The state Department of Transportation deserves a cheer for providing a third kind of testimony option at Thursday's public hearing dealing with the proposed Route 228 Improvement Project.

Not only did PennDOT allow verbal and written testimony, but it also made a stenographer available for private testimony. That option gave people who either are shy about standing up before a group, or who might not have had time to write down their thoughts, the opportunity to express their viewpoints anyway.

Mark Hillwig, a PennDOT District 10 spokesman, said the transportation agency makes available that option in higher-profile projects, and Route 228 meets that criterion.

Hillwig said Friday that 14 people took advantage of the private-testimony option while about a dozen people provided verbal testimony.

In addition, he said, a number of people provided written testimony.

It's important that people who want to express their views regarding such a project have the opportunity to do so. It would seem that in this instance, PennDOT covered all the bases.

The project involves improvements to the highway spanning Adams, Cranberry and Middlesex townships and Mars and Seven Fields boroughs.

The state Department of Agriculture merits praise for its expanded commitment to making inspection reports dealing with eateries in the commonwealth easily accessible by the public.That's despite the fact that it took the Morning Call of Allentown to bring the issue to the forefront when it reported in July 2005 that oversight of the state's restaurants was haphazard and that the frequency of inspections varied widely.The newspaper had to file written requests under the state's Right-to-Know Law to obtain 200,000 food inspection records. An analysis of 78,000 of those records found public health agencies in the state often do not provide the most basic monitoring of food establishments and are hampered by an inadequate number of inspectors and a disorganized record-keeping system.Now the Agriculture Department has revamped its online database of restaurant records so consumers can read complete inspection reports dealing with eateries. The 18-month-old database previously allowed people to see only whether the more than 23,000 restaurants under the state's jurisdiction had passed inspection.The expanded data in question indicate whether employees followed proper hand-washing procedures; whether cooking equipment, counters and utensils were cleaned and sanitized; and whether the inspector found evidence of rodent, animal or insect infestation, among other things.Not all restaurants are in the online database since six counties — Allegheny, Berks, Bucks, Chester Erie and Montgomery; four cities — including Butler; and 196 other municipalities do their own licensing and inspections. However, commendably, the department hopes to have those units of government using a similar inspection system and sharing their reports with the state by the end of this year.The restaurant inspection database can be found online at http://www.agriculture.state.pa.us/pafoodsafety. Inspection records dealing with Butler County eateries outside the city are part of that database.Given today's technology, there is no reason for this information to remain outside easy public access.

At a meeting last Monday, some members of the Seneca Valley School Board indicated that it was not their job to go through the proposed 2007-08 budget line by line.While it might not be school directors' responsibility to know every small detail contained in the budget — indeed, that would be impossible within the scope of Seneca's proposed $87.3 million 2007-08 spending package — it is school board members' responsibility to have a firm grasp of each budget category so he or she can vote in an informed way in regard to passage or rejection.No school district budget should be voted upon merely on the recommendations of district administrators. A school board is the administrators' employer, and it is board members who are elected by districts' voters to represent taxpayers' best interests.The proposed 2007-08 budget apparently will require a 4.26-mill property tax increase. With an attitude like that expressed last Monday, can district taxpayers be certain that all reasonable possibilities for cost control really have been sought out and implemented?