Lehighton council members who voted against the hiring of the borough’s new police chief last week said their decision wasn’t personal.

Borough council on a 3-2 measure hired Joseph Sparich as police chief. Council President Grant Hunsicker, Councilwoman Lisa Perry and Councilman Donnie Rehrig were in favor. Councilmen Ryan Saunders and Darryl Arner were opposed.

Councilwoman Autumn Abelovsky abstained from the vote because her husband, Troy, was one of the candidates who applied for the position. Councilman Joe Flickinger was absent.

Sparich, of Weatherly, was hired at a salary of $95,000, and is expected to start by mid-August.

The terms of his contract have not yet been finalized.

Sparich serves as lieutenant for the Pennsylvania State Police Hazleton barracks.

Recruitment

Perry said the borough used the Meyner Center to help with the recruitment process “to ensure we received the best quality of candidates.”

The Meyner Center set up a professional panel of police chiefs do the second interviews. Perry said Sparich scored the highest score.

Initially 18 candidates applied for the position, including Troy Abelovsky, who works for Bethlehem Township Police Department.

Autumn Abelovsky said when former Chief Brian Biechy gave his retirement notice she addressed council and the solicitor because there was a possibility her husband would apply.

Abelovsky said council “really has no oversight of the police chief other than approving his contract and retaining him each year, so my question was do you feel like this is going to be an issue?” She said she was willing to resign from council prior to her husband applying.

“Everybody on council and the solicitor said there was absolutely no reason for me to resign,” she said.

Abelovsky said if her husband had been hired she would abstain from voting on issues involving him.

Abelovsky said she did not know who any of the applicants were, nor was she involved in the process.

“When the day came for them to decide, my husband received a phone call from the Meyner Center,” she said. “Personally I wasn’t happy with the decision, but professionally, I had to accept that.”

As for Sparich, Abelovsky said that her decision to abstain from the vote was based on her morals.

“I don’t know Joe Sparich, I have no personal issues with Joe Sparich with him being our police chief or being hired,” she said. “I just hope that the process was done without bias.”

Arner voted against Sparich, saying he didn’t care for “the whole way it was handled.”

“I thought there would be more discussion,” he said. “I voted in protest with the whole way council went about doing it.”

Saunders, who also voted no, said the Meyner Center is a third party recruiting agency.

“The reason we did that was to ensure, No. 1 that we would get the best candidates possible,” Saunders said. “And the second reason was because we knew going into this that Autumn’s husband, Troy, was going to be applying for the job, so this ensured that we were going to get the most unbiased process possible.”

Saunders said the second round of interviews was conducted by an expert panel of police chiefs.

The panel interviewed candidates and graded them on a point scale. Joe Sparich scored one point higher than Troy Abelovsky.

“This entire process, I was determined that I was going to vote for the candidate that the Meyner Center recommended because that’s who we hired for them to give us the best possible chief,” Saunders said.

“I had asked each expert chief when they were done deliberating who is the best fit for our borough, and I voted for the candidate that they told me was the best fit for our borough, which would have been Troy, based on their findings of the interviewing process.

“For me, I needed them to tell me because we hired you to do this; you’re the experts, so I wanted them to tell me who is the best fit for our borough,” Saunders said. “All three of them said Troy, and that’s who I voted for.

Others, he said, voted based on the points scale.

Both Saunders and Arner said they will support Sparich.

“My hat’s off to Autumn Abelovsky for being put in a very difficult situation; she took the high road the entire time,” he added.

New police chief

Sparich is an Army veteran, and also served in the Pennsylvania National Guard.

He has 26 years of experience as a police officer, beginning as a patrolman with the Hazleton City Police Department, where he became a certified K-9 officer.

Sparich enlisted in the Pennsylvania State Police in 2000, and worked his way through the ranks to become lieutenant. His coverage area in the state police was Carbon, Monroe, Luzerne and Columbia counties.

His education and training includes Northwestern University Center for public safety, school of police staff and command; PSP leadership development program; FBI-LEEDA Command leadership Institute for Law Enforcement Executives; and PSP civil disorder training.

Former police Chief Brian Biechy’s last day was April 26. He was originally set to retire Aug. 10. Gabe Szozda is officer in charge until Sparich begins employment.