Former Gov. Ed Rendell has a message for city officials: Stop being "wussies."
At the signing of his memoir, "A Nation of Wusses," at Connell Lofts in downtown Scranton on Friday, Mr. Rendell said it is time city officials all sit down together and work out an agreement to fix its financial mess.
"City officials are wussies because they haven't acted in the long-term interest of the city," Mr. Rendell said. "You need to say 'what is the best way to get out of this' and if you don't, you're wussies. I am hopeful that they will."
Scranton Councilman Pat Rogan said he wouldn't use the term "wussy," but sees what the former governor means. "I've been asking for two months for everyone to sit down together and that never happened," Mr. Rogan said. "During the length of this entire crisis, there hasn't been one meeting (with) all six elected officials."
Mayor Chris Doherty, council President Janet Evans and Councilmen Frank Joyce, Jack Loscombe and Bob McGoff could not be reached for comment.
Mr. Rendell said that while the municipal workers did not cause or contribute to the financial crisis, they have to be "part of the solution" by reducing benefit packages and by paying more into their pensions.
"Those are things that are inevitable and they're happening everywhere across the country," Mr. Rendell said. "If they can keep all the jobs, even if it means changing work rules, changing benefits, paying in to pensions, that's in the worker's long-term interest and it's in the citizens' long-term interests."
He said the city will not get out of this financial crisis without "pain" and both council and Mayor Chris Doherty need to be willing to accept the pain. He said the mayor is right in terms of sacrifice, but he added that sacrifice needs to be "across the board."
His message to Scranton taxpayers? "Hang in there."
Mr. Rendell said he remains optimistic about the city of Scranton. Should the financial crisis be solved without bankruptcy, he believes the city of Scranton's economic vitality will pick up again, even if the tax burden is higher.
"If Scranton becomes a place where people want to be, Scranton will overcome that burden," Mr. Rendell said.
Mr. Rendell does not believe, however, that Gov. Tom Corbett is a "wussy."
He said there can be no complaints about Mr. Corbett's plan because he's "doing exactly what he said he would do."
"It's too late to complain and say 'why is the governor doing this, or why is the governor doing that?' " Mr. Rendell said. "I wouldn't put $400 million in the rainy day fund at the same time I was cutting education and care for our most vulnerable citizens."
Mr. Rendell said that recent cuts to education will, in the long term, hurt student achievement. The funding to targeted programs, such as pre-kindergarten, full-day kindergarten and after-school tutoring made a "huge difference" in student achievement, he said.
"Money doesn't guarantee success for your education system," Mr. Rendell said. "But not having it so you can finance the right programs makes a huge, detrimental difference."
Mr. Rendell said cutting the General Assistance cash grant was not something he would have done. He said that since the program had been "cut to the bone" in terms of eligibility, there needs to be some form of mental or physical disability in order to qualify for a cash grant and said these people need to extra money to survive.
"To cut these folks it means inevitably they're going to wind up on the street homeless or in prison," Mr. Rendell said. "And all of those things have a social cost that we're going to wind up paying for anyway."
Contact the writer: jkohut@timesshamrock.com @jkohutTT on Twitter