The Nov. 8 election mostly was about big statewide elections and control of Congress. But it also featured a local election that could help improve local governance in Pennsylvania.
For the second time in two years, residents of small adjacent communities have voted to merge their governments.
In Mercer County, near the Ohio line, residents of tiny Wheatland Borough — fewer than 600 residents living within fewer than 600 acres — and residents of adjacent Hermitage, a third-class city of about 16,000, approved the merger. It’s scheduled for Jan. 1, 2024.
In Clearfield County in 2021, voters of the third-class city of DuBois and those in Sandy Township, which surrounds the city, voted for their governments’ merger. DuBois has about 7,800 residents, the township more than 10,000.
The mergers very slightly will diminish the costly inefficiency inherent in Pennsylvania’s obsolete system of local governance. The commonwealth has more than 2,500 individual townships, boroughs and cities, 67 counties and 500 school districts and thousands of related authorities, boards and commissions. That ensures hundreds of millions of wasted dollars due to duplication of services.
In announcing the Hermitage-Wheatland merger, the Pennsylvania Economy League noted that the key was a series of decisions by both sets of municipal officials to share services, saving money and easing the path to the impending merger.
The state Legislature should strive to make the two mergers the beginning of a trend by providing incentives and eliminating obstacles to shared services and consolidation.
— The Republican & Herald (TNS)
