Although the Kilbuck Township Supervisors voted last month to pave 260 feet of Semple Avenue, a delay in completing the work allowed the topic once again to become an issue of debate at the supervisors' Nov. 24 meeting.

Kilbuck was offered the chance to piggyback on Avalon's street paving contract and repair the final 260 feet of Semple Avenue that intersects with New Brighton Road. Although the end of the roadway lies in Kilbuck Township, the remainder of Semple is within Avalon Borough. After a former Kilbuck public works supervisor reported that the township never had maintained the end of Semple, questions arose as to whether Avalon or Kilbuck was responsible for the street.

The Kilbuck supervisors voted last month to take advantage of the low unit price for asphalt obtained by Avalon, and spend some $9,000 to repair the portion of the street that is in Kilbuck Township.

Supervisor Susan Merkner said Tuesday that the approval was given contingent upon there being some research conducted to determine if the street really was the responsibility of Kilbuck. That was not done, she said.

Merkner said that she had someone research the deeds for property that abuts the end of Semple. The land, she said, originally was owned by the Kilbuck, Emsworth and Avalon school district, which became the Avonworth School District. In the late 1940s, Merkner said, the land was sold to Avalon for $1.

Solicitor Charles Means said that evidence of who owns the land alongside the road has nothing to do with who owns the road itself. The fact that the street lies within the boundaries of Kilbuck Township and provides a throughway between Avalon's portion of Semple and New Brighton Road indicates that the end of Semple is a public roadway that should be maintained by the township, he said.

Resident Janice Burns presented two maps that she said had been obtained from the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation. The fact that Semple does not appear on Kilbuck's map, she said, indicates that the street had been turned over to Avalon at some point. She called for the resignations of supervisors Russ Hardiman and John Fader, as well as township secretary Harry Dilmore.

Means pointed out that the end of Semple also does not appear on the Avalon map obtained by Burns, "which makes it clear that it's not in Avalon," he said.

Means said that the maps Burns presented were created by PennDOT to show roads for which liquid fuels tax credit is given by the state. A handwritten note on one map said that Kilbuck had never officially adopted the end of Semple as a township street, but the solicitor said that he doubted whoever wrote that note had actually researched Kilbuck's old records to see if that was true.

Dilmore pointed out that the PennDOT map also does not include any alleys, because liquid fuels tax revenue cannot be used to repair or maintain alleys.

A zoning map created in 1946 shows Semple Avenue in Kilbuck, Means said.

Dilmore, who also is employed as the manager of Avalon Borough, said that he had offered Kilbuck the chance to repair the street at a very low price as part of Avalon's contract, just as he had Ben Avon Heights.

"You'd have never gotten it paved that cheap," Dilmore told the supervisors, but expressed regret at the dissension that had resulted.

"I would have never brought this up if I thought it was going to go this far," he said.

Hardiman said that he stood by his assertion last month that without evidence to the contrary, the end of Semple Avenue is Kilbuck's problem.

"It looks like a road, it smells like a road, it is a road," and it's in Kilbuck, he said.

"Not paving it looks like we're going out of our way to avoid our responsibility," Dilmore said.

Dilmore said that Avalon has extended its agreement with the paving contractor until the spring because some work still remains and the asphalt plants have closed for the season. The per-unit price for asphalt included in that contract is expected to hold over the winter, and Kilbuck could have another opportunity to pave the end of Semple Avenue.