Muncy Creek Township now has two supervisors who will be present for the continued conditional use hearings regarding a proposed concentrated animal feeding operation (CAFO) of 350,000 chickens and a solar array farm on Clarkstown Road.

Chairman Eric Newcomer and Gary Phillips, following an executive session regarding legal matters Monday night, returned to the packed township building meeting room and appointed Harley Fry II as temporary or interim supervisor to cover the unexpired term of Dan Whitmoyer, a township supervisor who submitted a resignation letter dated July 10, and whose resignation the board of Newcomer and Phillips accepted.

Fry won the Republican and Democratic parties’ nominations in the May primary. Seth Green, township roadmaster, conducted a write-in campaign, according to officials at the meeting.

A motion was made by Phillips for Green to be appointed supervisor, which Newcomer did not vote on. Likewise, a motion was made by Newcomer for Fry to be appointed, which was not accepted by Phillips, leading to the need for the closed door or executive session and supervisors Newcomer and Phillips returning shortly afterwards to appoint a replacement for Whitmoyer’s term and voting to approve Fry, who was present to accept.

Phillips said he will remain recused on any vote regarding the CAFO — a farm of five barns that will house a combined 350,000 free-range chickens, which means they are able to roam outside of the barns, and produce eggs that would be collected and sold at stores and 12 individual solar array sections on the property on Clarkstown Road between Fogleman Road and Muncy Exchange Road.

The executive session did not occur until a member of the Muncy Area Neighborhood Preservation Coalition implored the supervisors to either have Phillips unrecuse himself or go into the room to discuss whether Fry, Green or another individual could be appointed supervisor to fill the vacancy left by Whitmoyer’s retirement. The group has spent several thousand dollars for legal advice and expert witness testimony in its fight against the Sunnyside Up Farms/Bollinger Solar project and did not want one supervisor to be representing the township in the hearings.

Phillips told the Sun-Gazette he is remaining recused after speaking to legal advisers.

Fry acknowledged that he had not made or been to all of the conditional use hearings for the proposed CAFO/solar array farm. It remains unclear with several legal opinions existing whether that will matter.

Under the law, supervisors had 30 days in which to appoint a supervisor had they not appointed Fry.

If they could not have reached a decision in that time, the matter would have gone to the township vacancy board, which had 15 days in which to reach a decision. Had that vacancy board (supervisors plus one other individual, William Poulton, not been able to decide, the chairman of the vacancy board would have had to petition the Lycoming County Court of Common Pleas for a judge to appoint the interim supervisor.

However, the public consensus in the room was for the supervisors to make a decision on the appointment before putting the township through this clearly more lengthy process as outlined in second class township law.

Newcomer and Fry are available as a board of two supervisors to be at the next conditional use hearing testimony, for the Bollinger Solar portion of the combined venture, which is at 6 p.m. Wednesday (tonight) at the Muncy Area Volunteer Fire Co. on East Penn Street.

A date for the continued CAFO conditional use hearing has not been scheduled, according to the township Solicitor Michael Wiley.