Officials:

Chris Pielli, Esq., Recorder

Diane O'Dwyer, First Deputy

Erin VanRyn, Second Deputy

Nancy W. Pine, Esq., Solicitor

313 W. Market Street, Suite 3302

P.O. Box 2748

West Chester, PA 19382

Telephone: (610) 344-6330

Fax: (610) 344-6408

Email: RODinfo@chesco.org

Website: www.chesco.org/ recorder

Hours: The office is open Monday through Friday from 8:30am to 4:30pm. Same-day document recording stops at 4:00pm. Same-day plan recording stops at 3:00pm.

Fees: For a full list, click here.

For more FAQs and an archive of past newsletters, please visit www.chesco.org/recorder.

Regarding COVID-19

The County of Chester is currently recommending that all employees and visitors – regardless of vaccination status – wear masks while on County property and while the County is considered in the Substantial or High transmission levels of COVID-19 as defined by the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC). When the County has moved out of those levels, additional or revised guidance will be released.

Effective: August 20, 2021

We hope you enjoyed the previous issue of Good Deeds and are proud to present our final issue of the year. Folks, what can we say about 2021? Honestly, if anyone thought they were leaving Crazy Town on the last train in 2020, I guess we all bought a round-trip ticket, because 2021 has been another doozy. With that said, it is time to reflect and take stock of the amazing staff accomplishments throughout this challenging year.

First, a special shout-out to one of our own, Jane DelPaggio, who has announced her pending retirement in 2022 after twenty (!!) years of service. The Recorder of Deeds will not be the same without Jane. Her knowledge, dedication, professionalism and companionship have helped make this the best ROD office in the state. Anyone who regularly visits our Search Room has had the pleasure of working with Jane. She has set the excellent standard of customer service that we all strive for and she will be sorely missed. Thank you, Jane! It has been both an honor and privilege to have served with you. (Please see more about Jane in the below section of this edition.)

As for the rest of the staff, I can’t say enough good things about their hard work in what proved to be a year that surpassed last year’s record-breaking number of recorded documents. All told, our year-to-date (YTD) 2021 figures are as follows: As of December 21, 2021, the ROD recorded 100,724 total documents. This is an astounding increase from our previous end-of-year record 2020 total of 85,067 documents… and we still have four workdays left to go! Additionally, as of the same date of this year, our office sent approximately $6,514,532 of much-needed revenue, without delay, to our County government as compared to $6,118,789 in total for 2020. Based on total revenue and expenses to date, we are on track to increase the net contribution to the County by 7.8% in 2021 over 2020.

Despite this massive workload, we found ways to innovate and implement various cost-saving measures so that we have revised our Fee Schedule, resulting in across-the-board reduced filing fees compared to 2020 despite the recent UPI fee increase! We continue to promote more efficient outcomes and higher productivity to include the following:

Increased Military Discharge recording for our County Veterans by a whopping 167% from 2020 by initiating extensive outreach events at various county locations in addition to our successful Veterans’ Breakfast event.

Completed at 97% our transition of processing all RTT municipal and school district checks from outdated and expensive snail mail to direct ACH electronic deposits.

What I stated in last year’s final Good Deeds, I must state again: “I could not be more proud of our staff and our department's accomplishments during this difficult year. Our mission to serve has not wavered despite all that 2021 brought to our doorstep. No matter what curve balls that were thrown at us, our staff always found a way to knock it out of the park. I am reminded of the motto I learned while serving in the U.S. Army First Infantry Division – 'No mission too difficult, no sacrifice too great, Duty First.' To my colleagues at the Recorder of Deeds office, I thank you all for reminding me what this means when serving the public during these trying times.”

As always, we thank you for your continued support of our department. It is an honor to serve you, the public, to the best of our ability. We wish you and your families all the best during the upcoming holiday season and look forward to seeing you all in perhaps the beginning of a better, brighter year. In the meantime, Stay Well, Stay Safe and Stay Strong. Please note, you can sign up for future publications here if you have received this in forward.

Chris Pielli, Esq.

Recorder of Deeds