Blair Commissioner Erb Seeking Second Term; Broadband Service is Goal

Editor's Note: Over the next few weeks, the Herald is publishing a series of articles regarding candidates for office who will appear on the May 21 primary election ballot. These articles are intended to offer voters a closer look at some of the candidates.

The Herald will be publishing a special section on May 16 with information about all candidates.

Blair County Commissioner Bruce Erb has announced that he is seeking re-election for a second term on the county's governing board.

Saying the county is "moving in the right direction," Erb said the things the commissioners are working on is setting the county up for a bright future.

"In terms of the things we are doing, both financially, with criminal justice reforms and increasing the housing stock to eliminate blight, we are making positive strides," he said.

Erb's family has roots in the Cove area. His grandfather Daniel Erb was born in Henrietta and served as a state representative from 1942 until 1957. Erb said improving the county's infrastructure in the rural areas is something he wants to continue to work on.

A major part of his infrastructure plan is bringing broadband service to those areas that don't have it.

"There are people out in the rural areas who don't have broadband service," he said. "This is something county government is working on. It is important for people to have cell service. It is part of a public safety issue."

Erb said making broadband available in all corners of the county will help attract business, which would reduce the number of people who leave the area for better jobs.

"We are trying to move forward with this because once you do that, it makes the quality of life better for the people in those regions and can also provide employment. No business is going to want to come to where they can't get broadband for cell service," he said.

Although Erb was not on the board of commissioners when the county decided to move forward with reassessment – his first term began during the implementation stage – he said the county's "back was against the wall" financially and that reassessment, which hadn't been done in over 50 years, was the only way to put the county back on solid financial ground.

"I can sit back objectively and say the county was in trouble because of the state mandates. They could not raise real estate taxes and there was no way to provide revenue," he said. "You can attribute a lot of the county's challenges to the fact that there had been a decision not to reassess for so many years."

Erb said he understands the public's dissatisfaction with the way reassessment was rolled out, but that the county's hands were tied.

"I think a lot of people were hoping it would be an incremental phase, but that's a state decision. We had to follow the law," he said.

Before being elected to the commissioners office, Erb served as the director of trust services for First National Bank, and said his background in finance has enabled him to help the county get on more secure financial ground.

He pointed out the county's pension fund as one example of his work in getting the county back on a good financial track.

Erb said the state mandates that the county have a defined benefit pension, and for almost a decade the county wasn't making any contributions to the plan. If left unchecked, it would have bankrupted the pension plan by 2025.

"The day I took office in 2016, we were $69 million behind in terms of contributions, and the interest and income that was lost on that," he said.

Through negotiating a reduced benefit package for future county employees, cutting investment management expenses and by increasing county contributions to the fund, Erb said the pension plan will be in much better financial shape.

"The pension plan is an obligation we have both morally and legally," he said. "The employees were doing their part, but the county wasn't doing theirs."

Other goals Erb has for a second term is getting the state to live up to its obligation when it comes to unfunded mandates.

He cited a 1987 Pennsylvania State Supreme Court case, Allegheny County v. the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, in which the Supreme Court ruled that the state, not individual counties, should fund the entire costs of the courts, citing equal justice to each of the state's 67 county's as the basis of its ruling.

"The state basically ignored that," Erb said. "Ten million dollars a year the state should be giving to Blair County courts."

Erb said the county is stronger now than it was four years ago, and he wants to continue strengthening it.

"We are in a much better financial position," he said. "The services we provide have stepped up and we have upgraded our budgeting and accounting system, There is a lot we can do yet, and that is why I am running for a second term."