It wasn\u2019t fun. I saw my name on local social media with unprintable words beside it. I still remember one Hellertown Borough Council meeting where then Council President Tom Rieger banged his gavel to get me to shut up, and I remember the slightly desperate look on Tom\u2019s face, and I recall thinking to myself, \u201cWhat are we doing here, fighting?\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve laughed about all that since\u2013the tension, the anxious community meetings, the dozens of emails, the newspaper articles. I\u2019m on friendly terms with Tom today. That whole episode got me into local politics, but it also taught me an important lesson: Good things can come from productive tension, but you also need to know when to stop.<\/p>\n
![\"Reinhard](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/reinhard-late-construction-1024x768.jpg\")
A gazebo is located in the new Reinhard\u2019s Park in Hellertown. (Contributed photo)<\/p>\n
To their credit, the Borough Manager Cathy Hartranft, Tom and former Councilman Earl Hill worked very hard to soothe neighborhood fears. But a few of us in the neighborhood kept pushing. Above all, we wanted to see handsome additions to offset the new garage and a balance of aesthetics and safety. For pete\u2019s sake\u2014one of my neighbors is a director of summer Shakespeare productions. People care deeply about how shared spaces look and function.<\/p>\n
There were smaller meetings where people could speak frankly. Eventually, huge changes to the initial plans changed our neighborhood\u2019s perceptions. We were won over. The garage was massively downscaled, a new pocket park conceived and green assets (lots of trees, please!) were added. And all that, along with Hartranft\u2019s remarkable skill at authoring successful grants, created a new community park. More adjustments were made and more careful planning ensued.<\/p>\n
I also think, crucially, that the public works director Barry Yonney has made sure the public works building itself looks as pretty as possible\u2013something neighbors also wanted. There are planters with petunias, pretty but restrained lighting and the ploughs are put away after winter. It\u2019s a busy building, make no mistake. But all in all, it\u2019s balanced with new things that look nice.<\/p>\n
No one likes a complainer, but when you\u2019re in the neighborhood where a planning problem erupts, \u201cnimbyism\u201d suddenly feels like necessity. Indeed, we\u2019ve seen it elsewhere in Saucon Valley many times. Citizens often don\u2019t care to hear the complaints of one group of neighbors if development doesn\u2019t affect them. And other townspeople can be downright brutal in turning on fellow citizens who do speak up and complain. I\u2019ve felt this first hand. But when the new development, the zoning change, the local expansion project, etc. comes to your neighborhood, suddenly it\u2019s OK to complain. Perhaps that\u2019s just human nature; that essential in-it-for-myself, gentle hypocrisy.<\/p>\n
There are two enemies to the difficult, painful process of working out differences in a community in a civil manner. Even today, as a school director at Saucon Valley, I see these two enemies: On the one hand, there are those can tolerate no conflict nor serious dissent, who insist on everyone liking them; on the other, there are those who can tolerate no reasonable consensus or peace, who never feel validated if they\u2019re not stirring the pot. You have to have people willing to battle through differences in a civil manner\u2013even when things get a bit, well, grumpy. People-pleasing isn\u2019t always healthy. But you have to accept differences, too, and know when to shut up.<\/p>\n
It would be misleading to pretend that how the new Reinhard\u2019s Park came together was a comfortable process. It was actually kind of awful at times, and there are still sore feelings out there if you scratch a bit. But when I look at this park, I think it was absolutely worth all the drama.<\/p>\n
When I see little kids already playing make-believe games around the beautiful new gazebo, and I see the slick new sidewalks and crossings across from my house, and the new trees around the public works building getting bigger every year, it all feels profoundly inspiring\u2013and instructive.<\/p>\n