Easton Mayor Sal Panto Visits LVRamblings

I first met Easton Mayor Sal Panto nine years ago, when I was railing against Northampton County's $111 million megabond. I rented a room at Northampton County College to explain my opposition, and about forty bond foes showed up. We sharpened our pitchforks and took turns burning effigies of bond proponents Glenn Reibman and Jim Hickey.

Good, clean fun.

But Sal Panto, who was just a private citizen in the midst of all these bond foes, risked his life and defended the bond eloquently, at least that portion of it containing a grant for Easton's State Theatre. There were no reporters on hand to catch his words. He was also doing something that was politically unpopular, at least in that room. He and I had a heated exchange over the public funding of a private enterprise, but he held his own.

Naturally, we strung him up.

Not really. I was extremely impressed by Panto's courage, and we have been friends since that night. Like Northampton County Exec John Stoffa, Sal Panto is one of those rare public officials who is interested in doing the right thing. Unlike public officials who think government works best behind closed doors, Panto strives to be as open as possible.

Yesterday, I asked you whether Sal should cross a firefighters' picket line in Rhode Island at the U.S. Mayor's conference being hosted in Providence on Friday. Panto himself joined in the conversation, explaining why he's going. For those of you who don't read comments, let me share his thoughts.

"Please don't equate my willingness to cross to not knowing what it is like to be out of work. No one understands the constraints on people out of work better than I do. I was out of work for more than 7 months due to 'downsizing' in the private sector.

"However, this is not about crossing a picket line where someone is not working. These firefighters are not on strike, they are being paid, they are working. This 'picket line' is more of a protest line in which they are protesting the fact that they still do not have a 'negotiated' contract. That is much different than workers striking and not working.

"The city of Providence and the IAFF have been through binding arbitration hearings and the latest award is due in September. During that time they are still negotiating and an offer letter was sent to them by the Administration as recently as May 26th.

"The issue with municipal unions is management's need for the employees to pay some form of healthcare co-share. In Easton our non-union employees have been paying a co-pay for the last five years. The FOP (police union) just agreed to the same co-pay this year and we successfully negotiated their contract. We are asking for amounts far less that that paid by non-municipal employees. We are also asking them to take more ownership in their healthcare program. For example, a 90-day mail-in prescription saves both the employee and the city money but yet very few of our employees take advantage of this for their maintenance meds.

"Like Easton, the city of Providence, is facing tremendous financial difficulties. Municipal government provides the most needed services yet we have the most regressive form of revenue collections. We have a mandate to bring fiscal soundness back to Easton and we will hold true to that commitment. We will continue to support our 'Clean and Safe' program and do it in the most cost-effective manner possible. We will continue to be responsible to our residents."