Chester CountyPRESS
www.chestercounty.com
Covering Avon Grove, Chadds Ford, Kennett Square, Oxford, & Unionville Areas
Volume 155, No. 7
INSIDE
Wednesday, February 17, 2021
$1.00
‘We’re operating week by week’ Kennett School County Health Department Board approves rushes to get COVID-19 preliminary vaccine to residents budget By Richard L. Gaw Staff Writer
By Chris Barber Contributing Writer
New book highlights America’s founding fathers from Pa. and Delaware...1B
Kennett Winterfest offers golden ticket opportunity ...2A
The Kennett Consolidated School District’s school board unanimously approved a preliminary budget totaling $90.4 million for the 2021-2022 school year. The budget includes a proposed 2.3 percent tax increase, and district officials said that they will be working to limit the tax increase when a final budget is adopted. If the budget were approved as is, the millage rate would increase from 31.5 mills to 32.2 mills, and the average property owner would see a $131 increase in taxes over last year. The average home in the Kennett School District is assessed at about $173,000, which translates into a bill of $5,838 for the coming year. A mill is a tax of $1 for every $1,000 worth of assessed property. At the virtual school board meeting on Feb. 8, school board member and treasurer Michael Finnegan presented
a breakdown of the budget numbers in a PowerPoint presentation. He said the projected expenditures drove the budget numbers that were arrived at, but that all the information about funding sources is not yet in. He said in the coming months, there is the possibility of bringing down the projected expenditures. “That’s about $11 a month. We will try to bring that down,” he said of the tax increase. “For the last five years, we have come in under the preliminary. We don’t think these numbers are final.” The major drivers of expenses are salaries, benefits and professional and contracted services. That includes the addition of three new positions – one of them a human resources manager. The other two will be covered by attrition, Finnegan said. Salaries amount to $33.1 million. Benefits are $22.5 million with a major driver Continued on page 2A
In early February, the Chester County Health Department requested 5,000 first doses of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine from the Pennsylvania Department of Health that it had planned to administer over a given week at its three vaccination sites: the Government Services Center in West Chester, the Kennett Square Fire Company’s Red Clay Room, and West Chester University’s Sturzebecker Health Sciences Center. They received none of them. The department did, however, receive 3,200 second doses that were subsequently given out, but for the department and vaccinators like them throughout the commonwealth who have been charged with the great responsibility of vaccinating their residents, it was a similar chapter in the same story, and the story is this: Since Dec. 17, 2020, soon after the state began receiving shipments of
Photos courtesy of Chester County Health Department
The department estimates that an average of 4,380 people in Phase 1A will receive the vaccine each week at their three administration locations.
the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines, the Chester County Health Department has requested nearly 51,000 doses. To date, the department has received just half of what they have requested. News of the state’s failure to provide faster delivery of the vaccine to its residents has not just been limited to Chester County, but has become a national story. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) state-by-state tracking system for vaccinations, Pennsylvania ranks near
the bottom in terms of the percentage of distributed vaccines – with 68 percent of doses administered. To date, a little more than 2.6 million doses had been distributed throughout the state, but only 1.8 million doses had been administered. In contrast, West Virginia and New Mexico have administered 98 percent of the vaccines they have received, while nationwide, 75 percent of the more than 70 million vaccinations delivered have been administered. Continued on page 3A
Penn Township supervisors prioritize projects By Marcella Peyre-Ferry Contributing Writer During the Feb. 3 township meeting, the Penn Township Board of Supervisors agreed on a list of road projects for 2021 that is estimated to cost about $336,000. “It may be less. The estiOpinion.......................5A mate is high because we’re Obituaries..............2B-3B not sure what oil prices will be,” Director of Operations Classifieds.............6B-7B Karen Versuk said. County man arrested for stealing $1.25 million...5B
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INDEX
The plan focuses on the north side of the township and includes all of Pusey Mill Road, half of West Ewing from Route 796 to Lewis Road, and a small piece of Woodcrest to follow up and complete earlier work. The bulk of the money, $131,000, will be used on Pusey Mill Road which is in the worst condition. Versuk reported that Pusey Mill Road was damaged in
the storm of August 2020. Ewing Road was never given a finish coat of blacktop when it was finished in 2004. Supervisor Curtis Mason emphasized that the paving should be done in one wide section so there is no center seam. The plan addresses half of the potential projects noted during a road tour of the township. On the calendar for future works are Faggs Manor Road in 2022 or
larger pipeline to carry it off-site. To complete the project the road will need to be closed daily from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. for no more than a week. The exact starting date is not known at this point and is dependent on the weather. A letter about the closing will be sent to area residents after approval by Versuk. Even though the road will be closed, there Continued on page 2A
we are here, and we are working Friends create a snow ‘Buthard… to maintain our dream’ castle in Kennett Square Restaurant owners
share realities of survival during COVID-19
By Richard L. Gaw Staff Writer
Photo by Chris Barber
© 2007 The Chester County Press
2023, and Philips Mill Road in 2022. Sunnyside Road will be briefly closed this spring by contractors for the Avon Grove School District in conjunction with their high school construction project. The supervisors approved a road opening permit and detour to allow for installation of an 18-inch storm water drainage pipe to tie storm water from the school project into an existing,
What began as a simple snow fort during last week’s storm became an elegant igloo thanks to the industriousness and creativity of a bunch of local teenagers. The group of friends often plays near the St. Patrick Church lot on Lafayette Street in Kennett Square. When the snow arrived a week ago, it was soft and sticky – perfect for the snowmen that were popping up all over town. The kids rolled large snowballs and piled them like round, white bricks to form the small structure. As the cold weather persisted in the days that followed, so did the igloo, and the kids continued adding to its features. People driving by slowed down to take a look. By Sunday afternoon, the structure had grown to include a second floor, windows, a back porch and a lookout perch on top. They posed for a picture with their masterpiece.
From take-out orders to outdoor dining kiosks, and from gift certificates to business loans, restaurant owners throughout southern Chester County have spent nearly the last year swept up in the innovation of necessity, all in an effort to see that their cafes, bistros and pubs see the other side of the COVID-19 pandemic. At the Historic Kennett Square Economic Council’s Feb. 12 online meeting, representatives from five of the 40 restaurants in the borough and the township shared their stories during an hour-long commiseration of overlapping hardship, enduring the yo-yo movement of state government restrictions, as well as innovation and resilience. When it first moved one block away from its former location on State Street in Kennett Square two years ago, the 160-
seat Portabello’s became an instant hit with diners, who would enjoy summer evening cocktails and dinner in near al fresco surroundings, while the sound of live jazz music floated from the bar to the dining room. Since the arrival of COVID-19, however, Brett Hulbert -- who owns the restaurant with his wife Sandra Morris – said that the experience has been “borderline devastating.” “When [the pandemic] began a year ago, we didn’t know how long it was going to last,” Hulbert said. “We broke our restaurant down for a few weeks, because that’s how long we thought that this was going to last. “It is now February of 2021, and we’re not done yet.” For Manuel Oliverez, the owner of Café Americana in the New Garden Shopping Center, he has seen his homestyle restaurant survive through PPP loans, and although he has not been Continued on page 4A