“It was the right thing to do,” he said. “I had to do it.” --Mayor Tim Burke as quoted by Chris Kelly, The Times-Tribune in Kelly's World regarding his veto of an amendment to the Dunmore zoning ordinance that would have hurt the community and only benefited Keystone Sanitary Landfill.
Chris Kelly: Daring to defy Caesar
KELLY'S WORLD / PUBLISHED: OCTOBER 16, 2019
Of all the revolutionary innovations conceived by the social engineers of ancient Rome, leave it to the mayor of a tiny Northeast Pennsylvania borough of 13,000 to shine a spotlight on trash collection and the veto.
Historians credit the Romans with embracing the radical realization that garbage shouldn’t be piled high in the heart of a community. They developed landfills, which are occasionally excavated by archeologists who jump for joy at the sight of a 2,000-year-old take-out container.
The Romans also invented the veto, which is Latin for, “I forbid.” After rejecting the rule of “divine-right” Caesars, it was exceptionally risky for Senate patricians to trust individual officials with the power to block bad policies backed by suspect majorities.
Dunmore Mayor Tim Burke may as well have been wearing a toga at Monday night’s borough council meeting. His veto of an amendment to the zoning ordinance echoed Roman tribunes who refused to sell out the common good to benefit an elite few.
It was a big deal. Maybe historic.
“Tonight, I am invoking my authority as mayor to veto this proposed legislation,” Burke said, thrusting a spear into council’s naked tribute to the Caesar on the throne at Keystone Sanitary Landfill.
In a brazen attempt to sidestep the judicial system, Keystone asked council to exempt the landfill from height restrictions on the ridiculous grounds that it is not a structure. The question of whether landfills are structures for zoning purposes is being decided in the courts. Council could have waited for an independent ruling, but chose to intervene on Keystone’s behalf.
On a 4-3 vote on Sept. 19, council members Mike McHale, Tom Ehnot, Carol Scrimalli and Michael Hayes rejected the obvious and overwhelming will of the people to grease the skids for a 46-year expansion of the landfill in Dunmore and Throop.
Council President Michael Dempsey, Vice President Tom Hallinan and Councilman Vince Amico stood up for the common good and voted against the amendment. On Monday, all three stood by their votes and their mayor.
McHale, Ehnot and Scrimalli were conspicuously absent from Monday’s meeting, but Hayes was there, still selling fear of phantom legal ramifications and the financial consequences of defying Caesar.
Hayes pointed to a line in the borough’s 2014 host agreement with Keystone that agrees the landfill “is not a building under the current zoning ordinance pertaining to maximum building height.”
If that sentence had the power to resolve this situation, the landfill surely would raise it. Hayes not only betrayed his professed opposition to the expansion and his oath to serve the common good, but now argues that Dunmore can’t survive financially without a landfill seeking permission to kill it over the next half-century.
“I have to look out for the 6,000 homeowners and taxpayers,” Hayes said, somehow with a straight face.
Someone should be looking out for homeowners and taxpayers, but I wouldn’t count on borough solicitor Tom Cummings, who has a history of “rendering unto Caesar” at public expense.
On Monday, Cummings cryptically refused to answer questions about whether he has researched the efficacy of the mayor’s veto powers. He said he will issue an opinion. If there’s a way this still works out for the landfill, Cummings will find it.
For now, we’ll go with the state’s borough code, which seems to support Burke’s position. Override of his veto would require a majority-plus-one, or 5-2 vote. One of the three dissenters would have to change his vote. All said they won’t, but voters have heard that before.
McHale and Hayes campaigned in the May Primary on an anti-expansion platform and betrayed voters with their zoning ordinance flip-flop in September. Voters can do Dunmore and the region a public service by voting them out on Nov. 5. Friends of Lackawanna member Janet Brier launched a write-in campaign and Beth McDonald Zangardi — a planning commission member who opposes the expansion — is on the ballot.
The Romans lost their republic when their leaders sold out the common good in exchange for the conditional favor of a greedy few. Tim Burke stood up to save his borough and set an example for the people he swore an oath to serve.
I called the mayor on Tuesday. He said his phone was ringing all day, and he was naturally feeling frazzled. It’s not easy siding against Caesar, but Burke said he stands by his veto and will not back down.
“It was the right thing to do,” he said. “I had to do it.”
Et tu?