{"id":82737,"date":"2026-01-09T21:24:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-09T21:24:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/82737\/"},"modified":"2026-01-09T21:24:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-09T21:24:08","slug":"meet-easton-city-councils-3-newest-members","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/82737\/","title":{"rendered":"Meet Easton City Council\u2019s 3 newest members"},"content":{"rendered":"

Residents will see new faces at Easton City Council meetings<\/a> to start 2026. <\/p>\n

Julie Zando-Dennis, Frank Graziano III and Susan Hartranft-Bittinger were elected to city council in November<\/a>, and will attend their first full meeting as council members next week. <\/p>\n

On Jan. 2, the three new council members were sworn in by Judge Brian J. Panella of Northampton County Court of Common Pleas. The council also bid farewell to three departing council members: Roger Ruggles, Jim Edinger and Taiba Sultana. <\/p>\n

Mayor Sal Panto Jr. presented the departing members with gifts, and welcomed the new members. <\/p>\n

\u201cI would just like to welcome everybody to what I think is a very dynamic council. We work really well together,\u201d Panto said. <\/p>\n

Other council members gave welcoming remarks, stating that they look forward to working together.<\/p>\n

Graziano<\/a> previously served on the Easton Planning Commission, and will represent District 1, which primarily covers the College Hill and Downtown neighborhoods. <\/p>\n

Graziano said during campaigning he learned that Easton residents are engaged and want to be heard. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe people of Easton have a very deep pride in this city,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ve lived in the city my entire life, and I share that same love and pride for the city. I\u2019m extremely grateful for the opportunity to listen to the residents and advocate for them, which is a responsibility I do not take lightly.\u201d<\/p>\n

Zando-Dennis<\/a> serves as vice president of Safe Harbor Easton<\/a> and is involved with the West Ward Community Initiative. She works as a construction professional and pollution claims examiner.<\/p>\n

She represents District 2, which covers most of the West Ward. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s an honor to serve the city of Easton, and especially my neighborhood the West Ward, for which I\u2019m going to hopefully make you proud,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n

Before sitting on city council, Hartranft-Bittinger<\/a> served as a school board member for Easton Area School District and is a lifelong South Side resident. She will represent South Side\u2019s District 3. <\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t wait to work with these great people here,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Residents will see new faces at Easton City Council meetings to start 2026. Julie Zando-Dennis, Frank Graziano III…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":79557,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[153,155,154],"class_list":{"0":"post-82737","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-bethlehem","8":"tag-bethlehem","9":"tag-bethlehem-headlines","10":"tag-bethlehem-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82737","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=82737"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82737\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/79557"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=82737"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=82737"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=82737"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}