Hazleton voters can decide the city government’s future shape on Tuesday.
The city’s primary election ballots include a question that asks voters if an elected commission should study “the advisability” of Hazleton adopting a home rule charter.
Cities that adopt home rule charters gain freedom and flexibility from certain state laws, especially on taxation. Charters also create the structure of government.
Eleven candidates are running for seven commission seats. They are Phil Bonafair, councilmen Tommy Bruno and John Nilles, Mayor Jeff Cusat, former Mayor Joseph Yannuzzi, Allison Keegan, Vianney Castro, David Dominguez, Orisa Dotel, Rossanna Gabriel and Isaura Pine.
The seven winners will study the idea if a majority of voters say yes.
Cusat and the other commission candidates urge a yes vote.
The mayor said current state law limits Hazleton to collecting a maximum 0.5% wage tax. (Another 0.5% goes to the Hazleton Area School District.)
Creating a home rule charter could allow the city to charge a higher wage tax to reduce future pressures to raise property taxes when it’s necessary, the mayor said.
The city could raise the wage tax instead if it needs more money to operate. Renters pay wage taxes directly, but not property taxes, though rents partly reflect a landlord’s property tax bill.
“We don't want to keep putting it on the property owners,” Cusat said.
Cusat opposes another idea that a charter could create: regional voting for City Council rather than at-large.
In regional voting, voters elect a single council member who lives in and represents their geographic district. In at-large voting — the norm in Hazleton and the vast majority of towns statewide — voters choose all five council members.
Cusat and other commission candidates think regional voting will divide instead of uniting residents.
Latino commission candidates favor a district system. For now, they hope it would give them a better shot to have one of their own on the all-white council, but one candidate in favor sees a benefit for non-Latinos.
“I think that we need as many people with a different point of view as possible so we can get better decisions,” Castro said. “It's not only about Latinos, it's about the whole population of Hazelton.”
Hazleton’s population is changing, he said.
“And Latinos population will be (the) majority in voting soon. Anywhere between the next four to eight years, we will have majority of the voters,” Castro said. “Today, it (district voting) might benefit the Spanish people, Latino people, but tomorrow it will be convenient for the white people that live in town. So, it's a good way to have representation for everybody.”
