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Update on Kardon Ponds

Great News for Downingtown! Judge Nagle decision has come down allowing the 70-home Millrace section of Kardon Ponds in East Caln Township to proceed. If the opponent does not appeal the decision, the community can move on through the approval process. Read his Judge Nagle's decision here.

The larger Kardon Park site was the subject of a separate litigation in Orphans Court. The decision by Judge Platt last October to prohibit the Borough from selling just under half of the site for development is being appealed to Commonwealth Court by the Borough and the developers. As Judge Platt’s decision now stands, the Borough would have to keep the entire site as permanent open space, even the contaminated lands west of the Lions Trail not currently used by the public. The cost to cap the entire site to make it usable by the public as open space is estimated to be $1.5 million dollars.  

If the appeal to Commonwealth Court is successful, the opponents of the Kardon Ponds proposal may appeal to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.   The higher court would then decide whether it wants to hear the case to further clarify the Donated or Dedicated Property Act after last year’s City of Erie golf course decision. The State Legislature exempted land acquired by purchase or condemnation from the Act.  Despite that fact, Judge Platt applied the State statute to the Kardon Park proposal based on her understanding of the Supreme Court ruling in the matter involving Erie. In fact, all of the parcels of ground that make up the Kardon site today were acquired originally through purchase or condemnation by the Borough and unlike the City of Erie’s golf course, there was no deed restriction mandating that it be or remain public open space. Even if the DDPA were applied to the Kardon Park site, the contaminated lands west of the paved trails are impractical to maintain because of the cost to Borough taxpayers to clean them up thereby providing for their disposition under the guidelines established by the DDPA.