Hazleton Buried in Mayor Barletta’s Mess
The city of Hazleton is currently buried under a $2.9 million mountain of debt, most of which is a direct result of Mayor Lou Barletta. In 2003, Mayor Barletta and the Hazleton City Council began using city pension money to buy insurance and buy back unused vacation and sick days from retiring city employees. The problem with this was that is was illegal, according to State auditors. Now, the city must pay back that money, bringing the city to the verge of bankruptcy.
Barletta’s solution? He wants State Representative Todd Eachus (D) to help pass legislation in Harrisburg that would allow the city to raise it’s earned income tax beyond the current legal limit. With this extra money, Barletta and the city could repay the pension fund and keep the city out of bankruptcy. The only trouble is, the State House of Representatives is less than eager to do any such thing. As a result, Barletta and a bunch of his mindless sheep who understand that Lord Barletta can do no wrong supporters are throwing a hissy fit, basically demanding that Eachus hurry up and pass this damn law so Barletta can avoid the consequences from when he broke those other pesky laws. Makes sense, right?
Right. Barletta’s whole defense for him using the City Pension Fund for purposes that it wasn’t intended for, uses that were illegal, is essentially, “It seemed like a good idea at the time.” And now that the poop is about to hit the fan, Barletta and his like-minded allies are trying to make all of this mess someone else’s responsibility. When I was in the Army, we had a saying that went, “Stupidity on your part doesn’t represent a problem on my part.” Does it suck that the fine people of Hazleton are stuck in this horrible mess? Yes. And it would be nice if the State House of Representatives would help, but if they don’t or they can’t, should we be mad at Harrisburg? No. Because, I remind you, all of this is Lou Barletta’s fault. The people of Hazleton elected him, repeatedly, as their mayor and he screwed them.
This is nothing new for Lou Barletta. He has a long and distinguished history of trying to make his own stupidity look like someone else’s fault. When he was first elected mayor of Hazleton, he thought it would be a good idea to save the city some money by cutting the police force in half. When crime began to rise, Barletta tried to fabricate this whole song and dance about an “illegal immigrant crime wave”. That was proven to be a lie. And now that Barletta has, once again, went and done something stupid that has resulted in the citizens of Hazleton having to suffer the consequences, he would like us all to believe that he’s the good guy and it’s some other bad guy’s fault, in this case Rep. Todd Eachus.
The real scary part of this story is that Lou Barletta is considering running for the United States Congress. Again. He’s lost the last two times he’s tried, but for whatever reason (another example of his inability to make good decisions, perhaps?), he thinks it would be a good idea. He’s probably hoping that he can get elected to higher office and then drop all of these problems that he’s wracked up for Hazleton on someone else’s lap. However, Lou Barletta should NOT be elected to ANY higher office. It will only allow him the ability to make bigger messes.
-Dan Cheek
www.StopLouBarletta.com
StopLouBarletta@gmail.com
July 10th, 2009 at 5:32 pm
Dear All,
I am a critic of Barletta and company. I think his staff are lacking in competence and are cocky and arrogant. They answer phones for a living and present themselves as if someone elected them to office. All that voiced, reducing the amount of money that Hazleton paid into the police pension fund at a time when the financial markets were at an all time high was a very smart thing for Barletta (or anyone else) to do. However, now that the markets are still 40% off the highs, Hazleton would be wise to make a large lump sum payment into the fund. If it does that, Hazleton could eliminate the need to make contributions in the future, providing that the fund achieves a large over funded status.
Claiming that the quoted 2.9 million obligation constitutes debt is incorrect. Its not a debt. Pension funds have a “funded status” and that status changes as the market price of the investments in the fund move. It also changes as actuarial assumptions change. It may be the case that Hazleton’s police pension is in an over funded status. The one thing I have not seen clearly reported is the actual quantitative funded status of the pension fund. So far, I have only heard opinion. I want to see real numbers.