subsidence," Bemis said.

The Betters project was announced in February -- the same month the alliance appealed to Common Pleas Court Baldwin Borough's preliminary approval of the Holly Hill development. Alliance members said the Holly Hill development would cause traffic congestion in their neighborhood, and their appeal seeks to have some control over development details.

Members of the alliance have been in regular attendance at Baldwin Borough council meetings and in recent weeks at Pittsburgh Planning Commission and city council meetings and sessions held by the state Department of Environmental Protection.

At a DEP forum at Baldwin High School last Wednesday, state officials told residents that their fears were unfounded -- that although the blasting would be loud and startling, it would not cause damage to their homes. DEP officials also said their regulations would prevent the developers from polluting air or water sources with their work.

In fact, the developers have said their project would shore up unstable areas of ground over the mines and clear up acid mine drainage on the property.

But the assurances did little to calm the fears of the Baldwin residents who live nearest to the site -- those on Agnew Road and Towervue, Michael and Camarta drives.

Buechler's home on Michael Drive is across from the third tee of the Holly Hill golf course. Officials have said the bulk of the blasting will occur near the fifth tee, in an area above Glass Run Road and Camarta Drive.

A previous loss

The battle over the racetrack and strip mining reminds many residents of a similar battle they waged in the fall of 1989, when Allegheny Academy moved its program for juvenile delinquents into the former Jones & Laughlin Research Laboratory on city property just off Agnew Road in Baldwin Borough.

Because the building the academy purchased was in the city, though its front lawn and only access are in Baldwin Borough, local officials and residents had no control over its operation.

The citizens group formed at that time lost that battle, as the academy received the proper permits to operate a day and evening program for juvenile offenders sent there by the courts.

Over the years, it has expanded, to the dismay of local officials and residents, to a program that keeps about 30 to 40 overnight each night.

As residents have been busy fighting the racetrack and strip-mining proposal in recent months, a small rash of runaways from Allegheny Academy has occurred.

Baldwin Police Chief Chris Kelly said a group of three escaped in April. Others ran from the center in June and twice in July. Residents have found the juvenile offenders hiding in their bushes and sheds, Kelly said.

Residents of Agnew Road said it's frustrating to have no control over Allegheny Academy or the racetrack and strip-mining project simply because the adjacent property is in Pittsburgh.

Bob Reppe, an urban planner with the city Planning Department, said despite the feeling among Baldwin residents that they weren't heard on the racetrack and strip-mining project, they did have significant influence over the city's approval process.

Reppe said that when City Council approved the strip-mining permit earlier this month, it attached 26 conditions that the developer agreed to voluntarily. Reppe said that in his seven years as a city planner he had never seen so many conditions attached to any approval.

Among the stipulations is that blasting will be limited to 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday and that trucks to and from the site cannot use residential roads in Baldwin, particularly Agnew Road. The developers will build their own access road from Glass Run Road.

Going it alone?

During their recent battles, alliance members have walked the streets in the neighborhood posting notices on poles about important public meetings and knocking on doors to provide information on how to purchase mine-subsidence insurance and how to set up pre-blast inspection of residents' homes.

Alliance members said they were angry that they have had to spend their time and money fighting battles they believe their borough officials should be fighting for them.

Some alliance members believe borough officials aren't opposing the development projects because the projects will bring tax revenues to the community and school district.

They also say no council members live in their north Baldwin neighborhood, so they aren't concerned about problems that may be created by the developments.

Alex Denmarsh, an alliance leader and spokesman, said his group is particularly upset with borough Councilman John Ferris Jr.

Ferris wrote a letter to Pittsburgh City Council President Gene Ricciardi, as a representative of an economic development agency he helped to found and on which he serves as executive director, saying he believed the racetrack project would "harmonize" with his agency's proposal for a large industrial park along Streets Run Road.

Ferris also spoke in favor of the development at a hearing before Pittsburgh City Council, which voted 7-2 to approve a permit that would allow the strip mining.

Coalition members said at last week's council meeting that they felt Ferris' position on the South Hills Industrial Development Corp. was a conflict of interest. Alliance member Barbara Wilson asked for his resignation from council. Ferris met that request with an emphatic "No."

Alliance member Ron Gruendl asked council to request an audit of the development corporation, which was founded with a $12,500 interest-free, open-ended loan from Baldwin Borough Council.

After last week's meeting, Ferris said he didn't necessarily support the racetrack development and the strip mining but that, in general, he thought development of that property is a good idea and is certain to happen even if the Betters project doesn't go through, since it's the largest undeveloped piece of land in the city.

"It's going to be developed one way or the other," Ferris said.

He said the tax revenue that would come to the school district from the development would help the entire community.

"On a $500 million project, that's $11.5 million a year for the school district. It doesn't take an Einstein to figure out that's a good thing," Ferris said.

In addition to Ferris, Baldwin officials associated with the SHIDC are: Councilman Francis Scott, who serves as president; Councilman David DePretis, who serves as vice president; and Mayor Alexander Bennett Jr., who is vice president.

To stay or to go

In the meantime, some residents of the Lafferty Hill neighborhood said they were thinking about selling their homes now but weren't sure if they are worth their full value with the possibility of the strip mining and development projects looming in the future.

Also, they said, it would be very difficult for them to leave the area, where close-knit neighbors regularly look out for each other.

"I don't want to go. But I don't know if I can live with the constant noise, the lights, the traffic and the smell from the racetrack," Bemis said. "What matters most to me is the peace and the quiet and the easy way of doing things we had in this neighborhood."

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