Lansford Borough Council on Wednesday again deadlocked 3-3 on adjusting the pay rate for two police officers they approved for full-time status and waived additional testing requirements.

Mayor Denise Leibensperger cast the tie breaking vote to set the pay rate for Officers Amie Barclay and Danilo Garcia to $33.95 per the current police contract.

The vote also included waiving the background investigation, medical exam and polygraph testing, which was a point of contention for the split council, now down to six members.

Councilman Jack Soberick resigned earlier this month. He was the second council resignation this year. Former Council President George Gilbert resigned in January after two weeks in the post.

Council accepted another resignation Wednesday night. Solicitor Bob Yurchak submitted his resignation, effective Oct. 14.

“After much reflection, my time has come to leave as Solicitor,” Yurchak wrote. “I have appreciated my time as Lansford Borough Solicitor and I want to thank all those with whom I have had the pleasure to work over the past years.

“I will continue performing my duties up to October 14th, but not thereafter. Best wishes going forward,” he concluded.

Council’s special meeting opened with courtesy and goodwill but quickly dissolved into disagreements and open hostility with questions regarding the civil service process which produced the two full-time officers voted upon this month.

Resident Erin Soberick, who administers a community social media page, asked how council was moving forward with civil service “since the rules were not followed. There really is no list that could be certified.”

Council President Joe Genits said that council received the police eligibility list from the borough’s Civil Service Commission, and what council did or will do after that was up to council. Anyone with standing who believes something was done wrong can appeal, he said.

Councilman John Zym asked what rules weren’t followed, asking for clarification.

Councilman Bruce Markovich said that the first rule of civil service was to have an open and closing date for applications.

“We never did that. We never advertised for applications,” he said. “We took applications that were submitted to us maybe a year previous.”

Leibensperger disagreed with him, saying that the borough did advertise for applicants last September, and a newly reorganized Civil Service Commission acted on applicants that weren’t tested.

“We did not advertise for applicants, Mayor,” Markovich said. “We did not. We took the applicants that we had here, and they have been here for like over a year.”

He told her to look at the legal ads in the newspaper for police applications under civil service, all have opening and closing dates.

“All those municipalities — they all use our civil service rules. We sent them to all of them,” Markovich said. “They are so easy to use. That’s why they took all of ours and they adopted them a little bit. They’ve being using ours for years. We did not follow the rules.”

Markovich put the blame on borough council, not the civil service commission, saying they needed an opening and closing date for applicants.

Leibensperger said the borough had already advertised properly for applicants, but the civil service commission “fell apart” last year and the borough had those two applications waiting to be tested.

They continued to disagree, and resident Tommy Vadyak from the audience asked council to verify the legal advertisements with the Times News.

Vadyak then added they have three more parts of the civil service process to follow, which included background investigation, medical exam and polygraph testing.

Zym told him that council could waive the additional testing, which resulted in another disagreement on whether or not they could waive those tests.

Vadyak said they can’t waive them as it’s state law, and Markovich agreed, saying that he sent the state law to council members, saying there was nothing in state law allowing them to waive those tests.

Councilman Joe Butrie asked if the two candidates underwent the testing, such as a polygraph to become part-time officers, as both candidates have been part-time officers — one for the past 17 years.

Markovich and Leibensperger disagreed on whether they were tested previously, and the mayor asked Officer Garcia, who was in the office, if he had polygraph for part-time.

“Yes, Ma’am,” he replied.

Vadyak wanted them to produce receipts, and Markovich said that he would also like to see that.

Markovich also said that state law doesn’t recognize part-time officers or how long they worked as part-time — they’re all considered new officers and state guidelines apply.

“That’s the state law. And it was sent to all of you. I don’t understand. Did you not read it? Did you not understand it?” Markovich asked.

All of this debate occurred during public courtesy, before council began taking any actions on agenda items, including the police pay increase and waiving the testing.

Council split on that vote with council members Markovich, Michele Bartek and Gwyneth Collevechio voting no, and Genits, Zym and Butrie voting yes. Leibensperger then broke the tie, voting yes.