Luzerne County government

In the recent election the Luzerne County GOP did well. Dick Hughes will now be a judge and Stefanie Salavantis kept hammering the kids for cash scandal topping Jackie Mo in the District Attorney race showing what a ton of money and a savvy media campaign can do.

The race for the new County Council was the most unpredictable yielding a somewhat surprising result with only 6 Democrats winning seats in a county with a big Dem registration edge. There will be 4 Republicans and an Independent rounding out the newfangled 11 member body. Kingston Mayor and study commission chairman Jim Haggerty told me before he wrote the new charter that he wanted to try to minimize the influence of campaign contributions For the most part each candidate ran a solo effort with a few alliances that at times crossed party lines but didn't work out. My good friend David Yonki said that name recognition would be a key in this race because of the crowded field predicting that Urban the Elder and Urban the Younger would top the poll. It was good to see that the CV quoted a real political expert in addition the Captains Obvious college professors. I would add that the Independent Rick Williams TV spots raised his name recognition contributing to his win. I expect (hope) that party loyalty will be put on the back burner and our new Councilors will do what is best for us all. It will be interesting to see what alliances and deals that will be made in the coming months and years.

Now the hard part.

Members get applicant details

The first job of the new council is to hire an unelected county manager but this story tells us that they can't even agree on the ground rules on applications.

In other news the present Commissioners have decided to spend $1 million to tear down the Hotel Sterling after pissing away $6 million trying to save it. The place was wreck even before the recent flooding.

Another boondogle on the horizon is the Market Street Square property that the county bought from Thom Greco for $5.8 million in 2006. They voted to sink another $2 million into the place to clean it up that will let the county put a senior center and the tourism bureau office in the station. $7 million plus for a senior center and tourist office for this place ? Another property that should be bulldozed and start from scratch. I worked at the Station years ago and it was an eyesore and hazard even then. There was some entertainment value when Greco and the owners of the Woodlands owners the Cornfelds got into a pissing contest that resulted in some expensive cars getting towed all over town.

Greco and Greg Skrepenack should enjoy the show on TV.

Looking to the fall-Luzerne County Judge

I got it wrong last night as 5 (not 4) candidates won both nominations. Barring some unforeseen scandal 5 of our 6 new Judges of the Court of Common Pleas will be:

Fred Pierantoni
Michael Vough
Joe Sklarosky
Lesa Gelb
Jennifer Rogers

I base that prediction on the fact that almost 10,000 people voted the straight party ticket in the 2009 election and the top vote getter in the Judicial election won with just over 38,000. Dick Hughes is again the odd man out topping the ballot on the GOP side but like 2009 he failed to garner the Democratic nomination. Molly Hanlon Mirabito snagged the Dem nomination so it is down to those 2 for the remaining fitting of robes on the 3rd floor. I have been hearing a lot of carping today that Terry Casey and Luzerne County GOP couldn't deliver the vote for the other 3 Republicans ( Haggerty, McMonagle, Saporito) on the ballot. I think that is unfair as judicial races are strange creatures. Let's see how the Republican candidates for county council do before we make judgements on his leadership. But I do think that they miss the organizational skills of Renita.

Another observation is I really don't like cross filing. The fewest voters have just decided an important election. The same goes for school director races. And don't get me started on state wide judicial elections.

Judge of the Court of Common Pleas

William H. Amesbury (Dem/Rep). . 37,125 36%


Tina Polachek Gartley (Dem) . . . . 35,482 35%


Richard Hughes (Rep). . . . . . . 30,154 29%


WITH 188 OF 189 PRECINCTS COUNTED

Exit polls

We voted about 6PM tonight and were voters 373 & 374 out of approximately 1000. Wilkes -Barre School Board candidate was greeting people out front and he was the only School Director hopeful that I voted for. Me and Mrs. G also wrote in David Yonki for Jury Commissioner.

Our side polls are now closed and the result that jumps out is the retention questions.

Peter Paul Olszewski Jr Yes 21 14%-No 136 86%

Tom Burke Yes 83 50%-No 83 50%


Of course this is an unscientific sampling of readers of Gort42 done for our amusement but couple this with what I've been hearing and it looks like PPO-2 is going down and Burke will hold on.

The Controller final has

Walter Griffith (R) 80 54%

Wil Toole (I) 44 30%

Bob Morgan 22 16%

Our next Judge

Dick Hughes (R) 90 49%

Tina Gartley (D) 55 30%

Bill Amesbury (D) 35 21%

Predictions-The Judges

In the retention races I think that Peter Paul Olszewski Jr. is going down. Tom Burke may survive but I doubt it.

Tina Gartley will be the top vote getter for one of the two open seats and Dick Hughes will win the other spot. Bill Amesbury is also a very well qualified candidate but this is the first time in my memory that having both nominations may not help.

Bullet voting

In a previous post I reported that supporters of Judicial candidate Dick Hughes have been urging people to vote for just for him even though you can cast 2 ballots for Common Pleas Judge in Luzerne County. Today I got an email from county GOP chairman Terry Casey asking people to vote for Hughes and skip the other 2.


A MESSAGE FROM CHAIRMAN CASEY

We’re in the final stretch of what has turned into a real horse race for two seats on the Luzerne County bench.
We’re fortunate because clearly the best candidate in the field of three is our very own Richard Hughes, the only Republican in the running.
Dick is running an upbeat, positive, bipartisan campaign.
Not only is Dick battling a lopsided registration edge but he has become victim of the same old dirty Democratic political machine that is fueled by sneaky and dishonest backroom tactics.
In case you haven’t heard, the two Democratic county commissioners decided to push that antiquated, mindless method of voting – straight-party ballot -- by adding some confusing language to the ballot.
They did this in September, a month after deciding in a public meeting that the language was not necessary.
They did not do this at a public meeting as required by law. The two Democratic commissioners approved the language in typical Luzerne County Democratic fashion – a backroom deal without advertising the meeting. Again, an illegal move.
And they didn’t tell anyone about it until they voted on it at a public meeting in October – a month after it was a done deal. By then the absentee ballots were printed and ready to go.
They tried to deceive you and me and all of the voters of Luzerne County and attempted to make an already uneven playing field even more crooked.
This was done at the urging of the attorney of one of the Democratic candidates who has everything to gain by this senseless system called straight-party voting.
They have wielded this political power for too long.
But we have the power now because we’re not going to take it anymore.
We have the power to show Maryanne Petrilla and Greg Skrepenak that we’re smarter than they think we are.
We can tell them we will no longer fall victim to their dirty political tricks.
But there’s only one way we can do this.
We have to cast a bullet vote for Dick Hughes. We have to vote for one and only one candidate for county judge: Republican Richard Hughes.
PLEASE tell your family and friends to vote for ONE and only ONE candidate for Luzerne county judge!!!!
That’s the only way our party will gain traction in Luzerne County.
That’s the only chance we have at getting a Republican on the bench.
That’s the only way the Democratic machine will stop trampling on our rights and our sensibilities ...
If we stand together we can put up a roadblock and stop that Democratic machine that uses unfair tactics to control our county.
We have the power to do that – in a single vote.
A single vote for Richard Hughes for Luzerne County Court of Common Pleas.




Bill O'Boyle in the TL explains the tactic. Bullet voting is a tactic that is employed in races in which there are more candidates than open slots. By not casting the allowable number of votes a voter helps his or her preferred candidate by not adding votes to his or her rivals.

The county GOP is still fuming about instructions being included on the ballot about straight party voting . Executive Director Renita Fennick said “We think the county election board’s decision to add language regarding straight party voting encourages the antiquated, mindless practice of one party voting,” she said. “They took an uneven playing field and made it even more lopsided.”

The usual suspects of political analysis, Tom Baldino, Terry Madonna and Ed Mitchell, had a mixed reaction to the tactic.


I've been bullet voting for years and I think it works. In the Wilkes-Barre Area School Board race the only person I will be voting for is Harry Haas. There are 5 candidates for 4 slots.

Luzerne County Judges

The headline election this year is the election of 2 new Judges for the Court of Common Pleas. After the revelations that the Juvie brothers, Michael Conahan and Mark Ciavarella, have taken public corruption to a level unseen anywhere in history of this country the choice is especially important. Taking a bribe to fix a case seems almost pedestrian (they did that too) but designing a scheme to conspire to build a private juvenile penal colony then railroading children through the court system to ensure the place makes money is beyond corrupt, it is evil. And they had lot's of help.


17 candidates ran in the primary and now we have the choice of 3 very qualified people to fill the 2 open seats. Wilkes-Barre district judge Bill Amesbury won both nominations which in past years would assure his election because his name would appear twice on the old lever machine ballots but with the new touch screens he will only be listed once. Tina Gartley has been running the most energetic campaign and has been all over the place and her online outreach has been impressive, I think John Dawe knows how to work the intertubes. Republican Dick Hughes has solid support from the local GOP and many Democrats and independents that I talk to also like him.

My prediction is that Gartley will be top vote getter with Amesbury and Hughes fighting it out for the second spot. Some Hughes supporters are urging a bullet vote for him. A bullet vote is casting a vote for just one candidate when you are allowed to vote for more than one. In this case you can vote for two.


You can cast a bullet vote in the Gort42 poll on the sidebar.

Walter Griffith for Controller

Luzerne County Republican candidate for Controller Walter Griffith had a gathering last night at the Ramada in Wilkes-Barre with a nice turnout.

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Just about every other county Republican candidate came out to show support for Walter and the rank and file in attendance expressed a unity that I have never heard from our local GOP.

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There was a microphone set up in the front of the room which always acts as a magnet to any politician but thankfully all of them kept their remarks short.

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All quotes are paraphrased.

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Gene Kelleher was the emcee of the event and the first to speak was former State Senator Charlie Lemmond. He wasn't planning to speak but the crowd demanded it.

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He said a conservative is a liberal who has mugged by reality. We keep exchanging one Democratic administration in the Controllers office for another and nothing ever changes. We need somebody to watch store and Walter is the guy to watch the store. This is going to be a retail election.

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Next up was Commissioner Steve Urban. It's no secret that Urban and Griffith have not always seen eye to eye in the past so his ringing endorsement of Walter put all that to rest. He pointed out that the Controller has to keep an eye on a Human Services budget $250 million, a General fund of $120 million plus serve on the Salary Board, Retirement Board and starting in October the Prison Board. That is a lot of responsibility and Walter is up to the job. Urban then blasted the local Democrats saying one party rule has resulted in 15 indictments so far. He claimed not to know the name of his opponent offering that the only name I need to know is Walter. He then made a point about row officers actually showing up for work asking how we can elect a controller who is working at PNC Bank all day then maybe showing up for a few hours.

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Court of Common Pleas nominee Dick Hughes said that before he started campaigning for office the only thing he knew about Walter was what I read in the papers. Since then he become a partner seeking to reform county government.

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Everybody sung Carolee's praises and she said she looks forward to another term in the Courthouse to continue to clean up the mess.

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Wilkes-Barre Area School Board candidate Harry Haas was called on next. We need to take the county back and one party rule doesn't work. He reminded us that the public schools are the foundation of the community and loss of the faith in the system is one of the reasons that people move away from the area.

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Walter finished up and decried the arrogant in your face attitude of elected officials with a sense of entitlement. Make them accountable! He was the good soldier and endorsed the rest of the GOP ticket and thanked everyone for their support.

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A few things that I have learned about Walter over the last few years. He doesn't get caught up in personalities but digs for the facts. He is tenacious. He is incorruptible.

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Walter Griffith is a pain in the ass and that is a good thing.

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The other Controller candidates are Democrat Bob Morgan (no website) and Independent Wilfred Toole.

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(L to R) W-B Area School Board candidate Harry Haas, Prothontary candidate Carolee Medico Olenginski, Walter, Commissioner Steve Urban, Judge candidate Dick Hughes, retired State Senator Charles Lemmond.

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Photo courtesy of Kathy Dobash who regulary posts at NewsTalkPA which is a wholly owned subsidiary of the ever growing GrassrootsPA internet empire. You can aslo find more pictures by Kathy on her Facebook page and Fotolog.

Operation HEART kickoff

"All Democrats are not crooks, but all the crooks are Democrats.”-Luzerne County GOP Chairman Terry Casey

To reinforce that point yesterday we saw the Juvie Bothers, Michael Conahan and Mark Ciavarella, plead not guilty to a 48 count indictment. They previously plead guilty to 2 charges.

Jury Commissioner and Housing Authority Board Chairman Jerry Bonner also entered a plea of not guilty to taking a bribe. To top off a banner day W-B Area School Board President Frank Pizzella was indicted. All of them are elected Democrats.

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Our local elephants have a snappy new slogan to get the point across.

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Operation HEART: Honesty· Ethics· Accountability· Reform· Transparency

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Yesterday, the county Republican Party had a sparsely attended news conference in their shiny new digs in the Mid-town Village in Wilkes-Barre with PA State Supreme Court nominee Joan Orie Melvin as the headliner. Two of the three row officer candidates didn't even bother to show up. You still have to work on this party unity thing folks.

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Chairman Terry Casey started off the festivities reminding us that this is "the valley with a heart." A slogan that has been popular since the Agnes flood in 1972. Again I feel like we are living on Noah's Ark, before the flood-after the flood.

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That will and determination, that essential goodness, is still here. Unfortunately, it has been overshadowed by a corrupt political machine brought on by the perils of a one-party system. It’s the dirty little secret that we’ve all known about for years: cronyism, nepotism, teachers paying for jobs. One set of rules for those in power, another set of rules for the rest of us. So, what do we do to polish that tarnished image and to reclaim our reputation as the Valley With A Heart?

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Nothing short of a heart transplant. And that’s what we plan to do.We are the Republican Party of Luzerne County and I stand here today and pledge that the days of a one-party political system are over.

Zen has the whole speech.

Judge Melvin had this to say:

The most egregious case of judicial corruption and judicial abuse of power in our nation’s history actually occurred here in Pennsylvania, in Luzerne County. The judiciary violated these children. Within 5 minutes of being sworn in, they were escorted out in shackles to these personal profitable lock-ups. This is surreal. It is right out of a Charles Dickens’ novel.

She then recounted how she handled juvenile cases when she was judge in Pittsburgh. Non-violent kids didn't get locked up but were sentenced to community service.

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Dick Hughes was the next to speak and he was for positive change then touted that he has been endorsed by the Luzerne County Police Chiefs.

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The last speaker was Controller candidate Walter Griffith who stole the show. He was going to read his speech but put it aside and spoke from the heart. He endorsed the goals of operation HEART and added that he has been passionate about local government and the spending of your money. He knocked the local Dems sense of entitlement and pledged to "follow the money" whenever something doesn't pass the smell test. He complimented former Controller Steve Flood for his tenacity and said he will be just as tenacious.

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The program ended with Executive Director Renita Fennick singing the praises of Carolee Medico who didn't bother to show up.

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If Carolee were here, we’d have to give her the letter “R.”
If anyone knows reform, it’s Carolee Medico Olenginski.
For those of you who remember, Carolee took the courthouse by storm when she was first elected 12 years ago.
She took some steps that were unheard of – she came to work every day, stayed all day and kept track of her staff’s hours and days off.
She used the term “judicial corruption” long before it became a household word in Luzerne County.
It took courage to stand up for the people – especially when you find yourself standing alone – as Carolee often did. Many wished her well but ran for cover when she confronted corruption.
She was way ahead of the investigators and knew there was trouble under the dome. She was such a threat to corrupt officials that her 2001 opponent spent over $265,000 to unseat her.
We need to get Carolee back in office to finish the job that she started.


Register of Wills Candidate Gina Nevenglosky was also a no show.

A few other faces in the crowd were Commissioner Steve Urban and former State Senator Charlie Lemmond.

GOP Kickoff

From the inbox:

Judge Joan Orie Melvin, Republican candidate for Pennsylvania Supreme Court, will join Luzerne County Republican candidates at 2 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 15, as they unveil the party’s unified campaign.

The press conference will be held at the county GOP’s newly opened permanent headquarters, 41 S. Main St., Suite 14, in downtown Wilkes-Barre.

The Republican candidates will outline their campaign for the remaining seven weeks as they work to bring honesty, ethics, accountability, reform and transparency to the Luzerne County Courthouse.

Republicans on the ballot include Richard Hughes, Court of Common Pleas; Walter L. Griffith Jr., Controller; Carolee Medico Olenginski, Prothonotary; Gina Nevenglosky, Register of Wills/Clerk of the Orphan’s Court; and Frank Semanski, Jury Commissioner. Democrat William Amesbury is the other judicial nominee on the Republican ballot.


The event is open to the public.

This is nifty

Luzerne County candidate for Judge of the Court of the Common Pleas Dick Hughes is hosting a whitewater rafting trip on the Lehigh River on Saturday, September 19, 2009. The details are on Facebook but not on his website. Get on the stick guys. I think this is one of the most creative fundraising ideas I have ever heard of. I'll be watching college football that day so I can't make it but maybe Kayak Dude and the Blogfather will join in. They are fond of water sports.

Now that we are past Labor Day the other local candidates have some events scheduled.

GOP Controller candidate Walter Griffith has a shindig scheduled for Friday, September 18th in Wilkes-Barre. The details are on his website.

Judicial candidate Tina Gartley has a full slate of events including celebrations of grandparents, beer and polka plus she likes college football. She has an events page on her site.

Double nominee for Judge Bill Amesbury has had some get togethers that nobody bothered to tell me about ahead of time.

The Democratic row officer candidates are out there also but they don't have websites so I'm not sure what they are up to.

I usually don't watch the local newscasts (car hits tree, house burns down) but I will start tuning in for the political commercials. I await the ads that say we should retain Judges Peter Paul Olszewski Jr. and Thomas F. Burke Jr. I have never voted to retain a Judge because I'm a political junkie and I want to see another election and I think that retention elections are BS. Many of my friends have urged me to vote Yes on Burke but nobody has defended PPO-2.

Looking to the fall

Luzerne County Judge

I think it's safe to say that Bill Amesbury will be the top vote getter for 1 of the 2 seats up for grabs by virtue of his nomination on both sides of the ballot. So the race is between Republican nominee Dick Hughes and Democrat Tina Gartley. Hughes has rock solid support on the GOP side and has broad appeal throughout the county. Even a trendy lefty like Carl Romanelli backs him. It still will be hard for him to overcome Gartley's advantages such as snagging the Democratic nomination in a county that has almost a 2 to 1 edge in Democratic registration and the feeling that there should be a woman on the Court of Common Pleas. About the only thing that can sink her is if she or a member of her family is tied to the Juvie Brothers.


Register of Wills


Two woman are vieing for this row office in the year of the woman. Dottie Stankovic has always been independent of the the local Democratic Party but the disgust with the local Dems just might make this a close race. The Republican nominee is Gina Nevenglosky

Prothonotary

This is another match up of 2 female candidates. Former GOP Prothonotary Carolee Medico-Olenginski romped to victory in the primary and will probably cruise to an easy win over first time candidate Democrat Nancy Bellas. Carolee back in the Courthouse, this will be fun.

Controller

Long time pain in the ass Walter Griffith won the Repubublican nomination and will face off with Bob Morgan in the fall. I think that Walter has been a "pain" in a good way like Steve Flood was when he was Controller. Let's just hope that he ignores nasty blog posts about him and stays out of the fray.

Wilkes-Barre Area School Director

Christine Katsock was the top vote getter on both sides of the ballot and should finally get elected to something. I haven't checked but people tell me she changed her registration to "D". Either way I'm voting for her. The only incumbent to hold on was Lynn Evans which is not surprising in this enviroment of investigations and indictments. Harry Haas won a spot on the GOP side and it looks like he will competing with former W-B Councilman Phil Latinski.

My view


Vote Repubublican in Luzerne County

Enough is enough. Throw the rascals out.

Amesbury hits a double

Wilkes-Barre Magistrate Bill Amesbury was the top vote getter on the Democratic ballot for Luzerne County Judge and came in 2nd on the GOP side virtually assuring he will be hanging out on the 3rd floor of the Courthouse next January. To the surprise of many (not me)Tina Gartley grabbed the other Democratic nomination. To the surprise of no one Dick Hughes was the top vote getter on the Republican side.

The race was remarkably free of rancor and most of the candidates stayed positive. The only exception was Dan Zola's robocalls and sensational direct mail pieces.


Complete Luzerne County returns are on the county website. Once again Leonard and his staff have done a great job.

Republicans to endorse today

The Luzerne County Republican Party make its endorsements based on the results of a county-wide poll of all committee people. Chairman Terry Casey said.“We want to conduct this endorsement process in an honest, open, fair and transparent way, just as we promise to govern in Luzerne County. Ours is a simple message: we want to restore honesty and integrity to the county courthouse and we’re starting by conducting an honest and open primary in our own party.”

I'm going to make some predictions. First the easy ones. There are only 2 Republicans running for the Court of Common Pleas, Dick Hughes and Michael Pendolphi, so that is a no brainer and Gina Nevenglosky is the only candidate for Register of Wills in the primary.


Carolee Medico Olenginski and Walter Mitchell are in the running for Prothonotary and I think that former Prothonotary Carolee will get the nod.


The hottest race shaping up seems to be for Controller. To get the nod a candidate has had to be a registered Republican since Feb. 16, 2008 so that rules out Edd Brominski. The contenders are Alice Coffman, Walter Griffith, Nanda Palissery and Bob Sypniewski. My reading of the tea leaves tells me that Nanda Palissery will be the anointed one.


You can read the POLIICIES & PROCEDURES FOR ENDORSEMENT if you are interested.


UPDATE: I got them all right.

As predicted Hughes and Pendolphi were backed for a seat on Court of the Common Pleas and Nevenglosky was backed in her uphill battle to be the next Register of Wills.

Former Prothonotary Carolee Medico-O got the nod over President for Life of the breakaway Republic of Bear Creek Village Walter Michell with a vote of 75 to 55. I still think that Carolee will sail through the primary and be returned to the Prothonotary's office in the fall.


The battle for the endorsement for County Controller was closer than I expected with Nanda Palissery edging out Walter Griffith 51-39.

I was stuck by how many Do Not Endorse votes were cast in each race.

Overall only 132 of the 272 Republican Committee people returned a ballot and they still don't have a full compliment in the county. Maybe I should run for Republican Committeeman in my little burgh because we don't have one.