Issues discussed at the event included overview of PA SAVIN system.

The Statewide Automated Victim Information and Notification service is a service to crime victims and communities that allows victims of crime to register to receive notification of an offender’s impending release or transfer.

The program is expected to lower a victim’s risk of being re-victimized by a known offender.

Anyone interested in the program can go to the system’s webpage at www.pacrimevictims.state.pa.us.

CCAP members also discussed continuity of government, or the ability of government offices to relocate and continue working effectively.

Clarion County Commissioner Donna Hartle said Clarion County has no problem with continuity, and county offices are easily transferred.

Hartle presented information at one of the conference’s breakout sessions entitled, “Broadband Service: Future Needs and What You Can Do.”

County commissioners around the state have been looking for ways to improve their information infrastructures, and broadband Internet service is, what Hartle called “the dial-up of the future.”

Hartle outlined the efforts of the Riverview Intermediate Unit to provide its member school districts with better broadband access.

“We also heard from P.J. Stevens, a Cambria County commissioner,” Hartle told the Clarion News. “In that county the county government is looking into providing its residents and businesses with low-cost broadband service.

Hartle, a member of the Technology Advisory for the county, said she would be interested to find out more about Cambria County ’s broadband services and what steps Clarion County would need to take to offer similar opportunities here.

Another issue discussed was the place of confinement for county inmates. Commissioner statewide are looking to push for legislation that makes it mandatory for county inmates sentenced to over two years in prison to spend that time in a state facility.

“Our judge is very good about that,” said Hartle of President Judge James Arner’s efforts to help. “It’s not the case across the commonwealth.”

Commissioners also attended a session to discuss handling the news media at the county government level.

“We’re not supposed to say ‘no comment,’” Commissioner Donna Oberlander quipped.

“All three of us get along,” Oberlander said of her fellow commissioners, “but again, that’s not the rule statewide.”

Oberlander said in other counties where there is tension between officials the media can sometimes hinder the government process by publishing quarrelsome comments between officials.

“That doesn’t seem to be a problem here,” Hartle commented.

“Of course tax fairness was discussed,” Oberlander said.

CCAP and Penn State Cooperative Extension are holding education meetings throughout the state to allow residents to sit down with county officials and facilitators and talk about tax issues, so residents can feel more connected to the process but also to be able to see where tax money comes from and who can levy taxes.

“The county only has one source of income: real property tax,” Hartle said. “All the services offered through the county have to come out of that one source.”

Clarion County is currently approaching its tax millage ceiling of 25 mills and commissioners are hoping to be able to hold an educational meeting with county residents to further discuss tax issues in the county.

“We trimmed our budget every way possible,” Hartle and Oberlander agreed.

The trip came during the protest of truck drivers around Harrisburg ’s capitol building.

“I could hear their horns blowing inside an elevator inside the capitol,” Oberlander observed. “It was cool.”