Merger still in studyphase

By Tom Fontaine
Herald Staff Writer

The Shenango Valley Intergovernmental Study Committee and residents invited by the committee met Tuesday and concluded that they wished they were further along in the study.

Sharon Mayor Robert T. Price said he wanted to see numbers and projections. “If the numbers come out bad at first, then this won’t even come to a ballot vote,” Price said of a potential merger or consolidation of services in Hermitage, Sharon, Farrell, Sharpsville and Wheatland.

Alan R. Kugler, northwest office director of the Pennsylvania Economy League, said, “We’re here now to discuss the structures, operations, programs and financing of the participating municipalities.”

Kugler added that state laws affecting municipal services and operations would also be reviewed. Richard English, a local real estate appraiser, also was on hand Tuesday to talk about property taxes in Mercer County.

Kugler said such background studies could continue until September or October, when the committee could then begin to look at the earliest merger or consolidation recommendations. Tom Tulip, director of the Economy League’s Mercer County office, said the study would then be close to halfway completed.

The office, which has handled three other consolidation cases but each involving only two communities, is focusing its efforts on “data gathering at this point,” Kugler said. The thoughts of committee members and invitees weren’t so focused and ranged a wide gamut of issues.

Price said that the study was headed in the right direction, but added, “I’d like to see the financial data and to consider those (numbers) first.”

League of Women Voters representative Pat Wooding wanted to ensure that municipal services would improve for the same or lower cost as a result of the merger or consolidation. Sharpsville Councilman Tom Lally suggested that subcommittees be set up within the committee to address the needs of specific services.

Hermitage Commissioner Joe Augustine fielded questions about the city’s status, and financial success, as a home rule community. Home rule municipalities may set rates higher than the limits provided in state law for property taxes and for personal taxes levied on residents. Farrell also is a home rule municipality.

Mercer County Regional Council of Governments Executive Director James A. DeCapua wondered if the five municipalities could unite under one government broken into five districts that maintained different taxing and service levels.

Several people questioned the viability of sharing services without consolidating. And before the meeting started someone jokingly blurted out that the name of a potential merged city should be Wheatland — because five borough residents, more than from any other municipality, were in attendance.

But throughout the two-hour-long meeting, Kugler repeated, “We’re not that far along yet. This has to be a systematic, disciplined approach. We have to proceed one step at a time.” About 20 people were on hand Tuesday.

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SHENANGO VALLEY

Merger still in study phase

Merger still in studyphase