Luzerne County Election Board won’t be holding a special meeting Monday amid appointment controversy

Luzerne County’s Election Board won’t be holding a special meeting on Monday, the day before council council convenes a rare special meeting to potentially remove three board members.

If the election board had decided to meet on Monday night, a county staff attorney wouldn’t attend, county Chief Solicitor Romilda Crocamo said Sunday.

Crocamo said she would not assign a solicitor to be present at any election board meeting until county council determines the status of the board’s current composition, according to an email she sent to the board and council Sunday morning.

Council is set to vote Tuesday on vacating three election board seats held by Republican county Councilman Stephen J. Urban and the two Republicans — Joyce Dombroski-Gebhardt and Keith Gould — who appointed Urban to the board chairman seat in move that shocked many last week.

A solid bipartisan county council majority has expressed agreement Urban’s appointment violates the county home rule charter, which states no election board member shall be or have been an elected county official at the time of appointment or for four years prior.

“My concern as chief solicitor is that appearance by attorneys from the Office of Law at Monday’s meeting will impart an air of legitimacy to the status of the board and the authority of its members to act in an official capacity. It is our unreserved opinion that they do not,” Crocamo wrote.

Questions have been raised about whether the charter can mandate a five-citizen board. But even if state election law supersedes the charter, the state election law itself — Title 25 — says home rule counties have the choice of designating the election board as the county legislative body or an appointed board or commission, according to both the county solicitor’s office and a state handbook about home rule.

Urban had said Friday he wanted to tentatively schedule a Monday night election board meeting to possibly discuss outstanding questions about due process and legal representation related to council’s Tuesday meeting.

However, for the same reasons stated in Crocamo’s email, the county administration did not forward the legal advertisement for newspaper advertisement or create an online meeting link on the county’s website posting the agenda or directions for the public to virtually attend.

Urban sent an email Sunday night announcing Monday’s election board meeting was cancelled.

“It is understood the special meeting wasn’t advertised after some investigating and county administration was the party that dropped the ball on this. We will not be holding the meeting as per the Sunshine Law,” Urban wrote.

As part of a due process requirement, the county sheriff’s office personally served notice of Tuesday’s removal plans at the residences of Urban, Dombroski-Gebhardt and Gould on Friday, the administration said. The communication from the county law office said Urban’s chairmanship violated the charter and offered all three the option to present an advance written statement or oral argument to council during the meeting on why they believe their election board seats should not be declared vacant.

This prompted Urban to send an email Saturday night to Crocamo, council and some election board members with the subject line, “Luzerne County civil action notes.”

Urban said a county council majority did not pass a resolution authorizing the county manager to send the county sheriff to deliver the special notice.

His Saturday email also argues the charter and council-adopted administrative code have no formal rules of civil procedure or removal process to remove public officials on a public board.

County Councilwoman Linda McClosky Houck drafted the proposed resolutions vacating the three seats, saying the home rule charter allows that action when appointed board members have “willfully and knowingly violated sections of the charter.” In the case of the chairmanship seat, she said it must be vacated because the invalid appointment of an elected county official to the board is a charter violation.

Dombroski-Gebhardt and Urban had both said the county could challenge Urban’s appointment in court if there’s a belief it is not permitted.

But McClosky Houck said Sunday that exercising the home rule charter’s provision to vacate the board seats could prevent the county from spending time and taxpayer funds initiating litigation that ultimately involves two county entities.

In his Saturday email, Urban complained the election board members already have been “tried and convicted by the press, other county council members and ‘the court of public opinion.’”

“A neutral court should take up this matter as this is an inter-governmental dispute that shows implicit bias and prejudice,” Urban wrote.

Democratic election board member Audrey Serniak could not be reached for comment Sunday on whether she would have attended an election board meeting Monday. She had strongly objected to Urban’s appointment, saying it deviated from the board’s usual practice of publicly seeking and interviewing citizen applicants for the chairmanship seat and that the change was planned outside a public meeting without her knowledge.

Dombroski-Gebhardt and Gould also had acted against Crocamo’s warnings they were “in error” and “making an incorrect decision.”

The two Republican board members were able to appoint Urban to the fifth seat with only two votes because there was a quorum of three following the recent resignation of Democratic election board member Peter Ouellette.

County Councilman Walter Griffith responded by email Sunday to Crocamo’s decision no solicitors would attend a Monday election board meeting.

Griffith maintained the county law office must provide legal representation because the election board is “still an authorized” board with “three members that were legitimately appointed by county council.” This legal representation is required in the charter because the election board has no ability to hire outside counsel, he said.

The council-appointed board members must still be considered legitimate until a county council majority deems otherwise, he said.

“The ability of this board to conduct a meeting without county legal counsel can place the county in a dangerous position,” Griffith wrote.

Council’s special Tuesday meeting will be held virtually at 5:30 p.m., with attendance instructions posted on its public meetings online link at luzernecounty.org.