Luzerne County Council to select new chairperson tonight

Brian Thornton said he was asked by several fellow incoming council members and others to serve as the new Luzerne County Council chairman.

“If it turns out I’m appointed chair, I’ll be very grateful and will assume the position with humility,” said the financial advisor from West Pittston.

Council will vote on a chair and vice chair after tonight’s 6 p.m. swearing-in ceremony at the county courthouse on River Street in Wilkes-Barre. While anything can happen, some observers are predicting Thornton has majority support.

Thornton said he told others he is interested in the chairmanship but would support someone else if he or she has more backing.

Council will be down to 10 members in coming weeks because Walter Griffith takes office today as the new elected county controller.

“The last thing I want is a vote to be 5-5 for a split. I hope that’s not the case,” Thornton said of the chairmanship decision.

John Lombardo, Kevin Lescavage and Gregory Wolovich Jr. also will be new to council. They will join current members LeeAnn McDermott, Tim McGinley, Chris Perry (also re-elected in November), Kendra Radle, Robert Schnee and Stephen J. Urban.

McDermott and Radle also have been mentioned as possible chair nominees.

The chair presides over meetings, prepares meeting agendas, serves as a ceremonial head and selects which council members serve on council committees.

McGinley, who served as chairman the last four years, had said he would not want to remain chair after 2021. He has only two years left on council due to the home rule charter’s three-term limit. McGinley also is the only Democrat remaining on council.

Perry said he’s not interested in remaining vice chair or in filling the chairmanship.

Thornton and Lescavage, also of West Pittston, are friends and ran as a team, saying they had previously worked productively and effectively together on West Pittston Council. However, they emphasized they would vote independently.

The pair ran their council campaigns almost entirely with their own funds and did not have any fundraisers, Thornton said. They also have no aspirations to seek higher office, he said.

“Neither one of us have any favors promised. We don’t have any paybacks to anyone,” he said.

He wants to “bring everybody together” if he is the next chair and credited current and prior council members for their success reducing county debt.

“It’s healthy to have dissenting opinions and votes, but hopefully it’s not fractured where we have severe personality conflicts,” he said. “I hope we can keep politics out of things and play nice.”

Thornton has a mechanical engineering degree and worked as a project engineer in New York City before becoming a financial advisor in the county nearly three decades ago. During his decade as a West Pittston Councilman, he served six years as council president.

Filling Griffith’s council seat with another Republican and hiring a new county manager will be top priorities, Thornton and others have said. The county’s citizen Manager Search Committee plans to present qualified manager applicants to council for its consideration in April.

Deteriorated roads and bridges and other infrastructure needs also must be tackled, particularly two aging bridges over the Susquehanna River — the Nanticoke/West Nanticoke Bridge and the Firefighters’ Memorial Bridge on Water Street linking Pittston and West Pittston, Thornton said.

“We need to figure out how we’re going to deal with those two situations,” Thornton said. “I think those projects need to be addressed very quickly.”

The Nanticoke/West Nanticoke Bridge connecting Nanticoke and Plymouth Township was downgraded to a 15-ton weight limit and must be replaced at an estimated cost of $40 million to accommodate Houston, Texas-based Nacero Inc.’s planned $6 billion project on mine-scarred land near this bridge in Newport Township, officials have said.

The Firefighters’ Memorial Bridge has been closed since early August pending review of a bent eyebar, and options are still under review, officials have said.

A realistic infrastructure assessment of the county’s prison also must be completed, Thornton said.

The aging prison on Water Street in Wilkes-Barre is outdated and contains blind spots due to its multistory layout, he said. Thornton said he wants to walk through the facility and review reports on the building.

“I want to start meeting with prison officials to get a handle on that because we deserve to have a state-of-the-art prison that is not dangerous,” he said. “I’d like to get that on the table for discussion the next few months.”

During a November budget presentation, county Correctional Services Division Head Mark Rockovich requested $11.8 million from the county’s $113 million American Rescue Plan funds to expand and repair the prison.

Tonight’s schedule

The oath of office will be administered to newly elected council members in the rotunda.

Immediately following the ceremony, a reorganization meeting will be held in the council meeting room, with selection of a chair and vice chair as the only stated agenda items.

Directions to attend the reorganization meeting remotely are posted on council’s online meetings link at luzernecounty.org.