PORT CARBON — With a unanimous vote Tuesday night, the borough council prohibited public parking near the Pottsville Street entrance to the borough garage.
“This is a no-parking ordinance on Pottsville Street near the borough garage,” borough solicitor William L. J. “Bill” Burke said at the council’s May meeting.
In February 2015, the council unanimously decided to spend $1,600 to buy a vacant lot at 11-13 Pottsville St., which the borough will use as a driveway connecting its borough garage to Pottsville Street.
In April 2015, the council approved a resolution to formally take ownership of a strip of ground the state Department of Transportation acquired in 2013 while preparing to replace the Pottsville Street Bridge.
The ordinance approved Tuesday restricts parking on a portion of Pottsville Street, state Route 1002, on the south side of the street from the intersection of Pike Street and continuing west for a distance of 350 feet, according to a legal notice published in the May 3 edition of The Republican-Herald.
The council also unanimously approved a second ordinance at its meeting Tuesday, “an ordinance amending Chapter 207 of the Borough Code of Ordinances here in Port Carbon. It updates our street ordinance with regard to replacing the street surface and the subsurface,” Burke said.
Burke said he worked on this ordinance with the borough engineer, James S. Tohill of Alfred Benesch & Co., Pottsville.
“It’s done with PennDOT specifications. It’s designed to help preserve our street surface when, say, for instance, a utility company comes in and disturbs a surface. When they have to restore it, it will be done to PennDOT specifications to prevent decay to our streets,” Burke said.
All members of the council were present for Tuesday’s meeting: Ray Steranko, president; John Franko, vice president; and members Harold “Bucky” Herndon, Michael Quercia, Michael Welsh, Andy Palokas and Warren Thomas.
In other matters, the council decided to spend up to $90 on signs warning traffic of children at play on Third Street after Quercia informed the board that more children have been playing in that area.
Thomas also reported that Lowe’s Home Improvement has offered to buy some playground equipment for the borough, but said he wasn’t sure how much. He said he was told to provide Lowe’s representatives with a list of possibilities and Thomas presented that list to the council Tuesday.
“The borough guys and Andy and myself have come up with a list of things we can present to them and they can pick and choose what they want to do and we’ll go from there with it, I suppose,” Thomas said.
“Sounds good,” Steranko said.
Thomas said he suggested some equipment for at the Miller Playground at Mill and Main streets.
At the February workshop, the borough’s secretary/treasurer, Sandy Palokas, announced that the snowstorm which dumped 27 inches of snow on the borough Jan. 22 and 23 — dubbed Winter Storm Jonas — cost the municipality “upwards of $9,000” in snow removal costs.
On Tuesday, Palokas said the borough received “in the neighborhood of $7,100” in support from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.