Sewickley Herald

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The Sewickley
Herald
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Wednesday, May 8, 1991
14 Gateway Presb l^ewspapers SUBURBAN PITTSBURGH'S LARGEST CJBCULATIOl^S
50 Cents
Debate rages on over condo plans for Academy Ave.
Guess who?
THE DRIVER of this car is a v^anted man. To learn more about his identity, see page 9.
€IVsoiig$ter$ to sing Friday at Pirate^ ganie
Quaker Valley Senior High iSk:hool chorus will sing the national anthem at Three Rivers Stadium before the Pirates game Friday evening, May 10.
Ernest Pdntiere, musical direictof,v will lead the entire chonte of approximatley 40 students in a special arrange-
ment by Jimi Drake.
The community will have the opportumty to hear both the junior-high and senior-high chorus perform at the Spring Choral Concert, re-scheduled for 7:30 p.m., Tueisday, May 14, at the Senior High School auditorium.
By Nicole E. Peffer
staff writer
Sewickley Planning Commission faces yet. another challenge: making a square peg fit into a round hole.
However, the commissioners don’t expect to know how they might make it work untU their June meeting, when they might vote on a recommendation.
The square peg is a housing plan proposed by developer Ed Condon, which involves converting 16 apartments located on Thorn Street and Academy Avenue into 10 duplexes. The round hole is an R-1 zoning classification, which permits single-family use only. The current structures were built before the zoning ordinance took effect.
The planning commission expected-Condon’S architects to come up with the solution at last week’s meeting, but representatives from Durell Consultants didn’t deliver.
^ We thought they were going to come to the meeting with the informKtion,” said Eliza Nevin, commission member. “We need a creative way to make the ordinance work.”
Planners discussed the possibility of amending the existing ordinance to allow a non-conforming use to continue if it is converted to a “less dense” use. Condon plans to tear down
the eight existing structures, which hold four apartments each, and construct five buildings holding two condominiums. This would bring the plan closer to the zoning ordinance, which permits single family dwellings.
Designers told the commission that they had met with neighboring residents to explain the plan and address their concerns. Parking, curb cuts and traffic flow were some of the concerns expressed by residents.
He also said the plan would improve the traffic problem on Academy by removing off street parking.
Carol Metzger, whose home is directly across from the location of the proposed accessway.
She se^ problem in the way Sewickley Academy students park on Academy Avenue, often illegally; she said. Efforts to prevent illegal parking on the streets have resulted in minimal success.
“I’ve seen kids take the parking tickets off of their cars and put them on someone elses’ car,” she joked.
Ms. Metzger also said traffic gets heavy during the morning and afternoon with buses and students’ cars. Drivers don’t always practice the caution necessary to negotiate the turn onto Thorn Street.
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Family has Hope for Mother's Day
By Ri^h Bottles Jr.
staff writer
arrived three'weeks early, but was still a day late for Mary Scalercio to celebrate her first Mother’s Day in 1990.	'
But Mrs. Scalercio didn’t mind waitiiig for this year to mark the occasion, because there was a time when she thought she would never get to experience a true Mother’s Day.
*‘It’s just such a blessing after all the years of sitting and thinking this would never happen,” she sdid. “I still can’t believe it.”
She and her husband, Leo Scalercio Jr., of Chestnut Street in Sewickley, began trying to have their first child four years ago, but two jniscarriages in the first year ruined then: immediate plans.'
Even though the Scalercios did not give up, there were no more pregnancies following the second miscarriage. The couple spent the next two years seeing an array of doctors, who simply recommended that Mrs. Scalercio keep trying ismce she had ahready proved twice she could get pregnant.
Finally, a friend at Quaker Valley School District, where Mrs. Scalercio teaches speech therapy through the Allegheny Interm^iate Unit, suggested th^t she visit Dr. Harlan Giles at
Allegheny General Hospital.
Giles, an Edgeworth resident who heads the gynecology department at AGH, recommended in August of 1989 that the couple try . en-docrmologist Paul Tippin’s fertility program at thehospitel.
For Mrs. Scalercio, the treatment involved two weeks of daily blood tests at AGH and 10 days of taking an expensive fertility drug called Pergonal. Although there was only a 20 percent chance of success in the first month of the treatment, she beat the odds and successfully became pregnant.
“It was very exciting, but also scary,” she recalled. “But I was closely monitored (by AGH doctors during the pregnancy) and they took good care of us.”
With the continuing support of the couple’s family and Sewickley friends, Hope Kathryn Scalercio was born on May 14,1990.
“Everyone was so supportive,” she explained. “They Were always in our corner even after Hope was born.”
And is there a Faith or a Charity in the Scalercio famUy’s future? •
“We’d like to, but we’re leaving this in God’s hands from now on,” Mrs. Scalercio concluded. “But we’re hoping she has a brother or sister some day.”
WE ARE FAMILY: Leo, Mary and Hope Scalercio.