Write In
ELLEN KOPLIN
Lower Milford Supervisor
The proposed Geryville Materials quarry seems to be an item of interest in the upcoming election.
Proficient in all things Township, Ellen has worked for 21 years to protect the welfare of the residents of Lower Milford, researching the detrimental changes a quarry would have on our Township.
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This website will explore the testimony presented over the course of the many hearings and challenges by the quarry. It will also dispel candy coated falsehoods concerning the benefits a quarry would provide.
The following articles will address each item.
I humbly ask for your write-in vote to follow through to conclusion, the most destructive assault on our Township in its history. This would be my second term as your Township Supervisor. My name is familiar since I have been involved with our local government as Township Manager, Volunteer and now first term Supervisor. As former Manager, I understand the limitations our state legislators place upon Townships. Our ability to set our own course is quite limited, however, not impossible.
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Most of our residents are aware that an application to our Township and PA Dept. of Environmental Protection has been made and revised several times over the past 21 years, to establish a stone quarry with an asphalt plant and a concrete plant. With the major Turnpike 476 widening project along with several other major road projects, it has become known that the quarry applicant wants, “to make another run at it.” Meaning, try to push the application through the Lower Milford Board of Supervisors. With a quarry located within our township, the quarry owners/operators would have a very lucrative advantage when bidding for the contract to supply materials.
​The Proposed Quarry
Please Do Not Be Mislead
This Quarry WILL Effect Everyone
HOSENSACK to LIMEPORT
Friends of the Quarry are selling big promises to the residents of Lower Milford. Promises of a new fire station, an ambulance corp., a full-time police force and all from Quarry money. Lots of quarries and other big businesses make promises to the communities they want to ruin, but few promises ever come to fruition. Some seem to think that the money Lower Milford spent on opposing the quarry application could have been better spent on a full-time police force. Think about that "logic" for a moment. We should have allowed the quarry with an asphalt plant and a concrete plant, putting over 400 large trucks per day on our roads. Without the quarry, the roads will not be as dangerous to travel and the safety of the Township can be fully examined for traffic concerns. Let us address the major threats first.
The current proposal provides a 100+ acre quarry pit on a 628 acre property, we have an asphalt plant needing liquid asphalt brought to the site for making blacktop, we have a concrete plant needing cement and sand delivered to the site to manufacture concrete. We have 400 trucks per day hauling stone out of the quarry and additional trucks bringing supplies and picking up blacktop and delivering concrete. We will have blasting at the quarry site several times per week. For those living in the Beverly Hills/Limeport area, please do not think the quarry will not impact you and yours.
According to the testimony given for Geryville throughout the numerous cases over a 21 year period, the quarry itself will generate 400 hundred dump trucks per day averaging 18 to 23 tons per truck. We can expect a truck every two (2) minutes, from 7 AM to 10 PM, mingling with school buses and vans, family cars, commuters, farm tractors and equipment along with the many tractor trailers that are now using our local roads.
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According to the most recent PennDOT traffic map, a total of 6,000 vehicles travel through the Village of Limeport daily. Now add the majority of dump trucks to the 6,000+ vehicle count in Limeport adding more diesel fumes, noise, engine brake retarders and dust.
All On the Road Together
One candidate on the ballot, who says she has lived in the Township for 30 years, however, never volunteered nor served the Township in any capacity, wants to suddenly be a Supervisor. When asked by several residents what her position is on the quarry application, she responded that she would need to review the files and look at options. That is a very strange answer considering the most devastating land use, a stone quarry with asphalt and cement plants, is trying hard to push their way into our agricultural and rural Township. The current, most recent member of the Board of Supervisors says he is in charge of a trucking company. In fact, a relative also has a trucking company right in Emmaus. There are only three Supervisors who make up the Board of Supervisors. who adopt policies and Ordinances that govern the Township. Two Supervisors can change the course of this Township. It only takes two.
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The quarry proposal seems to be the talk of the town. A group was overheard in a local restaurant discussing the plan to change the Township regulations, remove authority from the Township's Planning Commission to approve Land Development and the quarry applicant will "make another run of it."
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A generation of children have been born and reached adulthood while your Supervisors have fought hard to maintain all that is good about Lower Milford Township. Ten Supervisors have been in office since the quarry application crossed our doorstep. During those 21 years, no one worked harder than Ellen Koplin to fight for our Township residents' right to live without the harmful impacts and danger a quarry poses.