Felicia Lewis was announced as the choice for interim mayor Monday evening at the State College Borough Council meeting.
With the unexpected death of former Mayor Bill Welch, who had served in the position for 15 years and planned to run in the next election, the question of who would fill in for him temporarily was left in the air.
Lewis, however has made many contributions to the State College community. She was on the council in the ’80s and ’90s; she served on the library board of trustees and helped keep the library downtown; she has also been active in the prison society and American Association of University Women, council member Peter Morris said.
Lewis was also given the Legacy Award for a lifetime of service. She will serve as mayor until the end of December, when the newly elected mayor will take over.
“She’s a very nice person. She’s done a lot. It would be hard to mention everything,” Morris said.
In other business, a proposal that has been in the works for many years, the West End Revitalization Plan, was subjected to a public hearing last night. Some goals of the plan are to increase commercial activity and to improve parking and overall visual appearance in the West End.
However, the proposal also calls for the construction of more high-density student housing in the west end, to which the overwhelming majority of local residents voiced opposition.
The main concerns included preserving the natural and historic atmosphere of the neighborhoods, more noise, vandalism, and late night pedestrian and automobile traffic if more students move to the West end.
“People want to live close to work, want to get away from the cars, switch to bicycles and pedestrians. Doing that by allowing multi-story multi apartment buildings isn’t the way to do it,” area resident Eric Bell said.
Bell also said that his neighbor used to call the police every weekend due to noise.
“Reducing densifications is probably the best way of reducing police calls,” he said.
Pernille Boving, another resident, accused the council of catering to students.
“We are the residents. We are the people paying the high taxes. You need to think about us and us only,” she said.
On the other hand, Josh Lenes, a student and a representative from Central PA Community Housing is for the development of “low-cost and high-responsibility housing” for students.
Addressing the residents, Lenes said that the organization shares the same concerns about rowdiness, but also that some students get mischaracterized.
“There are students that don’t really fit your stereotype,” he said.
