F&M Eliminated Public Input Until Very End

I attended the public meeting that F&M hosted Thursday evening and indeed, I have learned new things.

One, F&M has consistently stressed from the beginning an environmental benefit of "diverting approximately 55,000 truck trips annually from Central Pennsylvania highways and roads". A Norfolk Southern representative confirmed that those 55,000 truck trips DO NOT EXIST and further commented that he stressed to F&M that this statement NOT be used. Yet Keith Orris used it twice during the meeting.

Two, it has been consistently implied by F&M to the residents of the affected neighborhoods that the proposed rail yard location behind the post office will be used for storage of empty cars awaiting the return trip to the Enola yard. In fact, the train master of the Dillerville yard told me at the public meeting that the railroad would use the new location to store, at least in part, incoming raw materials that are not scheduled to leave the yard for delivery on a timely basis. This may include hazardous materials.

Three, F&M has made many statements about the community service they are providing by remediating the former municipal dump. Unfortunately, they are only remediating a portion of the old dump. In fact, there is no plan to remediate the portion of the dump to the west of the Little Conestoga. John Fry suggested, in relation to property value questions, that our neighborhoods are better off with a rail yard in place of a dump. How considerate of him. It would appear we are now to have both.

From the very beginning, F&M has worked on this in a vacuum, eliminating public input until the very end, and then, only in response to the concerns of our neighborhoods, presented statements that misconstrue the facts. One begins to wonder what other mis-statements or half-truths may be floating around this project, such as presenting averages for noise levels rather than maximum levels that will be heard. One woman noted during the public comments, and I paraphrase, "When my ears hear the impact noise in the middle of the night, they do not average the sound before giving it to my brain."

If this behavior is the 'progress' our leaders talk about being needed for our county, I suggest that Lancaster has had enough growth, thank you. And what kind of example is F&M setting for our nation's future business leaders?