Wednesday night's meeting at the Kunkletown Volunteer Fire Company officially concluded the matter of Nestle Water's proposed "Chestnut Springs" project with the Eldred Township Zoning Hearing Board.

Eldred Township Zoning Board attorney Chad Martinez began the proceedings by announcing that it was the final hearing concerning Nestle's attempt to procure a special exception zoning permit in the township.The application had been voluntarily withdrawn by Nestle on June 8 at the Eldred Township Board of Supervisors meeting. The withdraw notice was admitted to the board's records and the matter was closed.Nestle had initially submitted the application for a special exception zoning permit to the Eldred Township Zoning Hearing Board on Dec. 30, 2015. The corporation sought to draw approximately 200,000 gallons of water daily for its Deer Park Brand Natural Spring Water product from wells in Eldred Township.Nestle cited several reasons for the withdraw of the application, as stated by Hydrogeologist at Deer Park Natural Spring Water Eric Andreus.These issues included "the need to accommodate multiple uses on a single property, which created logistical and design challenges" and a statement that "the community in Eldred Township does not believe the process around this project worked the way it was intended and that many of you have concerns about this project."Individuals, the Eldred Township Planning Committee and the Eldred Concerned Citizens Organization had spent the previous months challenging the township's changes in a regional planning code from 2014 that related to the project.The changes included allowing "light manufacturing," notably extraction of water, in the township. Residents argued that they were not notified of said changes, as is required by the state's municipal code, rendering said alterations invalid.Various citizens were noted as being integral to the mission of preventing Nestle from tapping the water in Eldred."The point was to save the water, maintain people's property values and avoid what the anticipated truck traffic would be… and we achieved it," resident Terry Kleintop said."We have been blessed with amazing people that came out of the woodwork to keep our town the way it is, an aesthetically rural one. The giant corporate water company would have basically owned the town. It would have been Nestletown," stated Eldred Township Supervisor Vice-Chairwoman JoAnn Bush.The meeting concluded with a toast (of local water, of course) to Kunkletown and its citizens."It was a group effort," said Eldred Township's Chairman of the Planning Commission Robert Boileau. "It was a monumental effort on everyone's part."