Lawrence Co. panel comes to naught

Chaos, infighting derail analysis of government

By JEANNE STARMACK

VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER

NEW CASTLE, Pa. — This time, it looks like it’s really over for a panel that was meeting to decide if Lawrence County should have a new form of government.

David Kennaday, chairman of the Lawrence County Government Study Commission, called that commission “dead in the water” last week.

The 11-member panel was to choose whether to recommend a new form of government to county voters. That goal was derailed by infighting — some members wanted to discontinue the study, and others were intent on proposing a council-manager form of government with a new charter to replace the three commissioners the county has now.

The commission’s last official meeting was in October. Since then, it has been unable to obtain a quorum. Member John Russo resigned to take a post on New Castle City Council, and members who didn’t want to continue the study did not come to meetings.

The panel attempted a brief revival in April, when it had a meeting with Russo coming back. It obtained a dubious quorum that way, which prompted the resignation of its solicitor, Charles Mansell.

Mansell said last week he advised it would be against the state code to let Russo serve on the panel and the city council at the same time, because both are elected positions.

“I resigned because they were going to act contrary to my opinion,” Mansell said, adding that the members who were trying to save the panel believed the meeting guidelines established in Robert’s Rules of Order overruled state law on the issue.

He said he knew there would be litigation over Russo’s return, and he couldn’t represent the panel “when I told them the same thing.”

When the panel met in April, it passed a budget request of $26,000 to submit to the county commissioners. The commissioners have the request under advisement with their solicitor, said Commissioner Steve Craig.

Because the request was made by a questionable quorum, Craig said, he isn’t sure the commissioners could honor it.

Kennaday told The Vindicator he didn’t know what to do about the funding request, suggesting the commissioners could just ignore it.

Craig said, however, that panel members haven’t communicated with the commissioners about dropping the request. The commissioners, he said, are still considering the request through normal channels.

The study commission was elected in November 2007, was sworn in in January 2008 and was to meet for nine months to decide if it would have a recommendation for the ballot.

The commission’s meetings were often confusing to people from the public and to other government officials.

Even some panel members said at times they were confused. In what may be the biggest example of that confusion, member Dwayne Evans voted in July 2008 along with five others to disband the commission. He later changed his mind, saying he didn’t realize that he was voting to stop the entire study. Rather, he said, he thought he was voting to stop studying the form of government the panel was reviewing at the time.

With Evans’ help, the panel re-voted itself back into existence.

That angered member Richard Audino, who’d made the earlier motion to disband.

He sued the six members who voted to re-establish the panel. He also sought an injunction to stop the meetings, but the Lawrence County Common Pleas Court did not grant one.

The commissioners allocated $12,000 in the panel’s first budget. About two-thirds of it was used to pay Mansell. The panel also paid a recording secretary and bought office supplies, its secretary-treasurer, Joe Cicero, previously told The Vindicator.

The panel got a nine-month extension to keep meeting after it decided to write a new home-rule charter, or constitution, for the county. That extension would have been up in July.

Kennaday acknowledged that even if the panel could continue meeting, it wouldn’t have much time to get its work done.

starmack@vindy.com