Lycoming County commissioner candidates talk voter integrity ... - Williamsport Sun-Gazette

Lycoming County commissioner candidates talk voter integrity, natural gas | News, Sports, Jobs - Williamsport Sun-Gazette

Lycoming County commissioner candidates talk voter integrity, natural gas

Questions about Lycoming County’s agricultural interests, voter integrity and natural gas exploration were among those posed to four candidates seeking the Republican nomination for Lycoming County commissioner.

During a recent debate, sponsored by the Lycoming Patriots, the candidates were asked: “What if any plans or ideas do you have to protect family farms in Lycoming County and to increase farm ownership in Lycoming County?”

“Prosperity in our county comes from our farmlands,” Adam Welteroth said, adding he was “mortified” over China buying up farmland across the U.S.

“Three people who don’t get thanked,” incumbent commissioner Scott Metzger said, adding that group included “veterans, who protect our freedom; our law enforcement, who I worked very closely with over 32 years as a probation agent and supervisor; and our farmers, who feed us.”

“My great-grandfather was a farmer,” Metzger said.

Out of $22 million in American Rescue Plan funds, $1 million is going to county agricultural interests, he said.

As a commissioner, Metzger said he regularly sits with the Conservation District and local farmers to ask them what the county can do, and their answers are things such as a young farmer mentorship program.

“We just recently approved a brand new pavilion to be built at the Lysock Farm,” he said, adding its purpose: “So education programs can be taught to farmers and all young farmers in the area.”

“A lot of land in this county that is unused and not protected should be offered to farmers,” Evan Painton said.

Marc Sortman said that, as a Loyalsock Township supervisor, he has worked on the board with the Conservation District, which allows for some tax breaks for farmland in the township.

“It locks that farm in so that it can never be sold off for anything but farmland,” he said.

He said he would sit down with the farmland owners and farmers to ask them what the county can do to ensure they remain financially secure and not have to sell their property.

“When they are offered big money for it, they don’t have much choice but to sell it,” he said.

“As a government official, I would work with them to make sure they can stay financially profitable without them having to sell off their land.”

A question about election integrity was posed: “Many county residents would prefer a return to paper ballots and a simpler more transparent election system for the county, which would include the removal of the machines and Voter ID. What would you do to assure election integrity in Lycoming County moving forward?”

“This has been a hot topic,” Metzger said, adding he was all for Voter ID.

“It is important that when you go to a poll, you should be able to prove who you are when you go to vote,” he said, adding that is unlike attending a Republican or Democratic convention, where Voter ID is required to get inside.

However, Metzger clarified that it all starts with the state.

“It starts with Harrisburg,” he said. “They passed legislation to put those machines in the state.”

“Until we change those laws back there is not much a county commissioner can do.”

Metzger added that he tried to get it on the ballot, so that voters could vote, but was threatened by the Department of Justice.

“We reached out to the state solicitor who said, ‘You guys will lose,'” Metzger said.

That is what precipitated the motion and vote by commissioners to hold a recount of the 2020 election.

“We wanted to make sure every voter is served and did not want to waste taxpayers’ dollars on a lawsuit that we were going to lose,” Metzger said.

“Showing an ID should be required to vote,” Painton said.

“I agree with Mr. Metzger,” Sortman said. “We don’t have a voting week, we have a voting day.”

Sortman said he was 100% in favor of Voter ID, but questioned mail-in votes.

“We have to look into it but we have to do a little bit more of an audit, (that proves what the election outcome is),” he said.

“We are 73% Republicans in Lycoming County, so if Lycoming County doesn’t end up with two of the commissioners’ seats, there’s fraud in the election,” Sortman said.

“Clean up the voter rolls, absolutely,” Welteroth said. “Marc’s right with that,” he said.

“I will tell you, the Department of Justice, who are they run by — that’s the Democrats,” he said. “I will fight the DOJ each and every time.”

He noted how the voters have expressed their desires and it should not take a group becoming motivated. “If paper ballots are what we need to go to, then maybe that is what we need to go to.”

The candidates were asked whether they believed that a law firm with a member who is a state representative or state senator should be used as the solicitor for the Lycoming County Board of Elections? If not, why not?

In the interest of full transparency, the candidates said they believed this was a conflict of interest and should not happen.

However, Metzger noted the individual who might be referenced in the question is sub-contracted by the law firm.

“We don’t deal with him directly, we deal with that law firm on county matters.”

The answer from Sortman was the individual lawyer who is a senator, congressman or representative should never be the solicitor, but the law firm could represent properly.

Questions also were posed about the large number of natural resources such as natural gas possessed in Lycoming County and what the candidates would do to promote these resources and attract more businesses to the county.

“We had a lot of different hearings on a lot of different well sites…everyone was approved in Loyalsock,” Sortman said.

Along with that, supervisors wrote 19 conditions that made it safer to drill in the township. Impressed with what the gas industry has done by following those rules, Sortman said the money that came in at the beginning of the drilling has dried up.

As a commissioner, he said, he would continue to work with the gas industry as he did as township supervisor.

“It’s definitely needed,” he said. “It is here and you can do it safely.”

After speaking with the state Department of Environmental Protection for hours, if drilling is done by the rules in place, it is never going to be harmful, Sortman added.

“I think it is important that we don’t over-regulate them,” Welteroth said. “Yeah, we have DEP looking over them but sometimes we need to look at ‘what is the goal, what is the mission statement?'”

Accidents do happen, he said. When they do, companies that committed the infractions should be held accountable.

“There is enough gas produced in the state of Pennsylvania to take care of Europe for the next 30 years,” Metzger said. “We have so much underneath us.”

Commissioners, he said, do not set gas drilling regulations; the state does. But, he noted, the gas companies have restored the quality of the land they drilled on better, in some cases, than what it looked like before they arrived to drill on the well pad sites.

He cited an example of his father-in-law being who lives at the north end of Cascade on Chapel Hill Road, near where gas drilling took place.

“It brings money to our area,” Metzger said.

The county has, in fact, $24 million in its Act 13 or natural gas impact fee fund. Those funds go to local projects.

Painton said he did not believe commissioners should handcuff these businesses and industries. At the county level, commissioners should be supportive and act efficiently, he said.