Freshmen don’t get much respect in Harrisburg. But Gordon Denlinger is making some headway.

The new 99th District legislator, who won his seat in a March 18 special election following the death almost a year ago of Rep. Leroy Zimmerman, has been named to a new committee charged with helping to set the agenda for the House GOP.

Denlinger is one of two freshmen – the other is Douglas Reichley of Emmaus – named recently to the Majority Oversight Committee, the brainchild of House Speaker John Perzel back when he was still the lower chamber’s majority leader.

Denlinger is the only Lancaster County legislator on the 13-member committee, which is chaired by Rep. Steve Nickol of York County and is a sort of think tank that will help the majority Republicans research and develop solutions on some particularly thorny issues. When Republican governors ran Harrisburg, Denlinger said, the Legislature generally followed the agenda they set. But with Democrat Ed Rendell in the governor’s mansion, the Republican caucus needs to come up with its own set of priorities.

Steve Miskin, a spokesman for Majority Leader Sam Smith, said the oversight committee, operating under the umbrella of the Republican Policy Committee, will be look to resolve “some very big, tough issues.”

The members were chosen to provide a cross-section of interests and experience that might help with those issues, he said.

Denlinger, a certified public accountant, has been assigned to a subcommittee looking for solutions for rising workers’ compensation and unemployment costs.

Ideas under consideration for unemployment involve keeping the total benefits at the same levels, but “front-loading” them – paying more in the early stages and less as the 26 weeks of coverage move on – to encourage out-of-work people to look for new jobs more aggressively Workers’ comp was revised several years ago, Denlinger said, but more tweaking may be needed, particularly on cases involving fraudulent claims.

Other subcommittees are reviewing whether money from the stadium financing bill a few years back has been spent according to legislative intent and how the state pension system is operating.

The oversight committee is calling in experts from think tanks like the Heritage Foundation and the Cato Institute for advice, as well as contacting other states to find out what works.

“I think we kind of operate with tunnel vision at times,” Denlinger said, so looking outside Pennsylvania for help is a smart idea.

He’s not sure how, of the 15 freshmen in the House, he was picked, but he suspects part of the reason might be the relationships he has been trying to form with other legislators.

The Republican hasn’t made a formal announcement, but he plans to seek a full term in 2004. While Denlinger still might wind up with a primary opponent, one of his biggest potential challengers, Elanco school board member Chuck Trupe, said Saturday that he has decided not to run.

Denlinger is a member of the conservative Commonwealth Caucus in the House, but he said he is always “willing to listen to other viewpoints” before deciding how to vote, except on some critical issues like abortion and gun rights.

“As a new person, it’s important to listen more than you speak.”

A secondary primary

Denlinger won his seat in the snows of last spring, when campaign volunteers had to perfect the art of planting yard signs atop snowbanks.

It could happen again.

A state House bill introduced last month would advance the date of the 2004 primary from April 23 to March 16. The motivation is to help keep Pennsylvania from once again being irrelevant in the presidential sweepstakes – by the time our primary rolls around, it’s usually all over but the shouting.

The bill is sitting in committee, and there’s no guarantee anything will happen, but if the primary did shift at such a late date, it would produce chaos in the parties’ systems for choosing nominees.

Brian McDonald, a spokesman for the state elections bureau, said the office is aware of the possibility but isn’t panicking yet, although a change would mean rejiggering petition filing and campaign finance reporting dates.

One reason not to panic: There are only scant days left in the legislative calendar for 2003, and those should be (everyone hopes) consumed with solving the education funding budget impasse.

The other calculation is that the Democrat-introduced bill is primarily (ouch!) concerned with the Democratic presidential primary – Republicans, after all, aren’t expecting a contested primary – and the GOP-controlled Legislature might not have much interest in helping state Democrats pick President Bush’s opponent.

But then again, an early primary presumably helps Republican U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter in his fight against his conservative challenger, Congressman Pat Toomey – less time for Toomey to build name recognition – so there is some percentage for the Republican leadership, anyway, in moving things up. Past years’ attempts at changing the primary date haven’t gone anywhere, McDonald pointed out.

“We’re still sticking to our guns,” McDonald said, “and thinking there’s not going to be too much of a change.”

Putting up the screens

The county Republicans are setting their calendars for the ‘04 endorsement process, assuming the Legislature doesn’t gum up the works by changing the primary date.

Not all the legislative district committees have candidate interviews scheduled yet, but of those that do, the GOP’s Web site, www.goplancaster.com, lists the 100th District (Solanco and part of Penn Manor) Jan. 12 at the Solanco Senior Citizen Center, the 97th District (Warwick and Manheim townships) Jan. 13 at the Warwick Township Building and the 41st District (Hempfield and Penn Manor) committees Jan. 22 at the East Hempfield Township Building. All meetings are at 7 p.m.

Jan. 5 is the deadline to notify county chairman Dave Dumeyer of a candidate’s intent to seek the endorsement.

The county convention will be at 7 p.m. Jan. 27 at the Historic Strasburg Inn. That’s also the first day to circulate and file nominating petitions for the primary.

Whenever it is.

Dueling memos

Expect Lancaster County to be a battleground for the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate. The fight turned even more bruising in the last week, with Specter’s camp sending letters to local Republican committee members accusing Toomey, the conservative alternative, of being soft on gambling.

The Specter memo, from campaign manager Christopher Nicholas and addressed to “Lancaster GOP leaders,” says that while Specter has consistently opposed gambling, Toomey “voted in Congress to allow Internet gambling.”

Specter’s memo also charges that Toomey “failed to come out against the current proposal (in Harrisburg) to put thousands of slot machines at state racetracks and at standalone slots parlors” and that he voted against a $101,000 grant to the School District of Lancaster for sex abstinence education.

Toomey’s camp returned fire with a statement saying the Lehigh Valley congressman voted against an earlier bill on Internet gambling, HR3125, “because the bill would have created an opportunity for more gambling than currently allowed and because it contained unenforceable mechanisms to crack down on offshore gambling.”

Toomey’s statement adds that HR3125 was opposed by the conservative Traditional Values Coalition, Free Congress Foundation, Seniors Coalition and Americans for Tax Reform for those reasons.

The statement charges that Specter “went above and beyond the call of duty” by helping an Indian tribe in California to develop a casino. Citing a Philadelphia Inquirer story, Toomey’s campaign said Specter wrote letters and personally addressed a congressional conference committee on the bill.

“Sen. Specter says that he is opposed to gambling, but the facts show that, as in many areas, he says one thing but does another,” the statement concludes.

Delegation doings

*State Rep. Roy Baldwin, R-97th District, will hold a public meeting on consumer fraud protection and identity theft from 6:30-8:30 p.m. Thursday in the Manheim Township Municipal Building. Speakers include representatives from the state attorney general’s office and the U.S. Postal Service, who will discuss ways to prevent being victimized by what Baldwin says is “one of the fastest-growing crimes in Pennsylvania.”

While identity theft and do-not-call lists the featured topics, the meeting is open for for any issues. For information, call Baldwin’s district office, 569-5855.

*State Rep. Katie True, R-41st District, has a limited number of 2004 Pennsylvania House of Representatives calendars available at her Manor Township office, free on a first-come, first-served basis to 41st constituents. Call 295-5050 to reserve a copy, or visit the office, 2938 Columbia Ave., Suite 501, from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday.

Helen Colwell Adams is an editor of the Sunday News Perspective section. E-mail her at hcolwell@lnpnews.com, or phone 291-4962.

blog comments powered by Disqus