Lititz Record Express

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1 CONSOLIDATED WITH THE LITITZ RECORD. 19371 Lititz, Lancaster County, PA. 17543, Thursday, September 14,1978 15 CENTS A COPY; $5.00 PER YEAR BY MAIL
WITHIN LANCASTER COUNTY 24 Pages-No. 23
L it it z B u s in e s sm e n P r o t e s t C u tb a c k In P a r k in g
By Peggy Frailey
Lititz business men are
opposing Boro Council's plan
to eliminate seven metered
parking spaces from North
Broad Street, and asking
instead for some kind of
compromise, such as
restricted parking at peak
traffic periods.
The businessmen claim
that removal of the parking
spaces will have a direct
effect on businesses along
North Broad Street, and an
indirect effect on businesses
all over town.
The big concern, they say,
is that doing away with
parking spaces won’t stop
with these seven, but will
creep “like a cancer” to
intersections all through the
business district. And with
parking already at a
premium, Council isn’t of­fering
any alternative
parking spaces for the ones
they are taking away,
businessmen say.
The seven meters were
bagged (covered) for a 30-
day trial period last month to
see if the parking ban on the
west side of North Broad
Street would improve the
flow of traffic.
Police and some coun-cilmen
said the traffic flow
did improve when cars were
no longer parked along
North Broad Street. Prior to
this, traffic backed up
beyond Lincoln Avenue
during heavy periods, police
said.
Congestion Areas
Congestion seems to
center around two spots -
left turns at the Square and
left turns into North Lane.
When cars are parked along
Broad Street, traffic cannot
pass turning cars on the
right, and jam-ups result.
Some businessmen feel
that Fridays are the only
days traffic is a problem on
Broad Street. Others say
that congestion occurs on
Friday and also during
morning and evening rush
hours.
Council is currently ad­vertising
its intentions to
eliminate the parking
meters and will be taking a
final vote on the matter Sept.
26. Many who are opposed to
the plan say they will attend
Council’s Committee of the
Whole meeting Sept. 21 to
urge a compromise.
Walter Popejoy, president
of the Lititz Retailers
Association, maintains that
Council has not studied the
situation. “They just did it
w ith o u t s tu d y in g it
timewise,” he said.
“They haven’t considered
alternatives like maybe
closing the parking spaces
from 8 to 10 a.m. and 4 to 6
p.m., or gauging all the
traffic lights in town so
traffic can flow more
smoothly, or having a
patrolman on the Square at
peak times.”
Noting that the borough
has already removed one
parking space in front of
Barnharts’ store, in order to
park police cars, (“and
probably will take the rest of
them there” ), Popejoy in­sists
that if the borough is
going to take away parking
spaces, it should replace
them somewhere “instead of
having complete disregard
for downtown.”
Self-Sufficient
“The downtown is self-sufficient
enough that we
don’t have to look for federal
funds like some other towns
do,” Popejoy said. “If they
(Boro Council) want to
continue taking parking
away, they should start
looking for federal funds,
because they’re going to run
the downtown into the
ground.”
“I feel there’s been no
communication between the
borough and the retailers
about anything they do in
town,” he said.
He said Council should
look to the future more -
“Everything is done for the
present with no future
planning,” he objected.
The president of Lititz
Improvement, George
Lewis, also objected to
Council’s plan this week,
saying that Council is taking
away parking spaces all
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Covered parking meters can be seen along left
side of street in this picture looking north on North
Broad Street. Fountain at Square is at lower right.
Boro Council is advertising an ordinance to per-manently
eliminate the parking spaces to improve
traffic flow, and downtown merchants are ob­jecting.
(Record Express photo)
Work has begun on getting the Gate House re­opened
by Oct. 1 as a halfway house for recovering
alcoholics. The house has been locked up since
April. Above, Larry North, treasurer of the new
operating group, HEAR, Inc., cleans out rain
gutters over front porch of the building at 649 E.
Main St., Lititz. (Record Express Photo)
Volunteer Workers Needed
Warwick Band Takes First Place
Again At Pageantry In Motion
The Warwick Marching
Band under the direction of
Dale Weller took first.prize
for the seventh consecutive
year in the open division at
the 12th annual Pageantry in
Motion.
The pageant, hosted by the
Ephrata Marching Band and
Band Aides at the Ephrata
War Memorial Field at 7:30
p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 9,
had a capacity crowd.
Warwick took awards for
best color guard and best
music score in the open
division. Northern Lebanon
won twirling and Centennial
won best drum major. In its
division Warwick scored
highest with 70.85 points,
followed by Elco with 64.10
and Northern Lebanon with
60.40.
Gate House Plans To Reopen In October
Shown with trophies won by the Warwick Band at Saturday night’s Pageantry
in Motion are Karen Marks, drum major, Jeff Stark, band president, and Beth
Rohrer, drum major. (Record Express photo)
By Peggy Frailey
With three-quarters of its
necessary operating funds
a lr e a d y r a is e d , th e
operating group for Gate
House, halfway house for
recovering alcoholics, plans
to be ready to open its doors
to clients on or about Oct. 1.
Work has already begun
on cleaning up the house,
which was shut down by the
county in April. Larry North,
treasurer of HEAR, Inc., the
group which will operate
Gate House, said that
anyone from the community
who wants to help clean,
scrape, or paint will be more
than welcome, and can come
to Gate House, 640 E. Main
St., Lititz, any morning
before noon. Someone will be
there to direct volunteer
workers every Monday
through Saturday, North
said.
HEAR also needs fur­niture,
lamps, rugs, bed
linens, and kitchen and
eating utensils, since the
previous ones were removed
when the house was shut
down last spring.
Roofer Needed
A prime need right now,
North said, is for a
professional roofer who can
fix some leaks in the house
roof. This must be done
before interior plaster can
be repaired.
The battle to get Gate
House re-opened has been
going on since last spring
when the former operating
unit, DARS (Drug and
Alcohol Rehabilitation
Services) shut it down for
lack of enough operating
funds.
There was much con­troversy
over the closing,
involving ch a rg es of
mismanagement, lack of
communication, a change in
concept of the facility, and
the hiring of too many
counselors for the number of
residents living there.
After numerous meetings
with the County Com­missioners,
the HEAR group
got the go-ahead to operate
Gate House, with one of the
stipulations being that three
months operating costs be
raised in advance, as well as
money for capitol im­provements.
No Frills
One of the big differences
in the way the “new” Gate
House will be run, according
to HEAR members, is there
will be no “frills,” and daily
charges to the county for
clients will be kept at $17 a
day. As clients get jobs
outside Gate House, they will
be donating toward their
own keep, and this in turn
will reduce the county’s bill,
North said.
The staff will be cut back
drastically from the former
five counselors, North said,
in keeping with Gate House’s
return to the original con­cept
of a simple halfway
house, a place where a
recovering alcoholic can live
while he or she gets back into
the mainstream of life.
Another change is that
Gate House will be a facility
for both alcohol and drug
rehabilitation. Facilities are
also being planned for
women clients, to meet the
growing need for services
for women alcoholics in the
county.
North said HEAR has had
a good response from the
Lititz area, including a
number of industries and a
few churches. He said that
groups or organizations
wanting a member of HEAR
to speak to them about
donations, or about other
facets of the Gate House, can
request a speaker by calling
the HEAR headquarters
number, 299-4774, at the
office of attorney Henry
Haefner, 216 E. King St.,
Lancaster. Donations can
also be sent to that address.
Lititz Retailer’s Present The
Final Sidewalk Event Of The Year
THIS FRI. & SAT.
SEPT. 15 & 16
• Lititz Retailers will be on the sidewalks
this weekend with bargains on items
you’ve been waiting for at special prices ...
including end-of-summer clearances and
new fall items.
★ Check This Issue For special
Values And Be Sure To Come
And Browse This Fri. & Sat.
• In Case of Inclement Weather, Most Advertised
Specials Will Be Available Inside Lititz Stores.
Residents Continue Battle
With E. Twp. Supervisors
By Bonnie Szymanski
E lizab e th Township
supervisors - George White,
J. Russell Ober and Jay
Foreman - continue to fend
off verbal attacks from
disgruntled residents during
their regular monthly
meetings.
On Monday evening,
several residents from the
Poplar Grove area joined
forces once again with
Daniel Groff, 1651 Furnace
Hills Pike, in an onslaught
against what they consider
“ deception” at worst,
“incompetence” at best.
The petition of recall,
circulated by Groff following
a public meeting called by
him to discuss charges that
the supervisors “ have
refused or neglected to
perform their duties,” will
soon be brought before a
county judge for a decision.
If the judicial decision
goes in favor of the super­visors,
said Groff, with
sufficient financial backing
he is willing to take his case
In This Issue
Editorial Page 4
Sports Section 6,7,8,9
Social 12
Church News 18
Business Directory 20
all the way to the state
supreme court.
Groff said he had no
trouble collecting about $200
in legal fees so far, but rental
for thè fire hall and a legal
ad for the August 2 meeting
came out of his own pocket,
he said.
Seek Facts
Because presentation of
the recall petition into court
is imminent, interested
residents were making an
attempt to gather as much
information as possible
Monday night to add to the
evidence supporting their
position.
S u p e rv is o rs were
questioned about everything
from zoning ordinance
revisions to the whereabouts
of a color television set
allegedly received by one of
the supervisors four or five
years ago as part of a liquid
salt sale to the township.
“Isn’t liquid salt more
expensive than the regular
kind?” one man wanted to
know.
The supervisors agreed
that it was, but Ober noted
that the purchase was made
by a supervisor no longer on
the board, Luther Ober, his
brother.
“I don’t know what ever
happened to that television
set,” said Ober, and ex­plained
that as far as he
knew, the set was never
delivered to the township
because the salesman left
the company soon after he
had made the sale.
Complaints about recent
zoning revisions centered on
residents’ contentions that
the stricter zoning or­dinances
went into effect
without the knowledge or
presence of the public.
Zoning Officer Dorothy
Thompkins wanted to know
why Groff and the other
complainants had not been
at-the public meetings ad­vertised
before the new
zoning ordinances were
passed.
Legal ads were carried in
local papers for a year prior
to the revisions, she said,
contending that the ads had
asked residents to come out
and air their views.
Later Groff accused
supervisors of not listening
to residents ideas and noted
that attendance at a zoning
ordinance revision meeting
would have been more of the
same.
“Complaints are ignored,”
said Groff. “They shut the
meeting off and say that’s
the way it is whether we like
it or not.”
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