Luzerne County Government

County controversies

January 28, 2010

Payments to records firm to continue

Despite officials’ protests, county board that controls special fund will pay LRW Solutions for about six more months.

By Jennifer Learn-Andes jandes@timesleader.com
Luzerne County Reporter
Jennifer Learn-Andes on Facebook   |   @TLJenLearnAndes on Twitter

A Luzerne County committee decided to keep paying a Wayne, Pa., company to organize county records, despite objections from several officials.

The county has paid LRW Solutions Group $973,500 since 2005.

Most of the company’s payments came out of a special record improvement fund built on deed recording fees. About $7,000 remains in the fund.

A committee that oversees the fund voted Wednesday to continue paying the company for an estimated six months to finish work that had already been planned, including moving some records and building two storage cages at the county’s rented storage space in the Thomas C. Thomas building in Wilkes-Barre.

The following committee members voted to continue the work: Clerk of Courts Bob Reilly, acting Sheriff Charles Guarnieri, Commissioner Chairwoman Maryanne Petrilla and Treasurer Deputy Dominick DePolo, who filled in for Treasurer Michael Morreale.

Prothonotary Carolee Medico Olenginski voted no after expressing numerous complaints about the project.

Register of Wills Dottie Stankovic, the final committee member, abstained, saying she was undecided.

Medico Olenginski questioned the logic of investing more money organizing Thomas C. Thomas when county commissioners are reviewing proposals from other property owners who may rent space at a better price. She also questioned the amount of work done for the amount of money paid to date.

She and her deputy, Bob Sypniewski, grilled LRW Solutions representative Eric Coombs.

“Are we running a trial here or are we having a meeting?” said Reilly, who was re-elected chairman of the committee, in part because he was the only member who offered to fill the role.

LRW’s record organization plan is meant to be used no matter what building houses records, Reilly said.

Coombs showed before-and-after pictures of records and released a seven-page summary of work that has been completed to date, including plans on which records must be kept and may be destroyed in various offices.

Petrilla said all three county commissioners had voted in September 2006 to continue the company’s work at the same fee of $1,050 per day plus expenses. A public request for proposals from interested companies had also been advertised before the company was originally hired.

“What we’re here for today is to try to get this project back in order,” Petrilla said.

But minority Commissioner Stephen A. Urban, who was in the audience, said he will make a motion to terminate the contract at the next commissioners meeting. While the committee oversees the records fund, commissioners are the county’s sole contracting agents by law.

Commissioners never signed the 2006 extension contract, and Urban said he believes the company has exceeded its original scope of work.

Controller Walter Griffith has refused to pay a $5,000 bill to LRW because of the unsigned contract, and he said he may still withhold payment if commissioners agree to continue the company’s work unless they negotiate and sign a new contract.

Griffith asked Reilly if any of his family members have benefited from the LRW payments.

Reilly said his son had been paid to help move records at one point.

Coombs said he paid college students $10 per hour, and Reilly’s son was “one of the best workers.” Coombs said he made it clear that Reilly’s son would not receive special treatment. The work was difficult, he said, because the building is 112 degrees in the summer with no ventilation. He said he kept time sheets.

“Nobody was paid anything more than what he’d done,” Coombs said.

John Hyder, the uncle of now-furloughed county prison deputy warden Sam Hyder, was also paid to help organize records until July. Coombs said he needed someone local to oversee the movement and shredding of documents so he did not have to excessively travel back and forth, and Reilly recommended Hyder.

Jennifer Learn-Andes, a Times Leader staff writer, may be reached at 831-7333.

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