“This is my 27th year in corrections,” Lehigh County Jail Warden Janine Donate replied when asked by Lehigh County Commissioner Nathan Brown to address the board during their Aug. 22 meeting.

Lehigh County Executive Phillips Armstrong had just nominated Donate to be the new director of corrections.

He described her as someone of whom he is proud, someone who has been “coming up from our own ranks.”

In other matters, the proposed $5 vehicle tax to fix infrastructure such as bridges proposed by Armstrong at the commissioners previous meeting came under attack by Joe Hilliard, who called it a “total money grab on the middle class and working poor.”

He said it is just not needed.

“All of our bridges are fixed,” Hilliard said.

He called the proposed state contribution of $2 million to those counties that enact the vehicle tax, a “bribe.”

“Hold them [the state] to what they should do,” Hilliard told commissioners.

According to Lehigh County Recreation Authority Executive Director Michael Kukitz, a feasibility study on the sustainability of a 16,000-square-foot Northern Lehigh Community Center at W. Church Street, Slatington, will be completed by the end of the year.

Kukitz said he would share the results of that study with the board.

He said a public hearing is scheduled for Sept. 20 in the Northern Lehigh School District Administration Building.

Commissioners approved release of $3,250 for the feasibility study.

This is a portion of the total money set aside in the county’s budget for the Northern Lehigh Community Center.

Commissioners also approved distribution of gaming program grants: Borough of Coopersburg and Upper Saucon Township will each receive $32,993 for a police cruiser; Whitehall Township is allocated $62,250 for a police cruiser and a license plate reader; the Borough of Fountain Hill will receive $113,800 for a rescue system, a patrol vehicle and training and outfitting of three part-time officers; Salisbury Township was allocated $113,800 for two patrol vehicles, funding for 300 hours of additional police patrols in the traffic corridor safety project and other hardware including camera systems.

Commissioners also gave preliminary or first reading approval to give a young bison bull from its herd at the Trexler Nature Preserve to Catoctin Zoo and Wildlife Preserve in Thurmont, Md.

As the young bull is “coming of age,” he will be a challenge to the existing dominant male on the preserve and must be transferred.