Baretta did much better on Lesante’s other show, The Inside Scoop, but he still did not disclose enough information. The entire Luzerne County area needs to move to a culture of full disclosure of all government dollars and all government books. The financial details of the Pension fund status and the city’s financial status should be posted on the web. The requirements should go as far as requiring that employees post receipts from all transactions that warrant reimbursement from government spending. Likewise, details of all operating transactions and costs should be published. This will allow all of us to see how expensive it is to have a local government and local services. Then we can call for the ones we don’t benefit from to be disbanded.

Sincerely,

Sean M. Donahue

I was disappointed with Barletta’s interview with Lesante. He didn’t really say anything meaningful. He was just campaigning. I wanted to hear a thoughtful and detailed disclosure of city finances and several very detailed scenarios for dealing with the problems but I heard none. His spreadsheets were hand written, which told me that they were afraid of an excel file getting out to the public online. Given that the city still refuses to just openly disclose the financial details of its books, I have to assume that someone is getting paid for a job that is unnecessary and that someone is getting an unnecessary municipal contract for something that need not be done. If the existing condition of financial distress would help Barletta’s case that he deserves to get out of making an installment into the police and fire pension fund, then he would error on the side of disclosure. But his staff, particularly the city administrator, has done a lousy job in disseminating the details of the city’s finances to the public.

Barletta’s only way out of this situation is to borrow big at a low interest rate and turn the whole thing into a monetary success for Hazleton. However, if he does not borrow soon he will be facing much higher interest rates and be forced into borrowing anyway. Hazleton needs a home grown, Hazleton born and bred Harvard or Yale MBA to take over as mayor.

Sincerely,

Sean M. Donahue