The Salisbury Township Board of Commissioners has tabled action on an apartment complex proposed for the east side.

Township commissioners voted 4-0, with one commissioner absent at the June 26 meeting, to table a resolution to approve the conditional preliminary-final plan with itemized waivers and deferrals for Vistas at South Mountain, 88 rental townhouses and one single home, 1030 E. Emmaus Ave., 1108 E. Emmaus Ave. and 1210 E. Emmaus Ave.

The 10 waivers and two deferrals are listed on the agenda for the June 26 meeting at https://salisburylehighpa.gov/.

“I have a ton of things to review. I’m not ready to vote,” township Commissioner Alex Karol said prior to the vote.

Karol made the motion, seconded by Commissioner Alok Patnaik, to bring the resolution to table the project to a vote.

“I have a lot of concerns about this,” board of commissioners President Debra J. Brinton said of the project prior to the vote.

“Eighty-eight homes with three bedrooms each. I can’t imagine what is going to be coming out of there,” Brinton said concerning potential traffic.

“The east side of the township gets a lot of water,” Brinton said of runoff concerns.

“I know that all of the concerns of the residents here are valid,” Brinton said of the estimated 35 persons who nearly filled the township meeting room.

“Sometimes, just because you can doesn’t mean you should,” Brinton added.

The development is proposed by Vistas at South Mountain Holdings, LLC, on approximately 48.5 acres in the vicinity of East Emmaus Avenue, Gaskill Avenue and Honeysuckle Road.

Salisbury Elementary School is at 1400 S. Gaskill Ave. Residents and township officials have expressed concerns about the safety of school children who would reside with their families in the development and might need to cross Emmaus Avenue at Gaskill Avenue during school hours.

“We’ve taken as much precaution as we can,” Stan G. Wojciechowski, department head, Municipal Engineering Services, Barry Isett & Associates, Inc., consulting engineering firm for Salisbury Township, said at the April 23 planners’ meeting of the Gaskill Avenue and East Emmaus Avenue intersection. Wojciechowski said of a Pennsylvania Department of Transportation [PennDOT] official, “He said there is no way they will approve it [a traffic signal].”

PennDOT requires a warrant system before approving a traffic light on a state road. East Emmaus Avenue is a state-jurisdiction highway. The PennDOT warrant system is a set of guidelines to determine when to install signs or traffic devices.

According to a PennDOT website, warrants for traffic signals consider factors such as pedestrian volume, crash experience, peak-hour traffic, school crossings and coordinated signal systems. Warrants are used in conjunction with professional judgment and local knowledge.

The developer offered to pay for a traffic light.

Proposed for the Gaskill Avenue and East Emmaus Avenue intersection is a mast-arm-mounted flashing warning device and a pole-mounted flashing warning device, which would be an automatic activated system with the mast arm out over the road. Diagrams of the device were projected on video screens at the Jan. 22 planners’ meeting.

The property, in the R3, Medium Low Density Residential and the CR, Conservation-Residential zoning district, is vacant land. All dwelling units will be within the R3 zoning district boundaries.

The Salisbury Township Planning Commission voted 3-2, with two members absent at its April 23 meeting, to recommend approval by township commissioners of The Vistas at South Mountain.

Salisbury planners voted 6-0 at the Jan. 22 meeting to table Vistas at South Mountain, but approved several variances and deferrals for the development.

The Vistas project was tabled at the Sept. 25, 2024, planning commission meeting when an estimated 30 township residents attended.

The 14 persons who spoke during the approximate 1-1/2 portion of the June 26 meeting pertaining to the Vistas at South Mountain opposed the development.

Representing Vistas at South Mountain at the meeting were Phillip C. Malitsch, professional engineer, director of land development, Tuskes Homes, and Justin Q. Massie, professional engineer, Terraform Engineering.

Several township residents have hired an attorney to represent them in opposing the project.

The Salisbury Township Board of Commissioners voted 4-0, with one commissioner absent at the March 27 meeting, to accept a time extension to July 31 for the Vistas at South Mountain Conditional Preliminary-Final Land Development Plan.

A vote on the Vistas at South Mountain is expected to be on the agenda of the next commissioners’ meeting 7 p.m. July 10 in the meeting room of the Salisbury Township Municipal Building, 2900 S. Pike Ave.

“The [Salisbury Township] school district never should have sold the land,” Karol said.

Salisbury Township School District sold the property Oct. 25, 2023, for $1.45 million to Tuskes Homes, developer of the Vistas at South Mountain.

A previous, unrelated, project for 70 to 90 age-restricted homes fell through in 2005.

Salisbury Township had considered purchasing the land in 2008 to connect it to Franko Farm Park.

The property was taken by eminent domain by Salisbury Township School District in 1967 as a site for a senior high school.

Attorney Rocco L. Beltrami, associate, Norris McLaughlin, P.A., Attorneys at Law, spoke prior to the June 26 commissioners’ vote on behalf of several citizens who retained him to represent them in opposition to Vistas at South Mountain.

“I have been retained by a group of several concerned citizens who are vehemently opposed to the Vistas at South Mountain development for reasons which I would like to place on the record this evening. Members of this group include residents who live immediately adjacent to or across from the project site,” Beltrami said.

“As you know, this property sits on a slope on South Mountain and contains wetlands and a stream. Previous testimony at the planning commission meetings in this matter raised concerns regarding serious stormwater runoff and erosion threats to adjacent neighborhoods, particularly near Honeysuckle Road and East Emmaus Avenue.

“Removal of hundreds of trees for this development will only compound runoff concerns, destabilizing slopes and impairing downstream drainage systems.

“The intersection of East Emmaus Avenue and Gaskill Avenue already operates near capacity and, as I have been informed, has been the site of severe motor vehicle accidents in recent years. This is precisely where the developer proposes to locate one of the site’s unsignalized entrance and exit points. This development will cause significant traffic congestion during school pick-up and drop-off hours as well as rush hour.

“PennDOT has confirmed that it will not permit a traffic signal at this intersection due to insufficient warrants. Without a traffic signal, pedestrians seeking to cross Emmaus Avenue or East Emmaus Avenue must do so at the risk of their peril, including students who may be walking to Salisbury Elementary School.

“It is not hard to conceive that these units will be rented by families with school-aged children. This influx of children could drive increased staffing demands at the Salisbury Township School District, and that strain would fall heavily on township taxpayers.

“Most of Emmaus Avenue features single-family homes on generous lots. This development would introduce high-density housing out of step with the neighborhood character, which is contrary to sound planning principles.

“The developer has requested deferrals for curbing and sidewalks, despite troubling testimony that stormwater flooding already occurs without adequate infrastructure and concerns regarding the pedestrian safety issues raised above.

“Based on the record, it is unclear what hardship exists that would warrant the granting of such deferrals, and these deferrals should be denied.

“It is also unclear based on the engineer’s explanation as to what hardship, if any, exists to support the developer’s requested waiver from the prohibition on earthmoving on slopes greater than 25%.

“Finally, as we understand, the subject site was previously proposed to be developed in or around 2005, but that development did not come to fruition due to environmental concerns.

“Although I have not had a chance to familiarize myself with those environmental concerns, I believe they are likely still relevant today, and we will be exploring these concerns as a potential basis to challenge the issuance of the NPDES [National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System] permit for this project.

“In closing, it is apparent from the record in this matter that the Vistas at South Mountain development will undermine township residents’ quality of life. The plan fails to mitigate serious risks, including but not limited to, inadequate stormwater management and traffic and pedestrian safety risks.

“Accordingly, these residents respectfully request that you deny this plan or, in the alternative, impose conditions which ensure that stormwater runoff and erosion are controlled and that pedestrians and vehicles can safely navigate East Emmaus Avenue and Gaskill Avenue.

“I recommend that a condition be imposed that the wetland and stream buffers depicted on the plan be placed within protective easements described by metes and bounds, naming the township as a beneficiary so that the township may ensure protection of these areas.”

At the April 23 planners’ meeting, planning commissioner Holly Weiss said, “I do not recommend approval.” The motion by Weiss did not receive a second and therefore was not eligible to be voted on.

A United States Fish & Wildlife Service Phase 1 bog turtle study was done for the property.

Weiss, one of the township residents who hired Beltrami, said, “They got a hit for a bog turtle. There is a protected turtle and wetlands on that land. This land should be protected.

“A lot of people have been in touch with the LCCD [Lehigh County Conservation District] and DEP [Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection],” Weiss said.

“It’s not a bad idea to build. It’s a bad location,” Weiss said.

The bog turtle (Glyptemys muhlenbergii) is protected under the United States’ Endangered Species Act. The bog turtle was noted in the 18th century by Gotthilf Heinrich Ernst Muhlenberg, botanist, Lutheran minister and grandfather of Frederick Augustus Muhlenberg, first president of Muhlenberg College, founded in 1848 and named for Henry Melchior Muhlenberg, German patriarch of the Lutheran Church in America.

Per a township regulation, a $2,000 per unit parks and recreation fee will be charged Vistas at South Mountain Holdings, LLC, which would put $172,000 into township coffers. Salisbury Township Planning and Zoning Officer Kerry Rabold at the April 23 planners’ meeting said the fee total is based on 86 units.

“It [the development] meets the Lehigh Valley Planning Commission Act 167 and [the developers] are working with the Lehigh County Conservation District and the NPDES,” Wojciechowsk said at the Jan. 22 planners’ meeting. NPDES is a permitting system regulating sources of water pollution.

“They’re [the developers] also showing a reduction in runoff,” Wojciechowski said.

“We’re using the latest NOAH [National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration] data,” Massie said.

“I have two large [water retention] basins on site. Three-quarters of the site is getting into that basin. We only have a three-in-one in-fill. It does discharge into Trout Creek. It’s a very small discharge that will be let out,” Massie said.

“We do have diversion swales and level spreaders,” Massie said.

“There will be an operations and maintenance plan” [for the development’s stormwater system],” Wojciechowski said.