DAUPHIN COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS
COMMISSIONERS' WORKSHOP MEETING
WEDNESDAY, MAY 24, 2006 10:00 A.M.

MEMBERS PRESENT

Jeff Haste, Chairman
Dominic D. DiFrancesco, II, Vice Chairman
George P. Hartwick, III, Secretary

STAFF PRESENT

Chad Saylor, Chief Clerk/Chief of Staff; Bill Tully, Esq., Solicitor; Marie Rebuck, Controller; Bob Dick, Treasurer; Randy Baratucci, Purchasing Director; Tom Guenther, Information Technology Director; Guy Beneventano, Esq., Assistant Solicitor; Kay Sinner, Personnel; Dave Schreiber, Personnel, George Connor, Economic Development, Dan Robinson, Economic Development Director, Steve Shaver, EMA Director, D'Juna Gaither, EMA; Elke Moyer, Human Services; Stephen Libhart, District Attorney's Office; Scott Burford, Spring Creek Administrator; Faye Fisher, Personnel Director; Bob Hawley, Deputy Court Administrator; Richie Martz, Commissioners' Office; Lena Martinez, Commissioners' Office; Jena Wolgemuth, Commissioners' Office; and Julia E. Nace, Assistant Chief Clerk

GUESTS PRESENT

Harold Jury; Brad Deitrich; John Clough; Mike Pickup; Daniel Bopp; Nichelle Chivis; Karla Hodge; Rose Guyer; Anita Stabile; Elaine Barker

MINUTES

CALL TO ORDER

Mr. Haste, Chairman of the Board, called the meeting to order at 10:00 a.m.

MOMENT OF SILENCE

Everyone observed a moment of silence.

PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE

Everyone stood for the Pledge of Allegiance.

APPROVAL OF MINUTES

Mr. Haste: We have four sets of minutes that we will take up at next week's Legislative Meeting.

RECESS FOR ELECTION BOARD MEETING

A complete set of Election Board Meeting Minutes are on file in the Commissioners' Office.

RECESS FOR TEFRA MEETING

A complete set of the TEFRA Meeting Minutes are on file in the Commissioners' Office.

PUBLIC PARTICIPATION

Mr. Haste: We are now at the point in time for public participation. Is there anyone in the audience that would like to address the Board? (There was none.)

DEPARTMENT DIRECTORS/GUESTS

Mr. Haste: At this time, we have people from Lykens to present a project.

1. Mike Pickup, John Clough, Harold Jury, Brad Dietrich, Lykens Borough Board Members; and Anita Stabille, CET Engineering, Borough Engineer
   1. Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) money for a sewer project.

Mr. Pickup: My name is Mike Pickup. I'm Chairman of the Lykens Borough Water & Sewer Authority.

Ms. Stabile: My name is Anita Stabile. I'm from CET Engineering and the consultant for the Lykens Borough Authority.

Mr. Haste: I've had conversations with Kevin Jury and others on this project. Will you brief the Board on where we are on the project and that you are asking for some of our emergency funds?

Mr. Pickup: Right. We have a situation where some of the septic systems have failed and we need to extend the sewer line to accommodate them. That area is at the point where the water level and the way it sits, you can't put in another septic system. The only way to fix this permanently is to actually hook onto the sewer line. This is a low income area. We have no money to fund the project. All the costs will run about $160,000.

Mr. Hartwick: When you say some of the systems have failed, you mean the current septic system?

Mr. Pickup: Yes, they have failed and those people are on holding tanks. As of now they have a permit which will soon expire.

Mr. Hartwick: How many households would you say that is?

Mr. Pickup: There are six right now.

Mr. Hartwick: And this will allow how many other homes to hook into?

Mr. Pickup: I believe there is a total of eleven. There are some lots that aren't developed yet.

Mr. Hartwick: This would allow for the opportunity for this area to be developed?

Mr. Pickup: Yes.

Mr. Hartwick: So there are six existing homes and eleven total homes would be connected?

Mr. Pickup: Yes, if the lots are developed.

Mr. Hartwick: Are there people interested in developing those lots?

Mr. Pickup: Not to my knowledge.

Mr. DiFrancesco: What is the location?

Mr. Pickup: Lykens, Lawley Road.

Ms. Stabile: In 1987 the Commissioners supported our project to provide an extension to a portion of Lawley Road. This would actually be an extension of that. It is about 850 feet to serve where the last home is.
Mr. Hartwick: You said 80 feet?

Ms. Stabile: 850 feet and it is fairly deep which contributes to the cost.

Mr. Hartwick: This would be doing just the lateral lines?

Ms. Stabile: The lateral to the existing homes.

Mr. Hartwick: So the laterals will be included in this project?

Ms. Stabile: Yes.

Mr. Hartwick: Are the home owners responsible?

Ms. Stabile: It would be the laterals to the end of the Authority's right-of-way and then the homeowners would do the last piece to bring the sewer into their home.

Mr. Hartwick: Can you give me an idea on the type of emergency conditions that are existing with the homes that makes this an emergency situation?

Mr. Pickup: We have two homes where the system has been condemned. They are now on holding tanks which you can only get a permit for that for so long. I believe the first one runs out next year. The second one will run out two years from now. Is that correct?

Member from Authority: That is correct.

Mr. Hartwick: The permit that you receive is from DEP?

Mr. Pickup: Yes.

Mr. Hartwick: Is there a renewal process and public health threat?

Mr. Pickup: There are no renewals to holding tanks.

Mr. Hartwick: So what are the options to the homeowners? Would they have to find an alternative place to live?

Mr. Pickup: They would have to find something else. Actually the land is saturated enough that another sand mound or anything like that could not be put in that area. It is a low lying area.

Mr. Hartwick: But for two homes specifically, this is an emergency situation?

Mr. Pickup: Yes.

Mr. Haste: What would you do if we don't have $160,000? What would you do if we were able to find $25,000? Does that help you at all?

Mr. Pickup: Anything would help.

Mr. Haste: Are you going to be able to move forward?

Mr. Pickup: Yes, we will find a way to move forward.

Mr. Haste: We had a little bit of money and we just gave the Borough $38,000 about two months ago. We just don't have the funds right now.

Mr. Pickup: Anything would help.

Mr. Hartwick: Could I offer a suggestion? With those potential lots being developed, is there any way that you can enter into some agreement for a revenue based borrowing through the IDA with the Sewer Authority that could allow you to fund the remainder of this project and the revenue that you may generate from the development of those lots to be used for the future of repayment?

Mr. Haste: They are probably privately owned lots, aren't they?

Mr. Pickup: Yes, they are.

Mr. Haste: I don't know how you can leverage someone else's land.

Mr. Hartwick: I understand.

Mr. Pickup: I think the biggest problem is that we are under time restraints.

Mr. Hartwick: This is the first time that we get to talk about it. I'm just trying to think about ways to try to address the problem because $25,000 isn't going to take you very far. Do you have a breakdown of the cost as to what your professional costs are as to what the actual work costs would be?

Ms. Stabile: The project has already been designed. They've already paid for that. It went out for bid and we got a bid of $123,000 although that was the Spring of last year. Costs have not really come down much.

Mr. Hartwick: Are there ways to finance the options?

Mr. Haste: There are other things that you could do.

Mr. Pickup: Actually the homeowners are going to have to jump in and help and whatever we can do; but we will get the project done one way or another. We have to.

Mr. Haste: You're going to have some happy homeowners!

Mr. Pickup: I'm trying to make that a bit of interest.

Mr. DiFrancesco: What are your current tap-in fees?

Ms. Stabile: The tap-in fees are $500. Lykens Borough is pretty much built out and these are the last remaining online systems. They've had some new development but it's been a replacement of an existing lateral. There isn't really many potential for more construction.

Mr. DiFrancesco: I was just curious with those remaining lots. What are your sewer rates?

Ms. Stabile: $110 a quarter. The Authority has been doing a CDBG project in Germantown. It was a five year project and they broke it apart. It is really a large project. We just got our Subrecipient Agreement for the last phase to finish that. Some of those pieces, those spaces, came in under the grand amount that we requested so I think there are also some remaining funds and hoping that the last phase doesn't chew up..

Mr. Haste: And request to move those dollars over. What sort of timeframe are you on, especially with those two homes?

Ms. Stabile: I think that the ESCO would have to extend that department. That is the only thing they can do.

Mr. DiFrancesco: I don't think they are going to approve putting it into the river.

Ms. Stabile: They aren't going to approve putting it into the ground.

Mr. DiFrancesco: They don't have much option.

Ms. Stabile: If you are a homeowner you are pumping out at least once a week. They have costs that way.

Mr. Haste: Why don't we talk with Dan to see if we can find the $25,000 at least you would know that you have that to go on and see how the rest of the project goes and see where we go from there? Do you think we could do that?

Mr. Hartwick: And explore creative financing as well. Why don't we take a look at what would be available for them to put together a plan to address it?

Mr. Pickup: Anything would be a big help. Thank you.

Commissioners: Thank you.

Mr. Haste: Steve, would you please come forward?

1. Stephen Libhart, District Attorney's Office
   1. Extension request for the Gun Shot Detection System Grant from Pennsylvania Commission on Crime & Delinquency (PCCD).

Mr. Libhart: I'm here in reference to a grant that we had approved last September for the installation of the Gun Shot Detection System. We would like to extend the project period by six months and in order to do so PCCD requires the approval of the same people that approved the grant. The six month extension will run from six months past July, 31, 2006. It will take us into January of 2007. There is no change of the finances; just an extension of time.

Mr. Haste: Did you see Philadelphia just approved..are you following that at all?

Mr. Libhart: I saw a few things here and there but between guard duty, etc.

Mr. Haste: They had on the ballot a program to install cameras and surveillance throughout the City for this reason. They went beyond detection. It was approved.

Mr. Libhart: I know they did that in Virginia Beach a few years ago and then it was overturned and they had to take them out.

Mr. Haste: Now they're going to put together a Citizen's Panel to actually have the Crime Watch Groups help be involved in placement. There is a whole privacy issue that goes with this.

Mr. Libhart: Apparently Chicago, when they installed this same system opted for this instead of the video. They went with the audio detection as opposed to just installing live microphones and also video because of privacy concerns. They felt legally they were a little more justified in doing this.

Mr. Haste: Maybe that is why Philadelphia had to go the voter route.

Mr. Hartwick: There is a lot of discussion in the City of Harrisburg with the recent gun shots. In the City council meetings it is something that comes up in almost every single meeting.

Mr. Libhart: I'm sure they will be thankful for it once it is installed. We are trying to do it completely right the first time and not half heartedly.

Mr. Haste: Is there a motion to extend the grant by six months?

It was moved by Mr. DiFrancesco to approve a request for the extension for the Gun Shot Detection System Grant from Pennsylvania Commission on Crime & Delinquency (PCCD).

Mr. Hartwick: May I ask one question? Is there any County general fund dollars required?

Mr. Libhart: No.

Mr. Hartwick: I just wanted to get that on the record. I'll second the motion.

Mr. Haste: All those in favor say, aye.

All: Aye.

Mr. Haste: Motion carried.

Mr. Hartwick: This doesn't tie us into anything long term, does it Steve?

Mr. Libhart: Six months.

PERSONNEL

Ms. Sinner: Aging is requesting permission to hire a food service worker I and is in the hiring packet. Children & Youth is hiring three interns into caseworker positions so they are requesting permission to fill three intern vacancies. We do have hires for those positions in the packet as well. They are also requesting permission to fill a caseworker vacancy and a casework manager vacancy. MH/MR has a casework supervisor. The DA's Office has a deputy DA position and a teamster's clerk III and are requesting permission to fill. The Prison has a CO position. Schaffner has a part-time youth program specialist aide and we do have a hire for that. Again the Sheriff has a part-time deputy position vacancy. Domestic Relations has a full-time department clerk I vacancy and they are requesting permission to fill that. There are a couple of other new hires in the packet for positions that have been vacant for a while. The Treasurer's Office is getting ready to fill the part-time temporary accounting assistant vacancy that they created. I don't have a name in there yet because a final decision has not been made and I'll add that next week.

Mr. Hartwick: What was the last comment?

Ms. Sinner: The part-time temporary accounting assistant in the Treasurer's Office, they are going to fill that but they have not made a final selection of the candidate.

Mr. Hartwick: That is why it is blank?

Ms. Sinner: Yes, I will give you the name next week. I was trying to avoid doing an addendum but I do have an addendum. The addendum is some transactions for Juvenile Probation. They had an aftercare supervisor vacancy so they transferred someone into that position which created an intake supervisor position. And they are promoting someone into that position. These transactions are effective May 15, 2006 so if you could vote on it today, it would be appreciated. I didn't know anything about this until just recently.

Mr. DiFrancesco: Which one was that again?

Ms. Sinner: The addendum for Juvenile Probation. Someone left and they needed to get these people into these positions right away.

Mr. Haste: Is there a motion to approve the addendum #3 & #4?

Ms. Sinner: The vacancies opened up for the employees going into those positions.

Mr. Haste: Is there a motion to approve Items #1, 2, 3, & 4 on the personnel addendum?

It was moved by Mr. DiFrancesco and seconded by Mr. Hartwick to approve the personnel addendum items #1, 2, 3 & 4; motion carried.

Mr. Hartwick: I hope we can get them a little sooner in the future.

PURCHASE ORDERS

Mr. Baratucci: You should have received a purchase order packet yesterday. There are a couple of items that I want to note besides the fact that we have a few budget issues as usual that we will need to take care of before next week.

The one item is on page 36. I want to highlight it because it is something that you may want to either address or ask a couple of questions about it. Steve is here from EMA in case you would ask some questions. I did have a discussion with Commissioner DiFrancesco about it prior to the meeting.

Mr. Haste: It is Derry Township's engineers.

Mr. Baratucci: I understand that. It was just an area I wanted to make sure..

Mr. DiFrancesco: Okay.

Mr. Baratucci: The other budget issues will be taken care of. In addition to that I gave you some information on the Central Pennsylvania Energy Consortium. There are no requisitions in this packet but there will be next week due to the time constraints. This is the group that does our bidding each year for our gasoline and our fuel oil. The information that I gave you is the recommendation from them for the bid awards. They want us to do our purchase orders prior to June 1 so that we can be prepared. This is to start July 1. They run July 1 through June 30, a year. Again this is the group that we are involved in with a lot of school districts, boroughs and townships. We do a joint bid. We are one of the founding members of this group. There are six counties that got involved. They do our bidding for us each year. I want to point out that and I know there were some questions about the gasoline. The purchases in the past and the current bid were done on a fluctuating basis. No one was bidding firm prices. The information that you have in front of you has a 15 cent mark-up. The way this works is a organization called OPIS which stands for Oil Price Information Service. Whatever that price is when you order it during the week you add 15 cents onto that price. That is the way the program works. At the bid date, the price would have been $2.38 a gallon. It is for unleaded plus. That of course does not include any taxes. It sounds great at $2.38 and is minus about 40 cents in taxes. It is still a significant savings from the pump price. That was the current price at the bid time. It will be adjusted weekly based on OPIS. We will order as we need to.

Mr. DiFrancesco: We get hammered when it goes up but we benefit when the prices go down?

Mr. Baratucci: Exactly. In fact, since the bid was awarded the price actually has gone down. We haven't ordered anything yet so hopefully by the time July 1 comes around it will be better. I wanted to bring that up because you will see two requisitions next week, one for gas and one for fuel oil. The fuel oil was at a firm price. That is used at Spring Creek and that price was $2.09 for fuel oil. They will be in the packet next week.

The last thing that I have is there are also two BlackBerry requests in the packet. One is for Kacey and that was an all personal cost. The other one is for Kelly in Solid Waste and the situation there is that it is her own personal BlackBerry that she paid for but she is asking that the monthly charge of $42.00 be reimbursed to her through the Solid Waste Fund. I wanted to make sure that you are aware of those. If you would like to vote on those today, that would be great but if not they can wait until next week. Do you have a preference?

Mr. Haste: We don't need to do them now.

Mr. Baratucci: Okay, that is all I have and if you have any questions.

TRAINING PACKET

Mr. Haste: Chad, is there anything that needs approved today on the training packet?

Mr. Saylor: No.

ITEMS FOR DISCUSSION

Mr. Haste: We have items for discussion and I see we need to approve item A today.

1. Memorandum of Understanding with the Townships of Lower Paxton and Susquehanna, Penbrook Borough, City of Harrisburg, and Paxton Creek Watershed and Education Association with respect to the future planning, development, and watershed rehabilitation in Paxton Creek. (***A VOTE IS REQUESTED 5/24/06)

Chad, can you explain that a little?

Mr. Saylor: I think we have a copy of it.

Mr. Haste: This is just to do a joint grant application. Am I reading that right?

Mr. Saylor: Yes.

Mr. Haste: At this point there is no commitment on our part? It is for Lower Paxton, the City of Harrisburg, the County of Dauphin, Paxton Creek Watershed, Penbrook Borough, and Susquehanna Township to jointly apply for a grant to continue the improved work on the Paxton Creek Watershed.

Mr. Tully: The Memorandum of Understanding is actually a condition pursuant to the grant. In other words, they basically say that we are going to cooperate in our planning which is what you probably would do regardless along those lines. It is not really giving up any County prerogative at this point.

Mr. Haste: Is there a motion to approve this Memorandum of Understanding? Bill you have reviewed it and you're okay with it?

Mr. Tully: That is correct.

It was moved by Mr. Hartwick and seconded by Mr. DiFrancesco to approve a Memorandum of Understanding with the Townships of Lower Paxton and Susquehanna, Penbrook Borough, City of Harrisburg, Paxton Creek Watershed and Education Association and the County of Dauphin with respect to the future planning, development and watershed rehabilitation in Paxton Creek; motion carried.

Mr. Haste: Are there any discussions on items B & C?

Mr. Hartwick: No.

1. Change Orders for construction of District Justice Office #12-2-05:
   1. Change Order #2 with Total Heating & Cooling, Inc., Mechanical contract, in an add amt. of $523.00.
   2. Change Order #3 with Total Heating & Cooling, Inc., Mechanical contract, in a deduct amt. of $214.00.
   3. Change Order #4 with Shannon A. Smith, Inc., Electrical contract, in an add amt. of $3,353.98.
2. Upgrade of the surveillance system at the Herbert Schaffner Youth Center.

SOLICITOR'S REPORT

Mr. Tully: I have nothing to add but happy to answer any questions.

REPORT FROM CHIEF CLERK/CHIEF OF STAFF - CHAD SAYLOR

Mr. Saylor: Just a note on item C, you should have a memorandum from Dan Kern regarding that. Do you want a presentation on that? He was unavailable to come in today but we can arrange to have him come in next week. It is the upgrade of the surveillance system at Schaffner.

Mr. Hartwick: I know that we have run into some expenditures there as a result of the spike in juvenile arrests and I know that right now we voted a mechanism in the Abraxas contract to take care of it if they have any savings related to personnel costs under the capital expenses in the project. Is this something on their schedule to do with any internal expenses? That should be something they outlined. I've heard from them that they are going to send to the Commissioners a list of priorities for capital expenditures and what they wanted to reinvest back into their facility. I would like to hear from Dan as it relates whether it is on the priority list, where they are at within the contract with any savings and if in fact they were able to cover it with any internal savings in the contract to take care of this capital need. They are saying they are going to request this from the general fund being a $6,500 initial expenditure. I would suggest that would be a capital expenditure at the facility. I have no problem with the request. I think it makes sense. I want to know if they made any savings so far and if this is a priority for them to pay for.

Mr. Saylor: We'll have him come to the next meeting.

Mr. Haste: Is there anything else, Chad?

Mr. Saylor: No, unless there are questions of me.

COMMISSIONERS' COMMENTS

Mr. Haste: Are there any Commissioners' comments?

Mr. Hartwick: I just want to bring the Board up to speed as far as trying to get some information about a conference call that I was on last week that had some significance to our Children & Youth Needs Based Budget, as well as our Juvenile Probation operation. On May 18th, I participated on a conference call with Secretary Richmond and Budget Secretary Nash on an all county conference call related to a problem with the administration for Children & Family withholding federal reimbursement for a portion of Pennsylvania's Title IV refund. Without reading through the details of the email, what it basically comes down to is that the federal government did an audit of all the states related to them claiming Title IV reimbursement dollars. I think three-quarters of the states that were involved with the audit were found to have some deficiencies including Pennsylvania. The common practice in the past was when deficiencies were found the federal government would give a corrected action plan to the state, they would have to address that corrective action plan but meanwhile there would be no interruption in the payment and the remaining Title IV dollars. It turns out that Pennsylvania now, out of all the states, was not compliant and has been placed in a position to be made an example of and to be made a model state. So in order to make that statement, the Office of Children & Families are withholding Title IV-E dollars from the state of Pennsylvania and beginning to try to develop Pennsylvania as a model state to make sure that any of the compliance issues are addressed and it is addressed right now. I guess they pulled the funding in order to get the attention of Pennsylvania. It was under the thoughts of the people that were participating in the conference call that Pennsylvania was being singled out and targeted for some reason. There is no reason why they shouldn't continue the past practice and why if all the states are not in compliance why have they not pulled the funding from all of the states and why just single out Pennsylvania? So we were asked to become involved at the federal lobbying level to begin from the County's perspective to tell federal representatives, senators and congressmen how important of an issue this is to Pennsylvania and what impact it could have on county budgets. Right now to date there has been $138 million that have not been submitted to the states and so far the states have submitted the payments for Title IV-E reimbursements to the counties. Up until the end of June, there is $165 million that would now be owed to the state by the federal government that the state has reimbursed the counties. That practice, unless the situation is remedied, is probably going to end. Without a supplemental appropriation from the state government the Title IV-E dollars that we are receiving particularly from Juvenile Probation side will stop. There has been an outline of one of three options. #1 the option is if the FCA lifts it's disallowances, returns the funds to PA and follows the normal resolution process everything will obviously wash out. If not, the Commonwealth will ask the Legislators for a supplemental appropriation. If the supplemental appropriation is not granted, the disallowance will then be passed onto the counties which has not been typical of what has happened in the past. We need to make some tough decisions around whether or not those dollars are coming in. To date, we received an email recently that our Title IV-E money just from JPO was right around $1 million. I know we budgeted for additional positions based upon those dollars coming into the County. I know it is going to present some significant challenges if we don't receive reimbursement and additional revenue stream in the budget. Along with that I know Schaffner Youth Detention Center is also going after Title IV-E dollars to pay for a portion of some of the Schaffner Youth Detention Center expenses with the lost of TANF. Now obviously, the Title IV-E reimbursements for Schaffner will be put on hold until this situation is resolved. So the budget impact to counties could be relatively significant unless we have this resolved. I've got all the supporting documentation and I wanted to provide a short summary to the Board as to what I know about that specific problem.

Are there any other comments?

Mr. Haste: Actually it sort of ticks me off. It seems to be a pattern going on. We just went through this with HATS. The MPO, without trying to sound political, but this administration has found a way to screw counties left and right. The MPO, we've got a problem there where the feds have just put Pennsylvania on notice that we're probably getting no more federal transportation dollars because this administration took the highway dollars from the MPO's and used it to help SEPTA bail out their problem and if SEPTA doesn't come up with a plan and an audit that passes the mustard, the feds are withholding federal dollars. So what that means is that our local highway problems are going to continue and aren't going to get funded because of mismanagement. This is just another example of that. Doug Hill should be screaming his head off. Our local MPO is not very happy. We've let it be known. We will probably get through this year's budget but it sounds like what they are trying to do is set up counties for a nasty year next year. It is getting irritating.

Mr. Hartwick: I completely concur with the MPO because I think that has been an issue of money being taken away from here for Philadelphia. I agree with that being a problem. This one I think more is about trying to make an example out of a state that is positioned to try to provide some corrective action and not take that out on the rest of the state. Singling out one state is not the appropriate course of action.

Mr. Haste: The problem is there appears to be a pattern. Whether it is Washington or here or both, it appears Pennsylvania is not doing what we have to do to keep the feds off our back. If it is going to be in these two areas, where else are they going to start taking a look. Apparently, we don't have a very good track record for fulfilling our obligation. If we as a County were doing that and state would start holding dollars from us across the Board we would have something to be concerned about.

Mr. Hartwick: It is not the County's problem. We are doing what we are supposed to be.

Mr. Haste: I know. There is a pattern and it is not healthy for central Pennsylvania. Are there any other comments? (There were none.)

PUBLIC PARTICIPATION

Mr. Haste: We are again at the point in time for public participation. Is there anyone in the audience that would like to address the Board? (There were none.)

ADJOURNMENT

It was moved by Mr. Hartwick and seconded by Mr. DiFrancesco to adjourn the meeting; motion carried.