HARVEYS LAKE — Zoning Officer Maureen Oremus was replaced by engineering firm Barry Isetts & Associates at the council re-organizational meeting Jan. 2.
The motion to give the borough’s zoning, third-party inspection and engineering responsibilities to Barry Isetts & Associates, an engineering and consulting firm with a location in Plains Township, passed the seven-member board with a vote of 3-2 with one abstention.
Council members Daniel F. Blaine, Clarence Hogan and Wayde Post, supported the motion. Council members Ed Kelly and Michell’e Boice voted against it. New council member Republican Chad Flack III, who replaced council member Bill Hilburt, abstained. Council member Thomas F. Kehler was absent.
“Maureen had a lot of support in the community,” Boice said Wednesday. “She earned about $15 an hour and we could control her hours. We can’t control the hours with Barry Isetts.”
The motion was not made specifically to remove Oremus but to create a more efficient way to do the job, Blaine said.
“We wanted to outsource it (zoning, third party inspections and engineering) to a company that is experienced, bonded, insured and has continuing education,” Blaine said. “We discussed this option two years ago and the (council) majority at the time rejected it.”
Barry Isetts & Associates will collect all building and inspection fees, do the work of a zoning officer and, in return, pay Harveys Lake Borough a percentage of the profits, he said.
“In the past couple years, the zoning officer did not collect enough fees to cover her salary,” Blaine said. “By eliminating the zoning office position, we picked up $20,000 into the budget.”
Boice disagrees noting Barry Isetts & Associates fees range from $65 to 70 an hour and the borough cannot control the number of hours the firm works.
The council also voted to promote two part-time police officers, Anthony Kowalczyk and Brian Gasper, to full-time status with a 4-2 vote.
Blaine, Hogan, Post and Flack voted for the promotions. Kelly and Boice voted against the motion.
“I am not against the police,” Boice said. “We had 24-hour coverage with two full-time officers and part-time officers. I don’t think we need the added expense.”
She said council members Kehler and Kelly, who are on the Police Committee, were unaware of a motion to promote two officers.
At the October meeting, the supervisors passed a motion to allow hiring more officers in the future, Blaine said.
“This is the future,” he said, adding part-time officers are always looking for full-time positions and “it is a juggling act” to maintain a part-time law enforcement staff.
The changes in zoning duties and the addition of full-time police officers requires the council to amend the $1.4 million 2018 budget that passed in November.
Blaine believes the changes made at the re-organizational meeting will not increase the current mill rate of .804.
A mill is $1 for every $1,000 in assessed property value.
The budget projected a $9,329 carryover to 2019, but Blaine believes that amount will be adjusted to nearly $29,000 with the removal of the in-house zoning officer.
Another item on the new council’s agenda is to establish a borough building that can provide privacy for residents to talk with the secretary as well as storage space.
The current municipal office is located inside the Harveys Lake Municipal Authority building, Blaine said.
“We don’t own our own borough building,” he said.
Boice said the borough’s office space does not cost residents anything because it is part of the municipal authority, which is owned by Harveys Lake taxpayers.
She believes borough funding can be better used to comply with the state’s stormwater regulation as well as maintaining the health of Pennsylvania’s largest natural lake by volume.
“We carried over from last year almost $400,000,” Blaine said. “The stormwater regulation is a very important issue and we will need to talk about it. It is on the top of the agenda.”
In other news, the council members made the following appointments:
• Clarence Hogan as council president
• Blaine as council vice president
The next Harveys Lake Borough Council meeting is slated for 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 16 in the municipal meeting room.
