Conservator says he expects to scale back role in Register of Wills office

Conservator Jim Antoniono said Tuesday his intensive oversight of the beleaguered Westmoreland County Register of Wills Office is no longer needed.

“I feel comfortable with the new leadership. My time over there is going to be really limited to just making sure it is going in the right direction,” Antoniono said.

He said operational functions, supervision and training of staff has significantly improved in recent weeks in the office that for years struggled to keep up with work requirements.

Westmoreland County judges appointed Antoniono, a private lawyer, in May to serve as the de facto head of the courthouse office where adoption and guardianship records and wills and estates are filed.

Sherry Magretti Hamilton, the three-term elected register of wills, was effectively stripped of her administrative duties after she was found in contempt of court for violating two court orders. They required she and her staff adhere to strict standards after finding the office repeatedly had fallen behind on its work.

Hamilton, as part of an agreement signed in June to avoid a potential jail sentence, was ordered to pay a $10,000 fine and resign her elected post by year’s end. She continues to earn a nearly $90,000 annual salary.

Antoniono has been paid more than $13,100 to date in his role as conservator. He said he submitted another bill this week for an additional payment of $3,800 but expects his pay to decrease in the coming months. Antoniono is paid $170 an hour.

New management has had an impact, Antoniono said. In late June, he fired the former first deputy, who served under Hamilton since she took office in 2016, and rehired former office clerk Katie Pecarchik as the new second in command. Pecarchik is in line to become acting register of wills after Hamilton’s resignation.

“I feel real comfortable now. Within 24 hours of her starting in the office, there was a different environment,” Antoniono said.

Hamilton, who has been on vacation since the end of June, remains on the payroll and has performed a series of jobs for Antoniono since her demotion, including payroll functions, conducting hearings and in the coming weeks will work to scan documents. She is consulted on systemic changes within the office, Antoniono said.

Work has been ongoing to train new staff including on key bookkeeping responsibilities officials said were for years neglected. Officials this month discovered a dormant bank account flush with about $270,000 in cash that is funded through $10 fees assessed on every document filed in the office.

The account is designed to pay for technology upgrades, but according to financial records on file with the county controller, the money remained mostly untouched since before 2020. Only about $32,000 since 2021 was spent from the fund to pay banking expenses to keep the account open.

Westmoreland County Treasurer Jared Squires said it is unusual for an account dedicated to “automation enhancements” to remain dormant for years. County statutes allows elected officials to exclusively control certain bank accounts related to their office functions.

“Accounts like this typically don’t have large sums of money,” Squires said. “We knew about the account but didn’t have control over it. The person who had signatory rights over it retired over a year ago.”

No improprieties involving the account are suspected, Squires and Antoniono said.

Several Westmoreland County elected officers have similar control over automation accounts.

Prothonotary Gina O’Barto said her fund, which listed about $260,000 in assets at the end of last year, is used to pay annual computer software licenses.

“In the future, I would like to have enough money in there to purchase better software. We don’t really use it (account funds) for a lot of stuff. We can’t use it to buy office furniture,” O’Barto said.