Wows & Scowls
Wow: Finally, the Fayette County Housing Authority has completed a reshuffling of its employee deck in a move designed to help it comply with a federal mandate affecting how it runs the operation. Under the asset-based management approach, housing administrators and site supervisors are replacing project/property managers, and the will play a more involved role in making properties viable. The move appears designed to make the authority run more like a private business, although the federal government will still provide substantial subsidy. Scowl: Thus far only two residents have expressed interest in serving on the local tax study commission being formed by Connellsville Area School District. State law mandates the commission and requires school districts to seek people from a wide variety of backgrounds. The group’s work will be to increase the earned income tax or impose a personal income tax in order to lower property taxes. If you end up not liking the eventual outcome, remember that you read this and didn’t offer to serve.
Scowl: Did anyone in Fayette County think the Keystone Opportunity Zone would ever come to this? Touted as a means to induce industrial and commercial investment, the KOZ site in Springhill Township has devolved into a proposed residential housing complex. Anyone building a $300,000 home (the high-end price being quoted by developers) and earning $100,000 in household income per year would get out of paying $8,720 in real estate and income taxes per year. The income taxes they would escape until 2013 would be $3,070 in state income tax and $1,000 per year in local earned income tax. The Fayette County commissioners, faced with a rezoning request on this matter, should keep the KOZ highway robbery to a minimum by denying the request.
Scowl: The Connellsville mayor and two councilmen are claiming that a demolition contract approved with Ritenour and Sons Construction Co. wasn’t binding because it was never approved by the city’s then-solicitor. The wording of the resolution may offer such an “out,” but is this really a sound way to conduct city business? And unless the solicitor found a problem with Ritenour being the lowest responsible bidder, that defense still might not hold up in court.
Wow: Pennsylvania state government is doubling the amount of electricity it purchases from renewable sources, such as hydroelectric and wind power. What’s the advantage to the environment? A reduction in 951 tons of sulfur dioxide, 271 tons of nitrogen oxide and 123,410 tons of carbon dioxide being spewed into the air.
Scowl: The number of U.S.citizens living in poverty has stopped climbing for the first time since 2000, but 46.6 million were without health insurance in 2005, a sixth straight year of increase. And this is in the world’s richest nation.