Intermunicipal cooperation is a goal many statewide planners have been supporting for decades.

They see it as a way forward for smaller communities which have limited resources and are being pressed by rising costs, static or declining population and a shrinking tax base.

This is one prime reason why townships often resist throwing their lot with cities or boroughs. There have been several notable examples of merger attempts in our five-county Times News region that could never get a head of steam toward completion. When voters were given the question in referendums, the answer has been a resounding “no.” One of the most spectacular failures was when Easton advocated for a merger with its contiguous townships and boroughs several decades ago.

Although it never got as far as a vote, a similar proposal to merge Stroudsburg, East Stroudsburg and Stroud Township also went down in flames, although their police departments are, and the merged force is known as the Stroud Area Regional Police Department.

Most municipal officials shy away from using the “m” word for several compelling reasons. For one, it’s asking a lot of a person to eliminate his or her own job. Secondly, it could have an impact on full-time employees when jobs are eliminated to avoid duplication. For example, if three communities merge, the single entity does not need three police chiefs, three community managers, etc.

For these and other reasons, officials of two or more municipalities prefer strategies that allow them to cooperate, especially when it comes to using their combined buying power to lower prices of goods and services.

Several area communities are discussing a merger of police or fire departments as the next step to their intermunicipal cooperation. Some police mergers have been quite successful.

With the proliferation of massive warehouses being constructed almost nonstop in the Lehigh Valley and parts of Schuylkill and Carbon counties, municipal officials are concerned about vanishing farmland and how this trend could impact the quality of life issues so near and dear to the hearts of residents.

That’s why I am impressed with the updating of the Northern Lehigh Multi-Municipal Comprehensive Plan which was approved most recently by Slatington Borough Council last month. In addition to Slatington, the signatories to the plan are: Heidelberg, Lowhill, Lynn, Washington and Weisenberg townships. There are several other of these multiple municipal plans sprinkled throughout the region.

I was surprised to learn that the Northern Lehigh plan has been in effect for 18 years, but planners thought that given all that has happened in terms of land use in Lehigh County in the intervening years it was time for an update.

According to the group’s mission statement, the purpose of their joint efforts is to “shape their collective vision for the future.” When it was originally adopted, it was a first of its kind in not only our region but in Pennsylvania, and it has served as a model for other joint municipal efforts.

In developing the plan initially, planners said the process requires “thoughtful coordination, deep consensus building and a collective open mind to work as partners in pursuit of health, safety and general welfare” among the six involved municipalities.

The plan was developed and adopted in accordance with the Pennsylvania Municipalities Planning Code. Simply stated, this planning process is to lay out a path for where these municipalities want to go and how they want to get there. Some of the areas that are covered in the plan include public policy for land use, agriculture, transportation, utilities, recreation, education, housing and other major local priorities.

I commend the leaders of these six municipalities, both past and present, for the visionary foresight they have brought to the creation and nurturing of this vehicle, and I heartily recommend it to other regional communities that this is a way to better achieve shared goals that should ultimately improve their residents’ quality of life.

By Bruce Frassinelli | tneditor@tnonline.com