Heidelberg Township’s fire code was discussed at the Sept. 25 board of supervisors meeting.

Dawn Didra, township manager, began the discussion on the fire code.

“So, I finally was able to get a price from Barry Isett for them to draft a fire code ordinance for us. Mike Italia from Barry Isett, he drafted the one for Weisenberg. I thought it was reasonable,” she stated.

“I’m still questioning, do we truly need this in the township,” Supervisor Steve Bachman asked Didra.

Jay Scheffler, Germansville Fire Chief responded.

“Again our Insurance Services Office rating, so our insurance whether it’s yours here in the township or you at home, that rating, that’s what all prompted this so we start out in the negatives with that, that dictates what sets your insurance,” Scheffler said. “Any step we can do to improve our ISO rating saves businesses and homeowner’s money on their insurance premium because it shows you’re proactive.”

Scheffler said the commercial buildings are already here and the staff at the fire department try to tour these facilities to familiarize themselves with the buildings in case of an emergency.

“It’s almost like an extra tax on all businesses,” Bachman asked.

“It’s just a scheduled fee. It’s just part of doing business,” Scheffler said. “It’s a minimal fee but again what monetary value do you put on life. That’s the whole purpose for it.”

“It’s for business owners, not for residential,” Bachman asked.

“It’s only businesses,” Didra responded.

“So this is just their proposal to write the ordinance for us?” Bachman asked.

“Yes, it’s for businesses only,” Didra responded.

After further discussion, the board approved the motion for Barry Isett to draft a fire code ordinance for the township.

Another major topic of discussion at the meeting was Resolution 2025- 28, an amendment to allow for zoning hearing board continuance fees.

Again, Didra began the discussion.

“I don’t know if this has ever come up, but we’ve had a zoning hearing board case that was scheduled for August and they asked for two different continuances. They asked for one because of an emergency and then we rescheduled it and then they asked for another one,” she said.

Bachman asked, “And we had to repay for the advertising?”

“Yes,” Didra responded. “North Whitehall, they have fees in their fee schedule so that it deters people from continuously asking for continuances. “

Keith Strohl, township solicitor entered the discussion.

“I wouldn’t go so far as to say it’s a deterrence. It’s really just to allow the township to recoup the costs of having to do their repetitive advertisements because you have to provide public notice of the hearing. You have to post the properties and all of that, an expense that the township has,” he explained. “So really the fees in any kind of governmental permit fees are really just meant to have the township be made whole for those costs that are associated with the hearing, and in this case it’s a continuance which creates those additional costs. So we’re just telling that property owner, the applicant, that if you couldn’t show up at the hearing when we scheduled it the first time, you requested the continuance, you’ll have to pay the fee to foot the bill for the next advertisement.”

He added that’s really what the purpose of this is as long as the fees are reasonable and within the scope of recouping those costs.

“We just have to have a resolution to add to our fee schedule that we already have under the Multi Municipal Planning Code,” Strohl explained.

A motion to adopt Resolution 2025-28 passed.

During Bachman’s Veterans Memorial committee monthly report, he said the Veterans Day event will be from 2 to 7 p.m. on Nov. 11, and they are doing a basket raffle, so they are looking for donations. Anyone willing to donate for the basket raffle can see him or any Veteran Memorial Committee member.

He added Veterans Memorial Committee member Chris Noll will be playing at the event in between the Gilbert family and the Kutztown bagpipers. People can look for a flyer in the Northwestern Press to announce all these things.

The next item Bachman talked about was the committee’s Hometown Heroes program.

“If anybody has been in any of the surrounding townships, you’ll see banners hanging up on telephone poles. The veterans committee would like to start doing that, so we’re going to each township,” he said.

“Lehigh Township is what sparked this. Their township is like us. They have no main street, no town center really and what they are doing is they opened it up and they had over 300 of these banners put up in less than a year in their township.”

The Veterans Memorial is going to receive and process the forms, order the banners, own the issues and complaints, he added.

“It’s a fundraiser to expand the memorial because we already are at almost the limit. Like I mentioned, there’s three different sizes of signs. The biggest one is 30 by 60, that’s what we recommend,” Bachman said. “The signs are made-up of two brackets that are held on to telephone poles with three stainless steel clamps on each one so two of them are holding it on. The third one is kind of there as a backup.”

He said there is a two-year warranty on the signs, materials, color and workmanship, but they’re expected to last over five years before fading and ripping apart. The signs are made in Michigan, then shipped to the vendor in Allentown and picked up by the veterans committee.

He added the only regulation that anybody has dealt with so far with all the various municipalities is that the bottom of the sign has to be 14 feet from the bottom of the ground and installed on the poles that have minimal accessories.

“Poles that have all these boxes on it with pipes and stuff coming up, you would skip those,” Bachman said. “The veterans committee is going to call and attempt to get permission from PPL, Verizon, Blue Ridge and Met-Ed. So we’re going to go through and contact all those companies to see if we can get some kind of a thing and we want all four townships to participate.”

Bachman said they expect to announce the plan if every township agrees at the Veteran’s Day event and start taking orders to install them in 2026 for the semiquincentennial celebration.

“So, final cost would be determined, but it’s expected to be about $250, and again some of that will cover the cost and we will have a little bit for miscellaneous and potential problems that we may have,” he said.

While there will be no cost to the townships, he continued, the committee is hoping the townships would install the banners.

The veterans committee would work with the township to determine what zones or streets they would designate as the corridors for the signs, Bachman added.

“So, what I’m looking for is would the road crew be willing to do the installation and would the township authorize that and would the township allow the Veterans Memorial Committee to move forward?” he asked.

The Veterans Memorial Committee is really excited about this. We think between the four townships, we can get close to 1,000 of these signs hung up,” Bachman said. “It’s not just for deceased veterans; it’s for any and all veterans. The sponsor supplies the picture, preferably the basic training picture, and it goes from there.”

He said the veteran will get a proof of it and the committee will check with the sponsor to make sure everything is spelled correctly. Then the committee will give the banner to the township to put up when they get a chance.

“We’re hoping that this continues on for years to come,” Bachman added.