As much as state lawmakers might hope that the pay-raise controversy would go away, that is not likely to happen anytime soon. Last week, news reports focused on how many lawmakers were giving back their questionable increase in pay that was received between August and November. As of Friday, fewer than half of the 158 lawmakers (out of a total of 253) who took the extra money had committed to returning it.

While every legislator who took the extra money through the clearly unconstitutional tactic of "unvouchered expenses" should repay the money, voters must not lose sight of the bigger picture — forcing change in Harrisburg by defeating incumbents in next year's elections and demanding that lawmakers obey the constitution. A reformed legislature would feature more transparency, greater accountability and less arrogance from entrenched lawmakers. Longer term, making Harrisburg more effective for citizens might require term limits and a 50 percent reduction in the size of the legislature, now ranked as the most expensive in the nation.

In the short term, however, the pay raise is the focus of attention and continues to generate controversy, voter activism — and even a little bit of humor.

Consider state Sen. Joe Conti, R-Bucks, who initially said he would not give back the ill-gotten extra money received through unvouchered expenses because he had already spent it on home improvements. Conti was quoted as saying "The treasurer would have to send someone to remove a new water heater I installed in my house."

After hearing that statement, John Grogan, a columnist for the Philadelphia Inquirer, volunteered to help with the water heater removal and assembled a team of handymen to help do the work. After Grogan wrote about plans in his column, his readers helped assemble a crew of more than two dozen volunteers consisting of contractors, master plumbers and others prepared to help relieve Conti of his newly purchased water heater. Finally, the senator relented and told Grogan the money would be repaid.

In his next column, Grogan began with the words, "OK, people, you can put away those pipe wrenches."

As much entertainment as Conti and Grogan have provided, the issue of the ill-gotten money is serious.

Of the 158 lawmakers who took the extra money, amounting to several thousand dollars each, it is scandalous that fewer than half are on record pledging to repay the money.

Some say that they've spent it on home repairs, others say it went to legislative office needs and several report having given the money to charity.

Regardless of what was done with the money, it should be returned. It was taken under such uncertain and unethical circumstances that any reasonable person would have set it aside and waited for a final, legal determination.

Beyond that, the more ethical and honorable solution would have been to never accept the money in the first place, and wait until after the next election for the raise — as the state constitution mandates.

If outside pressure results in more conversions similar to Conti's, then pressure within the legislature itself should build for a universal return of the tainted money. Every lawmaker who has already given or will be giving the money back, either in a lump sum or over time through payroll deduction, should demand that every one of the 131 House members and 27 members of the Senate do the same.

And even when, or if, every penny of the unvouchered expense money is given back, the issue is not over. The stealthy, middle-of-the-night pay-raise vote on July 7 and subsequent constitution-defying use of unvouchered expenses opened the eyes of millions of Pennsylvanians to the arrogance, and often self-serving behavior of many state lawmakers — most of whom have been re-elected by their constituents on a regular basis.

And that points to the most effective way to ensure change comes to Harrisburg — defeat significant numbers of long-serving incumbents and party leaders. New people and new ideas are needed to change the way Harrisburg works.