2008 News

January 16, 2008

Commissioners Unanimously Approve Resolutions for 14 Departments
Chairman James F. Cawley, Esq. Presides Over First Public Agenda Meeting of Reorganized Board

A new era of public business for the Board of Bucks County Commissioners dawned today inside the Doylestown courthouse community room, as Commissioners James F. Cawley, Esq., chairman, Charles H. Martin, vice-chairman and Diane M. Ellis-Marseglia, LCSW unanimously approved resolutions for 14 county departments.

Included in the agenda were the county’s annual allocation for the Agricultural Land Preservation program’s state match funds (which increased from last year’s $2 million to $2.2 million, a 10-percent increase in commitment), a grant application to the Pennsylvania Dept. of Community and Economic Development for $150,000 revenue to support continued operations at the Lower Bucks Red Cross Homeless Shelter, and several contracts with the Pennsylvania Dept. of Transportation for engineering, construction and maintenance programs.

“This is the annual allocation through the state Bureau of Farmland Preservation to secure state matching funds,” county Director of Agricultural Preservation Rich Harvey told the commissioners. “These are on a one-to-one basis so, for every dollar that you allocate, we get a dollar back from the state. We also work with a lot of the municipalities to help us out in our preservation efforts.”

Last October, the county Agricultural Land Preservation program surpassed the 10,000-acre milestone, a stated goal of the farm preservation initiative dating back to 1990. During last November’s General Election, voters overwhelmingly approved an $87 million, 10-year open-space referendum, which allocates $25 million for Agricultural Land Preservation over the next decade.

During discussion of the Lower Bucks Red Cross Homeless Shelter grant application, Commissioners Cawley and Marseglia offered various proposals to address recent state funding cuts to the only homeless shelter in Bucks County. “We have tried to appeal that decision,” noted Director of Community & Business Development Vitor Vicente.

“At our last meeting in December, this board approved an immediate infusion of $7,500 to help the Red Cross, particularly over the holidays,” Commissioner Cawley said. “I also had an opportunity to be at the United Way last Friday. They issued a challenge grant to the community for $25,000 that they would match dollar for dollar. There is another group that has issued a $10,000 challenge. If successful there, that gets us to – quick math tells us - $77,500 right there. I think the community seems to be stepping up.”

“I have a couple suggestions for the board, one of which is to reach out to some of the lower-end townships, to see if they would be willing to make a contribution,” Marseglia said. “I know when this happened a few years ago, they did that. I did also try to reach out to Reps. Melio, Galloway and King. Their offices suggested that we send a letter to Dwight Evans from the Appropriation Committee as well as to Gov. Rendell.”

The commissioners also approved a pair of Corrections contracts, one of which will provide cameras and software to inventory what items a prisoner possesses when he/she arrives at the county’s facilities.

“It’s a jail management system,” explained Director of Corrections Harris Gubernick. “This will really protect us when someone says they had a Rolex, but it was really a Timex.” The other contract was an upgrade to the state’s Digital Photo Imaging Network Records Management system.

During his bi-weekly report, Chief Operating Officer David M. Sanko addressed potential state budget cutbacks that may have significant implications for county operations in the human services and other sectors. “Last night, the governor made some announcements to legislative leaders, talking about his observations on the upcoming budget season. Very specifically, he said that spending increases were going to be very modest, he was going to be calling for a $100 million cut in general government operations, and a slowing economy is going to change the way in which the state will be allocating money. That will have some level of impact on our budget. We offer a calendar year budget, the state is on a fiscal year, so come July we will likely see some adjustments, and not the adjustments we have been anticipating in recent years. The good news is that the governor has given early warning, so we can get notification out to our departments, and particularly to human services. Human Services is 50 percent of our budget.”

Sanko also detailed a pair of Department of Corrections-related items, including the Jan. 15 notification that the county Men’s Community Corrections Center and Women’s Community Corrections Center again have received accreditation from the American Correctional Association. Furthermore, during 2007, Corrections inmates repaid three-quarters of a million dollars through the work release programs, money that was used for board, restitution and victim compensation.

For a complete audio account of today’s meeting, go to the 2008 meeting page and click on the link.