While many Republican officials in Pennsylvania were questioning the outcome of the 2020 presidential election, the GOP piled up gains in the General Assembly, strengthening their hold on the Senate and House of Representatives majorities.

Less noticed was the Republicans’ victories in two of the three row offices, the first time the GOP had taken control of the offices of treasurer and auditor general in 20 years. Mind you, all of these contests were on the same ballot, but those who claimed Trump was robbed couldn’t explain away these GOP successes.

Attorney General Josh Shapiro, a Democrat, won re-election, preventing the Republicans from earning a clean sweep.

The major upset was when Stacy Garrity defeated incumbent Democrat Joe Torsella by about 81,000 votes. Auditor General Timothy DeFoor fills the job vacated by incumbent Democrat Eugene DePasquale, who could not run for re-election because of a two-term limit on row officers. Shapiro was sworn in for his second term, but he is considered to be a prominent candidate for governor next year after incumbent Democrat Tom Wolf leaves office. The governor also has a two-term limit.

The Pennsylvania constitution created three statewide departments which are technically considered part of the executive branch, but since the officeholders are elected by us voters, they display strong independence from the governor. This will be especially true now that there are two Republicans.

This elective factor, however, also means independence from the other two branches of government - legislative and judicial.

This arm’s-length relationship also plays out on the local level in counties such as Carbon, Schuylkill and Monroe where row officers are elected but nominally report to the board of county commissioners. Northampton and Lehigh are home rule counties, so their row offices are constituted somewhat differently.

You might recall how the Carbon and Schuylkill commissioners found themselves between a rock and a hard place in dealing with the fallout from allegations surrounding Clerk of Courts William McGinley of Carbon and his counterpart, Stephen Lukach Jr. of Schuylkill. Both wound up in prison for misappropriating funds. Unlike state row officers, there are no term limits on county row offices, although there should be. Both McGinley and Lukach served for nearly 30 years each.

Getting back to the newly elected statewide row officers, before her election, Garrity, a graduate of Bloomsburg University, served in the U.S. Army Reserve and worked for Global Tungsten & Powders, a supplier of refractory powders, in Bradford County in Pennsylvania’s northern tier.

She ran on a platform of more government transparency and helping parents sock away cash for their children’s education through state-supported savings accounts. She also vowed to eliminate some of the onerous fees facing residents in their transactions with banks and other financial institutions.

Her goal is to give taxpayers the ability to go online to look at checks written from the Treasury Department. “It’s their money, and they deserve to know how every dollar is spent,” Garrity said.

In noting that the prior year has been full of challenges and hard feelings, Garrity said, “If you focus on the rearview mirror, you’ll miss where you’re headed. I say we look ahead toward a place of optimism and cooperation.”

Auditor General DeFoor was Dauphin County Controller for five years before resigning to take the state job. He also was a special investigator for the Pennsylvania Office of Inspector General and a special agent with the Pennsylvania Office of Attorney General.

DeFoor has a tough act to follow because DePasquale was aggressive in auditing local and school district funds and never hesitated to call out officials if he felt there were deficiencies in their accounts.

DeFoor agrees that state taxpayers expect and deserve to have “accountability, integrity and transparency” that their “hard-earned taxpayer dollars are being used and spent appropriately.”

“While you can’t run government like it’s a business, you can watch how government spends its money like it’s a business,” he said. “I’ll aggressively go after waste, fraud and abuse.”

By Bruce Frassinelli | tneditor@tnonline.com