Following a request from county commissioners, the Lycoming County Planning Commission will take on a greater role within the Planning and Community Development Department, it was announced during a recent commission.

What that expanded role will entail remains to be determined, though Chairman Jason Bogle said the group had identified four areas of interest, including: being more actively involved in and supporting the Planning Department on its department goals; departmental organization; staffing; and budget priorities.

“How this plays out is essentially the planning department initiates the planning commission reviews, and it advises the commissioners, and then the commissioners approve the recommendation, and the planning department implements them, Bogle said.

“I think that we’re looking at determining whether we want to have those responsibilities and whether we accept that,” he said, stressing the importance of having fully vetted ideas prior to review by the commissioners.

“Our role here is to support the county and support the planning department, and everybody involved in that process along the way and have a more active role in doing that,” Bogle said.

“Since I’ve been sitting on this commission, I’ve never seen a budget that I’m aware of. Is this something where there’s going to be a budget at the beginning of the year, and we’ll play an active role in reviewing and commenting or helping with that budget proposal,” asked commission member Joe Reighard.

“The part that comes after tonight is that the Planning Commission and the Planning Department need to make it a point to get together and sort out the details of this,” Bogle said, adding that it would be advantageous to do so early in 2026.

“I like this direction,” said Planning & Community Department AICP Director Jenny Picciano.

“It will be helpful to our staff, and more importantly, it’ll be helpful to the county,” she said, noting that commission members are out in the community, working in different sectors.

“You see what the need is out here. So we welcome this opportunity,” Picciano said.

Commission member Jeffrey Stroehmann noted that the reality of the planning function was different than his expectation prior to coming on the board.

“When I came on board, my first meeting consisted of an executive director discussing with us how to apply for more grant money to hire more people to make the department bigger,” he said.

“Now there’s been a purging throughout county government, including the planning commission,” Stroehmann said, adding that he supports the measure.

“It’s caused some difficulties on staff, but I can say through observation and seeing this happen many times before in other organizations, the good people are the ones that stick around,” he continued.

“I’m happy to be part of this, and I support the new direction of the board, being more proactive, and working with staff and building a leaner, meaner model for other counties,” Stroehmann said.

“I’ve always seen this as a group of subject matter experts in very different areas within this industry that overlap a lot with the planning department, and I would like to see us involved in the planning process from the beginning and provide our support from the beginning,” Bogle said.

With the commission at a consensus on moving forward, Bogle said his next step would be to deliver a memo to the commissions informing them of what had been discussed.

“This is how it was designed years back,” commission member Beth Miller said, suggesting bringing some previous, experienced members to help make the changes.

“I know three past members from before what appeared to me was the big change. So I think we do have some expertise, and some folks we could ask to be part of any planning or work sessions, because every one of these are very heavy lifts, as far as to be able to come out and out of the gates running with it,” said Secretary Denise Reis.

“I think what we need to do is form an ad hoc committee to spearhead this,” Bogle suggested.

“I think that’s a good route to go as well, because if you get those people who were here before, they’re going to be able to tell you what worked properly and what didn’t. And then you’ve got that tacit knowledge that you can use to build a more perfect machine based on some of their input,” said commission member Billy Brooks.