Lehigh County Looks To Streamline Contract Approvals

Lehigh County commissioners are looking to change the rules to streamline how they approve even large contracts, with two proponents insisting that it will not mean less oversight on their part. 

Commissioner William Hansell proposed an amendment to the county administrative code at the April 27 meeting that would allow contracts of over $10,000 to be voted on as a resolution, rather than an ordinance. That means each contract would only have to be dealt with at one meeting and it wouldn’t have to be advertised in a newspaper’s legal ads section, the way ordinances are.

Currently, all contracts the county enters into that cost more than  $10,000 must undergo two readings at two different meetings and be advertised – all of which can take up to six weeks, according to Commissioner Percy Dougherty.

Dougherty said the county tried to make the change years ago but voters shot it down in a referendum, perhaps over concerns that it would make the process less transparent.

“I do not think there’s any less transparency by speeding up the process,” Dougherty said. “Basically what we’re talking about in terms of most of these ordinances is simply paying our bills.”

Hansell said many of the contracts are routine expenditures in which the county is renewing a contract it has had for years. Commissioners will continue to receive notice of all county contracts, even for small amounts.

“None of us want to in anyway give up our oversight responsibilities,” Hansell said. “This will still have public notice, it will be on an agenda, it will still have discussion and debate in committees and if any commissioner wishes to they can request that it be held over [to a second meeting].”

The county legal staff concluded that the change from ordinance to resolution would be permissible under the Home Rule Charter, Hansell said. Northampton County already approves contracts by resolution, he said.

The commissioners will have to have a second reading and vote on the change at a future meeting.

Asked after the meeting, Hansell said the change would mean a contract as large as the one with Computer Aid Inc. of Allentown -- $2.8 million --  for development of the county’s proposed crime data center could be handled at one meeting. But any commissioner could put a hold on it for discussion at another meeting, Hansell said.

The change would save advertising costs, but Hansell said he wasn’t sure how much.