Laurel: To budget-conscious leaders in municipalities throughout Westmoreland County. Their preliminary budgets for 2002 are coming in, and most municipalities are holding the line on taxes. Particularly for the elderly and others living on fixed incomes, that's a relief.
It takes considerably more attention, and hard work, to contain costs and to budget accordingly than to pass along annual increases to taxpayers. It also can be argued that those who don't watch the bottom line will get their comeuppance, eventually, from disgruntled voters.
Whatever their motivation, local municipal leaders who have been putting in the hours to properly scrutinize next year's budgets deserve some recognition.
Lance: To those officials who have been less-than-studious in their annual budget review. We refer to those who haven't done their homework or haven't investigated cost-saving alternatives to the same old way of doing things.
If you're raising property taxes next year, you better be able to defend your decision.
Laurel: To Richard Hensler, a 16-year veteran of the Norwin School Board. Mr. Hensler chose not to seek re-election this year. Last week he attended his last school board meeting.
His tenure certainly has been an educational experience ("... no one told me about getting sued. Twice," he says). And 16 years adds up to a lot of board meetings.
To Hensler and all other school board members who will be stepping down, your service to the community and the students is appreciated. For newcomers who will take their seats, let the education begin.
Laurel : To Gov. Mark Schweiker. The commonwealth's new governor last week pledged to pursue legislation to strengthen Pennsylvania's not-so-open Open Records Law, one of the weakest in the nation. As such, the Legislature is exempt from the existing law, the shortcomings of which have been exposed frequently by the Tribune-Review
"It just doesn't work in this day and age," Schweiker said last week of the state's feeble law. More than that, governor, it's unacceptable to taxpayers.
Laurel: To Westmoreland County's 911 dispatching center. When tragedy struck on Sept. 11, unfolding in a rapid succession of horrific events, the dispatchers who man the center's phones proved their professionalism. This week the center's response was recognized by the National Emergency Number Association with the presentation of one of five national recognition awards for outstanding service.
One of the calls to the center that morning came from a passenger aboard United Airlines Flight 93 just minutes before the hijacked jetliner slammed into an old strip mine near Shanksville in Somerset County. Under incredibly difficult circumstances, the dispatcher who took the cellular phone call did "exactly the right thing" in accordance with Federal Aviation Administration specifications, says Dan Stevens, a spokesman for Westmoreland County's Department of Public Safety.
The 911 center's performance was a job well done and worthy of national recognition.
