Nittany Valley Environmental Coalition

Following is the text of a notice printed on plain white paper and hand-delivered Friday, Sept. 29 to David Stone, Nittany Valley Water Coalition activist, at the Whitehall Road site, by Zack Moore, PSU Vice President of Government and Community Relations.

PENN STATE UNIVERSITY  NOTICE AGAINST TRESPASS

This property is owned by the Pennsylvania State University.

However, it is not open to the public.

You are hereby notified that you are not allowed, licensed or privileged to place any personal property on this property.

Should you fail to adhere to this Notice, any personal property you have placed on this property will be subject to removal by the University.

THIS IS YOUR FINAL NOTICE.

CRITICAL ANALYSIS

There are a lot of strange things about this document.

1. It’s not on any letterhead: not Penn State, not a municipal police department, not a county sheriff, nothing.
2. It’s unsigned and unattributed. Not signed by Zack Moore, nor by PSU VP for Finance and Business David Gray, nor by PSU President Eric Barron, nor by PSU Board of Trustees Chairman Mark Dambly. No way to know who wrote it.
3. It’s not dated.
4. It doesn’t cite any federal, state or local law or authority to support the assertions contained within it. Nor does it cite any internal Penn State administrative directives or policies.
5. Most intriguingly, it walks back from the demands and threats stated and/or implied the prior day’s email thread. There is no reference to Penn State’s demand that the protestors themselves leave the site or risk arrest and imprisonment. The notice only asks that protestors remove their stuff, which consists of some folding chairs, coolers, canopies and signs, or risk having their stuff taken away by parties unidentified.
6. In the first two sentences, it makes an attempt to separate the notion of Penn State as a public university from the notion of Penn State’s land as open to the public.
7. Further, it carefully avoids asserting that protestors have no “right” to be on the site with their personal property, by stating only that the protestors are not “allowed, licensed or privileged” to have their stuff with them.

Nittany Valley Water Coalition activists don’t think Penn State has a legal leg to stand on.

And, based on the peculiar form of this alleged “notice against trespass,” it appears Penn State executives know the same thing.

They’re just hoping to bluff their way through and intimidate the water coalition into compliance based on innuendo and Penn State’s powerful reputation, even though Penn State has no legitimate authority to impose its will in this case.

BERNIE HOFFNAR’S RESPONSE

In response to the Penn State notice, water coalition activist Bernie Hoffnar spent a few minutes yesterday on his own computer, with his own printer, to produce a similar unsigned, undated, non-letterhead, legally-unsupported document, which he then handed to David Stone last night as a rebuttal:

PENN STATE UNIVERSITY NOTICE TO CANCEL THE NOTICE AGAINST TRESPASS

This property is owned by the Pennsylvania State University and the State of Pennsylvania and its citizens. The property is open to the public as it has been in the past.

You are hereby notified that you are allowed and privileged to keep any personal property on this property that you wish.

This is our final notice to you.

-Posted by Katherine Watt

The opposite of Penn State Pride.

A recent flare-up of the entitlement complex suffered by Zack Moore, Charima Young and other Penn State corporate executives is prompting an emergency meeting of Nittany Valley Water Coalition and its supporters, on Friday, September 29 at 5 p.m. at Foxdale’s board room.

Essentially, the dispute boils down to the same key issue we keep running into in this painful running battle between corporate exploitation and community sovereignty.

• Is Penn State a public institution, such that Penn State land is public land, the notion of “trespass” upon it is incoherent, and citizens have a Constitutional right to protest thereupon?
• Or is Penn State a private institution, such that Penn State land is private land and corporate executives have the right to invoke the police power of the state to forcibly evict  and/or arrest protesting citizens as trespassers?

Related questions:

• Are community residents subject to corporate Penn State “Administrative Directives” on such issues as authorized free speech sites?
• Or are community residents – non-university, along with university employees and students – free to speak whenever and wherever they choose, because they are independent human beings with inherent rights beyond the control of the corporate university?

See, for reference, AD51, which purports to restrict all citizens’ rights to free speech to 12 small sites from among Penn State’s thousands of acres of campus and non-campus land, and AD57.

Email thread below.

It’s an exchange between Zack Moore, PSU Vice President of Government and Community Relations, Charima Young, PSU Director of Local Government and Community Relations, and David Hughes, Penn State Professor of Entomology and one of the water coalition’s most vocal and visible leaders, about Penn State’s desire for water coalition activists to pack up the Whitehall Road protest site, go home, sit down, and shut up.

Sept. 27, 8:27 p.m. – Charima Young to David Hughes

I just wanted to follow up on our previous conversations about the removal of items from the Penn State Whitehall Road Property. On August 21st we provided notification that all items should be removed, which is in accordance with the No Trespassing signs. This is our FINAL no trespassing notification. It is our hope that members of the Nittany Valley Water Coalition will comply.

As mentioned before, we will continue to be open to dialogue during this process.

Sept. 27, 9:50 p.m. – David Hughes to Charima Young

I very much doubt whether the coalition will change their stance. I will of course mention this to them.

Given that you say it is FINAL, can you tell me what PSU intends? Will you send the police? I know that the coalition will ask this question.

Speaking now as a professor at PSU, I suggest that is not a good move.

Sept. 28, 8:40 a.m. – Charima Young to David Hughes

I would advise the coalition members to consider complying with the law and respecting the no trespassing signs that have been posted. How the University responds will be dependent on how the coalition responds.

We have always tried to work with the coalition members in a gracious and respectful manner. We hope that they will do the same and respect the University’s rights as land owners of the Whitehall Road property.

Sept. 28, 10:22 a.m. – David Hughes to Charima Young

You ducked the question. Let’s assume the coalition decides not to move. Will you send the police to forcefully evict?

I just need a clear answer on this to bring to the coalition in our meeting tomorrow evening.

Yes or no.

Just to help us (Penn State) manage the community relations here, I can assure you there are people in the coalition who are willing to be arrested.

Another question I received since last night is why is this happening now? We are just about to write to Charles Elliot as his 60 days period of (Toll Brothers) research on the West College Avenue site comes to a close. Why do you want to evict now?

Sept. 28 – Zack Moore to David Hughes:

We’ve been asking you to do this for more than a month.  Charima sent her email on August 21st.  This is not a recent request.

From the university’s perspective, there is very clear law and policy on this.

If we do not enforce it, it makes it more difficult to enforce policies in the future.

As a professor, what would you have us do?

From the community’s perspective, there is very clear law and policy on the Constitutional principles of freedom of speech and freedom of assembly, and Penn State is a public institution, not a private institution.

So not only do our Constitutional rights supersede your “Administrative Directives,” but as a public institution, your administrative directives should be fully aligned with Constitutional principles, because you are a government entity.

In a battle between your unconstitutional administrative policies and our Constitutional rights, our rights will win, even if it takes us years to vindicate those rights in protracted court battles.

So in this particular case, Zack, I’d have you void the sales contract with Toll Brothers, request that Ferguson Township Board of Supervisors zone the land back to Rural Agricultural, and apologize to the community at large for your abusive, disrespectful, exploitative behavior over the last 14 years, since you initiated the upzoning that led to this horrible mess to begin with, back in November 2003.

If you did that, the protestors would pack up their shit and go home, because this particular battle between the corporation and the community would be over at last.

-Posted by Katherine Watt

Toll Brothers executives and engineering consultants are continuing to assess the feasibility of an alternative student housing development site – on land also owned by Penn State – near the intersection of West College Ave. and Blue Course Drive (across from the Waffle Shop).

Penn State executives continue to be oddly cagey in their communications with NVWC representatives about the possible land swap.

Water coalition leaders continue to be concerned about the possibility that Charles Elliott of Toll Brothers and John Sepp of PennTerra Engineering align with the water coalition in supporting a land swap to protect public water supplies and give Toll Brothers a positive entrance to the State College market (which would be great!), only to run into obstructive Penn State executives and trustees who refuse to do the land swap and might even sue Toll Brothers for breach of contract in an attempt to force Toll Brothers to build on the public watershed.

That would be a super-strange outcome to this long, long water and farmland conservation campaign.

Further updates when available.

-Katherine Watt

From Deb Nardone, Executive Director of ClearWater Conservancy:

It’s with great joy and SO much appreciation that I send you this email.  Thanks to generous community support, ClearWater Conservancy has reached our fundraising goal of $2.75 million for the Slab Cabin Run Initiative.

We are finalizing the legal agreement with the Meyer and Everhart families and all 300 acres will be permanently conserved by the end of September.   

Facebook Event

Nittany Valley Water Coalition update about Toll Brothers proposed development on Whitehall Road.

History of the fight, what’s happening with the occupation of the site and the negotiations between PSU and Toll Brothers on a possible land swap.

Please join us. State College Municipal Building, Community Room at 7:30 pm, sponsored by the Moshannon Group of the Sierra Club.

Press Release from NVWC:

Toll Brothers identifies alternative sites for student housing

Nittany Valley Water Coalition (NVWC) held a follow-up meeting with Charles Elliott of Toll Brothers developers on Wednesday, August 16 to discuss Toll Brothers’ recent review of alternative State College sites for student housing.

On August 2, NVWC presented Toll with detailed information about PSU lands suitable for building closer to campus.

NVWC has been leading a community effort to pressure Penn State, the current landowner, and Toll to relocate a planned development on Whitehall Road to a site that does not risk local water safety. The current 44 acre site is located uphill from the Thomas-Harter wells.

Elliott and his team have now ranked several PSU properties with respect to zoning and infrastructure and identified several as viable alternatives if township officials and PSU officials will facilitate a “land swap” and any needed approvals.

The top ranked site is located on West College Avenue in front of the Blue Course golf property. Elliott stated that while further corporate economic and structural viability assessments are needed, the alternative site was attractive for its proximity to campus and downtown amenities.

Concerned citizens have occupied the Whitehall Road site continuously for 75 days and will continue community efforts to stop the Whitehall development.

Incoming PSU students and their families will be informed of the issue with a water and flyer distribution on Saturday.

Meanwhile, a citizen appeal is pending in the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.

For additional information, contact Terry Melton, terrymelton321@gmail.com, 814-883-8154, or visit nittanyvalley-eco.org

Press Release from NVWC

Nittany Valley Water Coalition meets with developer Toll Brothers today, August 16, at State College Borough Building at 1 pm for a follow up discussion on a potential land swap.

Pursuant to the previous August 2 meeting in which NVWC members presented alternative PSU properties for Toll Brothers’ Campus Living to locate their planned luxury student housing, Charles Elliott of Toll returns to State College to discuss these options.

NVWC has been opposing the planned development on Whitehall Road on PSU land for over two years due to the development’s location over the area watershed near the Thomas-Harter wells.

Penn State will make in excess of $13 million on the land sale.

An appeal by local farmers and concerned citizens is pending in the case in Pennsylvania Supreme Court.

Moving in weekend is hard work! We will be providing Nittany Valley Water Coalition water to parents and students moving into the dorms on campus during moving in weekend. We will be letting everyone know about Nittany Valley Water Coalition’s battle to prevent luxury student housing from being built over State College’s watershed. Look out for our bicycles and trailers with water dispensers and, of course, our signs–which will make our bikes stand out!