Giving license

As head of the state bureau that grants occupational licenses to everyone from doctors to beauticians, Basil Merenda is often invited to speak at professional-association meetings.

The commissioner of the Pennsylvania Bureau of Professional and Occupational Affairs will be the first to tell you that what he does for a living is serious stuff. But a sense of humor is important in all walks of life, so when Merenda addresses, say, a roomful of osteopathic physicians, he likes to break the ice.

"I tell them, "I’m the guy who signs your licenses. That nice South Philly Italian name is going to be with your career for years to come,’" Merenda, 47, says with a chuckle.

Merenda works and lives in Harrisburg during the week and commutes back to his beloved South Philly on the weekends.

He shares a home with his mother on the 1900 block of South Hollywood Street, not far from 29th and Mifflin, where he and his two younger brothers were born and raised.

Joe Merenda, 45, is a firefighter at Engine 10 and Ladder 11, 12th and Reed streets, while Ed, 43, is an accountant who lives in South Jersey.

Basil Merenda soon will return to Philly for professional as well as personal reasons. In keeping with his goal to be more accessible and responsive to licensees, the legislature and the public, he’ll take some of the commonwealth’s 27 licensing boards on the road for meetings.

On Wednesday, the Pennsylvania Pharmacy Board – which licenses and disciplines state pharmacists – will meet at Temple University’s School of Pharmacy at 3307 N. Broad St.

As BPOA commissioner, Merenda oversees 760,000 licenses assigned to medical doctors, funeral directors, beauticians and barbers, accountants, Realtors and even car salespeople and dealerships.

THE BUREAU’S MISSION is twofold: to protect the integrity of the professions that serve the public on a daily basis and to protect the health and safety of the consumers who utilize their services. The agency is responsible for disciplining licensees when they violate the rules and regulations of their professions. Professionals can have their licenses to operate revoked, suspended or put on probation, Merenda explains.

"We have to make sure these licensees are doing their jobs professionally and competently because when it comes to healthcare licensees, like doctors and nurses, unprofessional and incompetent conduct could be a question of life and death.

"And when it comes to our business-licensing boards, like the Real Estate Commission and the Accountancy Board, unprofessional and incompetent conduct could result in significant monetary losses for commonwealth consumers," he says.

Sometimes the board’s regulatory actions coincide with criminal accusations.

Merenda recently signed an order to revoke the nursing license of Joan Wood Barnes. The Georgia native was convicted last month of slashing the feeding tubes of six patients at a North Philadelphia nursing home on Sept. 22. None of the patients was seriously harmed in the incident.

Appointed by Gov. Rendell in January 2004 and confirmed by the state Senate soon after, Merenda proudly points out that he’s the second Italian from South Philly to serve as BPOA commissioner. State Sen. Vince Fumo occupied the post in the mid-1970s under then-Gov. Milton Shapp.

"So I have some pretty big shoes to fill. I gotta show these people that South Philly guys can carry out our duty with intelligence, vigor and effectiveness to make a difference," he says.

After earning an economics degree from Villanova University, Merenda received his master’s in the field from Notre Dame University. He returned to Villanova for his law degree.

From 1987 to 1993, Merenda worked as legal counsel for United Food and Commercial Workers Union Local 1776 in Norristown, which represents Acme supermarket employees, among others.

Before his appointment to the BPOA post, Merenda was a prosecutor for the New Jersey Office of the Attorney General.

Merenda says he’s honored to serve the commonwealth and loves his job because it combines his passion for the law and public service.

"It’s a nice opportunity. As an attorney, it has the law, it has public policy and the political process. And I finally get an opportunity to work for Gov. Ed Rendell," he says.

Though it doesn’t figure into his current job, Merenda also has an interest in veterans affairs, which he traces to having a father who fought in World War II. Basil Merenda Sr. was a Navy man who participated in the D-Day invasion.

In addition, many first-generation Italian men who lived in Merenda’s neighborhood were in the military, he says.

Inspired by their stories and those of his father, Merenda wrote profiles of those heroes – including "Band of Brothers" vets William "Wild Bill" Guarnere and Edward "Babe" Heffron – for the Review and other publications.