Weissport Code Officer Brent Greene recommended that Weissport Borough Council form a planning commission.

Greene pointed out a property where the owner built buildings without land development plans. In order to properly handle such an issue, the plans would need to be presented to the borough’s planning commission.

“You have an ordinance of 1962 that appoints a five member planning commission,” Greene said. “What I recommend is you appoint your five borough council members and your planning commission just meets as needed.”

Council passed a motion naming the five council members Thomas Ketchledge, Brenda Leiby, Joe Foster, James Osborne, and Arland Moyer, as the borough’s planning commission.

Moyer reported that he reached out to PennDOT regarding replacing the “State Law Yield to Pedestrian within Crosswalk” signs.

“We have to purchase them ourselves,” Moyer said. “They no longer provide them.”

The approximate cost is $355 per sign and the base.

“We would need four of them on Bridge Street,” Moyer said.

“You can use Liquid Fuels funds for that,” Aimee Shank, secretary/treasurer, said, but that she would need to check the fund to confirm the balance.

Council voted to table the measure until the next meeting.

Road work request

Mike Muffley, of Hanover Engineering, Weissport’s engineer, advised council in a written report that they are working on grant proposals for Allen, Railroad, and Prospect Streets.

“We only requested work for Allen and Railroad streets, not Prospect Street,” Moyer said. “Allen Street needs to be graded and re-blacktopped, and Railroad Street needs new drainage. There is only one drain with only a two inch pipe that is blocked.”

Hanover is also working on the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) for drainage projects for Forge and White streets.

Other business

Council passed a motion to purchase the desktop version of Quickbooks 2023 for $500. The current 2015 version is incompatible with the 2023 online version being used by Moyer for the garbage bills, and information cannot be transferred from one computer to another, or they risk losing all the data.

• Osborne received a written copy of the proposal for furnace cleaning from Home Comfort Solutions and presented it to council to vote on.

The service is normally $149 a year, and Home Comfort will offer a $50 community services discount, so the cost will be $99 per year.

Borough Council voted to approve the plan.

• Leiby reported that one morning around 1:30, two men were in the Borough Park with flashlights.

Current ordinance says the park is to be closed at 8 p.m. in the winter, 9 p.m. in summer. Council will look at posting signs at the park and the playground and begin enforcing the ordinance.

Leiby also reported that people are climbing up on the wall of the bell tower and ringing the bell. Council will look at possibly putting some flowers around the bell or possibly an ornamental fence.

• Council voted to officially hire Evan Everett, of Lehighton, at $12 an hour for up to 15 hours per week, in the Public Works Department.

• It was reported that at 437 Allen Street, the stop sign is covered, grass and weeds are very high. The owner was warned and will receive a citation. If the owner does not clear the weeds and uncover the stop sign, borough workers will do it and bill the homeowner for the work.

• On Tuesday, the Army Corps of Engineers will be inspecting the levee that runs along the Lehigh River.

The Army Corps will be making needed repairs to the levee that cost around $730,000. Council received a grant that will cover the $146,000 that the borough has to pay toward the project.

The damage was apparently done during the storm of 2021 that washed away a lot of the stone along the river banks.

• Greene told council that he needs to get a copy of the rental inspection ordinance that was recently passed. Solicitor Greg Mousseau will provide the ordinance to Greene.

“I will be working on putting together a letter to property owners that are suspected to have rentals on their property to schedule those inspections,” Greene said, “The first letter will be a courtesy letter. After that, we’ll follow up with actual certified letters to those property owners to get them in compliance.”