Gov.-elect Wolf won't stay in governor's house
HARRISBURG — Gov.-elect Tom Wolf plans to use his own money to rent office space for state police security officers while they are guarding him at his private residence, where he plans to live as governor, a transition team spokesman said.
Wolf’s transition team is not saying how much he will pay for the office space. Wolf’s transition team spokesman, Jeffrey Sheridan, would only say that Wolf will pay “full market value.”
Decades of governors have lived at the governor’s official residence along the Susquehanna River in Harrisburg, where there is office space for the security team to work. But Wolf prefers to live at his residence in Mount Wolf, about 20 miles south of Harrisburg.
Wolf also will not accept the governor’s salary of nearly $191,000 in 2015. The businessman reported $1.3 million in adjusted gross income in 2013.
He takes office Jan. 20 after beating Republican Gov. Tom Corbett in last month’s election.
The office space Wolf plans to rent is in a building across the street from his home. He once owned the building before donating it to the Otterbein United Methodist Church, Sheridan said.
“This is one of those situations where he doesn’t want the taxpayers to pay for it, or incur any additional cost,” Sheridan said. “It’s something he doesn’t want to sock the taxpayers with.”
Sheridan said he did not know whether the police security team will be allowed inside Wolf’s residence while he is there, and a spokeswoman for the state police said the agency does not reveal such details publicly.
Corbett’s press secretary, Jay Pagni, said police security is always on the property at Corbett’s home in suburban Pittsburgh when the governor stays overnight there.
