Battle for the Franklin Mint is Drawing to a Close

The battle may have been lost, but the war is being won. And while the skirmishes have been waging for the past six years, the residents of have shown their resolve, and persevered.

The battle I am referring to is the and surrounding historic properties.

On Jan. 23, Middletown Township Council approved the latest version of the plan. SAVE MIDDLETOWN, the grass-roots organization started in 2006 in opposition to the developers original CITY Plan, endorsed the latest mixed-use concept presented. What they opposed was the language that described the density permitted on the site. It was too loose, and through their attorney Thomas Oeste, they were asking for an explicit cap on the amount of square footage permitted.

If that cap would have been included, you may have never heard from SAVE MIDDLETOWN again. But that safeguard wasn’t deemed necessary by the township planners.

Council was receiving feedback and planning information just hours before the public hearing on Jan. 23. Admittedly, most council members do not have the skill-sets to comprehend the complexity of something as large as a CITY plan or anything this big. And unfortunately the experts they rely on, except for township engineer Art Rothe, were subsidized by the developers to help "refine" (read: sell) the CITY plans.

At times these experts appeared to be completely inept at making decisions, explaining zoning, and even following the points of parliamentary procedure for orchestrating a zoning change.

Spokesperson for Council, Mark Kirchgasser, was charged with trying to convince the community that fail-safe measures were not necessary before passing this ordinance. And SAVE MIDDLETOWN members and the community weren’t buying it. They vehemently disagreed with what was in place to prevent over-development.

For example, the ordinance stated a planned hotel will be 150 rooms in size. It does not define the size of the hotel, attached conference center, or the size of the rooms. It just states there will be no more than 150 rooms. That's like me asking the township if I can build a one-bay garage. And then building one that is 60 feet wide by 20 feet deep and putting on one door. Yep, it's a one-bay garage.

In the end, Middletown Township Council voted 5 to 1 to approve the ordinance and advance to the next step. Lorraine Bradshaw, the architectural engineer of the group, cast the single 'no' vote. And although we are on to the next step of the process, we are that much closer to getting something that is a win-win for the community.

Because in the end, that’s what this is all about. It’s not about special interest groups, or taxes, or filling campaign war chests with contributions from "developer" PACs. It’s about the community and the effect these massive developments impose on them.

I have to say I am proud to be part of this community that banded together and held true to what they believed was the right thing to do. If not for the diligence of Middletown’s residents, the original CITY plan would have been ushered in as expected by the political powers in charge in 2006.

The plan may not be perfect, but it is very much a plan of the people. And SAVE MIDDLETOWN members will continue to review the plans as they come in to ensure they match the ordinance and land plan submitted by the developers. We've followed it this far, we mine as well see it to the end.

For more information visit www.savemiddletown.com.