Westmoreland County election winners sworn into office

Months of campaigning and election-night nerves were a thing of past on Thursday as Westmoreland County’s new slate of government officials were sworn into office.

The former candidates and now newly elected officials, with family members and supporters by their sides, one-by-one came before the county’s Common Pleas Court judges to take their oaths of office.

The event, conducted in the county’s ceremonial courtroom at the courthouse in Greensburg, marked a turning of the page for county government with six new officials taking control of various offices. Their new terms officially begin on Jan. 6.

That’s when Republicans Sean Kertes and Doug Chew join Democratic incumbent Gina Cerilli as county commissioners to elect a new chairman to preside over the board. Kertes and Chew will become the second Republican majority of the board in the last half century. Cerilli has served as board chairperson the previous four years.

Controller Jeff Balzer, Recorder of Deeds Sherry Magretti Hamilton and Treasurer Jared Squires will begin new four-year terms in office, each having won re-election last month.

Newly elected Recorder of Deeds Frank Schiefer returns to the job he held from 2012-15 to serve his second non-consecutive term in office.

That rarity prompted Judge Jim Silvis, who administered Schiefer’s oath, to quip that the oddity “makes him the Grover Cleveland of Westmoreland County” in reference to the former U.S. president who served non-consecutive terms in office in the late 1800s.

When work begins next month, the county court will operate with two new judges: Michael Stewart II and Justin Walsh, who are expected serve as judges in the family court division.

“This is the first time in seven years we will have a full compliment of judges,” said President Judge Rita Hathaway.

Stewart, a lawyer from Hempfield, and Walsh, a Republican member of the state House of Representatives from Rostraver, will serve 10-year terms on the bench.

Judges Chris Scherer and Michele Bononi, who won retention to new 10-year terms, were also sworn in on Thursday.

Sheriff-elect James Albert, who defeated two-term Republican incumbent Jonathan Held, will have his own ceremony next week to be sworn in to office. Albert’s ceremony will be conducted Dec. 30 at Pizza Siena in Greensburg, the same location from which he launched his campaign in mid-2018.