When Michelle Kichline is sworn in Tuesday afternoon as the County’s newest commissioner, replacing congress-bound Ryan Costello, Chester County’s leaders, developers, educators, lawyers and residents will have a commissioner with a long resume of consensus building, community leadership and strategic thinking.

A lawyer by profession, Kichline spent most of her 20-year legal career working with municipalities and school districts doing special education, labor, and zoning work.

In her home township of Tredyffrin on the eastern end of the county, Ms. Kichline served on the township zoning board for 6 years where she became the board’s first female chairperson.

A term on the Tredyffrin’s Board of Supervisors followed her time on the zoning board.  Like on the Zoning board, Kichline was appointed chairperson of the seven-member board by her fellow board members, a post she held for two year.

While on the board of supervisors, Kichline joined with her fellow board members to form a township business development advisory committee.  The committee brought together township-based corporate stakeholders like Vanguard and Liberty Property with prominent members of the community to look at how the Tredyffrin marketed itself as well as complex transportation issues.

Ms. Kichline served on the Paoli Task Force for 5 years where she participated in discussions with SEPTA, Amtrak and PennDOT to find the optimal configuration for Paoli Transit Center perennially congested streets and parking lots.

Kichline served on the Transportation Management Association of Chester County’s (TMACC) board for a year and as the county’s representative on the Delaware River Port Authority’s board of directors, leading that quasi-government agency’s strategic planning initiative.

As a current member of the Chester County Planning Commission, Kichline participated in the creation of Patriot’s Paths, an initiative that links county historical sites in Malvern, Wayne and Valley Forge to the Chester County Trail system.

As commissioner Kichline would like to leverage contacts and experience bringing disparate stakeholders together to find, develop and implement creative solutions to long-term, systemic Chester County challenges including economic development in Coatesville and southern and western Chester County.

Ms. Kichline is passionate about the county’s agricultural base and believes the county needs to be vigilant in its efforts to both protect and grow that “business.”

Finally, Kichline would like to see the County’s trail system expanded and extended.  She saw the positive impact the Chester County Trail had on Tredyffrin including attracting young people to the township’s tech firms and providing a safe avenue to bike to and from work, and looks forward to extending those same benefits to Chester County residents living along the Route 1 corridor and elsewhere.

Ms. Kichline  is a second generation American and a native of Chester County.  Her parents migrated to the United States after the Hungarian Revolutionary of 1956 and settled in Chester County because of the county’s proximity to Philadelphia, wide-open spaces and great schools.

The new commissioner is a graduate of Conestoga High School, did her undergraduate work at the University of Pennsylvania and completed her law degree at Temple University.