COMMON PLEAS COURT Voters to decide on judge's retention

Both the county bar and chiefs of police associations have endorsed him.
By HAROLD GWIN
VINDICATOR SHARON BUREAU
MERCER, Pa. -- Mercer County voters will get to decide Nov. 6 if Common Pleas Judge Francis J. Fornelli should serve another 10-year term on the bench.
Judge Fornelli, 60, of Hermitage, is president judge of the three-panel common pleas court and has served as a county judge since January 1982.
He won a retention election in 1991, garnering 80 percent of the vote.
Those who deal with the courts on a regular basis -- police and attorneys -- say they think Fornelli should be kept on the job.
Both the Mercer County Chiefs of Police Association and the Mercer County Bar Association have endorsed his retention.
Common pleas judges are part of the state court system and are paid $116,065 annually. As president judge, a post he has held since October 1991, Judge Fornelli is paid an extra $559 annually to handle administrative duties and supervise 90 court employees.
His backers: State election laws bar judicial candidates from directly asking for political party support but a bipartisan committee is handling that task on Judge Fornelli's behalf.
The Rev. Donald P. Wilson of West Middlesex is serving as Republican co-chairman of the committee and Atty. William Madden of Sharon and Peter Joyce of Sharpsville are Democratic co-chairmen.
Pennsylvania judges are required to retire at age 70 and Judge Fornelli, should he win retention, will turn 70 in August of his final year on the bench.
However, he said a Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruling allows a sitting judge to complete the full year in which he or she turns 70, so he would be able to complete his term.
Should he not win retention, the bench will become vacant in January and the governor will have to appoint a temporary judge to serve until the next municipal election.
Biography: Judge Fornelli is a graduate of Sharpsville High School, the University of Notre Dame and the New York School of Law as well as the National Judicial College & amp; American Academy of Judicial Education.
In addition to his duties on the bench, he is an instructor at the Penn State Shenango campus in Sharon.
He is chairman of the Pennsylvania Corrections Policy Committee and a member of the Judicial Ethics Committee for State Judges and the President Judges Committee of State Trial Judges.