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Pocono News Section
No Decision on Luzerne Co. Budget Loan
No Decision on Luzerne Co. Budget Loan - Tuesday, October 7, 2008 at 7:02PM EST
Reported by: Joe Holden
Tuesday, Oct 7, 2008 @ 07:02pm EST
WILKES-BARRE, LUZERNE COUNTY- Luzerne County is in some serious debt and it’s going to cost 16-million dollars to get out of it. Now a judge will decide if the county will get a loan to help pay for it.
If they don't get it, county officials say they could run out of money and won't be able to pay the bills by next month.
Testimony end Tuesday afternoon and we wanted to talk to the county's Chief Legal Advisor. We wanted to ask Jim Blaum about allegations a former county administration ignored policy and deceived commissioners into approving a bad budget. But he wouldn’t say much.
Despite any decision, testimony revealed ex-budget director Sam Diaz chose to leave out multi-million dollar bills, essentially hanging the county in debt. That's now at least a 16 million dollar problem.
Leaders said government would shut down in November without that cash. Sam Guesto was the County Manager under the administration that's blamed for this mess. His name up in court. We asked why? He said he didn’t know.
In attempting in court to answer the judge's questions about the budget shortfall, Judge Lokuta said quote, "Let's not forget counselor, you had some problems of your own with junkits made to male or female strip clubs."
Judge Lokuta was referring to the federal investigation of the county's debit card scandal. It was also asked if the FBI was probing this situation. There were no answers.
There's also no information on a possible decision on the loan, though the judge said it'll be by November.
Eyewitness News reached out to Commissioners Greg Skrepenak and Steve Urban. They have not returned our calls.
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