Lansford Borough Council plans to sit down with Panther Valley School District officials to resolve a more than decade-long sidewalk dispute at the stadium.

Council planned action on sending a letter to the district to talk about the sidewalk issue, but school district officials came to Wednesday night’s meeting to discuss the matter.

The dispute goes back to 2012. A year earlier, the district tore down a dilapidated industrial building behind the stadium and a sidewalk along West Bertsch Street was not replaced.

The borough says it has an ordinance requiring sidewalks, and the district says borough council exempted them from that rule.

School Board President Daniel Matika told council what they wanted the school district to do, noting that they have a letter saying council waived the sidewalk requirement from Dec. 26, 2012, signed by Rose Mary Cannon, who was council president at the time.

“This will enable the school district to pave the stadium parking lot, and not do the sidewalks,” Matika said, reading from the letter.

Council President Joe Genits said the borough also had a letter that the school district wanted to pave the entire area with blacktop, and council turned the request down.

Genits said he had turned over a file with documents to the borough solicitor, Bob Yurchak, for review. He also deferred to Councilman Bruce Markovich, the former council president, for background.

Markovich said that they hired an independent attorney to review the situation and found that the borough should have sought the sidewalks when the district withdrew its zoning application 10 years ago.

Right now, a parking lot doesn’t meet the borough’s stormwater runoff standards, Markovich said.

“So you can’t pave the parking lot,” he said. “That’s out of the question.”

Markovich believed the only thing they might resolve was the part of the sidewalk that goes around the western corner but urged caution due to a sewer line that runs underneath.

Council then discussed the ownership of that tract; the borough gave the district the tract but may have kept the sidewalks, Markovich said.

Councilman Jack Soberick added that the county parcel map shows that tract belonging to the borough, so the ownership may be in question, or it wasn’t recorded properly.

Matika said that the district wants to do something with the lot but assumed that the borough is going to want curbing and a sidewalk when down the street Boyer’s parking lot has no curb or sidewalk.

Genits pointed out that situation with Boyer’s lot was also on council’s agenda for Wednesday.

Council members said they want a sidewalk there to help preserve the street, which is eroding on the edges and for the safety of residents, who must walk out in the street.

“I don’t care what you do with the dirt part of that lot,” Soberick said. “But there needs to be some type of pathway where they’re walking.”

Matika asked if the district could pave the entire lot, but Markovich said doing so would violate the stormwater rules.

Council and school board members batted around a couple ideas, such as half-paved and landscaped, or blacktop sidewalk or a raised sidewalk, or curb stops for parked cars to prevent them entering and exiting the lot at will.

Matika also inquired about the status of a grant they applied for to pay for the sidewalk, but Markovich said the grant was not successful.

Genits said that council received complaints from residents regarding the safety issue with the lack of a sidewalk, and the borough is looking at other areas where sidewalks are needed. The borough is tackling them one at a time, he said.

Council also approved sending a letter to new owners of the Boyer’s shopping complex at 500 W. Bertsch St. regarding the sidewalks there as well on Wednesday night.

“We’re not here to cause you problems,” Matika said, noting the district worked with the borough this winter with snow removal and the Bertsch Street lot was used to place piles of snow pulled from borough streets.

“At least give us the opportunity to make it right,” Matika said, “rather than trying to bust us at a meeting.”

Genits said they’re not trying to bust the district but wanted a meeting to resolve the issue. Matika told them to just call to set up a meeting, and they can work at resolving the issue