Monessen mayor attends 1st meeting in nearly 2 years, fires clerk and solicitor

After a 20-month absence from city meetings, first-term Monessen Mayor Matt Shorraw returned to local government Monday night armed with a majority of council votes and an unannounced agenda that angered some members of the public as well as the council members who have essentially run the city since spring 2018.

Shorraw, incoming Councilman Donald Gregor and Councilman Gil Coles — who also returned to city government Monday after attending only one meeting since May 2018 — voted to fire city administrator Judith Taylor and solicitor Joseph Dalfonso and shift council meetings to a different date.

None of those items was on council’s agenda, a fact that was not lost on council members Tony Orzechowski and Lois Thomas, who cast dissenting votes on all three. Orzechowski has served as acting mayor in Shorraw’s absence and, as such, set the agenda for Monday’s meeting.

“You walk in here, you haven’t been here in 20 months,” Orzechowski said. “Not only have you not told us what the plan is, you’re getting rid of all these people and appointing someone who we don’t even know right afterwards? How callous are you? How childish are you?”

Asked repeatedly by Orzechowski and members of the public to explain his nearly two-year absence or to explain his decision behind the terminations, Shorraw would say only that the city is moving “in a new direction,” and spent most of the night banging his gavel to silence the meeting.

“I finally have the support to make the changes needed for the city in order to straighten things out administratively,” Shorraw said in an email to the Tribune-Review on Tuesday. “I feel that it would be better to show what that new direction is going to be and how it’s going to benefit the city in the long run, now that new administration is in place.”

“He didn’t do anything by the book,” Orzechowski said, reached after the meeting. “Councilwoman Thomas, Councilman Feehan, myself, our solicitor and Judy Taylor busted our (expletive) to keep Monessen going. We had no time off. We had no vacation time. I had a death in the family the day before a meeting, and I wasn’t able to attend because I had to make sure we had a meeting and were able to make payroll.”

Shorraw, Coles and Gregor confirmed Tim Witt of Watson Mundorff & Sepic as the new city solicitor, as well as John Harhai in the role of city administrator. Harhai is a former city administrator and councilman.

While some members of the public appeared to back Shorraw — who serves not just as mayor but as president of the five-member council in Pennsylvania’s third-class city form of government — many others did not.

“You owe us an explanation,” resident Susan Thwaite said. “Where have you been? You were elected to represent our community.”

Orzechowski attempted to get an answer from Shorraw before roll call votes were taken, mostly without success.

“You may have not have to answer (the public), but you have to answer me,” Orzechowski said. “We aren’t making payroll. You don’t have a clue because you haven’t been around. We’ve been robbing Peter to pay Paul and pay the city employees to make sure they have a paycheck.”

Councilwoman Lois Thomas echoed Orzechowski’s concerns.

“When you say ‘we’re’ moving in a new direction,’ the rest of us should have been included in that,” Thomas said. “I don’t even know you, Matt, but you did not come here for two years. I wanted to work with you then, and I want to work with you now, but this is showing me that you only care about the people you care about.

“I’m sorry, but I’m ashamed,” she said. “Don’t let this be the beginning of you coming back.”

City resident Ronald Mozer put it succinctly.

“Why should we even pay attention to what you’re doing here today, after missing 40 meetings?” Mozer asked. “I think you owe it to the community to explain why you weren’t present.”

Orzechowski apologized to his constituents.

“I should’ve kept my composure and professionalism a little more because that’s what we expect from our elected officials,” he said. “But I could not in good conscience let him continue to trample on procedure.”