Letter to the editor: Jail board nomination undermines citizen representation

Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald hopes to replace Jail Oversight Board member Terri Klein with a former warden of the Allegheny County Jail (“Fitzgerald seeks to appoint former warden to Allegheny County Jail board,” March 4, TribLIVE). This violates the intention of the state statute governing the authority of the Jail Oversight Board and is an arrogant self-serving decision.

The state statute on citizen representation on the board reads “citizens shall be representative of the broad segments of the county’s population … whose background and experience indicate that they are qualified to act in the interests of the public.” To the best of my knowledge, no other jail advisory board in Pennsylvania has a former warden as a citizen representative. County governments recognize that having bona fide citizen representation should exclude a former warden of the same institution the board is mandated to oversee. This is a flagrant conflict of interest and a gross assault on the spirit of genuine citizen participation.

Klein voted against the C-SAU contract which would have deployed dangerous military hardware against the residents of the jail, contrary to Fitzgerald’s wishes. The precedent that the county executive is setting in removing Klein is that citizens can be removed if they do not vote with the county executive. If Allegheny County Council ratifies this nomination, they are reinforcing this message. This is not democracy, it is authoritarianism.

I urge council members to vote against this nomination of a former warden representing “broad segments of the county’s populations.”

John Kenstowicz

Morningside