Allegheny County Council may weigh in on the search for the new warden of the county jail.
Council on Tuesday sent a motion, which seemingly is meant to limit the role of current Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald in replacing outgoing Warden Orlando Harper, to its committee on public safety.
In a statement announcing Harper’s departure, county officials earlier this month said Fitzgerald’s administration would work with Common Pleas Court President Judge Kim Berkeley Clark to find a search firm that will begin looking for a permanent replacement
“The last search took well over a year, and so the work being done now is intended to give the next county executive a head start in the search process,” the statement said.
If the motion makes it out of committee and is approved by the full council and Fitzgerald, his administration could collect data and information for use by the next county executive to select the next warden, but his staff would be instructed not to “interpret or select what data is provided to the next administration.”
“[T]he next administration must be given the ability to make its own decisions regarding the ACJ, based upon unfettered access to unbiased information,” the motion reads.
The motion is non-binding, however, and it generally expresses council’s opinion rather than actually limiting or dictating the actions of another branch of government.
A spokesperson for Fitzgerald’s administration declined to comment.
Both candidates for county executive have expressed the need for new leadership at the facility.
Democratic nominee Sara Innamorato has explicitly said Harper should be removed. In a statement earlier this month, she said she didn’t object to Fitzgerald launching the search process and called for a “transparent, national search for a new warden where all stakeholders … have a voice in who ultimately holds this position."
Republican Joe Rockey has indicated that he sees the position moving in a different direction.
“This is the opportunity to get the right leadership to fix the broken jail,” he said in a statement after Harper’s announcement.
Also Tuesday, council withdrew a motion to override Fitzgerald’s veto of a bill that would have given it the ability to remove a chief assessment officer appointed by the county manager.
