end of year
A new era began in August with the welcoming of the first students to PennWest California, as well as PennWest Edinboro and PennWest Clarion.
The three campuses consolidated under the Pennsylvania Western University umbrella as a means of keeping all three open and fully operational while facing rising costs and declining enrollment.
The first semester as consolidated campuses seemed to go well. The first PennWest commencement exercises took place the weekend of Dec. 10-11 with more than 1,600 graduates from the three campuses.
A show of unity for the three campuses took place in August during Welcome Weekend 2022 with simultaneous PennWest flag raising ceremonies.
Each school still does maintain its identity in some ways, including its sports teams.
“We are Vulcans, Golden Eagles and Fighting Scots,” said Dr. Dale-Elizabeth Pehrsson, founding president of PennWest, in August. “The flag raising ceremony symbolizes that, together, we are part of something greater. PennWest is a place of boundless opportunities for our students.”
The combined universities are overseen by a single president in Pehrsson and a council of trustees.
Resignation was the word in Union Township in October, and plenty of it.
On October 17, four of the township’s five supervisors – Heather Daerr, chair; Charles Trax Jr., vice-chair; Richard Lawson and Michael Barna, who had only been a supervisor for three months – resigned, leaving Michalle Dupree as the lone supervisor in a township of roughly 6,000 residents. They cited a hostile atmosphere as a reason for their resignations
“I have never experienced the feeling of unsafety and fear and dread that I did in coming to those meetings,” Daerr said at the time about a group of regulars. “There was a pugnacious atmosphere. It was very difficult to conduct township business, and it was getting progressively worse.”
Other resignations included the Sweat Law Firm of Washington as solicitor; accounting firm Palermo/Kissinger & Associates; project manager Terri Gladus secretary/assistant treasurer Roberta Singer and the township’s two representatives to the Peters Creek Sanitary Authority – Harold Breinig and Frank Latorre.
A week after the resignations Washington County Judge Gary Gilman appointed Larry Spahr, Linda Evans Boren, Stephen Parish and Charles Wilson to serve on the board on an “interim basis” until January 2024. Each served as a Union Township supervisor in the past.
The judge also had to formally accept the resignations since in the absence of a majority board.
At the first meeting of the new board configuration Dupree asked for patience as the township moved forward.