Although some people consider the Shenango Valley one community, it is clear that each of the towns in it is far different from the other.

Farrell, Sharon, Hermitage, Sharpsville and Wheatland are not only different in size and population but also have unlike tax structures and set disparate priorities for municipal services.

The Shenango Valley Intergovernmental Study Committee, which has decided not to make any recommendation on merger or consolidation of services in the five towns, was unable to overcome those obstacles to create a model city.

Here are some of the problems committee members faced and ultimately could not resolve:

The government structure subcommittee initially proposed an 11-person council, which was whittled to nine, but a constitutional problem arose over how to elect the council members.

The subcommittee proposed creating five wards made up of the current municipal boundaries of the five towns, and electing one person from each ward. The other four members would be elected at-large.

A ward system requires each ward to include the same number of people, which obviously would not occur when you consider Wheatland's population -- 748 in the 2000 census -- and Sharon's, 16,328.

Subcommittee Chairman James DeCapua, executive director of Mercer County Regional Council of Governments, said he received a legal opinion that a new city would be able to get away with the plan initially, but equal-sized wards would have to be created soon after.

The subcommittee was trying to keep the smallest towns, particularly Wheatland, from losing any voice in the running of the city, while keeping the size of council manageable.

The subcommittee also proposed a council-manager form of government with the manager serving at the pleasure of council and handling executive duties, and council adopting legislation. The president of council, so deemed by the other council members, would serve as mayor, who would preside at council meetings and act as representative of the city.

One of the disadvantages of current state law is that municipalities that want to consolidate can form a home rule charter, but residents who force a vote from a petition drive can only work under the antiquated third-class city code or adopt the home rule charter of one of the municipalities currently in place.

Sharon, Hermitage, Farrell and Sharpsville are entitlement communities and receive annual Community Development Block Grants, and Wheatland has successfully applied for a share of the CDBG allotted to Mercer County for specific projects.

The subcommittee said the five communities receive about $1.9 million a year in CDBGs. The federal Department of Housing and Urban Development said a new city would receive $1,677,000.

While that would appear to be a loss of funding, the new city might also qualify for a couple of funding streams none of the five municipalities currently receives: HOME money for affordable housing improvements and Emergency Shelter Grant funding.

Using other towns of comparable size, the subcommittee estimated the new city could receive somewhere between $441,000 and $574,000 in HOME funds -- the communities have used CDBG funds for housing rehabilitation programs -- and $84,000 to $90,000 in ESG money.

Subcommittee Chairman Dennis Puko, executive director of Mercer County Regional Planning Commission, said he's confident the new city would get HOME money, and less confident ESG funds would be forthcoming. Both programs use federal money.

The fire subcommittee's proposal to keep the current fire service as is -- full-time in Sharon, volunteer in Sharpsville and Wheatland and a combination paid and volunteer in Hermitage and Farrell -- was one of the most contentious issues among committee members.

The committee felt compelled to make its recommendation because of disagreements among the fire departments for combining them, but acknowledged it was likely to lead to the rapid dissolution of the volunteer departments.

Also, no one ever came up with a way to fund the departments. The committee looked into cutting up the new city into fire service districts using the current municipal boundaries, and charging a fire service fee in each district.

Subcommittee Chairman Thomas Lally, a Sharpsville councilman, said the committee received a legal opinion that charging a fee would be illegal. The courts have generally deemed the fee a tax, and it's illegal to charge people within a municipality differing amounts of tax.

DeCapua said Frederick A. Reddig, a state Department of Community and Economic Development official who has overseen the committee for the state, gave the opinion that the fee would be legal. Other committee members said Reddig is not a lawyer and discounted his opinion.

Wheatland citizen committee representative Joann Jofery, who is a lawyer, said she had the subcommittee's legal expert forward her the case law concerning service fees, and she knows of no court case supporting it.

The police subcommittee recommended a force of 85 policemen, although a consultant working with the subcommittee said a force of 69 would be sufficient.

Accounting for unfilled positions, the Sharon, Hermitage, Sharpsville and Southwest Mercer County Regional police departments currently have 76 policemen.

Because the current departments have different wage structures, a merged department would have to come up with a new wage scale, negotiated with the police union. Wages would not fall, but go up to the highest level of the current departments, said finance subcommittee Chairman Robert Jazwinski. The new police department would cost $1 million more than what the five communities are collectively spending now.

Jazwinski, a Hermitage citizen representative, said the subcommittee was hampered by the pledge that no current municipal employees who want to work in the new city would lose their jobs, and the requirement to have to build a budget from the subcommittee reports.

Farrell Mayor William A. Morocco said the pledge to employees was made to get their cooperation in the study and set a friendly ground rule for the study process.

The tax structures from the five towns are so different that it was impossible to prevent the residents of one or more communities from paying more taxes, while residents in others paid less, without underfunding the new city's budget.

By applying Hermitage's tax structure to the new city -- 5-mill real estate tax and 1.75-percent resident earned-income tax -- the new city would take in $2.1 million less in tax revenue than the five towns bring in now. General government expenses would fall by $675,000, but the $1 million increase in police would leave the city with a $2,425,000 deficit.

The committee would have to break its pledge to employees and divert from the recommendations of the subcommittee to make a workable budget, Jazwinski said.

The committee is supposed to meet to approve a final report at 6:30 p.m. Nov. 13 in the Farrell City Building.

You can e-mail Herald Staff Writer Joe Pinchot at:
jpinchot@sharonherald.com