Bank robbery, assaults, burglary top Southwestern Berks crime reports in January

by Steve Reinbrecht

A handful of serious crimes were reported in Southwestern Berks in January.

Someone in a mask robbed the Wells Fargo bank in Robesonia on Tuesday, Jan. 10.

A simple assault was reported about 8:15 p.m. Jan. 3, Tuesday, in the 100 block of West Penn Avenue in Wernersville.

A residential burglary was reported about 6:30 p.m. Monday, Jan. 30, in the first block of West Penn Avenue in Wernersville.

Western Berks Police Chief William Schlichter did not return several calls asking about those reports.

The county district attorney’s office reported an aggravated assault about 12:30 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 26 in the 500 block of Erich Street. No one from the DA’s office returned my calls.

But as usual, the 20,000 residents or so in Wernersville, Lower Heidelberg, South Heidelberg and Sinking Spring lived in relative peace and safety in January, measured by police reports and 9-1-1 calls. 

All together, police reported 46 crimes in the four municipalities in January, up from the 43 reported in December.

As usual, most of the violence appeared to be domestic.

In January, 9-1-1 calls for domestic problems were reported on Brownsville Road and East College and Penn avenues in Lower Heidelberg.

In Sinking Spring, domestic calls came from James Street, Penn and Woodrow avenues and Michigan and Oneida drives.

In South Heidelberg, domestic trouble was reported on Balthaser, Mountain Top and Golf roads and Longview drive.

In Wernersville, on Beckley and South Reber streets and West Penn Avenue.

Lower Heidelberg has highest housing prices, far and wide

by Steve Reinbrecht

Lower Heidelberg, right here in Southwestern Berks County, tops the county’s median housing prices, data from the county planning commission show.

On a map of prices, the township stands out against the rest of Berks, Lancaster and Schuylkill counties like a single cherry tomato in the middle of a big spinach and kale salad.

The ranking puts Lower Heidelberg average house price -- $286,500 [plus or minus $31,000] -- in the ranks of those in Chester County and Montgomery counties.

“If you drive around the township, we have some mighty big houses,” said Lower Heidelberg Supervisor Debbie Scull. “People don’t ever realize they are there.”

She said many of the people in the expensive houses have transferred here from New York and New Jersey, have high incomes and can buy big and expensive houses.

Berks Planning Commission Executive Director Shannon Brossman said she was not sure why Lower Heidelberg had the highest house prices.

It’s not because of big-lot zoning, she and Scull said. The township has a mix of housing, they said.

Having so much preserved farmland is very attractive to the remaining lots, Brossman said.

Across Penn Avenue from Lower Heidelberg, [and in another measure of economic health] South Heidelberg ranked 10th for total assessed value in Berks County in 2014, the latest data available.

From 2008 to 2014, South Heidelberg grew 4.2 percent, by nearly $16 million, to almost $400 million in total assessed value. Berks’ total assessed value rose 2.1 percent over that period.

[Get ready for more statistics. Remember, Census estimates have large margins of error, especially with small communities.]

Of Berks’ 74 municipalities, Southwestern Berks punches above its weight, according to numbers from the Berks Planning Commission, which gleans data from the Census and other sources.

Lower Heidelberg was ranked 13th in total assessed value in 2014, up 3.7 percent, to nearly $374 million. Sinking Spring was ranked 21st in assessed value.

Between 2010 and 2015, the median housing value DROPPED in:

• The United States
• Berks County
• Spring Township
• and Southwestern Berks:
• Lower Heidelberg
• South Heidelberg
• Sinking Spring

BUT NOT Wernersville. Anybody have a theory?

Spring Township, Southwestern Berks’s neighbor directly east, had the highest assessed value in Berks in 2014, almost $1.6 billion. Reading was second, at just over $1.4 billion. Berks County’s total assessed value was about $18.5 billion.

Spring ranked second in assessed value per resident, topped only by New Morgan, an outlier because of its tiny population. I guess Spring has a lot of value in commercial and business properties.

RACC will offer college classes in Wilson Southern Middle School

By Steve Reinbrecht

Reading Area Community College plans to offer evening classes in Wilson Southern Middle School, starting in late August.

The college [where I work as a part-time instructor] did a survey in 2014 to better understand the needs and expectations of current and future students. It found that people had a lot of interest in possibly taking RACC classes at places other than the college’s campus in downtown Reading.

The middle school would host about 50 sections of 23 different college courses, which could generate hundreds of students. 

The college zeroed in on the Wilson school, off Penn Avenue in Spring Township, not far from Lowe’s, for several reasons, President Anna Weitz told me on the phone. It has great access to Route 222, is surrounded by a big population, and has lots of parking and casual restaurants nearby for students making a dash to class from work, she said.

An announcement on the middle school’s website lists facts about the arrangement in response to “incorrect information posted on social media.”

  

RACC will lease the space. The classes will be offered on afternoons and evenings on Mondays through Thursdays in accelerated, 7-week sessions.

The move “speaks directly to our mission of providing accessible higher education,” Weitz wrote in an announcement.

The college wants to make sure this pilot program succeeds before trying satellites in other places, Weitz said.

“I don’t want to get ahead of myself.”

Wilson also participates in RACC’s dual-enrollment and early admission programs.

Southwestern Berks County was very safe in 2016, but evil and horror did strike

by Steve Reinbrecht

There were no riots, acts of terror, beheadings or kidnappings in Southwestern Berks County, an area of about 20,000 people, in 2016 – although there was a mass shooting and a fatal fire, and a child was raped.

Across Berks County, 37 people died on roads in 2016, though there were no traffic fatalities in Sinking Spring, Lower Heidelberg, South Heidelberg,or Wernersville, according to the Berks coroner’s office.

Berks followed the national trend of rising heroin deaths in 2016. At least 37 people died of heroin in the county, surpassing the total of 27 in 2015, according to the Reading Eagle.

Only two were reported in Southwestern Berks in 2016. One victim died at the Wernersville Community Corrections Center and one died in Sinking Spring.

Mass shootings – unimaginably horrible but statistically very rare – get a lot of attention but little legislative response. One organization counted more than 340 mass-shooting attacks in the United States last year, which killed more than 400 people and wounded nearly 1,400.

And like the result of a terrible lottery, there was one mass shooting in Southwestern Berks. On Aug. 6, Mark Short, 40, shot to death his wife, Megan, 33; his daughters, Lianna, 8; and Willow, 2; his son, Mark, 5, and their dog. He then shot and killed himself. He had bought the gun in Lancaster County and destroyed his family the day his wife had planned to leave him.

In March, a 12-year-old was raped in Sinking Spring. Constables arrested a 27-year-old man from Reading in November.

Over the year, police counted 44 assaults in the four municipalities, according to records they send to state police. I believe most of the violent crime in Southwestern Berks involves men beating up their partners. As far as I know, crimefighters don’t, for their records, distinguish between you getting beat up in a bar by a stranger or in your living room by a family member.

Watching for drunken drivers certainly keeps the area safer. Police in Southwestern Berks reported 29 DUI arrests in 2016, though Western Berks reported zero, which could be a mistake. Officials from Western Berks, which covers Wernersville and Robesonia, were not available.

Smoking pot for fun is legal now in eight states, but not in Pennsylvania. Local police made 18 arrests for possessing marijuana, according to the state police records.

Robberies are scary – somebody taking something from you by force or threat. No muggings were reported, but there were two bank robberies. The man who robbed the M&T bank on Penn Avenue in South Heidelberg in August was captured. The woman who robbed the OneMain Financial in Lower Heidelberg and probably another bank in Spring Township has not been caught.

Burglaries are scary too and more common. Police reported 25 in Southwestern Berks. Five of them were cleared.

A woman died after jumping from the third floor
of an apartment building in Sinking Spring as a fire destroyed it. State police said the cause was undetermined. A local official told me the cause was electrical.

I wonder if anybody wrote a report about how her death could have been prevented.

I feel very confident in saying that we are all about as safe as can be out here. We have honest, competent and professional police officers. Residents who look out for each other and have a lot to lose.

If you fear violence, however, it exists here, mostly in attacks in the closed-off rooms of homes, on spouses, lovers, children and family members.

Farmer will use $400,000 state loan toward 76 acres in South Heidelberg

by Steve Reinbrecht

Dairy farmers David and Cindy Wolfskill were approved in January for a $400,000 state loan to buy 76 acres in South Heidelberg and Wernersville.

They plan to grow crops on the farmland, which is between Lincoln Road and the railroad tracks, to support their dairy operations, according to the state Industrial Development Authority. The 15-year loan has a 2.25 percent rate for the first seven years. The total project cost is estimated to be $800,000.

In March, the Wolfskills bought that parcel and a 105-acre property adjacent to it, which abuts Krick Lane, for $2.4 million, according to county records. A bank had given them a bridge loan.

The Wolfskills did not reply to requests for comment.

The family has been featured for winning yield contests. For example, Wolfskill placed second in 2014 and 2015 in the Pennsylvania soybean yield contest.

Number of young farmers grows fastest in Berks

by Steve Reinbrecht

Berks County had the largest increase in the number of young farmers in Pennsylvania, according to an “Analysis of the 2012 Census of Agriculture,” released last month.

Much land in Southwestern Berks is used for agriculture.

From the Berks County Planning Commission

In 2002, Berks had 154 farmers younger than 35, according to the Census. In 2012, the county had 238 young farmers, an increase of 55 percent.

Penn State Extension educator Mat Haan said this is important because the average age of farmers is increasing and young people are needed to replace them as they retire.

In 2012, the average age of Berks farmers was 54.5 years. The average age of Pennsylvania farmers was 56.1.

Haan, whose specialty is dairy farming, said the growing importance of technology in successful farming is helping to attract young people to the industry. For example, automated milking allows farm families to spend more time on other activities, he said.

In general, Berks agriculture production ranks high in the state, in the 4-year old data.

According to the 2012 Census of Agricultural, from 2007 to 2012:

From 2007 to 2012, the value of Berk’s agricultural products grew 70 percent, from about $368 million to $529 million. Lancaster County, just south of Southwestern Berks, had the highest sales of agricultural products in the state in 2012 -- nearly $1.475 billion.

From 2007 to 2012, the number of farms in Berks grew from 1,980 to 2,039. The average size was 115 acres.

The number of acres in farms rose from 222,119 acres to 233,744 acres. That means 43 percent of Berks County is in farms.

Berks ranks near the top of the state in agricultural production.

Berks ranked:

       Third in sales of grains, oil seeds, dry beans, and dry peas.

       Second in nursery, greenhouse, floriculture, and sod.

       Second in poultry and eggs.

Total farm production expenses were $415 million.

The data is from 2012 but was released as late as 2016 — I guess agricultural statistics take a long, long time to compile. I found the link in state Sen. David Argall’s newsletter.

Blending butane in Spring Township will add to tanker-truck traffic in Sinking Spring

by Steve Reinbrecht

Update – Feb. 7

An average of 80 trucks a day drive in and out of Sunoco Logistics’ facility in Montello, near Sinking Spring, according to Jeff Shields, a Sunoco Logistics spokesman.

The terminal stores and distributes refined products, predominantly gasoline, diesel and heating oil, he wrote in an e-mail.

++++++++++++

More tanker trucks will be driving through Sinking Spring, according to plans for a butane-blending facility that Spring Township supervisors approved last month.

Sunoco Logistics wants to build the butane system in the middle of its existing tank farm, between Mountain Home and Fritztown roads, adjacent to Sinking Spring.

This matters because more trucks will further clog roads in Southwestern Berks – especially because tanker trucks with petroleum products must stop at the area’s five rail crossings.

So how many tanker trucks use local roads to come and go with their fossil fuel loads?

A local official laughed when I told him nobody was calling me back from Sunoco Logistics, which I called and visited to ask how many tanker trucks use its terminals in Montello.

“They don’t want anyone to know,” he said.

Sinking Spring officials are hoping to convince state and federal officials that Sinking Spring is a bottleneck for vital commerce – in this case petroleum products such as gasoline, diesel, propane and heating oil.

Officials hope the distinction helps the borough get a federal grant.

A study years ago counted 100 trucks a day, Berks transportation planner Alan Piper said, and he expects the number has grown. He helped me find state data from 2016 that show, in general, almost 3,900 trucks -- anything larger than a pickup -- drive on Penn Avenue between Columbia and Route 724 on an average weekday.

Fuel oil trucks chug through town all day long before making deliveries throughout the region. Sunoco, Gulf and Amerigas have tanks in the area. Tanks, pipes, and other infrastructure cover about 100 acres.

The complex in Montello is Sunoco Logistics' eastern pipeline system headquarters, as well as a trucking terminal and a major midstream terminal for refined products.

Sunoco's pipelines out of Montello provide gasoline, diesel fuel, and heating oil to large markets in Pennsylvania and New York. Sunoco Logistics, which has extensive tanks, pipes and other equipment in the Montello area, plans to build a pipeline called Mariner East 2. 

The new pipeline would nearly quadruple the amount of petroleum product gushing through pipes in Sinking Spring, to 345,000 barrels a day. A barrel is 42 gallons.

In November, Sunoco paused the project, blaming the delay on problems getting permits from the state Department of Environmental Protection.

In any case, in January, Spring Township supervisors granted Sunoco Logistics final approval to build a station to add butane to gasoline in the middle of the property it owns between Mountain Home and Fritztown roads in Spring Township, just across the border with Sinking Spring. Trucks would bring the butane, which would be stored in a 90,000-gallon tank.