Franklin Estates Residents Association

Overview of Murrysville Council Mtg on 3/5/03 re: IDC

Mar 10, 2003

To: FERA Members:

On Wednesday, March 5, 2003 several of us from the FERA Board of Directors
attended the Murrysville Council Meeting where representatives from IDC
presented their revised plans for development of the final 75 acres in
Franklin Estates. I will outline the pertinent issues from the meeting
below. Hopefully, this will get everyone up to date on what is happening and
the residents can notify Council members as they see fit to aid in our
position.

1. IDC proposed a new plan for development of 75 acres in Franklin Estates.
Unfortunately, we did not have the opportunity to review the details of
the proposal at the meeting. I will try to get in touch with Fred Wilder in
the next several days to see how we can get a copy of the drawings for our
review. Currently, they are proposing a "low-density, upscale" development
of single family homes zoned R-2 which requires that the smallest lot size
must be 20,000 sq ft. In their plan, however, the smallest lot size is
30,000 sq ft ( approx 3/4 acre) and going up to 5.5 acres.

2. The major point of debate surrounds the area of the water sewage
treatment plant, approx 6 1/2 acres. Currently, it is unclear who controls
that land. IDC claims they control the land and is asking that they be
allowed to include that in their development. The municipality of
Murrysville and FERA is claiming that there was an "agreement" that this
land would be set aside as greenspace and parkland for residential use.
Unfortunately, there does not appear to be anything in writing pertaining to
this "agreement". IDC is threatening that if they are not given the use of
this land they will then convert their plans from a "low-density"
development to a "high-density" development, which I assume means townhomes,
etc. At the meeting, both the Municipality and IDC agreed that they would
begin negotiations over the use of this land and to discuss the issue of
greenspace and parkland. It was brought to our attention that Franklin
Estates is the largest residential development in Murrysville with the
smallest amount of greenspace. I will ask Fred Wilder when I speak with him
if FERA Board Members can be involved in those negotiations. It was
suggested at the meeting that if IDC uses those 6 1/2 acres for their
development that another 6 1/2 acre site would be set aside for
greenspace/parks. This will be discussed in the negotiations.

3. I want to make it very clear that Mayor Joyce Somers and Councilman John
Cardwell were very supportive of FERA and made it very clear that acreage be
set aside for greenspace/parks. All of us as residents of Franklin Estates
must continue to make our voices heard so that the Mayor and Council will
continue to support us.


Those are the major points at this time. As I stated above, I will be
getting in touch with Fred Wilder to try to look at the new development
proposal. We need to see exactly where they are proposing the new
development. In the previous plan, they proposed opening Lexington Court
cul-de-sac and building 2 or 3 homes behind the existing homes and
connecting to Jefferson. I am not sure if this is in their new proposal. I
also will see if FERA can be involved in negotiations between the
Municipality of Murrysville and IDC to assure that we get our greenspace,
either the 6 1/2 acres around the treatment plant or at another suitable
site. Finally, if any resident of Franklin Estates has any document
pertaining to the "agreement" regarding the greenspace please bring that to
my attention as that would be extremely valuable in the future. I have a
lot of old documents and papers dating back to the 1980's but it is all very
confusing.

I will keep the residents of Franklin Estates up to date as things progess.
Please do not hesitate to get in touch with me if you have questions,
concerns, or suggestions. It would be appreciated. Again, the Council was
very supportive in our favor, led by the Mayor (in fact, they want to meet
with the FERA Board of Directors to get further input)and we need to
continue to make our voices heard.


Sincerely,

Matthew D'Onofrio, M.D.
Co-President, FERA
mdonofrio@adelphia.net