Alburtis Borough Council convened for its first meeting of the month March 8, at 260 Franklin St., Alburtis. As custom, meetings take place the second and last Wednesday of each month and begin 7 p.m.

The meeting began without public comment or a report from Mayor Kathleen Palmer.

In the monthly police activity report prepared by Chief Tony Alsleben, there were a total of 153 total incidents in Alburtis. Vehicle stops or truck stops made up 80 of the incidents.

Council approved the meeting minutes of Feb. 22, bills for payment and treasurer’s report. Dating back to the previous meeting, the bills totaled $67,703.58. Just under half was for waste removal paid to JP Mascaro and Sons.

There were 15 listed items in the engineer’s report from Ott Consulting. In just a few developments, Ott Consulting is developing pricing for options to raise and waterproof borough manhole lids. They have scheduled a meeting with the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation to continue preparing the design plan and permitting package for the improvements within the PennDOT right of way and along Church Street.

Lastly, Ott is coordinating the remaining repair work and additional options for improvement for the sewer laterals project. Council also discussed the infrastructure improvements planned for Bicentennial Village, which included new sidewalks and curbs. There has been a dispute between a resident and PennDOT, which is slowing the project. Council wants to move forward on this as soon as possible due to ongoing costs.

The meeting then entered the administration phase.

Lehigh County Executive Phillips Armstrong was in attendance to represent the county and let the borough know he is always available. He also announced a liaison person has been established for any local municipality to contact in case questions or help is needed from the county.

Armstrong also announced the county is awaiting a bond that, once received, will then be utilized for a couple of Alburtis Borough infrastructure projects, including Lockridge Park, and potentially, Church Street Bridge. He said municipalities can make any requests for work to be done, but requests need to be in by April.

Next, Ordinance 579 was approved. This expanded the membership of the parks and recreation commission, its duties and responsibilities, as well as establishing certain organizational provisions. The commission will consist of a minimum of five and a maximum of nine members. This all took place to accommodate the newly established special events committee. The ordinance also granted the borough manager two weeks of annual vacation time after a 90-day period as manager.

In congruence with the ordinance, Resolution 2023-14 was approved, which appointed six new members to the parks and recreation commission. The new members are Ashlyn Rivera, Hector Moss, Nicole Steirer, Lydia Jones, Kathleen Palmer and Nolan Kacsur.

Newly appointed Borough Manager Stephen Nemeth officially put in his resignation from the parks and recreation commission.

Resolution 2023-15 was then approved. This authorized Nemeth as the authorized representative to make requests and receive any tax information or records from Berkheimer regarding the collection of taxes for Alburtis. A lot of Nemeth’s appointments and resignations are all in accordance with his new position.

There were three items listed under maintenance. First, was a request to purchase an electric hoist for the pump station basket system. The nonofficial quote for the device came to around $2,500. It was approved by council.

Roadwork plans were then revisited. The four roads to be addressed are Fifth Street, Lower Chestnut Street, Flint Hill Road and to finish West Second Street to Flint Hill Road. Each project will be to mill out the road, blacktop and add stone if needed. Council decided Fifth Street and Lower Chestnut Street will be addressed.

The third maintenance item was a borough hall floor replacement project. The quoted work came to $5,100. It was decided this will be revisited in September.

Nemeth gave an update from his meeting with state Rep. Ryan Mackenzie, R-187th. He said they talked about the problems with truck traffic and the bridge closings that are affecting traffic in the borough. Mackenzie informed Nemeth they will reach out to Lower Macungie and the state about fixing those bridges. Lower Macungie has already reported bridges are not repairable and should be closed, though this is deemed unacceptable due to traffic concerns and residents’ access to the borough.

The last item on the agenda was a Liquid Fuels payment received by the borough in the amount of $66,457.29.

Following that, the meeting was adjourned. The next meeting will be held at Alburtis Borough Hall 7 p.m. March 29.