McKean County commissioners have declared May to be Foster Care Month in the county.

They made the announcement during their regular meeting Tuesday morning.

According to the proclamation, there are about 15,000 children and youth in foster care throughout Pennsylvania, living with families “who open their homes and hearts and offer help to children whose families are in crisis, play a vital role in helping children and families heal and reconnect and launching children into successful adulthood.”

In the proclamation, they “urge all citizens to change a lifetime by sharing their hearts, opening their homes, and offering help to children in foster care, foster parents and the child welfare professional staff working with them during this month and throughout the year.”

Marcy Flickinger, Sue Hogue and Lisa Johnston from the county’s foster care program attended the meeting, which was held by teleconference.

Flickinger shared her appreciation of the commissioners’ support and of the foster parents.

“We couldn’t do our jobs without them,” she said.

Also at the meeting, Jeremy Morey, the planning director and chairman of the county’s Complete Count Committee for the 2020 census, gave an update of the committee’s recent activities.

They recently put up about 10 more signs in the Bradford City and Foster Township area at busy intersections to encourage people to take part, and an order has been placed with local signmaker Heath Cousins for more.

“We continue to see a fairly decent increase each week in every municipality,” Morey noted.

The highest participation has been in Bradford Township, with a 72.1% response rate, while the lowest is in Sergeant Township, where only 11 people have completed the census so far for a 7% participation rate. Countywide, 24,542 have completed the census, or about 47.6%.

In the 2010 census, the county population was about 43,000, he said.

He said residents should be seeing census packets being hung on their doors by census workers, and people can complete the survey by phone or online, too.

Morey said many areas of health care are affected by census numbers, influencing local disbursement of funding through the following programs: Medicaid, Medicare Part B, CHIP, WIC and SNAP.

He noted, “$1.5 trillion annually goes to those programs.”

Morey explained that the impact is more pronounced in rural areas like this one that have limited health care facilities.

Local outreach efforts for census awareness have included yard signs, community banners, ads in publications and radio interviews.

In other business, commissioners approved a 2019 property tax refund for an individual who qualified for a veteran exemption, and they approved a property tax request for a 2020 veteran exemption for Lt. John C. Roche VFW Post 212 in Bradford.

They also voted in favor of recapturing prior 2019 tax exemption from five Keystone Opportunity Zone (KOZ) applicants who were not eligible. The KOZ program offers temporary state and local tax benefits to businesses.

The following were not eligible because they were not in compliance: WMP Eldred LLC, Ravyn & Robyn Pa Holding LLC and DJN Land Holdings LLC. Angie Tennies, director of the county’s assessment office, noted that a DJN representative reported to her that the issue was resolved, but she had not been able to confirm it by the time of the meeting.

Representatives of two separate parcels for Portage Industrial Properties LLC were not eligible because they did not submit an application that year.

Under the human resources update, there was one new employee and one resignation.

Sherri Geary, economic development director, resigned effective May 22 to take a position with the Erie County Redevelopment Authority. Amy Aguilar was hired as a clerk typist in the prothonotary office.

Commissioners approved agreements with Workforce Solutions for North Central PA for two summer interns: a GIS intern with the planning commission, and an intern with the Good Growing Gardens program. The interns will make $10.35 per hour for a maximum of 35 hours per week for eight weeks.

The next commissioners meeting will be at 10 a.m. May 26. That meeting will be held electronically, too.