The 2010 Road to Excellence Conference, entitled “Beyond Mutual Aid: Intergovernmental Cooperation, Public Safety and Homeland Security” was held on June 1, 2010 at the Sheraton Station Square and was sponsored by Pennsylvania Region 13. James Powers, Director of Homeland Security for the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Association, discussed the potential for functional or structural consolidation at the local level to improve homeland security.

James F. Powers, Jr. was appointed as Pennsylvania’s Director of Homeland Security on June 5, 2006. As Director, Powers serves as the Commonwealth’s primary point-of-contact on homeland security issues related to critical infrastructure protection and the Governor’s senior advisor on emerging homeland security legislation for the nation’s 6th most populous state comprising 67 counties and over 2500 municipalities.

 

From 2001 through mid 2006, Director Powers served as a special operations consultant with the Department of Defense; an adjunct Faculty Instructor with the U.S. Army War College, Carlisle Barracks, PA; and a Senior Fellow with the Joint Special Operations University, U.S. Special Operations Command. Before serving as a consultant and Senior Fellow, Mr. Powers served over 30 years as a career U.S. Army Special Forces officer attaining the rank of Colonel.

The 2010 Road to Excellence Conference, entitled “Beyond Mutual Aid: Intergovernmental Cooperation, Public Safety and Homeland Security” was held on June 1, 2010 at the Sheraton Station Square and was sponsored by Pennsylvania Region 13. Bob Full, Director of Allegheny County’s Department of Emergency Services, spoke on valuing professionalism in public safety services. Throughout his presentation, Bob Full also analyzed this region’s gaps in public safety services and identified opportunities for improvement and increased cooperation among public safety agencies.

Robert A. Full is the Allegheny County fire marshal and chief of the Allegheny County Department of Emergency Services. He also holds the position of chairman of the Regional All Government Joint Terrorism Task Force and the PA WMD Region 13 Working Group. He has over 30 years experience in public safety and emergency management.

Full served 23 years with the City of Pittsburgh in the Department of Public Safety. As assistant chief of the Emergency Medical Services Bureau, he handled all emergency ambulance and rescue services for the City of Pittsburgh. He also supervised all river rescue and hazardous materials response. He served 13 years as the 1st hazardous materials team chief and responded to over 2,000 chemical spill emergencies within the city and county. Full is also a former president of the PA State Association of Hazardous Material Technicians. 

 

Pennsylvania State Fire Commissioner Edward Mann discussed mutual aid in the 21^st century.

Ed Mann was reappointed as the State Fire Commissioner by Governor Edward G. Rendell in November 2003. Commissioner Mann was appointed as the fourth State Fire Commissioner of the Commonwealth by Governor Tom Ridge in July 2000. Ed has extensive background in emergency services having started with the Logan and Undine Fire Companies in Bellefonte, Centre County. Ed has served in the United States Air Force as a Fire Protection Specialist. After his retirement from the service he worked for Senators J. Doyle Corman and Jake Corman as an Executive Assistant in the 34th Senatorial District.

Ed has worked as a Local Level and Adjunct Instructor since 1987 and is currently certified as an Airport Firefighter, Fire Inspector 2, Fire Instructor 3, Fire Investigator 2, and Fire Officer 3 through the International Fire Service Accreditation Congress. He is currently the Assistant Chief and Financial Secretary for the East Derry Fire Company in Mifflin County. He is a member of the National Fire Protection Association and the International Association of Fire Chiefs (IAFC), where he served as a member of the Board of Directors to the Volunteer and Career Officers Section. He is currently a member of the Volunteer and Career Officers and the Firefighter Safety Health and Survival Sections of the IAFC and is a member of the Eastern Division of the IAFC. Ed also serves on the Advisory Committee to the IAFC Firefighter Near Miss Reporting Program.

 

Frederick Thieman, President of the Buhl Foundation and former US Attorney, examined the relationship between the justice system, homeland security and local public safety services.

Frederick W. Thieman was name President of the Buhl Foundation, Pittsburgh’s oldest multipurpose foundation, in June 2007. A former United States Attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvania, Mr. Thieman arrived at Buhl with an impressive civic and professional background. Appointed by President Clinton, Mr. Thieman served as the United States Attorney from 1993 to 1997, where he headed an office of 42 attorneys who both prosecuted criminal violations throughout Western Pennsylvania and handled voluminous civil litigation ranging from health care issues and tort liability to employment rights and environmental impact. While serving as the U.S. Attorney, Mr. Thieman was instrumental in establishing a youth crime prevention effort in Allegheny County that garnered national attention.

Over the course of his 30 year legal career, Mr. Thieman practiced as a trial attorney with a specialty in complex business related litigation. He began his career in 1977 as a law clerk to Pennsylvania Supreme Court Justice Thomas W. Pomeroy, Jr. While practicing law, Mr. Thieman was recognized in professional journals as one of the leading attorneys in Pennsylvania. 

 

Ron Stern, a Local Government Policy Specialist with Pennsylvania’s Department of Community and Economic Development, discussed the status of intergovernmental cooperation in Pennsylvania.

Ron Stern has worked as a Local Government Policy Specialist with the Department of Community and Economic Development’s Governor’s Center for Local Government Services since 2005. He also worked for the Governor’s Center between 1997 and 2000. Prior to rejoining the Governor’s Center for Local Government Services, Mr. Stern worked as a Criminal Justice System Planner and Planning Supervisor with the Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency.

He also spent 10 years with the Somerset Borough Police Department, serving both as patrolman and Chief of Police. Mr. Stern earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Police Science/Corrections from York College of Pennsylvania. 

 

John Baujan, Chief of the Stroud Area Regional Police Department, discussed regional policing and the success story of creating the Commonwealth’s largest regional police department – Stroud Area Regional PD.

John F. Baujan became chief of the Stroud Area Regional Police Department (SARPD) in October, 2003 after serving in the chief’s position temporarily while the department’s police commission searched for a permanent replacement for its first chief, who resigned in 2002 to pursue another job opportunity.

Baujan, 48 was born and raised in Stroudsburg and still resides in Stroudsburg with his family. He seems to have police work in his blood. His father, John Baujan, was a Stroudsburg police patrolman from 1947 through 1978, retiring as chief of the department. His uncle, William Baujan, served as a Stroudsburg police officer in the late 1930s until World War II, when he began a stint in the military.

The younger John Baujan received an associate’s degree in police science from York College in 1977. He qualified to become a municipal police officer through Pennsylvania’s Act 120 – the Municipal Officers Training Act.

In 1979, Baujan began work as a patrol officer for Stroudsburg police. In 1988, he was assigned to the Stroudsburg department’s two-man Detective Unit with fellow officer Charles Schmidt. In 1995, he was promoted to sergeant, and continued to serve with the Detective Unit until 2002. In 2002, he was promoted to Captain, after which, he was appointed to serve in the then-vacant chief’s position. He applied for the permanent chief’s position, among 29 other applicants. He was eventually chosen as chief after a lengthy interview process by three panels. Chief Baujan is also currently the President of the Pennsylvania Regional Police Association.

 

Dean Fernsler, an Emergency Services Consultant, discussed methods for successful fire department consolidations.

For more than 20 years, Mr. Fernsler was employed by the Department of Community and Economic Development as a local government consultant and trainer. Based in Harrisburg, his territory encompassed the entire state and one of his specialties was helping to create partnerships of local government and volunteer emergency services.

During his tenure with the Commonwealth, he assisted with more than 150 volunteer and paid companies to develop meaningful and lasting partnerships that resulted in increased recruitment and retention of volunteers and enhanced business practices. Local governments benefited from increased service levels, better training, decreased duplication of equipment, and also cost savings.

He previously worked in private industry, was an elected township supervisor, and currently serves on his township planning commission. He graduated from Slippery Rock University and did Master’s Degree studies at Penn State University. He retired from the Commonwealth in 2008. 

 

The 2010 Road to Excellence Conference, entitled “Beyond Mutual Aid: Intergovernmental Cooperation, Public Safety and Homeland Security” was held on June 1, 2010 at the Sheraton Station Square and was sponsored by Pennsylvania Region 13. Tom McElree, Director and General Counsel for the Emergency Medical Service Institute, discussed the challenge of coordination among local public safety services and emergency medical services.

Thomas J. McElree is the Executive Director and General Counsel for the Emergency Medical Service Institute (EMS Institute), a nonprofit organization designated by the Pennsylvania Department of Health, Bureau of EMS as the Regional EMS Council for Southwestern Pennsylvania. Mr. McElree and his staff are responsible for overseeing all EMS activities in the 10 counties of Allegheny, Armstrong, Beaver, Butler, Fayette, Greene, Indiana, Lawrence, Washington and Westmoreland. They are also responsible for certification and continuing education of more than 15,000 EMS practitioners, licensure of more than 250 EMS agencies, and oversight of all clinical aspects of emergency medical care including accreditation of Training Institutes, Medical Command Facilities and Medical Command Physicians.

 

The EMS Institute is also heavily involved in local and regional planning and coordination for any major incident or “all hazards” response and is a member and active participant in the Region 13 Task Force.

 

A licensed attorney with 16 years experience, Mr. McElree has provided legal counsel to numerous clients in the areas of healthcare, nonprofit and corporate law. Mr. McElree also holds a Master of Business Administration and has provided extensive consulting services to EMS agencies and hospitals related to pre-hospital emergency care. In addition, Mr. McElree is a practicing Paramedic with more than 32 years experience in all facets of Emergency Medical Service.           

This Podcast features an interview with Dick Dunlap, Executive Director of the Allegheny League of Municipalities, and Laura Zinski, Executive Director of the MonValley Initiative. Together, they explain the importance of the 2010 Census to local governments and community-based non-profit organizations.

*Please Note: This file was encoded from a DVD to an MP4 format so that it could be added to LGA's podcasts. Windows Media Player may say that it does not recognize the MP4, but it will still play. Please click "Yes" to open the file from a trustworthy source.

Click to hear Ron Painter, CEO of the Three Rivers Workforce Investment Board, explain the important of human capital for businesses looking to develop in a region

The 2008 Road to Excellence Conference entitled "Putting Intergovernmental Cooperation to Work: Employing Multi-Municipal Planning to Link Communities and Conserve Costs" was sponsored by Comcast and offered in partnership with Three Rivers Workforce Investment Board. Ron spoke on the consequences of the trend in development where residential, commercial, and office developments were spread over the southwest Pennsylvania region, separating where people live and where they work.

Ron explained the classic economic equation of land+labor+capital = the cost of our doing business. He said that in this age, talent, or human capital, is the most important part of the equation. Companies search for talent, making the location where they choose to do business very important. Therefore, it is important for Pennsylvania and the southwest Pennsylvania region to educate, train, and retrain our labor force. Ron noted that PA commits about $20 million of general revenue dollars for incumbent worker training, making the state a national leader in talent development.

Listen to Ron note that the southwest PA region has more people over the age of 65 and less under the age of 18 than the benchmark city average, which are those cities with comparable industries to southwest PA

The aging of the workforce in the region is also important. The region has more people over the age of 65 and less under the age of 18 than the benchmark city average. Benchmark cities are those that have similar industries as southwest PA. These regions compete with southwest PA for talented workers as well as industry and development.

Click to hear Ron explain that the migration of workers in, out, and within the region affects the region's ability to retain workers, especially younger workers

Ron reminded participants that a major issue for PA and the region is workforce retention, particularly the retention of younger workers. Migration in, out, and within the region affects workforce retention. People within the region tend to stay in one neighborhood for long periods of time, but more people are leaving than coming into the region. Ron explained that people, especially younger people, like the density of cities, and that Pittsburgh needs to consider density in all of the development decisions we make. He also reminded participants that 40% of the PhDs and scientists working in the U.S. are foreign-born, and that immigration is important to workforce development. The United States and PA needs to compete internationally as well as domestically for the most talented workers.

Listen to Ron speak about the consequences of sprawl and spatial mismatch, explaining that available jobs are not always located where the workers who would fill those jobs actually live, making commuting difficult, expensive, and nearly impossible for some workers

Ron explained that suburbanization and decentralization of job sites leads to urban sprawl, where more land is being consumed for development and existing jobs may be moved around the region instead of new jobs coming in. The region will be better off if more people are coming in and more net jobs are created. Ron asked the question, "Where is the work, and where is the worker?” People are commuting out of their home communities for work because the jobs that exist there often do not match the skills, education, and salary requirements of the residents. This decreases quality of life by adding to traffic congestion, because suburban jobs are spread along major transportation corridors. This can necessitate having a workforce that drives, making hiring and retaining workers more difficult in these areas. This phenomenon is called “spatial mismatch”, where the jobs that many low-income workers would fill are located in the suburbs, far from their homes in the urban core. This makes commuting difficult and expensive for many workers. Pittsburgh, however, is a city that has a high number of jobs in the city, in fact, the count is higher than many comparable cities.

Click to hear Ron explain how intergovernmental cooperation can be used to create of good jobs, improve access to these jobs through infrastructure and multi-modal transportation, and create affordable housing

Addressing the mismatch between “where is the work and where is the worker” involves intergovernmental cooperation for the creation of good jobs, improved access to these jobs through infrastructure and multi-modal transportation, and affordable housing. Many low-income workers do not drive and rely on public transportation, which is a major problem for suburban employers who cannot attract these workers. Three Rivers Workforce Investment Board can help with economic development project assessment, so that communities can minimize spatial mismatch.

Click to view the 2008 Road to Excellence Conference Handout Booklet