Thursday, May 17, 2012
Parks, roads departments being consolidated; county's legal department being rebuilt
Last fall, residents thronged a hearing held by the previous Montgomery County administration after a preliminary version of the 2012 operating budget proposed the elimination of the county's parks department, among other drastic funding cuts. That Board of Commissioners eventually passed a budget that hiked property taxes by 17.5 percent and kept the Parks and Heritage Services department intact. Thursday morning, Montgomery County Commissioner Josh Shapiro announced that the department had been eliminated, after all. Parks and Heritage will soon cease to exist. The same goes for the Public Property department and the department of Roads and Bridges. In their place will be a single, new department: Infrastructure and Public Assets. "The …
Thursday, April 19, 2012
Plan includes funding for critical repairs to county roads, bridges, Norristown office tower
The Montgomery County Board of Commissioners Thursday approved a $146.5 million capital spending plan that includes repairs to at least 18 bridges and roads around the county as well as extensive repairs to the 1 Montgomery Plaza office tower that now houses the bulk of county's government. View the county's full summary of the $146.5 million spending package in the PDF section attached to this article. The county purchased the building for $26 million in 2006 and is now facing $35 million in repairs, prompting Commissioner Bruce Castor to wonder whether the county might pursue compensation from any parties that were charged with inspecting the building for the county prior to its purchase. "Somebody decided to buy this building without …
40.11532
-75.344159
1 Montgomery Plz, Norristown, PA
/articles/county-approves-plan-for-146-5m-in-capital-repairs
/locations/6843732
Thursday, April 12, 2012
New policies governing bids for county business, employee ethics introduced as new administration marks 100 days in office.
The current Montgomery County Board of Commissioners marked its first 100 days in office Thursday morning with a special meeting that introduced new county ethics and procurement policies intended to increase transparency and eliminate patronage and corruption from county government. Board chairman Josh Shapiro said Thursday marked the beginning of a "new era" for Montgomery County. Reading from a prepared statement, Shapiro said the new procurement policy will "ensure a level playing field and a good value for the taxpayers" while the "totally revamped" ethics policy will "value integrity and not one's political agenda." New procurement policy favors local businesses, punishes misconduct The new procurement policy replaces a policy passed…
40.11532
-75.344159
1 Montgomery Plz, Norristown, PA
/articles/montco-commissioners-herald-new-era
/locations/6789479
Thursday, March 15, 2012
Shapiro is "confident" that the new law, signed yesterday by Gov. Corbett, will be overturned; calls law "wrongheaded"
Montgomery County Commissioner Leslie Richards said Thursday that the county intends to do "whatever is necessary" to comply with the state's new Photo Voter ID law, which was signed into effect by Governor Tom Corbett on Wednesday just hours after the bill passed by a mostly-partisan 104-88 vote in the state's House of Representatives. Richards, speaking in her capacity as chairperson of the county's Board of Elections, said she had "concerns about the constitutionality" of the new law. "I'm particularly concerned about its impact on the elderly, [people with] low income, and people with disabilities," Richards said, adding that the Board of Elections expected "long lines" at polling places and that it would be watching for evidence of "…
Thursday, March 1, 2012
CFO Uri Monson: 'Disingenuous' budgeting process included 'questionable assumptions,' didn't reflect real costs of operating county government
When the previous Montgomery County Board of Commissioners approved the county's 2012 operating budget in December, it included an across-the-board 2.5 percent cut for most county departments. It did not, however, include specific instructions for how those cuts should be achieved. As March begins, that process is ongoing. Uri Monson, the county's chief financial officer, told the current board of commissioners on Thursday that the county's various courts, departments, and offices had so far managed to make $7.72 million in "adjustments" to comply with the budget, but that more changes would be needed to close the remaining gap of $2.24 million. The county distributed copies of Jan. 5 memos sent by Monson to virtually all county offices in…
Thursday, February 16, 2012
County 9-1-1 dispatch earns accreditation; other notes from county commissioners meeting.
Montgomery County will have to reckon with "very, very negative" effects from the "bare bones" budget announced by Governor Tom Corbett last week, according to Montgomery County Commissioner Josh Shapiro. Shapiro cited the Parkhouse in Upper Providence as his chief example of the Corbett budget's impact. The facility for the aging and chronically ill will lose between $800,000 and $1 million of its funding under the Corbett budget. Cutting occupancy at the facility is not a solution, Shapiro said, because doing so would cut the Parkhouse's eligibility for other sources of funding. The county's office of Children and Youth also stands to take a big hit from the Corbett proposal and could lose $170,000 from its budget, Shapiro said. "The …
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
Parks, library move off chopping block, but cuts still likely; 14.5 percent tax hike proposed.
A county budget compromise that includes both a tax hike and some funding cuts seemed increasingly likely Wednesday as the Montgomery County Commissioners continued to back away from a posted preliminary budget that would have gutted county government while eliminating funding for parks, the county library system and other programs. As drafted, the new approach would increase county property taxes to 3.085 mills, up 14.5 percent from the current rate of 2.695 mills. At that rate, the average Montgomery County property tax bill would increase by about $66 per year. The new tax revenue would be complemented by a 5.3 percent cut in general county expenditures and appropriations. Rather than being eliminated, the Parks and Heritage Services …
Thursday, September 29, 2011
Parts from the manufacturer are no longer available for an aging system as potentially 'catastrophic' component failures loom.
The county's emergency radio system is now in a state of emergency. With many of the county's chiefs of police crowding its Norristown meeting chamber, the Montgomery County Board of Commissioners passed a resolution Wednesday declaring that an "actual emergency exists" in the county's aging public safety telecommunications infrastructure. Commissioner Jim Matthews described the measure as a "Band-Aid" that gives the county "the ability to immediately respond to any shortcomings in the system." Those shortcomings are reportedly multiplying. Lower Gwynedd Chief of Police John Scholly called the increasing difficulty of obtaining replacement parts for the system a "major concern." "There are parts of the county radio system that are as old …
40.11532
-75.344159
1 Montgomery Plz, Norristown, PA
/articles/countys-public-safety-radio-system-in-critical-condition
/locations/5501391
John Sailor
12:43 am on Sunday, July 1, 2012
Castor is involved in a quid pro quo with former mobsters that he made a sweetheart deal with years ago, only fining them, and then later when the feds caught the mobsters doing the same thing and hiding money in pipes underground on their property, he now defends them in court. Too bad the other republican was a teaparty person, or would have voted for her instead of withholding my votes. more ›