To The Editor,
I’m going to take a risky political stand here that may alienate and offend a great many readers: I am against potholes.
Until last month, I was not aware that being opposed to potholes was even a controversial political opinion. I assumed that everyone was as anti-pothole as I. Then I watched in disbelief as our current State Representative Warren Kampf voted against the bipartisan Transportation Bill that secured sorely needed funds for pothole repair, road repaving and the development of the Paoli Transportation Center, on the floor of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives last fall. And then voted against it again. And again. And then a fourth time. Even as our other representatives, like Andy Dinniman, were working diligently to secure its passage.
Had Warren succeeded in stopping the bill, those giant, black, car-swallowing pits that showed up in record numbers in our area last winter would have remained on our streets for years and individually we’d be spending thousands of dollars replacing tires, wheels and hubcaps as a consequence.
Given the effort Warren put into overcoming anti-potholers like myself last year, I was surprised to see a letter his campaign sent a few weeks ago, as part of the heated race he’s running against Marian Moskowitz in the 157th district. The letter featured newspaper clippings that read: “Paoli Transit Center gets $36M for work”, “Thank Goodness: Lancaster Repaving Starts Wednesday” and “Major road improvements headed for the suburbs”. Then underneath the clippings, in bright yellow letters, he had written “Thanks, Warren Kampf”.
Since Warren voted 4x against the bill that granted us each of these local victories (as well as the Paoli Transit Center, the repaving of Route 30 and many other vital infrastructure repairs and improvements), I’m not sure why he thinks he should be thanked.
So in case anyone else was as confused as I by the letter, I wanted to reach out today to my fellow anti-potholers, small minority though we may be, to make it absolutely clear that Warren Kampf in fact voted against the Transportation Bill and all the fine anti-pothole work that came with it. He also effectively voted against the development of the Paoli Transportation Center.
President of the Southeastern Pennsylvania Anti-Pothole Society
PaulDrucker
Paoli
Former State Representative, 157th District
Rumor has it that the reason for the Lancaster Pike repaving delay was due to Warren’s not voting for the transportation bill. It took the urging of Andy Dinniman and John Rafferty to get PennDot to pave it and our local state roads.