East Penn School Board has selected its delegates for the Hamilton Crossings Tax Increment Financing Committee. Superintendent Dr. Thomas Seidenberger and board member Kenneth Bacher, along with Francee Fuller as an alternate, will participate with Lower Macungie and Lehigh County in reviewing the project and determining whether the district would benefit by participating in it.

The committee is still a very preliminary stage in the formation of a TIF, which will provide some much needed funding for infrastructural projects associated with the proposed shopping development. Most noted of these is the costly necessity of digging out some unsturdy minewash under the ground and fortifying it with construction materials. The TIF, with participation from the three local taxing bodies, will help in offsetting the costs of the project and lead to mutual benefits of revenue.

"The committee will inspect proposals, look at various financing options available and then determine whether it's recommended for all entities involved to go forward with the TIF," President Charles Ballard said. "This is an exploratory committee. It does not commit any entity involved into creating a TIF or approving a TIF."

With the committee's blessing, the Lehigh Valley Industrial Development Authority, which chairs the committee, creates the TIF and presents it again to the taxing bodies who then vote on it. The committee's main responsibility at this point is to investigate whether East Penn would benefit by participating in the TIF at all.

Board member Julian Stolz was the only one opposed to the school board's participation in the TIF committee.

"I have concerns about us getting involved in business," Stolz said. "Government interference in the free market has led to our current economic situation. This is picking market winners and losers and giving benefit to one particular set of businesses and developers and I'm not going to support this and I will do my level best to fight this every step of the way. I wonder how as a school board we can tell our teachers to instruct our students on a free market capitalist society that made our country great when we are approving government interfering with the free market process."

Bacher responded saying by sending delegates the board was not making a decision to support the TIF, merely to gather information.

"I would like to have the data to make an informed decision," Bacher said. "The time to debate the merits of the TIF are when we have the data on what the TIF is."

Vice President Alan Earnshaw pointed out the need to have a school board voice on the committee. "If we have no voice then we will not have any choice on the recommendation that is brought to us."

In other business, the school board approved a motion requesting the superintendent to prepare a report on webcasting board meetings. The motion was put forward by Stolz.

"I would be interested in seeing what would be required for East Penn School District to webcast meetings along the lines of Lehigh County Board of Commissioners, for example," Stolz explained, adding later, "It could be something as simple as us having our own camera."

The school board also approved a motion authorizing the Pennsylvania School Boards Association to conduct a compensation analysis and market assessment for Act 93 compensation practices. Seidenberger presented the analysis to the board as a more precise means of determining how accurate the district is on payscale for those employees who fall under Act 93.

At a cost not exceeding $4,100, Ballard called the services offered by PSBA "extraordinarily cheap." Donches and Stolz were concerned the work could be done in house to save money, but Bacher pointed out the likely 10 percent savings would be negated by the cost of preparing the material for analysis.

According to Earnshaw, "This study will help us set parameters in a much more rational way. It's not simply whether we'd increase existing employees' pay … having this will really help us."

The study was specifically recommended by Seidenberger because of PSBA's access to information on school districts otherwise available only through lengthy and costly communication with Lehigh County and all the more precise for finding exact matches for job descriptions.