News

January 22

Nanticoke citizens to get their say

A panel studying possible governmental changes sets a public hearing.

By Sherry Long slong@timesleader.com
Staff Writer

NANTICOKE – Members of the city’s Government Study Commission want to know what the public thinks about how the city operates.

The commission will hold a public hearing at 7 p.m. Tuesday to listen to views of what the citizens like and don’t like regarding how the city functions, Commission Chairman Jerry Hudak said.

Since taking oaths of office in June, the seven-member volunteer panel has heard testimony from city employees, current and former council members and city administrators detailing how the city is run.

To help the commission navigate the Home Rule process it hired the Northeastern Pennsylvania Alliance last year as its consultant.

The commission plans to vote on Feb. 8 to decide if it will draft a charter that will later be presented to voters for their approval or disapproval during the November elections, said Jeff Box, Alliance president and chief executive officer.

Hudak said the commission can’t and will not decide on its own whether a charter should be written.

“Right now we need to hear the voice of the citizens of Nanticoke…We (the commission) are not going to create anything. What is going to be created is going to be done by the citizenry of Nanticoke. We will not be dictating anything,” Hudak said.

Before deciding to draft a charter the commission must consider if changing the form of government will be more beneficial, accountable, economical and efficient to citizens, said commission solicitor Jeff J. Malak.

The state will allow communities to generate revenue with particular tax programs if the community is in distressed status, he said. Yet once that status is removed the community doesn’t have the ability to continue the earned income tax at the same level as under Act 47.

“Nanticoke is quickly coming to a crossroads and a crisis…If you don’t have a plan or a means of securing these revenues then you could fall right back into the same troubles that you had originally when it all started,” Hudak said.

He called the Third Class City code that governs the city “archaic,” saying it had not been updated since the 1950s. Any revisions to the code must be made by state lawmakers in Harrisburg.

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