Residents Take Pleas To Save Linden Elementary To Doylestown Council

DOYLESTOWN BOROUGH, PA — Parents, teachers, graduates and neighbors of Linden Elementary School took the fight to save their school to the Doylestown Borough Council this week.

School supporters showed up en masse to council’s monthly meeting to ask the borough to consider passing a resolution urging the Central Bucks School Board not to close their neighborhood school and to consider other alternatives.

A study done by Crabtree, Rohrbaugh and Associates (CRA) of the district’s population trends, building utilization and capacity limits recommends a grade realignment, with 9 to 12 at the high school level, 6 to 8 at the middle school level and K to 5 at the elementary level.

The study also recommends Linden Elementary for possible closure as a result of declining enrollment across the district. The district released the results of that study last fall. Since then no decision has been made by the school board or the administration.

Throughout the hour’s worth of public comment, speaker after speaker spoke glowingly about the school and how it was part of the small town package that attracted them to the borough.

Among them was Karen Ambrose of Creek Drive who said it was that small town feeling, the walkability and the neighborhood school that sold her on the town.

“It’s incredibly valuable to our community that we have Linden School,” she told council. “It helps to build and strengthen our community and our neighborhoods. Besides Linden being an amazing school, it’s also a community center and a park. On a daily basis there are people walking,
running, biking, dog walking, playing ball and using the playground. And when it snows, there are 75 people on that hill sledding.”

Ambrose said she’s concerned about the lack of transparency from the school board and raised concerns over the process and the data that was used to develop the recommendations.

“We are asking the council to consider passing a resolution opposing any possible closure of Linden School and asking the school district to invest in Linden as a very valuable school in our community,” said Ambrose. “Linden is an important part of the borough and our community.”

Marie Castor of Maple Avenue urged the council to “unify with the community” around the position that “the closing of Linden is not in the best interest of the Doylestown Borough community.

“Linden is a vital part of an ecosystem of this small town. There is significant concern over losing the sense of community that the school brings to this ward,” said Castor. “I see it every day when I look outside my window - kids learning to ride their bicycles on the parking lot, a place to practice their 50 state geography, a place for teenage banter on the basketball courts for hours and the best sledding hill in the area. But most importantly, a community meeting spot for the residents of this ward.

“Any significant development of this property would reduce our property values, create a significant environmental issue with the runoff into the neighboring creek, but most importantly eliminate the reason why most of us chose to move to this area of the borough in the first place - a walkable small school with a community first culture,” said Castor.

“We realize that it is likely the district has made its decision, however we are optimistic that with council’s support we can overturn a shortsighted financial decision and maintain the attractiveness and charm that are unique and highly coveted in the small town of Doylestown Borough,” Castor said.

Debbie Gregory, a future Linden parent with a five and three year old at home, called the school “a beacon” for young families entering the borough.

“When I came to look at properties in the borough, every time I would speak to someone or talk to someone on the street they didn’t say you’re going to love Doylestown. They didn’t say you’re going to love the borough. They said you are going to love Linden - every single person. And that was one of the main reasons we chose to live where we are living now. Hearing the news about the school was incredibly heart breaking … I would love you to take some kind of action against this closure.”

Maple Avenue neighbor Jane Ramos-Yates raised another concern with a potential Linden closure. Apparently there are upwards of 300 Chimney Swifts who have Linden home for more than 30 years.

The swifts summer in the school’s chimney between May and August before migrating south to South America for the winter months, said Ramos-Yates.

“This works out for them because the school is mostly empty during the summer,” said Ramos-Yates. “They migrant just before Labor Day as the kids are going back to school.

“A lot of people think they are bats, but they are a bird,” she said. “They are insect eaters. One swift will eat more than 12,000 insects per day. They don’t perch. They hang on the inside of the chimney.”

According to Ramos-Yates, some years there are 100 swifts and some years there are 300.

“They are not an endangered species, but they are federally and state protected under a migration act,” she said. “Under this law the building or the chimney cannot be disturbed when trey are nesting.

“If they come back and there is no chimney there they are going to die. That’s something we should all be concerned about,” she added.

After about an hour’s worth of public comment, Council President Jack O’Brien asked the council’s Community and Government Affairs Committee to look into the issue and to determine what action the borough might take.

“We really don’t have a lot of leverage with the school board,” O’Brien told the Linden supporters. “And quite frankly, in my opinion they aren’t being very transparent with some of their dealings. Just by holding a meeting, and we can raise some more awareness.”

The meeting is scheduled for Monday, April 10 beginning at 6 p.m.

Doylestown Borough Manager John Davis noted that “this is a decision of the Central Bucks School District. Doylestown Borough Council does not have a vote on that,” he told members of the public. “What council can do is to take a position and let that position be known to the school district in an attempt to make an argument that the property should remain as an elementary school.”

The decision by council to send the issue to committee brought applause from the audience who had pleaded with Council to send a message to the school district.

“Your voice is important not just for the school board but for the community and for the Linden families to know that you care and you are listening,” resident and Linden supporter Marlene Pray told council.