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Cecil rejects MarkWest settlement offer

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Attorney Jon Kamin, who represents several private intervenors in the appeals case, said Cecil Township Zoning Hearing Board had no jurisdiction to vote on an appeals case regarding 26 conditions it upheld in June.

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Solicitor Jeff Ries said an Aug. 26 between MarkWest and zoning hearing board members was an executive session that was a fact-finding meeting that took no action, nor discussed any settlement.

Editor’s note: This article has been updated to reflect the correct outcome of the vote, which was 2-1, and that Krystle Burt is not an intervenor in the case.

Cecil Township Zoning Hearing Board rejected Monday a settlement proposal from MarkWest to remove two of 26 proposed conditions for a natural gas compressor station.

The unanimous vote sends all parties back to court before Washington County Judge John DiSalle to figure out which of the conditions Cecil Township can reasonably enforce. The two conditions MarkWest wanted to be removed were the required use of electric engine compressors or limited use of gasoline-powered units, and to require annual testing of air quality by a third party near the proposed site near Routes 980 and 50. The 2-1 vote came after a Aug. 26 meeting in which MarkWest attorneys, Cecil zoning hearing board members and their solicitor, Jeff Ries, met in private without public advertisement. Chairman George Augustine dissented.

Ries said the parties “convened a fact-finding executive session specifically in regard to matters with (state law compliance) concerning the compressor station land use appeals case.”

“Absolutely no settlement negotiations took place. We try very carefully not to violate the rules of the Sunshine Act,” Ries said.

Pennsylvania News Association media law attorney Melissa Melewsky disagreed, saying courts have ruled several times parties deliberating on cases presently before a judge cannot convene in private.

“The point for a private meeting here was moot, because the whole point for private executive sessions is to have each party protect their legal strategy; for one legal team to meet with (the solicitor) and have those two parties bring back information to present for any municipal board and ultimately the public,” Melewsky said.

Resident Krystle Burt said she didn’t believe the board met just to go over Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection enforcements.

“I find it interesting that after five years MarkWest still needs additional time in a back room to find more facts. … As a lifelong resident of Cecil Township, I’d like to continue living here and be able to breathe safely,” Burt said.

Several intervenors in the lawsuit said they wished they were invited to the Aug. 26 meeting and brought up comparisons to Robinson Township, which recently approved a compressor station with electric compressors.

“That’s what we want. We want what Robinson has,” said alternate zoning hearing board member Anthony Menosky.

MarkWest has been trying to build the compressor station since November 2010, but sued Cecil Township and the zoning hearing board after the site was rejected.

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