John L Butler for Marple Township Commissioner

John L Butler Candidate for 2nd Ward Commissioner in Marple Township 

My name is John L Butler and I am seeking election as Marple Township’s Second Ward Commissioner.

I am a 44 year resident of Marple. I am a graduate of Georgia Tech and retired.  I do some part-time consulting and volunteer work.  I am vice chair-man of the Preserve our Pennsylvania Towns a bi-partisan statewide group working on legislation to give local towns the right to control billboards. I have been endorsed by the Sierra Club for my environmental efforts.

I remember over the sixteen years that I served on the Marple Board of Commissioners that there were public discussions of the issues.  The citizen forums were an exchange of ideas between the commissioners and the community and the public sessions were always longer than the executive (private) sessions. We respected diverse ideas and listened to many points of view.

I remember when public documents were available for review without having to file a “Right to Know” request and wait a month or longer for an answer.

I remember when we worked in a bi-partisanship way on any number of issues for the betterment of our community.

As your commissioner, I want to bring those days back! In that environment, we were able to save thousands of dollars for Marple on utilities, refunds of overcharges, equipment upgrades, health care costs and recycling fees. We also revised the property maintenance code to finally force the owners of blighted buildings to fix or demolish them. The whole community worked to obtain the free solar panel on our library building.

I believe a commissioner should be a responsible fiscal steward of our tax dollars and that is how I have always conducted myself. I believe residents should have a vote before any multi-million dollar expenditure is made. The township must learn to live within their means just like the tax payers.  The board balanced this year’s adopted budget with a proposed $500,000 loan and is planning a multi- million dollar bond issue for next year which will permanently increase our taxes at a time that many of our citizens are still recovering from the downturn of the economy.

As your commissioner I would encourage the Township to use a zero base budget where each expenditure needs to be justified each year.  This will allow us to reduce costs while delivering quality service. A family healthcare plan for Marple Township employees is now costing about $24,000 a year with no contribution on the part of the employees. Total health care cost for Marple is $2,160,000 a year.  Employees should be paying a percent of their health care costs just as most employees in the private sector. 

Working with a bi-partisan board we were able to change our sign code to help block the proposed billboards in Marple also introduced the following: recreational impact fee for new developments that has funded park upgrades without tax dollars, storm water controls, responsible developments and single stream recycling and partnering with the Marple schools to collect their recyclable material saving them collection fees, and the senior citizen discounts on refuse and sewer fees.

On November 5th, I would be honored to receive your vote to allow me to continue to serve our community in partnership with the public. And I will always be available to address your concerns.

 John L Butler

(Candidate for 2nd Ward Commissioner Marple Township)

353-3856

610-550-1080 cell