By Matt Chiappardi, Staff Writer
For more than four years the former rug mill site on Bank Street in Hightstown has hung in limbo with borough officials and residents expressing frustration with current owner John Wolfington over its redevelopment.
And they are not alone.
Officials in two towns in Pennsylvania say they have had serious difficulties with Mr. Wolfington changing his plans — something he has done several times in Hightstown — and in one case selling the property soon after getting local approvals. In yet another Pennsylvania town, there’s fear Mr. Wolfington will play a part in demolishing its only historic property
One Pennsylvania official called a secondary plan of Mr. Wolfington’s “the very definition of poor planning,” and said his town is changing its development regulations as a direct result of Mr. Wolfington’s actions.
Wolfington Companies owns at least 13 properties in nine municipalities throughout Pennsylvania, according to its Web site. Pottstown is one of them.
”He didn’t deliver what he promised. We basically have a vacant property with a large fence around it and that doesn’t inspire development,” said Pottstown Borough Council Vice President Steve Toroney.
Terri Lampe, the economic development director in the Montgomery County borough, says Mr. Wolfington began the demolition of the former Mrs. Smith’s pie factory in the summer of 2006 to make way for a condominium complex. However, she said, “we’re still waiting for the buildings.”
Rich Almquist, vice president of development for Wolfington Companies, said it’s another developer, Ryan Homes, that is not delivering since his company sold the property to Wright Land Development in November 2006. And Mr. Almquist says Pottstown officials should not find that surprising.
Selling the property “was always in our plan from the beginning,” he said, while claiming that the company made that clear during its negotiations with the borough.
As for those negotiations, Mr. Toroney said it took Pottstown about four years to go from the initial concept submitted by Mr. Wolfington’s company to the first phase of construction. In that time, he said, the details of the project shifted a number of times during negotiations going from an ambitious mixed-use development with a retail and entertainment component to a solely residential one.
An almost-identical situation is taking place in Hightstown. Mr. Wolfington originally planned a mixed-use development in 2003 with a commercial and residential component where the residential units would not, by borough ordinance, exceed 80. He quickly raised that to 130 units, and when the borough met Mr. Wolfington on the limit, he sought to raised it again to 141.
Moreover, a borough requirement that Mr. Wolfington refurbish the nearby municipal hall is in question, with the borough mulling whether to end that requirement and accept $350,000 instead.
Through all this, there are fears in the borough that Mr. Wolfington might sell the property before any shovel hits the ground. Just this week, Councilman-elect Jeff Bond said at a public meeting he wouldn’t be surprised if Wolfington sells the land to another developer.
In Pottstown, Mr. Wolfington sold a majority of the Mrs. Smith’s property only four or five months after he got site approval from the Planning Board, according to Mr. Toroney. All that sits there 13 months since the sale are some foundations and sewer and gas hookups, said Ms. Lampe.
When Mr. Wolfington first came into town half a decade ago, the plan was to stimulate Pottstown’s downtown area with a major revitalization on the former pie factory site. That still hasn’t happened, officials say.
”We were promised all this nightlife, theaters, and stores, not residential,” said Mr. Toroney.
Mr. Almquist said the Mrs. Smith property was “always an evolving plan,” and that it changed over time based on “input from the community and those involved in the discussions.”
”There are some people who are not pleased with the results, and that will always be the case,” he said.
In Radnor, Pa, a western suburb of Philadelphia, Mr. Wolfington’s company did complete its project. But not to the satisfaction of some in that township.
The company bought a former gas station property now known as “The Chateau” in 2003, said Township Planning Manager Matt Baumann. Construction did not begin until three years and three site plans later, he added.
”The Chateau” is now a two-story building on Route 30 in the heart of the Main Line in the upper-middle-class community of Wayne, said Mr. Baumann. On the bottom is a branch of Bank of America, but on top is a 4,000 square-foot condominium that has sat empty since the summer of 2006, he said.
Mr. Baumann said Radnor officials are so displeased with the end result — parking is confusing and there are too many entrances leading to the bank’s drive-through window on the busy thruway — that they’ve amended their development regulations to prevent anything like this from happening again.
”This turned out to be the worst possible plan you could enact,” said Mr. Baumann.
The planning manager said the local Planning Board was satisfied with one site plan from the company that included what would be typical for a property on the busy suburban corridor. It had front parking at an angle, residents’ parking on the side, and only one driveway for a potential bank’s drive-through. The company later rescinded that plan claiming the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation would reject it, Mr. Baumann said. However, Mr. Baumann added, his communications with PennDOT indicated that claim was untrue.
Mr. Almquist said he could respond to that claim because he was not the manager on that project. And he said Mr. Wolfington was not available this week for any comment.
When Mr. Wolfington’s company came back with a different site plan, it was “the very definition of poor planning,” according to Mr. Baumann.” It altered the parking from angled to straight. And it added two extra driveways to accommodate the bank, at the expense of traffic on the road, he said.
Unfortunately for the board, he said, there was nothing they could do to deny the plan because it still conformed to the uses allowed under the property’s zoning.
”It was a shift in strategy that surprised the township,” said Mr. Baumann.
”As a result we have an empty condo,” he added.
On a tract of land straddling two other Delaware County towns, Edgmont and Middletown townships, there is a proposal for an age-restricted development at the site of a former boarding school campus, founded in 1826, on land co-owned by Mr. Wolfington.
Edgmont Township Manager Samantha Reiman said she is not happy with the prospect of the school buildings being demolished.
”We’re a little old farm community that has been visited by the McMansions. They want to demolish what little historical significance we have,” said Ms. Reiner.
The manager estimated that about half of the residents in her 4,000-person township feel the same way. She added that she would have no problem with some other type of proposal at that site as long as it preserved the buildings.
Across the border in Middletown, the site plan for the same project was rejected by the Planning Board more than a year ago, said Township Manager Bruce Clark. Now, he said, the development company working with Mr. Wolfington appealed the decision in county court.
”They still have the opportunity to submit an amended site plan, and we may yet see that before we’d have to go to court,” Mr. Clark said.
It’s not all horror stories being told about Mr. Wolfington in the Keystone State.
In Amity Township, a community on the Interstate 76 corridor, Mr. Wolfington finished development of the 10-unit Ben Franklin Court strip mall in the fall of 2005. Township Manager Charles Lyon said he’s had no difficulty in his dealings and called the strip mall a “win for the township.”
”He even did things he didn’t have to to help the township,” Mr. Lyon said, in a reference to some financial contributions.
In Lehman Township in the Pocono Mountains area, Mr. Wolfington is planning to build a clubhouse adjacent to a golf course that his company also owns. The chairman of the township’s Board of Supervisors, John Siuick, also said he has had no problems with Mr. Wolfington.
While construction hasn’t begun in Lehman, Mr. Siuick said, “It’s moving at the pace the economy dictates, but it’s moving.”
And in Pocono Township, where Mr. Wolfington is developing a condominium complex called Four Seasons at Camelback Mountain, Zoning Officer Steve Maylach said “everything is going fine.”
Officials from Bushkill, Pa., and Scranton, Pa., where Mr. Wolfington is planning developments, did not return calls seeking comment.

