Longtime Pleasant Hills manager remembered for eagerness to help everyone

Deborah Englert was known for her kindness and her love of family.

As the borough manager of Pleasant Hills for 23 years, she attempted to help residents every day in any way she could.

“She would do anything for anybody,” said daughter Aimee Chalus.

Englert, 62, of Jefferson Hills, died of cancer on March 4. She retired as borough manager less than a year prior, in June 2018.

“She was a wonderful, sweet woman,” said Jan McCartan, administrative coordinator in Pleasant Hills. “She was kind. The residents loved her. Her staff adored her.”

Englert had worked at a job at an engineering firm prior to coming to Pleasant Hills. When her family moved to the borough, she took the job as borough secretary/manager, to be closer to home.

“She just really liked it,” Chalus said.

Every day, she dealt with the residents, police, council and everything going on in the borough.

But she never showed her political feelings or affiliations, Chalus said. “She was there for everybody, to help people.”

Borough council members on March 18 passed a resolution honoring Englert.

“Her legacy here in the borough is how she got along with people,” borough solicitor Fred Jug said.

Employees who worked with Englert — even some who have retired — attended the council meeting in her honor.

“In 23 years, the one thing I heard over and over, was there was no complaint from a resident about Deborah A. Englert,” Jug said. In a job where people are calling for help constantly, that’s rare, he said.

When Englert wasn’t at work, she loved to garden and spend time with her five grandchildren. She loved the beach. Her family went to Surfside Beach every year.

In October, when a mass was found in Englert’s body, her family took her on a trip to the beach. It was her last time there.

She spent her days with her family.

“If we weren’t at her home, she was at ours,” Chalus said.

Her family is the true legacy Englert left behind, Jug said. She talked often about them and was proud of them, he said.

“Her children and her grandchildren were the shining stars in her life,” said McCartan.

Borough council also approved a motion to put a plaque in the borough building honoring Englert and to rename the community room at the borough building in her honor.

“Her legacy is not measured by something being built, some change in the office or by anything else. Her legacy, this resolution provides, first and foremost is her family and how proud she was of her family and her grandchildren,” Jug said.

Englert is survived by her children, Aimee Chalus (Randy) and Bryan Englert (Sarah) and her grandchildren: Rachel, Arielle, Reed, Cole and Zack. She also is survived by family in Florida and Texas.