Political Science 101

Local professors of political science have been collecting Tom Muller's campaign flyers. They will be used as source material for future courses about negative campaigns. Each successive 8 1/2 X 11 flyer is more negative than it's predecessor. Campaign manager Mike Fleck told the National Enquire, A man's gotta do, what he's gotta do to win. Muller's business experience has been sanitized. Scott Ott's experiences have been marginalized. Ott's comments as a commissioner have been taken out of context. Muller's campaign is being assisted logistically and financially by the Democratic State Committee. Muller keeps telling everybody that his heart isn't into politics, apparently, neither is his conscience.

Wildlands Conservancy Dictates Park Policy

In the picture above, a representative from the Wildlands Conservancy supervises the placement of the broken dam rubble around the bridge piers. Although this placement radically defiled the aesthetics of the classic bridge, no one from the park department or city was  assigned to overseer the project. This spring the new park director will receive an award from the Wildlands for his cooperation in conservation, and the Conservancy will announce the new projects for the park.

The Lost Beauty Of Lehigh Parkway

                                                                         photography by Tami Quigley

This beautiful photograph was taken by Tami Quigley last fall. This classic view of the stone piers, rising out of the Little Lehigh, has been inspiring photographers and artists for over 70 years. I have picture postcards of the same view. The stone piers are now surrounded by the concrete rubble of the former dam. Although the rapids still provide some sound and view, the portion of beauty and magic has been reduced in half. The new park director may have set a record in park degradation. Although only here for a matter of weeks, before even having seen the whole park, he agreed and recommended that the Robin Hood Dam be demolished. Piling it's rubble by the stone piers is salt in the wound of our lost beauty.

photograph by Tami Quigley

The Sad Case Of Our Park's Future

When I appeared in front of Allentown City Council to defend the Robin Hood Dam, I told them something they apparently cannot absorb, the truth. Although the Wildlands Conservancy had a very professional powerpoint presentation, and expert witnesses, facts at the bridge today tell a different story. Wildlands testified that they would be leaving both ends of the existing dam, and only removing the middle. The entire dam has been removed, from end to end. Wildlands told City Council that the dam was built after the bridge, along with the water monitoring station. That news to the USGS, who put their station next to the existing dam. Wildlands dismissed my claim that the change in water velocity could endanger the WPA bridge. In truth, the consulting engineer doesn't know how deep the bridge piers are, and directed the excavator to place the broken dam pieces around the upstream ends of the stone bridge piers, to protect them from the increased water flow. I have a copy of a drawing of the bridge before it was built, Allentown took great pride in it's beauty. I have picture postcards of the bridge, with the stone piers rising out of the creek, as designed. The pile of broken concrete depreciates that beauty, as do the tall weeds growing along the creeks edge. We have a mayor and a new park director from out of town, with no feeling or affinity for our beautiful park system. We are at the mercy of the Wildlands Conservancy and their grant agenda, with a gullible City Council.

Pawlowski's Halloween Tricks

As we approach Halloween, Allentown City Government amuses itself by playing tricks on it's citizens. The mayor played a good one on me, by not mentioning that the dam was being demolished, as we both were commenting on the arena. The city is getting ready to play a much bigger trick, on all it's citizens. Allentonians of memory, of which there are very few who still bother fighting for this town, remember both the incinerator and sewage plant as problems. While the trash incinerator spewed soot over a large portion of the city, the sewage plant emitted unpleasant orders. In a bizarre Halloween type nightmare, Allentown will soon be mixing it's sewage with it's trash, and burning it to produce electricity. It's an experimental process, because only Allentown decided to permit this hideous plant to be built. Citizens of good intent tried to stop this bad dream at City Council, with no success. In desperation, they produced a ballot referendum, only to have it rejected in court, at both the local and state levels. Only because Allentown has a large minority population, and therefore qualifies as an Environmental Justice Area, the state will now hold a hearing on the topic, never mind that the objectors are all white middle class. The meeting is on October 30th. I don't know if the state officials will be wearing Halloween costumes, but I do know that the meeting is just another trick.

Ed Pawlowski's Secret

Ed Pawlowski and I belong to the same Facebook group, at which we both visit and comment. On Friday I posted a petition to the site, which requested that Mayor Pawlowski reconsider, and save the Robin Hood Dam. The Petition was pinned to the top of the Page, making it impossible to miss. Both the site administrator and myself posted numerous appeals since then, asking people to sign the petition. Mayor Pawlowski has commented several times, on another topic, since the petition was posted. Unbeknown to me, Pawlowski sent the bulldozer Monday morning to tear down the dam. The dam is gone. It would have been courteous for the mayor to inform the group that the effort to save the dam was futile. Rather, he remained silence on that topic, while commenting about the arena, for his own agenda. I can't tell you the horror that the Parkway was today. Robin Hood Parking lot held the large concrete pieces from the former dam, while a large excavator broke them into smaller pieces, for waiting dump trucks. Elsewhere in the park, large bucket trucks parked on the sensitive ravine slope, to string the Christmas display lights. He may call it restoring nature to our city, I call it degrading our beautiful park. The removal is in violation of the state guidelines against dam removals starting in October. Of course a state that encouraged fracking would hardly care. I saw several consequences to the stream that have already been caused by  the dam removal.  Future posts will document those unfortunate side effects. It's a sad week for Lehigh Parkway.