Michelle Bednar for Controller 2017

Incumbent Democratic Luzerne County Controller had a nice gathering of supporters at Bentley's on Friday. It attracted a nice crowd including a few Republicans including District Attorney Stephanie Salavantis. The Democratic Party heavyweights State Reps. Eddie Day Pashinski , Jerry Mullery and State Sen. John Yudichak sang her praises. Her campaign team touted her accomplishments including weeding out incorrect homestead tax breaks wrongly granted to some Luzerne County property owner. Her opponent Walter Griffith  had received the break on two homes and an auto repair business he owns.

Democratic County Council candidates Wendy Cominsky, Matt Vough and John Gadomski  offered their support and Republican Chris Perry showed up. Perry has been to almost every event D or R I've been to. He is running hard.

Other notables were Judge David Lupas who is up for retention and George Brown who should have been the Mayor of W-B. I asked Judge Lupas about mandatory minimums and he gave me a  lawyers answer saying they could act as a deterrent but Judges should be able to fit the punishment to the crime.

                                          


Luzerne County sending bills to recipients of incorrect homestead tax break

Paperwork problem for Tony George

This one has me scratching my head. City Council member Tony George is the Democratic nominee for Mayor of Wilkes-Barre and was previously the police chief of the county seat. He has probably filled out hundreds if not thousands of forms making sure to cross the T's and dot the I's as a police officer as a mistake could screw up a prosecution or wrongfully deprive someone of their liberty. He has also been a candidate for election before and had to file campaign finance reports.

He claims he tried to do the reports himself and screwed it up. TL: “What was I trying to hide? My problem was I kept poor records,” George said Friday. He has brought in professional accounting firm to fix the problem and file an amended report. He also said he he would have help running the city "The mayor has a controller and finance office. I’m not going to run the whole city myself. That’s why they have all the department heads,” George said. OOKAY.

The reports are so screwed up that county election board is referring the matter to the District Attorney . Solicitor Mike Butera said The District Attorney’s Office will be asked to determine if the mistakes were an intentional attempt to deceive the public, which would be criminal. " Not that Stephanie Salavantis  will find time to deal with this before the election.



Bob Caruso, who has been involved in elections for decades, told the board George’s campaign reports are “the most irregular election reports I’ve ever seen.”
Amended reports should be permitted in cases where something must be added — not to redo and replace a significant portion of the information, Caruso said.

 Republican candidate for Mayor Frank Sorick and writer of local bog Wake Up Wilkes-Barre
  was surprisingly restrained.
Sorick accepted George’s explanation. “This was a multitude of honest mistakes,” he said.
Still Sorick said voters should be concerned and ask themselves which candidate is most capable of running the city.
“Voters should look closely at who has the best opportunity to serve the city residents, who has been doing the best job and doing it without asking for a dime in return,” he said.
He contrasted his campaign to George’s saying it’s more of grassroots effort with less focus on raising funds because with school district, county and city taxes people in the don’t have the money give.

This is coming from a guy  who refers  to present Mayor as Tom Lie-A-Ton


 Sources:

Election board calls for criminal probe of W-B nominee's campaign finances

 

George: Campaign finance mistakes expected to be issue in Wilkes-Barre mayor race

 

 

Upcoming events

Tonight is the Wilkes-Barre Township Fall Picnic at the American Legion, 54 Chestnut St, W-B Twp from 6-10PM.

Tomorrow you can catch Joe Valenti of Pittston Politics on Joe Holden's Sunday morning show along with Kristen Cook, Editor of the Wilkes University Newspaper, The Beacon and Sue Henry of WILK. It'll air Sunday morning on WBRE at 11:00AM and WYOU at 11:30.




Blogcon was a big success and the Fearsome Foursome are planning next year's event join them on Wednesday at

Rodano's

53 Public Square, Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania starting at 6PM.

NEPA Blogcon Meetup 2: Electric Boogaloo


It's a meet up! Hang out, have some drinks, network, tweet about stuff, maybe even some hugs!!  pants required. Squirrels with light sabers will be there.

We can discuss NEPA BlogCon 2012, what we liked, disliked, and what we hope to see next year.


Conservative Voter Rally  

Saturday, October 20, 2012  11:30am until 3:30pm

 

 

Genetti Ballrooms Inn & Suites

1341 N Church St, Hazleton, Pennsylvania

 

Special guest speakers include: Lou Barletta (U.S. Congressman), Sam Rohrer (Pres., PA Pastors Network), Tarah Toohil (PA House of Representatives), David Madeira (The David Madeira Show), Bob Zaruta (Pres., Luzerne Co. Young Republicans), and Laureen Cummings (Candidate for U.S. Congress).

Organizations supporting & participating in the event: God in Government, Luzerne County Young Republicans, PA Pastors Network, 94.3FM "The Talker," First District Republicans, Victory Bible Church, The Voice of John (pro-life movie), Citizens Alliance of PA, and Tea Party Patriots.

Tiffany Cloud (Host of Storm Politics on WYLN-TV) will serve as Emcee for the event. Pastor Ron Radtke (Victory Bible Church) will lead the gathering in prayer.

 

Youth in Politics Sunday October 21st 5-8PM

The Luzerne County Young Republicans will be hosting our second annual Youth in Politics event! Youth in Politics is a celebration of the accomplishments of young people in politics. Last year's event was a huge success and we anticipate this year being bigger and better.

This year we will present the Young Republican of the Year Award to District Attorney, Stefanie Salavantis. The award will be presented by last year's winner, State Rep. Tarah Toohil.

We will also be presenting the first annual P.J. Stebbins Award. P.J. Stebbins was one of the founding members of Luzerne County Young Republicans. He passed away earlier this year and the YRs plan to honor him on a yearly basis by presenting an award in his name to a young person who has shown dedication not only in the political arena, but also in his or her community. This year's award will be given to fellow Young Republican, Aaron Kaufer.

 

S

 

 

 

New Luzerne County GOP chairman

In a bit of a surprise Kingston attorney Bill Urbanski was elected as Luzerne County Republican chairman defeating incumbent Terry Casey 79-72 at the party convention Sunday at Genetti's.


Casey was elected in 2008 succeeding Lynette Vilano. and it's fair to say that his record has been more hits than misses. In 2007 the Luzerne County Republicans lost EVERY contested county election. Their only winner that year was Steve Urban because one Republican had to be on the board of commissioners. His first move was hiring Renita Fennick as executive director who was able to deal with the various factions and got people to work together. A year round headquarters was opened in downtown Wilkes-Barre with space donated by a real estate outfit and he got the back mountain money boys to kick in some bucks to pay for it all. It paid off in the 2009 county elections when the Republicans won 2 out 3 of the Row Offices up that year. In 2010 the focus was getting Lou Barletta elected to Congress that was helped by the national wave.

Elections for the county council under the new Home Rule form of government was on the ballot in 2011 and the Republicans snagged 4 of the 11 seats and Stefanie Salavatis knocked off DA JAckie Mo. Not bad for a party that has been on the outside for a long time with a significant deficit in registrations.

 But some Republicans said they should have done better after all the corruption that has seen a slew of Democrats go to jail. Some have complained that the county party didn't help out municipal candidates enough particularly in Wilkes-Barre but that is not the focus of the county party.

The county Republicans haven't been able to fill all of the committee spots and got a big black eye when a race hater wrote himself in for one of them.One of my Republican friends said it was not a priority to recruit county committee members but 6th District honcho James O'Meara said he tried his best to get people to sign up without much success.

Bill Urbanski sounds like a Republican populist if there is such a thing CV: "My vision is simple: do away with unnecessary expenditures and bureaucracies and build a more inclusive county Republican Party," Urbanski said. "Too often committee members and even average voters feel as though they are on the outside looking in, or what may be worse, on the bottom looking up. In my mind, the contributions made by the rank-and-file members of the GOP are just as important as the contributions made by those in positions of power."

It looks like Kingston Mayor Jim Haggerty is the next coming of Marty Murray on the Republican side. He wrote the Home Rule Charter and now this.  "Winning the Republican county election is proof of your grassroots ability," Haggerty said.

Bill's brother posted this picture  :

Update: James O'Meara corrects me in the comments..

Actually, Gort, this year we were successful in the 6th getting new committee members. We have filled 8 of 10 slots in Plains, for example, and I will find people for the other two slots. It was similar throughout the rest of the 6th District. Recruiting those slots is a primary duty of a District Chair, so the empty slots ...and the responsibility to fill them ...are my responsibility.

Kathy Kane out as Luzerne County Dem Chair

The Valley Scanner reports that Wilkes-Barre Controller and former city council member then chair Kathy Kane calls it quits:

In a letter dated April 25, Kathy Kane resigned as chairman of the Luzerne County Democratic Committee effective May 25, 2012.

According to the letter, Kane is stepping down to "run for an office" in June. What office? Your guess is as good as ours. With Kane's recent track record of supporting losing candidates, her supporters will be staying away in droves.

In 2013 the county offices that are up is 5 seats on the county council and Controller. Look out Walter.

 The county Democratic party has had rough time of it the last few years with all the Democratic office holders going to jail. In 2007 under the leadership of Mark Buffalino the Dem's made a clean sweep of the county row offices but in 2009 they lost 2 out of 3 after he left to run for Judge and lost . In 2011 they only won 6 of the 11 Luzerne County Council despite an overwhelming registration edge and Republican Stephanie Salavantis knocked off Jackie Mo in the DA's race.

In this past election Kane presided over a meeting of the county executive committee that turned into a farce when Tim Holden was endorsed for Congress over Matt Cartwright in the 17th CD race.The headline out of the meeting was that Holden  was that the Luzerne  County Democratic Committee unanimously endorsed Tim Holden but that was not was not the case. A parliamentary maneuver changed the result as 2nd District Chair Casey Evans explained. In the primary election Cartwright won Luzerne County by almost 3 to 1.

In the run up to the election there was some controversy when there was a dispute about what event was scheduled first. 120th State Rep Phyllis Mundy (my 3rd favorite) hosted an event for Matt Cartwright in West Pittston on the same night that Kane had a rally for Luzerne County Dem's at the Ramada in Wilkes-Barre. Phyllis assured me that she didn't know about the county committee meet up or she would have had it on another day. 

PoliticsPA had a recap of the 17th CD race and  I would add that Cartwright had a better ground game. In Luzerne County Cartwright had an office in Wilkes-Barre that was buzzing with people working the phones and the Holden "HQ" was an empty store front with some signs in the windows. Before the election I was called by 2 volunteers from Cartwright but only  a robo call for Holden paid for by the AFL-CIO. On election day I got a remember to vote call from the Cartwright camp because they identified me as a supporter. Great job Shane!

Election polls

Very few scientific polls are conducted in local elections for the simple reason that they are expensive and very few campaigns have the money to conduct one. Even if they did the chances are that they don't have people with the expertise who know how to use the results to shape an election strategy.

I know the Wilkes-Barre Mayor's race has been polled (guess what camp did that) and Pittston Politics reports that Jackie Mo had a survey that showed her up big before Salaventis went on the air. In the last Congressional races the local papers paid for polls but they are not about to waste money on a municipal election. Besides, it looks like the Times-Leader can't afford it anyway.

Polling the Judicial races is pointless and trying to survey the races for seats on the new Luzerne County Council is impossible with so many candidates and without a model to build on.

Local bloggers decide to take up the slack .

The LuLac Political Letter

Here are the poll results we took for the General Election in 2011. As we indicated yesterday, the poll was among LuLac readers, it had 178 respondents, to our knowledge they only voted once and is presented as an unscientific sampling of the pulse of LuLac readers who follow politics as well as this blog site.

It's a tradition on Gort42 to put up some polls on the sidebar the week before the election. I'm not going to list multiple candidate races such as County Council and the Judicial contests. Altogether there are 35 candidates.

So we have 2 questions.

Who will win the races for Luzerne County DA and Mayor of Wilkes-Barre?

Vote on the side bar.

Looking to 2012 I have heard reports that the NRCC has polled the 11th CD recently finding that former 10th CD Congressman Chris Carney would top Congressman Lou Barletta by 5 points. I'm trying to get more info on that.

Speaking of local bloggers

Blog of the week
Harold Jenkins from NEPA Blogs talks to us today about "Gort42", the ultimate guide to local politics and local political blogs.

NEPA Blogs Flapdoodle

Luzerne County DA

The hottest race this cycle has unexpectedly been the contest for Luzerne County District Attorney. In the spring incumbent Jackie Musto Carroll looked like a shoe in without a primary opponent and no Republican had circulated nominating petitions. She even mounted a write-in campaign trying to also snag the Republican nomination but Stepahanie Salavantis got into it at the last minute and secured enough write-in votes to become the Republican nominee. Like most political junkies I hate uncontested elections and welcomed her entry, I always like a choice in an election.

To the surprise of most political observers Salavantis is running hard spending some big bucks on radio and TV ads. Her campaign finance reports show that she has received some financial support from individual donors but most of her money has come from her parents. Carroll also got money from her folks but not as much. I didn't find the name of her Uncle Ray in any of the reports.

Stephie Sal has had 3 spots on TV so far trying to tie Jackie Mo to the Juvie Brothers (cash for kids) scandal implying she could have somehow prevented or stopped it. DA Jackie Mo is not on the air yet that I have seen but I'm told that will change shortly. She has hired local legend Ed Mitchell to do her media.

PittstonPolitics.com has been all over this race and even made an ad for Carroll.





Update: Jackie Mo on the Air

Salavantis hits Jackie Mo hard

Republican challenger Stephanie Salavantis is trying to make Luzerne County District Attorney Jackie Musto Carroll a part of the kids for cash scandal that resulted in Judges Conahan and Ciavarella going to jail. She has been running an ad the last few days that says Jackie Mo could have made a 3 minute journey to juvinile court to find out what was going on and thus end it. The spot is not on her YouTube channel even after I asked her to post it. That request was posted on her Facebook page and was deleted within minutes. Her facebook page has been chopped up with everything before September being deleted.

Nice try, but David Lupas was the District Attorney for most of the time when all this was going on. It's ironic that Lupas is now the judge in charge of the Juvunile Court. With Hugo Selenski back in the news I'm reminded how many times Lupas dropped the ball and couldn't get a murder conviction for someone with at least 5 people buried in his back yard.

Musto Carroll faces aggressive challenger

What the hell here is the Majestic ad




Update: The "Three Minutes" spot has been added to Salavantis' YouTube Channel
http://www.youtube.com/user/salavantisforda