By Gabbie Burton
Contributing Writer

Kennett Borough council held a voting session meeting on Oct. 9 that included legislative updates from U.S. House Rep. Chrissy Houlahan’s office, approval of the consent agenda and proposed draft of the 2025 budget presentation.

The meeting began with Sue Walker, Rep. Houlahan’s deputy chief of staff, who joined the meeting on Zoom to update the council on legislative initiatives and developments.

“The 117th Congress had a lot of really generational investments that were made to our communities overall, and I believe in Kennett in particular, you’re seeing some of those investments from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act,” Walker said, mentioning PennDOT road and infrastructure improvement.

Walker also commented on updates for local hospitals, including the former Jennersville Hospital and Brandywine Hospital in Coatesville, who are using funds from the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA).

“We’re really at a deficit right now in southern Chester County for those emergency services,” she said. “So hopefully, with both the funding from ARPA to go to what had been the Jennersville Hospital -- which is now owned by Christiana Care -- and what Penn Medicine is doing for the Coatesville property -- what had been the Brandywine Hospital -- we will have those emergency services back in Chester County again.”

Walker stated that moving forward, Houlahan is working for more efficiency in congress, tackling inflation, paid leave, infrastructure and education.

In other borough business, Mayor Matt Fetick gave proclamations to the Mushroom Festival committee, and to the Domestic Violence Center of Chester County to mark Domestic Violence Awareness month.

The board also approved the consent agenda which includes $367,000 for paving projects on sections of Hornblende, Church Alley, Mulberry, Wilson, W. Linden, Rose Alley and Juniper streets.

The agenda also included the 2025 Capital Improvements Plan, waived garage fees for weekends in December to encourage holiday shopping and gave their approval for the New Year’s Midnight in the Square Mushroom Drop.

The board discussed the lease for Kennett Community Grocer potentially moving in the 600 S. Broad Street building at their work session meeting on Oct. 7 and was not approved to be on the consent agenda for the Oct. 9 meeting. Further action for approving the lease failed at the voting session meeting.

The Wednesday Workshop section of the meeting included a presentation from Borough Manager Kyle Coleman for the proposed draft of the 2025 budget. Highlights of the draft included the most recent audit for 2023, making it the 13th consecutive clean audit for the borough, low staff turnover rate, 10.7 percent of the budget going towards capital investment and securing a $1 million dollar grant for the sewer treatment plant. The budget draft was made public on their website at the end of the meeting.

To contact Contributing Writer Gabbie Burton, email [email protected].