Joe Sargent, 1932-2008

Joe Sargent died Wednesday, March 12th, 2008 at his home in Sayre, Pa. He was Sayre’s Emergency Management Coordinator since 1972. I first met Joe in 1998 during meetings of the Council’s Public Safety committee. He was thrilled that finally some one on the Council was taking an interest in emergency management. Together we updated the borough’s emergency plan, and worked together in Valley Project Impact. One of my mental images of Joe is of him and his “flood stick” that he stuck in the wet side of the levee to gauge how fast the river was rising. He was in poor health for the past year or so, but he made it a point to attend the Council’s Emergency Management Committee, which I chair. He will be sorely missed. He was a great guy to work with and a great source of history on public safety and emergency management issues in Sayre. My most heartfelt sympathy and condolences to his wife, Mary, and his family.

His obituary, as reported in the Morning Times:

    John Joseph “Joe” Sargent, 75, of Sayre, loving husband for 53 years of Mary Hoffman Sargent, passed away peacefully at his home on March 12, 2008.

    Joe was born on June 22, 1932, he was the son of the late Harold and Mary Brennan Sargent.

    Joe worked for the Ingersoll Rand in Athens for 37 years. He was very involved in the Sayre Fire Department (Engine Co. #1) and the Valley Ambulance Corps, serving as president and being honored for 50 years of dedicated service in 2005. He served as civil defense director of Sayre and a member of the Emergency Management Association for many years until his death. He was also president of the Sayre Little League and played an integral part in the construction of the new field at Gene Paluzzi Park.

    Joe enjoyed visiting his friends at the ambulance building, stringing lights and flipping burgers at the Valley Fire Works Display at Riverfront Park; and sitting on his front porch.

    In addition to Mary his wife , he survived by: son and daughter-in-law , John and Nancy Sargent of Camden, W. Va.; sons, Robert Sargent of Columbus, Ohio, and David Sargent of Sayre.; daughter, Theresa Sargent of Sayre; grandchildren, Sean, Craig, Syreeta, Daniel, Andrew, Andrea, Arielle, Nicholas and Hailey; and great-grandchildren, Teahe, Trevor, Cheyenne, Aubre and Emma. He is also survived by: brothers, Ray and his wife Sarah, Leo and his wife Marguerite and Bill Sargent; sisters, Ruth Ann Gombash, Rose Mary Dickinson and her husband Robert and Laurena Sargent.
    He was predeceased by his brother, Bernard.

    A gathering of family and friends will be held on Sunday, March 16, 2008 from 5 to 8 p.m. at the Blauvelt Funeral Home, 625 Broad St., Waverly.

    A Mass of Christian Burial will be celebrated on Monday, March 17, 2008 at 9:30 a.m. at St. John’s Catholic Church, South Waverly, with Father Vincent Langan officiating.

    Burial will be held in Tioga Point Cemetery, Athens.

    Memorials in Joe’s memory may be sent to: Guthrie Hospice RR 1, Towanda, PA 18848 or to Greater Valley EMS, 904 N. Lehigh Ave., Sayre, PA 18840.

Mass cards will be available at the funeral home

    Those wishing to do so may send a sympathy message of remembrance to Joe’s family at the Blauvelt Funeral Home’s web site under obituaries.

Energy For PA

And so it begins….

Pennsylvania is rapidly approaching an energy crisis. Rate caps enacted during the mid-1990s as a way to deregulate a supplier market and allow consumers to choose an energy supplier will be expiring within the next two years. The average electricity bill could increase by as much as 50 to 70%.

Energy For PA

WITH SIGNING OF OPEN RECORDS BILL, GOVERNOR RENDELL SHINES BRIGHTEST LIGHT ON STATE GOVERNMENT OPERATIONS, INFORMATION

 

Feb. 14, 2008 WITH SIGNING OF OPEN RECORDS BILL, GOVERNOR RENDELL SHINES BRIGHTEST LIGHT ON STATE GOVERNMENT OPERATIONS, INFORMATION HARRISBURG Governor Edward G. Rendell today made it easier than it has ever been for Pennsylvanians to learn more about how their state government operates and spends tax dollars when he signed Senate Bill 1 into law. The new Right to Know Law, which will affect requests made after Jan. 1, assumes that most government records are public. The law the measure repeals has placed that onus on the people who ask for information.

PAPower: WITH SIGNING OF OPEN RECORDS BILL, GOVERNOR RENDELL SHINES BRIGHTEST LIGHT ON STATE GOVERNMENT OPERATIONS, INFORMATION

Daily and Sunday Review – Pa. open records legislation needs commitment from Pickett and Baker

Keep your fingers crossed that we get a viable and strong Open Records law.

The state Senate has passed an open-records bill that finally would create much greater transparency in the operation of local and state governments. As passed, the bill is strong. With a touch more pro-openness tweaking, it could become exemplary.

 

Key provisions of the bill include a presumption, in most cases, that government records are open to public scrutiny, inclusion of legislative and judicial records, inclusion of state-affiliated universities, creation of an Office of Open Records, and higher fines for public officials who fail to comply with legitimate records requests.

 

The House should adopt those measures and improve on them in a few ways, rather than gutting the bill, as it did in October.

Daily and Sunday Review – Pa. open records legislation needs commitment from Pickett and Baker

 Open Records Act overhaul – In the House…

Open Records Act overhaul – In the House…

From the Morning Call: An overhaul of Pennsylvania’s antiquated open-records law is on ice, awaiting a House vote that could send it on to the governor or prolong the debate for months.Commonwealth’s Open Records Law Heads to the House…again!

Are we getting our moneys worth from Harrisburg.

Self-explanatory.

Borough Statistics.

If you’re interested in various statistics, mostly those from Census data, plus business resources, then check out City-data.com report about Sayre. It translates census table data into charts making the data more accessible.

Two interesting statistics: Sayre’s population increases by almost 46%, or an estimated 2,669 people due to folk commuting to work in Sayre. A troubling statistic is that our population dropped almost 4% (228 people) from the 2000 census (5,813) to 5,585 residents. Ouch!

Commonwealth’s Open Records Law Heads to the House…again!

One of the many blogs/web sites I monitor is the Keystone Politics, a blog dedicated to covering Pennsylvania politics. They recently reported on the latest on the proposed update to Pennsylvania’s “much maligned” Open Records Law.

If you are interested, you can get an RSS feed for Keystone Politics here.

New Year, New Council.

The Council held its reorganization meeting on Monday, January 7th, as required by Commonwealth law. Returning councilors Henry Farley and myself, as well as newcomers Gene Cerutti and Bob Dydynski were sworn in by Mayor Denny Thomas.

Henry Farley was selected to be our president; Tom King will serve as vice president, and Steve Novak will serve as President Pro Temp.

We appointed the Morning Times as our official newspaper and the 1st Citizens Bank as our official depository. We also set up our meeting schedule on a new day and time, the third Thursday at 6 PM. Our first meeting will be January 17th.

President Farley made committee assignments and I will once again chair the Emergency Management Committee. Henry surprised me by including the phrase “Public Safety” in the committee title and appointing all councilors to the meeting. My committee will start meeting in February on the second Wednesdays at 4 PM at the Sayre Borough Hall.

We appear to have a fairly good council, albeit one member is a disappointment – I really wonder why that individual volunteered to serve. Oh well, c’est la council (?) I am looking forward to serving with the new guys, Gene and Bob. It’s been a while since the council had a pair of fresh eyes on the issues before us.

Good luck to them, and to all of us!

December 2007 Council Meeting.

The night’s activities began with a required public hearing for our 2008 Community Development Block Grant application. I didn’t take any notes on it as I usually wait for the formal document. There was discussion of how we could apply the CDBG program to our sewer infrastructure projects.

This was the last meeting for this council. We said good bye to two long serving members, Mrs. Barbara Ault and Mr. John Stetz. I met Barbara shortly after my sister was hired by the Borough in early 1996. Over time, she started suggesting that I should run for a seat on Council, something not even remotely on my horizon. However, she, and several others (probably at her instigation) began working me over to convince me this was a good move. What can I say other than here I am.

Mr. Stetz served in some capacity as a councilman since the earl 1960’s, when he served on Council with his father. He had some interruptions of service, but one can say he has been around for quite a while. He served as our Mayor for two years after the untimely passing of Mayor Repasky.

I wish them both well.

We have a busy agenda. After the usual housekeeping actions (minutes, financial reports, and bills), we again heard from Mr. Carnrike, 310 E. Lockhart St under our “Citizens to be Heard” time.

We first heard from him at the November meeting (which I didn’t report on at the time – there were too many unanswered questions). His issue is his neighbor and a retaining wall in front of his property. He provided photos to Council at that meeting and again at this meeting (which appear to be the same photos). He was angry that he had been working on these issues “for over a year and no one is helping.” An odd statement because, other than the Sayre Borough Police Department, no one heard of Mr. Carnrike before his appearance in November. He’s been busy calling everyone he can think off: Representative Pickett, Senator Madigan, Congressman Carney, the commonwealth’s CDBG coordinator (who asks the ongoing question: why is he calling me?), DEP, the County Commissioners, and so on. Funny thing is, when we talk to each other, we find that he is telling each audience a different story and putting words in our mouths that we never said or promised. Sigh…. The retaining is problematic. We don’t know who owns it. It is part of the bridge structure, but not the current bridge. Mr. Carnrike was informed that until we establish the ownership of the wall, the Borough cannot do anything. Our attorney is looking through County records for the transfer documents that detail the change of ownership from PENNDOT to the County. Until then, we wait and Mr. C. stews…. For a view of the retaining wall, see this picture, this one, and this one

As for the rest of the meeting:

• The 2008 budget was adopted 4-3. I was among the dissenters. This is a very bad, foolish budget with no basis in reality.
  
• The tax ordinance was adopted 4-3, raising our property tax rate from 9.92 to 10.12 mills. Again I was among the dissenters.
  
• Adopted 5-2. an ordinance amending Chapter 117, Parks, defining proof of liability insurance requirements or food vendors.
  
• Adopted 5-2, an ordinance raising the sewer rental fee for 2008 from $71 to $84 a quarter for residential properties. The ordinance also raised the rates for residents who need a grinder pump from $44 to $56, and metered rates (commercial) from $4.05/cubic hundred feet ($5.40/thousand gallons of water) to $4.80 and $6.398, respectively. This ordinance goes into effect on 1/1/08.
  
• Authorized, 7-0, advertisement of an amendment to Chapter 163, Snow Emergencies, redefining when a snow emergency goes into effect and how long it remains in effect. In this amendment, we tie the start of the snow emergency to the National Weather Service declaration of a Winter Storm or Heavy Snow Warning.
  
• By a vote of 7-0, authorized Attorney Foster to file a protest of the recently announced Aqua Pennsylvania water rate increase proposal with the Public Utilities Commission – a council ritual.
• Approved 7-0, a lease agreement with Williams Scotsman Inc., for a temporary office trailer for use as the Public Works office. This action results from serious structural and health (mold) issues in the existing poor excuse for a building.
  
• Authorized 7-0, the council present (me) to sign checks through 12/31/07, the interregnum between this council and the next one.
  
• Accepted 7-0, Mr. Robert Dydynski’s resignation from the Athens/Sayre Joint Code Agency, where he served as Sayre’s resident representative-at-large. Mr. Dydynski will join the next Council.
  
• Approved 7-0, the appointment of Mr. James Cook to replace Mr. Dydynski on the Code Agency.
  
• Approved 7-0, our annual animal sheltering contract with the Bradford County Humane Society for $1,453.25 for 2008.
  
• Authorized 7-0, moving $24,859.57 from the CDBG Economic Development line item and $22,000 from the CDBG Slum & Blight line item to the North East Street Sewer Pump Station Project.
  
• Approved 7-0, the reappointment of Mayor Denny Thomas to the Health Care Facilities Board.
  
• And finally, after a very long executive session, approved the application of Mr. Jon Foster to continue as our solicitor in 2008.

This meeting was my last one as the council president. It was an interesting experience. Maybe I’ll post my observations and experiences, still deciding on that one.

I don’t know who the next president will be; the only viable candidates are myself and my colleague Henry Farley, who coyly suggests he is not interested. Stay tuned for my report of our Reorganization meeting, scheduled for January 7th, 2008.