BCT Editorial – 11/15/06

This page was last updated on November 15, 2006.

Changing times; Editorial; Beaver County Times; November 15, 2006.

Below is a detailed critique of the subject editorial.

“Newly elected lawmakers have enough clout to force through much-needed reforms

“For the first time in decades, Pennsylvania has a chance to see major changes made in the way in which the Legislature and state government operate.

“Approximately one-fifth of the General Assembly will be new. If the new members can stick together, if they don’t fall prey to politics as usual in Harrisburg and if they can remember who elected them to office, they have a chance to effectuate major changes.

“It helps that the newcomers won’t be alone, at least in the state House of Representatives. At the end of the last session, a bipartisan group of about 50 lawmakers came together to support significant changes in the way in which the House does business.

“Reps. David Steil, R-Bucks, and Kathy Manderino, D-Philadelphia, are leading the effort. The Associated Press reported they said some of the proposed changes could be accomplished by revising the House rules, such as prohibiting legislative activities between midnight and 8 a.m.

“The group also advocates applying the state’s open-records law to legislative accounts and requiring audits of those accounts.

“If they are joined by enough new members, they will form a critical mass that leadership can’t ignore.

“This brings up another step that must be taken to bring good governance to the Legislature: breaking the enormous amount of power that the leaders of the Democratic and Republican caucuses in both chambers have over the rank-and-file.

“Lawmakers aren’t representatives of the people they are supposed to be representing. Far too many are little more than serfs who do what their leadership tells them to do. As a result, Pennsylvania isn’t a representative democracy. It’s an oligarchy in which a few high-ranking lawmakers and the governor make all the major decision.

“Rank-and-file lawmakers also must end the abuse of so-called walking around money, the legislative grants that they can dole out to constituents to curry favor with them.

“The most egregious example of this is the $1.2 million in grants that soon-to-be-former state Rep. Mike Veon and state Sen. Gerald LaValle gave to the Rochester Area School District and Rochester Township to install artificial turf at the football stadium. Grants should be handed out based on need, not legislative whim.”

[RWC] The editorial was doing OK until this paragraph. There should be no grants, period. Local taxpayers need to pay for local needs/wants and state taxpayers need to pay for state needs/wants. There should be no federal grants to state/local governments and no state grants to local government.

“While we’re on a good-government kick, the commonwealth must do something about gerrymandering, which has turned into an incumbency protection racket that makes it extremely hard for people with new ideas to gain a toehold in Harrisburg.”

[RWC] I’ve mentioned this before, but I wonder how many editorials mentioned gerrymandering when Democrats were the majority in the General Assembly.

“Finally, a number of people inside and outside the General Assembly have been asking Gov. Ed Rendell and legislative leaders to call a special legislative session and a limited constitutional convention to reform state government. The newly elected lawmakers should throw their support behind these proposals.

“That’s a long list, but it’s a reflection of years of legislative inaction. It’s time to get Pennsylvania moving again.”