CLEARFIELD – The Clearfield-Lawrence Joint Consolidation Committee reviewed the final section of the draft home rule charter last night and revisited a couple previous pages for final discussions.
The meeting began with Bill Lawhead, committee member and township supervisor, noting how similar the situations of both the borough and township are in regards to demographics, tax base, debt, etc.
Things are a little tighter for the township financially; however, both are facing a need to do more with less in regards to services to the community, he said.
The committee began with Article VII of the draft charter, which pertains to codes and the committee determines for all sections of the article that the new city council would have 12 months after the effective date of the charter to adopt codes by ordinance.
Codes include administrative, purchasing and personnel, and spell out how each area will be handled by the city council. Codes are done by ordinance and can be changed later if needed.
The next section, Article VII, was eliminated. It dealt with initiatives and referendums from the community, which the committee felt was unnecessary. It will be replaced with a section dealing with procedures during emergency situations, and all parts of the charter pertaining to emergencies will fall under that article.
Article IX is concerned with the transition process. One item of importance is in regard to the separate ordinances of the two municipalities.
When the charter takes effect, the original ordinances will still apply until the new council is able to revise the ordinances. The council will have 18 months to do so and will likely hire a firm to do the work and present the ordinances to council.
The city will also have four years to adopt a new zoning ordinance. Until then, the zoning for borough and township will continue to be used.
The transitional planning committee, which is the joint committee now, will help the new council at first and will terminate six months after the effective date of the charter.
The final article, Article X, concerns general provisions, including the effective date, definitions, intergovernmental cooperation, pensions, amendments and severability. It was noted pensions will continue to be governed by state law. And the charter cannot be substantially changed for five years, though minor changes are possible.
The committee reviewed several items in the charter, which had not been decided earlier.
Compensation for council members and the mayor was discussed. The committee agreed on $200 per month for council members and $250 per month for the mayor and council president, contingent on all attending at least one voting meeting per month. Currently the borough council members are paid $75 and the mayor $100 while the township supervisors are paid $50 per public meeting.
The committee also removed a section on employment of former council members and mayors and also agreed on either the mayor or council president being able to sign certain documents, such as subpoenas.
When review of the draft charter finished, the committee then discussed the responsibilities of the state Department of Transportation.
Members of the Pennsylvania Economic League, which is guiding the committee through the consolidation process, spoke with PennDOT representatives.
PennDOT does not recognize home rule municipalities due to a law from 1945, which has never been updated.
PennDOT suggested the new municipality include language in the charter so that PennDOT may consider it a second class township, even though it will be a home rule municipality and will call itself the City of Clearfield.
This may result in more help from PennDOT than anticipated, but the committee will have a meeting with representatives at a later date.
The committee meetings will return to a start time of 3:30 p.m. on Aug. 23. There will not be a July meeting. All committee meetings are open to the public and allow for public comment.