Op-Ed: New Hellertown Park Was ‘Worth All the Drama’

The development of the old Reinhard School site in Hellertown into what looks and feels more and more like a new park wasn’t an accident. It’s easy to forget the bitter, sometimes personal, and at times ferocious arguments that went into making what you see today between East Saucon and Magnolia streets.

Ever since the Reinhard school’s closure in 1999 and its demolishment in 2012, there were rumblings about how to best use the school district land that was eventually sold to Hellertown Borough. It had become a kind of no-man’s land of old pavement and cement staircases to nowhere. It had a certain quiet beauty, but it wasn’t practical. 

For a few years, the idea of a new Hellertown police department being built there was floated. More fanciful ideas came and went. Eventually, the borough proposed a new public works facility–smack dab in the middle of a quiet residential neighborhood previously used as the location of an elementary school.

I remember hearing from neighbors almost instantly when the public works facility was proposed in 2018. There was outrage and fear. Some of us had bought our first homes in the neighborhood. We formed a community group, and frankly, we went to war against the borough.

It wasn’t fun. I saw my name on local social media with unprintable words beside it. I still remember one Hellertown Borough Council meeting where then Council President Tom Rieger banged his gavel to get me to shut up, and I remember the slightly desperate look on Tom’s face, and I recall thinking to myself, “What are we doing here, fighting?”

I’ve laughed about all that since–the tension, the anxious community meetings, the dozens of emails, the newspaper articles. I’m on friendly terms with Tom today. That whole episode got me into local politics, but it also taught me an important lesson: Good things can come from productive tension, but you also need to know when to stop.

To their credit, the Borough Manager Cathy Hartranft, Tom and former Councilman Earl Hill worked very hard to soothe neighborhood fears. But a few of us in the neighborhood kept pushing. Above all, we wanted to see handsome additions to offset the new garage and a balance of aesthetics and safety. For pete’s sake—one of my neighbors is a director of summer Shakespeare productions. People care deeply about how shared spaces look and function.

There were smaller meetings where people could speak frankly. Eventually, huge changes to the initial plans changed our neighborhood’s perceptions. We were won over. The garage was massively downscaled, a new pocket park conceived and green assets (lots of trees, please!) were added. And all that, along with Hartranft’s remarkable skill at authoring successful grants, created a new community park. More adjustments were made and more careful planning ensued.

I also think, crucially, that the public works director Barry Yonney has made sure the public works building itself looks as pretty as possible–something neighbors also wanted. There are planters with petunias, pretty but restrained lighting and the ploughs are put away after winter. It’s a busy building, make no mistake. But all in all, it’s balanced with new things that look nice.

No one likes a complainer, but when you’re in the neighborhood where a planning problem erupts, “nimbyism” suddenly feels like necessity. Indeed, we’ve seen it elsewhere in Saucon Valley many times. Citizens often don’t care to hear the complaints of one group of neighbors if development doesn’t affect them. And other townspeople can be downright brutal in turning on fellow citizens who do speak up and complain. I’ve felt this first hand. But when the new development, the zoning change, the local expansion project, etc. comes to your neighborhood, suddenly it’s OK to complain. Perhaps that’s just human nature; that essential in-it-for-myself, gentle hypocrisy.

There are two enemies to the difficult, painful process of working out differences in a community in a civil manner. Even today, as a school director at Saucon Valley, I see these two enemies: On the one hand, there are those can tolerate no conflict nor serious dissent, who insist on everyone liking them; on the other, there are those who can tolerate no reasonable consensus or peace, who never feel validated if they’re not stirring the pot. You have to have people willing to battle through differences in a civil manner–even when things get a bit, well, grumpy. People-pleasing isn’t always healthy. But you have to accept differences, too, and know when to shut up.

It would be misleading to pretend that how the new Reinhard’s Park came together was a comfortable process. It was actually kind of awful at times, and there are still sore feelings out there if you scratch a bit. But when I look at this park, I think it was absolutely worth all the drama.

When I see little kids already playing make-believe games around the beautiful new gazebo, and I see the slick new sidewalks and crossings across from my house, and the new trees around the public works building getting bigger every year, it all feels profoundly inspiring–and instructive.

Bill Broun is a writer who lives in Hellertown. Letters and op-eds about local topics are published at the discretion of the editor. Opinions shared on our community platform are solely those of the authors.