From left, Adams Township Supervisors Russell Ford, Ron Shemela, David Goodworth and Ronald Nacey, and on screen, Darryl Brandon, deliberate during a board of supervisors meeting on Monday night, Feb. 24. William Pitts/Butler Eagle

ADAMS TWP — Residents of the Camp Trees and Hickory Glen neighborhoods in Adams Township packed the municipal building for a supervisors meeting on Monday night, Feb. 24, just days after they received an unsettling letter from the township.

The letter stated that the township had the legal right to terminate winter maintenance at both neighborhoods over a dispute between the township and the company that manages both residential developments, Weaver Homes.

According to township Supervisor Russell Ford, Weaver failed to pay for winter maintenance for the neighborhoods in both 2023 and 2024 and has no intention of doing so.

“After numerous letters, meetings, conversations and even phone calls, it would become very apparent and very clear that it was not going to get paid for,” Ford said during the meeting.

The roads in Camp Trees and Hickory Glen are currently private roads, but were built to the specifications set in Adams Township’s code with the intent that the township would take control of them. The township also charged Weaver Homes a monthly fee to maintain the roads during the winter, providing the same amount of maintenance that it would to a public township road.

“We had a winter maintenance agreement put together with both of these plans and they’ve failed to pay for the winter maintenance,” Ford said. “We have now been waiting for two years to be paid for our winter maintenance on the developments.”

One resident of Camp Trees, Alison Cannon, revealed that the state of the development’s roads could have had serious consequences for her 3-year-old son when he experienced two consecutive seizures earlier this month.

“The Adams Township fire and police departments arrived in less than 10 minutes after I called 911, and only minutes before my son experienced his second seizure,” Cannon said. “I am beyond thankful for the quick response of our local emergency services that arrived that day to help our son. And it is terrifying to think that our township road could have been impassable that day because of this issue.”

Despite the content of the letter, Ford said the township will not actually suspend winter maintenance at the two developments, even though both he and township solicitor Mike Gallagher assert their right to do so if they wish.

“If you have a contract with the township, you perform the contract, and if you don’t perform the contract, the township is free to perform what it has to do,” Gallagher told the Butler Eagle.

“I’m going to be the first one to stand here and tell everyone of you sitting here right now, if it snows tomorrow, you (expletive) well know our plow trucks will be in your area,” Ford said during Monday’s meeting. “That’s a promise.”

During the meeting, Ford assured the disgruntled residents that the township was prepared to “take the next steps” to resolve the situation, but stated that he could not reveal what those next steps were.

“There are a lot of legality issues in regards to where the next steps of this will go,” Ford said.

No representative from Weaver Homes was present at Monday night’s meeting.