Lower Heidelberg church offers services in Chinese and Spanish

by Steve Reinbrecht

For many reasons, people from all over Berks County come to a church in Lower Heidelberg to join thriving services for people who speak Chinese or Spanish.

In all, about 1,000 people typically attend services at Calvary Bible Fellowship Church, 4891 Penn Ave., every Sunday.

About 40 people attend the Chinese service at Calvary. They formed a church group years ago and had been meeting in borrowed spaces. For a while, a few mixed American-Chinese couples attended services in English at Calvary and then drove to a Chinese service in a church in Spring Township, Calvary Pastor Wayne Rissmiller said.

In 2012, Calvary offered the group a permanent site in its church, just west of Krick Lane. More than 600 people in Berks speak Chinese at home, according to the Census.

Local high school students who are learning Chinese have come to the Chinese service to practice the language, Rissmiller said.

The church reaches out to Chinese students at Albright College and Penn State Berks, and Chinese students from those campuses often enjoy meeting members of the Chinese church, especially if their English is limited.

Meanwhile, the church has hosted a Spanish service since 2013, and it now attracts 45 people or so. Rissmiller said many Spanish-speaking people from different countries have been moving to Southwestern Berks. The Census says more than 50,000 people in Berks speak Spanish at home.

“They are becoming much more of the fabric of community out here,” he said. Many parents go to Spanish service while their children go to Sunday School in English, he said.

Most of the people who attend the Chinese services are local, he said. About half the Spanish families come from Reading and the rest from Southwestern Berks, he said. The church’s general population draws from as far as Schuylkill and Lancaster counties.

The Spanish- and Chinese-speaking members gather with general members and have parties and shared meals.

Rissmiller doesn’t believe there are other Chinese services in Berks.

Calvary opened in 1963 in the current Community Evangelical Church, where the poll booth is, on Green Valley Road just up from Sheetz. It moved to its 47-acre campus in 1999.

Calvary has services at 11:11 a.m. to make the time easy to remember.

Township police in Southwestern Berks would hold illegal immigrants for immigration agents

by Steve Reinbrecht

Police in Lower Heidelberg and South Heidelberg would notify federal immigration authorities if they contact someone in the country illegally.

Across the United States, some communities – so-called “sanctuary” cities, for example – vow to protect immigrants who are here illegally by not cooperating with federal immigration agents. For example, they prohibit their police from notifying immigration officials if they have someone on an ICE detainer.

Those who support such protection say it makes communities safer. Illegal immigrants would refrain from reporting crime or otherwise cooperating with police if they had to worry about being identified and detained. Supporters cite research that shows immigrants of any status are less likely to commit crime than non-immigrants.

Critics, including President Trump and many mostly Republican leaders, say the detainees are criminals who tend to commit crimes and take jobs from citizens.

Lower Heidelberg Police Chief W. Thomas Deiterich said the township does not have a policy regarding officers asking about residency status or immigration status.

If someone has a federal immigration detainer, the department will contact immigration officials and have them come, he told me in an e-mail.

An immigration detainer is an official request from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to another law enforcement agency, such as a state or local jail, that the local agency notify ICE before releasing an individual so that ICE can arrange to take over custody.

Refugees or immigrants have not caused crime or trouble in the township, Deiterich wrote.

South of Penn Avenue, in South Heidelberg, the police department’s policy is to notify ICE “in the event we would contact someone who is in the country illegally” and “let them decide what they would want to do with the person.”

There have been no documented crimes in South Heidelberg attributed to any person who is in this country in an undocumented status since July, when he became chief, Chief Barry Whitmoyer wrote.

He doesn’t believe people are discouraged from reporting crimes because of potential cooperation between police and immigration agents, he wrote.

Sinking Spring Chief Lee Schweyer and Western Berks Chief William Schlichter did not respond to my questions for this post.

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.

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.

Southwestern Berks’ orange snow fences are ready for action

by Steve Reinbrecht

Public works crews have installed orange fences in South Heidelberg and Lower Heidelberg to keep snow from drifting on the road, which impedes travel and makes it harder to plow.

Krick Lane in South Heidelberg

South Heidelberg is working to identify areas where snow drifts can be a problem, township manager Sean McKee said. The public works staff began installing the stakes and fencing in the fall.

North Church Road in Lower Heidelberg

Congressman for Southwestern Berks votes to ban abortion funding

by Steve Reinbrecht

Ryan Costello, the congressman who represents most of Southwestern Berks, voted “yes” Tuesday on a bill to permanently prohibit the use of taxpayer money for most abortions.

The bill, H.R. 7, passed 238-183. It now goes to the Senate for consideration.

According to the Republican Policy Committee,

“H.R. 7 prohibits the use of federal funds for abortion or health plans that cover abortion, except in cases of rape, incest, or when the life of the mother is in danger. H.R. 7 prohibits abortions at facilities owned or operated by the federal government, and prevents federal employees from performing abortions within the scope of their employment.

“H.R. 7 prohibits premium tax credits and cost-sharing subsidies authorized under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) from being granted for health plans that include elective abortion coverage. H.R. 7 also prohibits small business tax credits authorized under PPACA for health plans offered by an employer that include elective abortion coverage.”

Costello’s district, the 6th, includes Lower Heidelberg, South Heidelberg, and Wernersville.

H.B. 7 was introduced Jan. 13.

Lower Heidelberg plans to close bridge. Does anybody care?

Update Feb. 1: It may take another month to close the bridge, Lower Heidelberg Supervisor Deborah Scull said Wednesday. The township must notify the Wilson School District, BARTA, other municipalities, and first responders, she said. The township will order signs and find a permanent barrier, she said. No one has complained about the plans, Scull said.

by Steve Reinbrecht

Lower Heidelberg officials plan to close the bridge on Palm Road because they and Heidelberg officials can’t settle a years-long dispute over how to pay to fix it.

Maybe nobody cares.

PennDOT estimates that about 100 drivers a day use the bridge, which connects Route 422 and Wooltown Road, crossing Spring Creek in the westernmost part of Lower Heidelberg.

Lower Heidelberg wants Heidelberg to pay half the cost to repair the bridge, while Heidelberg has offered to pay 30 percent.

Heidelberg Supervisor Dave Randler said he doesn’t care if the bridge stays closed permanently. Few people live on half-mile-long Palm Road, and a parallel route, Big Spring Road, runs a few hundred yards west.

Why spend taxpayer money when an alternate route is 60 seconds away, Randler asked. He would rather spend the money on other bridges in the township. He expects it would cost about $100,000 to fix the span. Heidelberg has budgeted $30,000 for the project, Randler said.

Lower Heidelberg Supervisor Deborah Scull said she does not have a cost estimate.

The bridge was built in 1973. PennDOT considers it structurally deficient.

The townships share the bridge, though Lower Heidelberg is the “custodian.”

The two municipalities have been talking about repairing the bridge since 2010, both supervisors said.

PennDOT's bridge inspector has told Lower Heidelberg to provide repair plans or close the bridge by the end of January, Scull said.

Lower Heidelberg will pay $150,000 to Sinking Spring after long dispute over sewer fees

by Steve Reinbrecht

Update: Sinking Spring Borough Manager Mike Hart told me Feb. 21 that he had received the $150,000 from Lower Heidelberg.
+++
After a year-long dispute, Lower Heidelberg will pay Sinking Spring about $150,000 for treating its sewage, Lower Heidelberg Supervisor Deborah Scull said Thursday.

Much of the money was surcharges. The borough believes Lower Heidelberg and South Heidelberg are not properly enforcing rules about what businesses are allowed to drain into the system.

This is important because our quality of life and tax bills depend on properly managing sewage treatment.

Wastewater from the borough and parts of Spring, South Heidelberg and Lower Heidelberg drains to Sinking Spring’s treatment plant, at 2305 Reedy Road [not the plant at Reedy and State Hill, which is Spring’s plant.]

The four municipalities have an agreement about how to share the costs. Under that deal, at the end of 2015, Sinking Spring calculated that Lower Heidelberg owed it about $97,000 for that year's treatment.

Sinking Spring also reckoned that Lower Heidelberg owed about $50,000 in surcharges because it was sending wastewater that had too much “hot” or “strong” waste, such as oil and grease, that makes it harder and more expensive to treat.

The disputed payments equal more than 10 percent of the borough’s sewer-fund budget.

Lower Heidelberg held the payments as collateral in the dispute, Scull said last week. She released them after getting more information from Sinking Spring.

She said about $7,800 remains in dispute.

“Our engineer is talking to their engineer.”

Monday, Sinking Spring borough manager Mike Hart said he had not received the money but had sent another bill last week.

Over the year, Lower Heidelberg failed to respond to a series of invoices, he said.

Lower Heidelberg thinks Sinking Spring might be charging it for hot waste generated in South Heidelberg.

Hart said both townships have problems. The borough tests the wastewater from Lower Heidelberg and South Heidelberg at manholes at the point it enters the borough’s system. It consistently exceeds the limits in the agreement, he said.

Lab tests prove that waste from Spring and the borough is not hot, Hart said.

Hart believes the townships might not be enforcing rules that require sewer customers to pre-treat their waste before it gets into the system.

Scull doubts the grease is coming from businesses in Lower Heidelberg, such as Sheetz or the Bar-B-Q Pit.

Instead, she said, it could be coming from food places on the South Heidelberg side of Penn Avenue, which include Subway, the Steak Shack, Arby’s, Salute Ristorante Italiano, Wendy’s, China Moon and Redner’s.

In June, Lower Heidelberg’s engineer, Pamela Stevens, of Systems Design Engineering, said she believes the strong waste is being produced by South Heidelberg businesses.

The dispute goes back at least to March, when minutes record that Lower Heidelberg received a bill from South Heidelberg for an industrial surcharge.

South Heidelberg Township Manager Sean McKee had no comment.

The borough’s treatment plant can treat 1.25 million gallons a day, and has capacity reserved for Sinking Spring’s downtown revitalization plans. The 2017 sewer-fund budget is $1.31 million. Sinking Spring council members disbanded a municipal authority in August 2008 to cut costs. The authority had been formed in 1961.

South Heidelberg police charge man with burglary

by Steve Reinbrecht

Spotting a Pittsburgh Steelers blanket in a suspect’s house helped South Heidelberg police make a case against a Womelsdorf man they say stole a safe, a bottle of cognac and the blanket from a township man’s house on Christmas.

Also in December, township police charged another man for violating protection-from-abuse orders, saying he called and texted the victim.

That was the worst of the crime reported in December in Southwestern Berks.

According to court records:

The tale of the burglary started when Christian Racine, 20, and a woman companion visited the victim’s home in the 500 block of Hill Road about 12:30 p.m. Dec. 25.

The victim wouldn’t let the woman inside but talked with Racine. Through a window, he saw the woman walk to the backyard, where he and his parents found her under the deck. His father told the visitors to leave and not come back.

Later, as the victim was walking to Wernersville for cigarettes, a car with Racine, his mother and the woman passed him twice – heading toward his house and then back.

When he got home, he noticed an outside door to his bedroom was open and discovered the safe, which had gift cards and headphones, was gone from under his bed, and the cognac was gone from the mini-fridge in his room. He told police the woman knew he had a safe under his bed.

About 1 a.m. the next morning, Racine and the woman appeared at the victim’s outside bedroom door. When he told them to leave, the pair tossed patio equipment around.

Police went to Racine’s mother’s house the next day. Racine, the woman and his mother were there. The officer noticed the blanket, the mother consented to a search, and officers found the broken-open safe and cognac bottle. Racine told police the safe had also contained cannabis and methamphetamine, which he and the woman consumed.

Police also charged Racine with stealing two knives from another man’s unlocked pickup truck near the victim’s house.

In another case of alleged criminal behavior, South Heidelberg police charged David Koehler, 50, of Willow Road, Sinking Spring, with violating a protection-from-abuse order signed in November and in effect through 2019. He called the victim three times and texted six times, police said.

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

All together, police reported 43 crimes in the four municipalities in December, up from the 38 reported in November.

A commercial burglary reported Dec. 30 in the 100 block of West Penn Avenue in Robesonia was under investigation, Western Berks Police Chief William Schlichter said Monday.

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

Lower Heidelberg police responded to a report of a domestic assault with injuries about 7:30 p.m. Dec. 25 in the 100 block of New York Avenue. Police were still investigating, Police Chief Tom Deiterich said Monday.

Domestic trouble was also reported in Lower Heidelberg on Saddlebrook Drive and Pine Street.

In Sinking Spring, it was reported on James Street, Shillington Road, Sioux Court, Huron Drive, Vester Place, and Woodrow and Evans avenues.

In South Heidelberg, domestic trouble was reported on Butternut and Elm View courts, Mountain Home and Texter Mountain roads, North Arthur Drive, and Caramist and Lambda circles.

In Wernersville, it was reported on Beckley Street and West Penn Avenue.

Domestic assaults among worst violence in Southwestern Berks in November

by Steve Reinbrecht

At least three men were charged with assaulting women in November in Southwestern Berks.

In one case, a man terrorized his girlfriend in a bedroom for hours, at one point choking her unconscious, South Heidelberg police said.

In that case, on Nov. 1, William M. Brown, of 132 Walters Ave., just south of Wernersville, was charged with aggravated assault and related offenses. He posted $25,000 bail.

And a young woman robbed a bank with a gun in Lower Heidelberg, probably the same woman who robbed a Spring Township bank three days earlier.

Those were among the worst crimes reported in Wernersville, Lower Heidelberg, South Heidelberg and Sinking Spring last month. In general, the 20,000 residents or so in the area lived in relative peace and safety, measured by police reports and 9-1-1 calls. All together, police reported 38 crimes in the four municipalities in November, up from the 35 reported in October.

As usual, domestic violence prompted many 9-1-1 calls and criminal charges. I gleaned these details from court records at District Judge Ann Young's office and the state website.

In the second domestic-violence report, a Sinking Spring police officer wrote that he could hear the sounds of a man and woman fighting, and a woman yell, “Get off me!” as he approached a house at 318 Windmill St. after midnight on Nov. 4 in response to a 9-1-1 call.

Now is the time to comment on your local taxes

by Steve Reinbrecht

Municipal officials in Southwestern Berks have started the process of calculating how much to charge you for their services.

And they want you to come to the meetings to examine the budgets and comment on tax plans for Lower Heidelberg, South Heidelberg, Sinking Spring and Wernersville.

“This is your money, to be blunt,” said Lower Heidelberg secretary Theresa Connors. 

“Taxpayers should have an interest and should have a say.”

Sinking Spring plans to adopt its final budget tonight, Thursday, Dec. 1. It calls for a tax increase of 0.68 mill, to a total of 8 mills. That would add $136 a year to a property assessed at $200,000.

South Heidelberg supervisors have proposed increasing property taxes by 0.75 mill, which would add $150 a year for a house assessed at $200,000.

Supervisors plan to vote on the proposed budget and tax increase Dec. 8. South Heidelberg has 21.5 employees.

The township increased its contribution to the Wernersville Library from $14,542 to $18,178, or $2.50 a year for each resident.

South Heidelberg’s 2017 preliminary budget calls for total expenditures that are about $44,000 higher than those in the 2016 budget’s, a rise of less than 2 percent.

On the other hand, with the proposed tax increase, budgeted revenues would rise almost $415,000, or 13 percent over revenues budgeted in 2016.

South Heidelberg would have a fund balance of almost $1.4 million, up 30 percent over the fund balance in the 2016 budget.

Kudos to South Heidelberg for posting its complete preliminary budget on the township’s website.

Lower Heidelberg’s preliminary budget, adopted Nov. 21, calls for no tax increase. The township didn’t raise taxes in 2016 or 2015, and actually lowered them in 2014.

Lower Heidelberg supervisors plan to vote on the proposed budget Dec. 19.

The township also increased its contribution to the Wernersville Library, from $6,891 to $16,539, or $3 a head.

Under the proposed 2017 budget, township employees would start contributing to health-insurance costs. Lower Heidelberg employs 16 full-time workers and 2 part-time workers.

The preliminary budget calls for expenditures of about $3.11 million, up $110,000 from the 2016 budget.

The budget’s expenditures are balanced to the dollar. The township has a reserve fund outside the budget of about $1 million.

Wernersville plans to adopt a preliminary budget at a public meeting Dec. 7.

Police service generally takes up the biggest part of municipal budgets. Local municipalities also maintain roadways, provide zoning and planning oversight, and contribute to fire departments and ambulance companies.

Illegal Lower Heidelberg farmhouse is being dismantled

by Steve Reinbrecht

A farmhouse in Lower Heidelberg that had been completely renovated and occupied by happy residents is being dismantled after the owner lost a fight against deed restrictions.

In the summer, the owner, Leonard Leibman, posted a sign at the property at 190 Evans Hill Road asking for someone to remove the house. Berks Nature had demanded Leibman remove it after Leibman built a new house on the property. A deed restriction from the 1970s limits the number of buildings on the pastoral 83-acre property.

It looks like windows have been removed at least.

Leibman did not return messages.

Berks Nature spokesperson Tami J. Shimp said she has had no news about the property since I spoke to her in July.

Southwestern Berks voters choose Trump by more than 3 to 2

by Steve Reinbrecht

Voters in Southwestern Berks County strongly supported Republican Donald Trump for president, as they pulled for him in the Primary Election in April.

In the General Election on Tuesday, just over 9,500 people voted in Lower Heidelberg, South Heidelberg, Sinking Spring and Wernersville, in unofficial Berks County tallies.

Just over 5,600 voters pushed the "Trump" button. About 3,600 chose Democrat Hillary Clinton. Libertarian Gary Johnson got 246 votes. Green Party candidate Jill Stein got 35 votes.