Whitehall-Coplay school director stepping down
Leiner leaving board to focus on health after cancer diagnosis
Bill Leiner Jr., who has worn many hats in the Lehigh Valley as a county commissioner, borough mayor and Democratic candidate for Congress, is hanging up his most recent hat as Whitehall-Coplay School Board member to focus on his health.
Leiner, 67, has served on the school board since 2015, helping lead the district through the implementation of full-day kindergarten, safety concerns following a spate of school shootings around the country, and several significant capital projects. But a cancer diagnosis in January and resulting chemotherapy treatments led him to reevaluate how much should be on his plate. He officially vacates his seat April 12.
“I have been a busy guy my entire life, since I was a teenager,” he said Tuesday. “My plate has always been full. Last week, I came to realize this circumstance I find myself in requires a little more focus and attention on my healing than what I thought it would.”
Leiner, a registered nurse, is keeping his day job of consulting and community outreach with New Vitae Wellness and Recovery, a mental health treatment center in Quakertown. He also writes for the Lehigh Valley Press. But the volunteer job of school director involves intense concentration, reading, researching and long meetings.
“It is time to prune my schedule,” he wrote in a news release announcing his resignation.
The former Bethlehem Steel machinist has engaged in local politics for several decades, serving stints as mayor of Coplay, where he lives; Lehigh County commissioner; Coplay council member; chairperson of the local Edward M. Kennedy Democratic Association; and in 2018, a Democratic candidate vying to fill former U.S. Rep. Charlie Dent’s congressional seat representing the Lehigh Valley. He later pulled out of that race to support Susan Wild.
“Of the four offices I’ve held, in a way, this was the best one,” he said, because it involved working with thoughtful people helping children craft their futures. “I enjoyed the time on. Personally, I learned a lot.”
In addition to the previously mentioned milestones, he’s proud of one other that seems small, but was significant to him: getting a POW/MIA flag on the district flag pole.
He considers one of the board’s biggest challenges to be the annual battle against a tax hike. In his 23 years as an elected official, he said, he only once voted for a tax hike: the year Whitehall-Coplay went to full-day kindergarten and started bidding for the athletic complex renovations.
Leiner, who was unopposed during both his elections to the school board, exits before one of the most stacked primaries the board has seen in recent memory. Ten people are running for four seats, several galvanized by the issues surrounding the reopening of schools during the pandemic.
“I am delighted to see a full range of candidates pursuing a seat on the Whitehall-Coplay School Board. This is a welcomed change,” he wrote in his statement. “It truly is wonderful to see younger people running for political office. I think we need more of this at every level of government.”
In the meantime, the board will appoint someone to fill Leiner’s seat until December. The board will approve Leiner’s resignation at its April 12 meeting and pick a replacement at its May 10 meeting, district Superintendent Lorie Hackett said.