PA Bill Number: HB2235
Title: Providing for regulation of the meat packing and food processing industry by creating facility health and safety committees in the workplace; ...
Description: Providing for regulation of the meat packing and food processing industry by creating facility health and safety committees in the workplace; ... ...
Last Action: Referred to LABOR AND INDUSTRY
Last Action Date: Apr 25, 2024
Rivals vary on role of Westmoreland County sheriff :: 10/21/2015
Westmoreland County Sheriff Jonathan Held said he's earned a second term through his performance in upgrading the office over the past four years, while his opponent, Democrat Paul Cycak, says it's time to return stability to the office.
In the hotly contested race, voters will decide which man will lead the office's 77 deputies and nine civilian employees.
The office is responsible for serving arrest warrants, transporting inmates, providing courtroom security, transporting back to the county suspects who have fled the state to avoid prosecution and issuing licenses to carry firearms.
The sheriff's position pays $66,614 a year.
“Just watching what was going on, I felt I needed to run. Repeated disputes with commissioners over budgets ... a sheriff's deputy arrested in Pittsburgh using heroin and one clerk arrested on a charge of furnishing drug-free urine to be used in a drug test,” said Cycak, the chief deputy coroner. “Shouldn't we be drug testing employees before they are hired by the county?”
Held, a Republican, counters that he has enhanced fiscal responsibility within the office.
“Despite a 26 percent increase in prisoner transports and an 8 percent increase in warrant service since 2012, I have managed the office efficiently and have come in under budget every year,” he said. “Also, I've increased revenues we've brought in through warrants and various fees by $1 million.”
Held noted the office “had clean audits” in each year of his term.
“I am continuing to fight the drug epidemic in our region and continuing to work toward lowering the number of overdose deaths in the county,” Held said.
Held pointed to his office's support and involvement in drug prevention programs and the reality drug-prevention tour.
“We began a K-9 narcotics program funded through the Ben Roethlisberger Foundation,” he said.
As for Cycak's criticism of budget squabbles with commissioners, Held is not apologetic.
“In a representative republic, governments are supposed to work things out for the betterment of society,” Held said.
Held called Cycak's comments about drug problems and criminal complaints within his office unfair.
A part-time deputy sheriff, Erika Ditch, was charged with drug possession in 2013 in East Liberty and resigned. A clerk, Mario A. Lizza, who later left the office, was arrested for fabricating a drug-free urine sample, entered a rehabilitation program and served six months' probation.
“We were actually the first agency in the county to (drug-test) employees. I started looking into it right after I was elected in 2011,” Held said.
Because of union contracts, “that has to be negotiated with the bargaining group, then you have to file with the labor relations board,” Held said. “It's a long, lengthy process and can't be completed overnight.
“But again, we were the first agency here to enact it, and our management started drug testing immediately,” he said. “Both the employees involved in those previous incidents actually had squeaky clean backgrounds when they were hired.”
Held said the incidents among his staff during his term are an indication that “the area's drug epidemic knows no boundaries.”
Cycak said he has the necessary experience as a police officer and in the coroner's office to oversee and enhance the sheriff's office.
“I have a background in business. I was in retail management for eight years until I became a policeman with the city of Greensburg,” Cycak said. “I think we need to get back to the business of what the sheriff's office should do.”
Cycak said he wants deputies to focus on providing courtroom security, serving warrants and transporting inmates.
He has been deputy coroner for 12 years. He worked for 24 years as a police officer.
Four years ago, Cycak lost in the Democratic primary in a bid for the sheriff's job.
He completed training at the Pennsylvania State Police Academy Southwest Training Center and the Pennsylvania State Fire Academy. He served with the Army Reserve and was honorably discharged.
“I've run patrols, done criminal work, supervised criminal investigations, worked as a fire marshal and arson investigator and managed crime scenes,” Cycak said. “I've worked on our budgets the last 13 years and have shown I can work with commissioners.”
Responding Letter to the Editor:
October 23, 2015
Letter to the Editor,
DEMOCRAT FOR HELD
"In a Trib Article, Cycak, the challenger, lists the duties of the Sheriff's office as serving warrants, courtroom security and transporting prisoners. This is a minimum focus. One extremely important and blatant omission in his "list of duties"
is issuing Licenses to Carry Concealed Firearms. This seriously affects our 2nd Amendment right to bear arms and the ability to protect ourselves, our families and loved ones. This is a major focus of the Sheriff's Department in service of We, the People.
A serious question needs to be asked. Did Cycak leave this important duty out because he is unfamiliar with the true duties of the office or is he anti-gun and will make it more difficult to obtain these licenses?
Self defense is not a partisan issue, but, an essential human right. I will not trust my right to an unknowing candidate. We should re-elect Sheriff Jonathon Held because he has proven that he knows best how to manage the Sheriff's Office and he is a passionate supporter of the Constitution and our right to bear arms. Sheriff Held has received Firearms Owners Against Crime endorsement, his opponent has not.
s/William G. Fike, Democrat, sportsman and an American!
http://triblive.com/news/westmoreland/9199358-74/drug-office-sheriff?showmobile=false#axzz3pGH5NXt9
