Editorial: Finding the next best thing to a health department for Westmoreland

There’s nothing like a disaster to show you what you have and what you need.

Westmoreland County Commissioners said Thursday that the coronavirus pandemic has shown them what they don’t need: a county health department.

For almost a year, the county has responded to the increasing challenges of covid-19 without that central hub of organization and information that neighboring Allegheny County has to provide assessment and guidance.

Allegheny is authorized by state law to have a health department — just like Bucks, Chester, Erie, Montgomery and Philadelphia counties and Allentown, Bethlehem, Wilkes-Barre and York cities. Westmoreland, like other counties, is not included in the 1976 law that gave that OK. Asking for a change doesn’t seem like much of a problem.

The money, on the other hand, is a major stumbling block for the commissioners. In the annual State of the County meeting, held virtually this year because of the pandemic, Commissioner Sean Kertes cited that as the obstacle.

“You’re looking at anywhere from $7 million to $10 million for a start-up. Yes, the state has money for a start-up if it progresses, but the fact is that is a massive amount of money the commissioners do not have. We would have to take a bond issuance for that or raise your taxes to have a health department,” he said.

That’s a valid concern. But the massive financial impact of a health problem on the economy of the state and the county would seem to suggest a cold hard cash benefit to the idea.

Commissioner Gina Cerilli suggested she would support participation in a regional department that could help other communities while sharing the burden. There is plenty of precedent for that in other shared services like regional police departments.

“Those are further discussions we would have to have, but unfortunately nothing we would do right now would see any advance within the next year or so,” she said.

But are those really the only options?

Westmoreland County has not had a defined pandemic response. It had a task force that hasn’t met since the summer. The county’s point person has been Public Safety Director Roland Mertz, who already has a plate full of things like emergency management and 911 dispatching.

If there is acknowledgement that some kind of hub would be beneficial and the question is about the cost, maybe there could be a way to test the waters with a coordinator rather than a department. Mertz was hired in 2014 at a salary of $75,000. In Erie County, with a population a bit under Westmoreland’s, the county government pays $1.6 million toward its health department, which has total budget of $8.2 million (the balance mainly covered by federal and state funds).

And as vaccine distribution issues continue and new strains of covid-19 are identified, it definitely seems long past time to be planning ahead for what comes next.