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
State House Rep. Daryl Metcalfe and Cranberry politicians carry on with uneasy 'detente' :: 07/31/2018
Cranberry Community Day started without the sprawling suburb's most famous public official, Daryl Metcalfe.
Though the Pennsylvania House was on recess on July 13, the representative, who lives in the township, couldn’t be found amid the rows of booths, in the gaggle of local officials or browsing the works of a dozen chainsaw artists. If Mr. Metcalfe had been a classic gladhanding politician, some might call that an oversight — even a slight.
But to Cranberry supervisor Bruce Mazzoni, it’s just another chapter in the uneasy “détente” between township leaders and the 10-term Republican legislator. Mr. Mazzoni characterized that relationship as, “Don’t bother us and we won’t bother you.” It had been 18 months since the two had spoken.
You'd think Republican supervisors and a veteran G.O.P. legislator would talk. But Mr. Metcalfe's ardent brand of conservatism has clashed with the pragmatic approach of the leaders of the district's biggest township, even as Cranberry has flourished.
“We’re all working together, and that’s where Cranberry’s success is based on: building partnerships and overcoming obstacles to get things done and to move forward with an eye on the future and how we’re going to get there, and not be deterred by the obstacles that are out there,” said supervisors chairman Richard Hadley. But Mr. Metcalfe, he said, “doesn’t bring the bacon back home. ... That’s not what he thinks he should be doing in Harrisburg.”
To some of his supporters, Mr. Metcalfe’s disinterest in governmental give-and-take -- some call it horse-trading -- is a virtue.
Typical politicians "believe that compromise is the way to get something done,” said Virgil Knox, owner of Hampton Precast Concrete and a top Metcalfe backer. “But the reality is, if you compromise, you never do anything right."
Those two forces -- a yearning for unyielding principal, and a penchant for progress through compromise -- are at odds all over America, and certainly in Mr. Metcalfe's district. In his 11th general election race, the 55-year-old representative faces a Democrat who is emphasizing transportation funding, support for first responders and Sunday hunting — and who has, in the words of the incumbent's fundraising appeals, "attracted national attention because he is a homosexual."
Over two months, Post-Gazette reporters sought to interview Mr. Metcalfe for this story by calling his office, stopping there three times, calling his desk phone twice, and knocking on the door of his Cranberry townhouse and leaving a note there. He did not make himself available.
Few officials predict that Mr. Metcalfe will falter in what will likely be a low-turnout race ahead of the Nov. 6 election, meaning the tension between ideology and pragmatism may endure even as southern Butler County evolves.
Twenty years ago, Pennsylvania's 12th state House district, covering much of southern Butler County, wasn't a slam dunk for either party. Patricia Carone Krebs, who held the seat from 1991 through 1998, served four years as a Democrat and then four as a Republican. The race to succeed her, though, set the stage for two decades of dominance by the man some call the state's most conservative politician.
In 1998, Jim Powers, of Middlesex, was considering a run for the seat in order to combat an educational system that seemed, to him, to be “looking to create a passive, compliant, and dare I say it dumbed down generation that will not object when their freedoms are taken away.” But then he sat down with Mr. Metcalfe, who was a 35-year-old Army veteran and medical equipment technician from Syracuse, N.Y., with a dozen years of residence in the district.
They were “political clones of each other,” said Mr. Powers, who "prayed about it,” and bowed out, backing Mr. Metcalfe. He’s since contributed money and time to Mr. Metcalfe's campaigns, while fighting for the representative in intraparty battles.
Mr. Metcalfe also shook the Butler County money tree, making connections he would keep tapping for nearly two decades.
“I was the first person he called for a contribution when he first ran for office,” said William E. Adams, chairman of furniture maker Adams Manufacturing. He has remained a top donor. “I don’t think there’s a taxpayer with a three-digit IQ who would not support Daryl," he said.
Putting their money on Metcalfe State Rep. Daryl Metcalfe has built a loyal base of campaign backers. Most hail from business or development interests, but a few are partisan or ideological in nature. His biggest backers since 2001 (the first year for which electronic data are available) through April:
Total contributionsJohn M. & Denise M. Stilley |Amerikohl Mining (aggregates, coal, natu…Donald B. Rodgers |Creative Real Estate Development Co.Robert A. Ferree |Landmark Properties Group (developer)Republican State Committee ofPennsylvania | Republican PartyWilliam E. Adams |Adams Manufacturing Corp. (outdoor fur…Paul M. Sweeney |Cennial Co. (McDonald's franchisee)Dillon McCandless King Coulter &Graham LLP | Law firmVirgil & Mary Knox |Hampton Concrete ProductsLinda L. Sedgwick |The Armstrong Group (cable)Ray Joll | Joll Development Co.Citizens for Progress Committee |Real estate, law and development profes…Firarms Owners Against CrimePolitical Action Committee | Firearm own…Kirby Campbell | Armstrong UtilitiesCitizens for Gov. Reform |Trial lawyersCathy M. Myers | MichaelBaker Jr. Inc. (construction engineering)Chamber PAC Political ActionCommittee | Chamber of CommerceThomas M. Ferraro Jr. |Personal care serviceWilliam C. Skuba |Retired investorRonald Nolfi | RetireeSimon Campbell |Independent futures trader$0$10000$20000$30000$40000$50000$60000$70000$8…
Source: Pennsylvania Department of State data | James Hilston/Post-Gazette
In the 1998 primary, Mr. Metcalfe emphasized his support for state-backed vouchers so more students could attend private schools. He beat the son of a former representative, then bested a Democrat by nearly two-to-one.
Mr. Metcalfe showed his backbone during his first month, bucking Republican Gov. Tom Ridge’s personal plea for his support for funding stadiums in Pittsburgh. “I am solidly against it," Mr. Metcalfe said after the tete-a-tete.
A pattern was set -- one which turned Mr. Metcalfe's early supporters into a corps of die-hards.
Since then, Mr. Metcalfe’s views on hot-button issues have tended to fall to the right of most of the legislature, putting him ahead of his time as the G.O.P has become more conservative. He pushed a bill permitting the carry of concealed weapons on school property after the Columbine High School shooting in 1999; proposed a measure requiring voters to present an ID at the polls in 2002; and fought to strengthen the state’s ban on gay marriage before it was struck down by a federal judge in 2014.
"Daryl is the most conservative politician in office anywhere," said Don Rodgers, of Creative Real Estate Development Co., another early backer. "He cannot be bought by anyone, including me, and the fact that he upsets everybody means that he's doing something right."
Replacing moderates with allies
Ann Reale was in her 12th year on the board of the Seneca Valley school district when voters booted her from her seat. The reason? Mr. Metcalfe, she said.
It started in 2005 when she cross-filed on the Democratic and Republican tickets for reelection -- a common approach in low-level races, and something she had always done -- in an effort to remain nonpartisan. But instead of cruising to another term, she lost to Tom Roth, a neighbor of Mr. Metcalfe’s who took the GOP nomination and beat her in the general.
Republicans told her that real party stalwarts never cross-file, she recalled. “All Daryl wanted was me off the board because I would not blindly follow his agenda,” she said recently.
Ms. Reale’s ouster -- which was reversed when Mr. Roth could not finish his term and she replaced him -- underscores Mr. Metcalfe’s fraught battle for allies in Butler County politics.
In 2003, Mr. Metcalfe's daughter, Lisa, then 16, accused Cranberry supervisor Chuck Caputy, a Republican, of deliberately bumping into her at Ross Park Mall. A resulting harassment charge against Mr. Caputy was thrown out. Four years later, though, Mr. Metcalfe asked David Root, a Democrat, to run against Mr. Caputy. Mr. Root won, allied with Mr. Metcalfe, and served through 2013. He has since become a Republican.
In 2006, four new members (among them Mr. Hadley) won election to the Butler County Republican Committee, only to be told by Mr. Powers, then the committee chairman, that they could not take their seats. The reason: They had publicly supported Democrats -- and the cross-filing Ms. Reale -- in the past. A judge ruled that the four could take their seats on the committee.
In 2015, a likely Metcalfe ally -- his daughter, Lisa -- ran in the Republican primary for a seat on the Butler County commission, but finished fourth in a ten-person field.
The intraparty tremors and ideological fault lines contributed to what Butler County Commissioner Kevin Boozel, a Democrat, called a “rift that’s been unsolvable” on the most concrete of issues -- road funding.
As county and local leaders sought dollars to fix the congested Route 228 over the past decade, Mr. Metcalfe attended the meetings, but didn’t pursue state funding, numerous officials said. Instead, the Cranberry supervisors worked with PennDOT directly without their representative’s involvement.
Had Mr. Metcalfe lobbied PennDOT for the funds, he might not have been well received. The legislator vocally opposed Republican governor Tom Corbett’s Act 89, which raised gas taxes to put an additional $2.3 billion into transportation improvements across the state.
The representative purports to be “a watchdog for the taxpayers,” said former Butler County commissioner Dale Pinkerton, but legislators who oppose funding streams in Harrisburg often don’t see the resulting money come back to their districts.
“We send a lot of taxes to Harrisburg. We’d like to have a little bit of that come back to Cranberry,” supervisor John Skorupan added.
Schools as “special interests”
Mr. Metcalfe started his political career advocating private education, so it’s not surprising that he has routinely criticized school boards for what he considers to be excessive spending. That has led to public spats and resentment.
Former Seneca Valley president Dean Berkebile, a Republican, said Mr. Metcalfe disdained school directors and criticized school spending while refusing to provide suggestions or attend meetings.
The battle over school finances poured out into the open in 2004, when two districts sparred with Mr. Metcalfe over his comments that school directors were “appropriating money for self-interest or special interests.”
Mr. Berkebile responded by sending a 33-page memo outlining the district’s per-student spending, which was near the bottom in comparison to other districts. He invited Mr. Metcalfe to a meeting with the board, but the representative called that invitation “political grandstanding.”
“It suggests that he shouldn't be a legislator,” Mr. Berkebile said. “It suggests that he is more than willing to mark a paper wrong, yet really doesn't know the right answer and is too much of a coward to face the public.”
That year, the Mars Area School Board also invited Mr. Metcalfe for a meeting over his critique of school spending. At one point comparing school boards’ raising taxes to the British Empire’s taxation of American colonies. Mr. Metcalfe declined the invite, citing a busy schedule.
Some school officials, though, respect Mr. Mecalfe’s focus on fiscal prudence.
Former Seneca Valley school board member Paul Adametz, a Republican, said he liked that Mr. Metcalfe wasn’t willing to go to Harrisburg, “rub elbows” and “bring back wads of cash,” even though the representative’s unwillingness upset other members who thought the district and community should get a bigger share of state tax dollars. “I’m not going to turn my back on him no matter what he does or says,” he said.
Awful thick skin
Mr. Metcalfe is described by local leaders as a professional campaigner, one who will go door to door himself gathering petition signatures. Mr. Skorupan called him a “mean competitor” whose campaign tactics and big war chest have discouraged others from running against him.
“You’d have to have awful thick skin to run against him,” Mr. Pinkerton said.
Four years ago, an alliance of Mr. Metcalfe’s skeptics in Cranberry, and a politically potent name in nearby Adams Township, nearly toppled the arch-conservative legislator. Gordon Marburger, a Mars Area School Board member whose wife Diane was and is the county treasurer, filed to run in the Republican primary.
“It seemed like he just wasn’t representing the area well,” said Mr. Marburger recently. “He kept saying he’ll never vote for taxes,” he added, but wasn’t “coming up with measures to solve things without raising taxes.”
Mr. Mazzoni, the Republican supervisor, ran a sophisticated campaign. But Mr. Marburger was tossed off the ballot because of a mistake in his campaign’s paperwork. He launched a write-in bid that fell just 570 votes -- or 10 percentage points -- short.
Mr. Marburger said that Mr. Metcalfe then threatened to support a challenger for county treasurer, but the threat never materialized. He tried another run against Mr. Metcalfe in 2016, but lost by 20 percentage points.
Local officials said the district’s low voter turnout and Republican registration edge have helped Mr. Metcalfe to maintain power. In 2014, only a quarter of the Republican electorate in the district voted in the primary, and Mr. Metcalfe won the nomination with just 3,276 votes. In the general, the district’s 2-to-1 Republican registration advantage helped him to get 61 percent of the vote against Democrat Lisa Zucco.
Democratic nominee Daniel Smith Jr. will face similar prospects this November, but hopes that his focus on localized issues -- like road congestion and hunting on Sundays -- will provide a stark contrast to the incumbent. Mr. Smith calls himself an “aggravated constituent” who is tired of Mr. Metcalfe alienating his constituents.
“How much he has provided a disservice to the district as a whole, it’s disgusting,” Mr. Smith said of his representative and opponent. “I was fed up with it. This particular district, they just want representation. That's all it is. They're sick of partisanship.”
Mr. Smith said the reason his candidacy is getting national attention is not because he is a homosexual — as Mr. Metcalfe wrote in a fundraising letter — but because Mr. Metcalfe has embarrassed the district on a national scale.
Asked whether an openly gay Democrat could topple Mr. Metcalfe, former Butler County commissioner Jim Kennedy said he doesn’t “give a darn” about anyone’s sexuality, but doesn’t see a Democrat beating the Republican in the county’s southern tier.
“We’re Republicans,” he said. “There’s no doubt about it. We act like Republicans. We’re very conservative.”
Mercury rising
Conventional wisdom holds that smart candidates emphasize middle-of-the-road positions in the run-up to general elections. Not Mr. Metcalfe.
In July, Mr. Metcalfe touted a 5-4 U.S. Supreme Court ruling against public sector unions as bringing Pennsylvania "one step closer to becoming a right-to-work state." He also blasted Gov. Tom Wolf's creation of an election security workgroup as "a supreme act of hypocrisy.”
Mr. Wolf shouldn’t talk about “foreign aggression” against U.S. elections while failing to address the problem of “foreign nationals illegally registering to vote,” argued Mr. Metcalfe — whose wife and son-in-law are immigrants from Germany and Poland, respectively. The representative wrote in a press release that this fall he'll hold a hearing on election integrity in the powerful House State Government Committee, which he chairs.
Mr. Metcalfe has said that he won’t let Democratic legislation through his committee. The chairmanship has given him more power than the governor, Mr. Berkebile said, because he “can’t be overridden.”
Only Mr. Metcalfe knows what his political ambitions are. In 2009, he floated his own name for House speaker, but didn’t pick up enough support. In 2010, he ran for lieutenant governor, finishing third in a nine-person primary.
For now, he lives in a modest townhouse in Cranberry, outside of which sits a 2004 Mercury Monterey decorated with two of his campaign’s bumper stickers, one for Donald Trump, and a pro-life magnet.
While Mr. Metcalfe wasn’t willing to talk about his plans, his supporters wish him “continued success wherever he serves,” as Mr. Powers put it.
“If he elects to stay, I'd be happy,” Mr. Powers said. “If he'd decide to run for Congress I would support him in that endeavor, too.”
A move up might take him out of his office in Cranberry’s municipal building, just feet away from the suite in which Cranberry’s supervisors meet to discuss local issues without him.
“I’m not afraid to talk to him. I just don’t want to deal with him,” Mr. Skorupan said. “There’s no advantage for us dealing with him anymore. We’ll do it on our own. Thank you very much.”
Julian Routh: 412-263-1952 or jrouth@post-gazette.com. Rich Lord: 412-263-1542 or rlord@post-gazette.com.
