Easttown

The Easttown Township Public Library building quietly changed hands Monday night, after Tredyffrin/Easttown school board members voted to accept the township's offer to purchase it. The township supervisors sat in the front row at the school board meeting Monday as the board agreed to sell the library building - which is attached to the township building - for $235,000. The township, which will continue to fund the library, has been paying rent to the school district for use of the space.

After misguided legal advice and a brokered agreement, the township Planning Board voted last night to approve one of the most controversial land developments here in recent history. Voting 5-2 with one abstention, the board granted general development plan approval for the mixed-use Easttown plan, represented by developer Steven D. Samost. Samost received approval for Easttown's sister plan across Route 70, known as Eayrestowne, at last month's board meeting. General development approval for both plans sets the limits on residential, commercial and retail square footage for the site.

Easttown supervisors may have to dip into savings to cover township bills. But Township Manager Gene Williams, who last week said the township would fall $220,000 short by the end of the year, said Monday that the gap had been whittled down to $138,000. Williams cited two reasons for the change in the total: a $1.4 million increase in the township's total assessment and a 15 percent increase in workers' compensation costs instead of the 40 percent increase he had originally budgeted.

The Tredyffrin/Easttown school board voted unanimously Monday night to appoint Marian K. Schneider to fill a seat on the board left vacant by the resignation of Del Tweedie last month. This spring, Schneider was nominated for Tweedie's seat in both the Republican and Democratic primaries. She is running unopposed in the Nov. 4 general election. Tweedie resigned from the school board Aug. 25, saying that since Schneider was likely to win election, he wanted her to serve through an entire school year, rather than waiting until December.

After an extensive search that attracted more than 100 candidates from 12 states, the Tredyffrin/Easttown school board has hired Theodore W. Foot of New York state as the new superintendent. Board President Mary Ellen Mittelstaedt said Foot was a "mature, senior educator who will bring many talents to the district. " She said colleagues and co-workers described Foot as a patient man who was open, warm, honest and visible in the community. Mittelstaedt introduced Foot, 56, to a crowd of about 100 residents at a board meeting Monday.

Easttown's first effort at collecting leaves from designated sites was hailed last week as a success. At the supervisors' meeting on Monday, Judy Tilles, a representative of the township's Solid Waste Task Force, reported that 561 bags of leaves were collected from 32 residents on Nov. 19. Trash compactors were located at Devon Elementary School and the municipal building. "Half of the people who participated said that ordinarily they would burn their leaves, while the other half said that they would put one or two bags out with the regular trash each week until they had disposed of them," Tilles said.

Well into the budget season, Easttown supervisors are straining to find a way to reduce a $222,000 gap between projected expenses and revenues. That is the gulf remaining even after capital projects have been left out of the budget, and after supervisors agreed Monday that Easttown could not afford to hire a reference librarian or a police detective. The proposed budget expenditures total $2,093,000, while revenues are projected at $1,871,000. The supervisors seem determined to cut the budget without imposing an earned income tax or dipping into the $200,000 reserve fund, although Chairman Anson W.H. Taylor offered nothing more than reassurances that the budget would balance out. "I haven't figured out how we're going to do it yet. But we will do it," he said.

There was a changing of the guard at the Tredyffrin/Easttown school board Monday night, as Board President Frank Allen and Vice President Perry Teillon left the board after four years of service. The board elected Pat Wood president and Noel Jackson vice president. Deborah Rollins of Berwyn and Del Tweedie of Devon were sworn in as new members. Wood, a retired district volunteer services coordinator from Berwyn, has served on the board for four years. She is also the president of the Friends of Tredyffrin Library and serves on the Daemion House board of directors.

There was a changing of the guard at the Tredyffrin/Easttown school board Monday night, as board President Frank Allen and Vice President Perry Teillon left the board after four years of service. The board elected Pat Wood president and Noel Jackson vice president. Deborah Rollins of Berwyn and Del Tweedie of Devon were sworn in as new members. Wood, a retired district volunteer services coordinator from Berwyn, has served on the board for four years. She is also the president of the Friends of Tredyffrin Library and serves on the Daemion House board of directors.

Tredyffrin/Easttown school board member Del Tweedie has resigned three months early from the board, in support of the candidate who defeated him in the May primary. Tweedie said yesterday that Marian K. Schneider, who won both the Republican and Democratic nominations for his Easttown seat, should be appointed to the post by the board, since she is likely to win in November. Schneider will not be contested in the election. "That's my main purpose, so she can serve the whole year," he said.

A former Tredyffrin/Easttown School District official who said she fell into financial trouble when she was fleeced by an online love interest was arrested Wednesday and accused of using the district's gas card to fill personal vehicles. Toni Amerman Pulcini, 60, a former transportation supervisor, used the card to steal $8,329 worth of gasoline between October 2011 and November 2012, police said. Pulcini, of Easton, Pa., is charged with theft, receiving stolen property, and access-device fraud.

Pennsylvania   245 S. Fourth St. , $965,000. 241 S. Sixth St. unit 1711-L , $850,000. 747 E. Passyunk Ave. , $785,000. 507 S. 24th St. , $650,000. 412-414 S. 47th St. , $627,500.   1900 Park Dr. Lower Makefield , $795,000. 2604 Heron Pointe, Warwick , $795,000. 3237 Wilkinsons Village Court East, Buckingham , $740,000. 217 Cecelia Acres Dr., Northampton , $730,000. 16 Columbia Circle, Northampton , $675,000.

$3.3 Million 901 N. Penn St., Unit R2901 Philadelphia 225 Spruce St., Unit 27 Philadelphia 706 Knox Road Radnor Delaware County 407 Gatcombe Lane Lower Merion Montgomery County 419 Lantern Lane Easttown Chester County All sales recorded Aug. 11-15.

Two Chester County schools came out winners with two awards each at the 13th annual Future Cities competition at Villanova University on Jan. 26. Great Valley Middle School in Malvern won the award for architectural engineering integration and for fire protection engineering. Tredyffrin/Easttown Middle School in Berwyn won the award for "transforming ideas into reality" as well an award honoring one of the winners at the first regional competition in 1996. At Great Valley, teacher Heather White said about a dozen students in her mentally gifted program worked on imagining a future city of 200,000 people, living under a dome on the moon.

A visibly agitated Nichol Lee rocked back and forth as a district justice explained yesterday that she would face trial on multiple armed-robbery and conspiracy charges. Lee, 24, of Spring City, waived her preliminary hearing before Devon-based District Justice John F. Anthony, who set a formal arraignment date of Oct. 21. Lee was apprehended after she and Christopher Butler, 30, of Philadelphia, got lost after allegedly robbing a bank in Royersford on Sept 10. Lee, who was driving, was stopped for speeding on Lancaster Avenue in Easttown Township.

Herb Fry of Berwyn, Easttown Township believes, as do many other historians, that all history is local. So he has written a book, Easttown: Old in History, Young in Spirit 1704-2004. This is a prime piece of local history, illustrated with photos, drawings and old maps - well-researched and a good read. Using an unpublished manuscript of former township historian Franklin Burns (1868-1946) and articles from the quarterly of the Tredyffrin-Easttown History Club as his primary sources, Fry covers 300 years of life in Easttown, which today consists of the villages of Berwyn and Devon.