Garrettsville – Village Council met on Wednesday, February 13, 2013 for their regularly scheduled monthly meeting. The public hearing that had been scheduled at last month’s council meeting to discuss proposed restructuring of the Design Review Board (DRB) was postponed due to an error in publishing the announcement. Instead, proposed Ordinance 2013-01 was presented for second reading. The Mayor stated that the Planning Commission, at their last meeting, voted to give their support and recommend passage of the proposed ordinance as well.
Next up for business, Council passed Ordinances 2013-04 for appropriations for current expenses and 2013-05 approving editing and certain ordinances as parts of the various component codes of the codified ordinances of Garrettsville. The passage of these ordinances sparked a discussion about the ease of use of the online version of Garrettsville’s Codified Ordinances. Village Clerk, Nancy Baldwin, informed council about a company that specializes in making the codified ordinances easier to read and search through for online public use. There would be an upfront fee of $1895 and then a monthly fee of $30 for them to host the storage of the documents. There were questions raised about updates and what exactly the fees covered. Mayor Patrick recommended tabling further discussion until more information could be obtained about all possible options and costs.
In other business, Mayor Patrick introduced Mark Russell of Ellerhorst Insurance and Megan Roschek from the Public Entities Pool who presented a proposal for the Village’s Liability Insurance. The current policy, held by Dawson Company, will be up for renewal in April of this year. A very lengthy and detailed discussion ensued. The proposal comparison was based on the inception coverage of the current policy and could possibly save the village money. It was noted however, that there were certain line items that needed appraisals or updating from Dawson Company to make a valid comparison for renewal. Council agreed to wait until the renewal policy was available to compare coverage before making their final decision.
Bill Steiner, Director of Portage County Solid Waste Management addressed council and asked for support of the Portage County Solid Waste Management Guidelines that outline future operation for the district. He stated that the proposed guidelines must be approved by the majority of municipalities in the county for the Ohio EPA to accept them. Without community support and approval, the state could take over and dictate operations. It was decided by council to further review the guidelines and to have a decision made by the next council meeting.
During round table discussion, Councilman Hadzinsky mentioned the village’s yard sale weekend May 18-19, 2013 and suggested council consider changing the community clean-up date to right after the weekend sale. Councilman Matson informed council about the establishment of a ‘new vehicle fund’ by the joint fire district and Councilman Kaiser stated that the 2012 EMS summary was available. He stated that the total call volume had increased 43 calls from 2011, yet EMS response time had remained almost the same at an average of 6 minutes, 12 seconds.
Mayor Patrick praised the efforts of the police department, Save-A-Lot Food Store and the community in the success of the fill-a-cruiser campaign. The mayor said that $11,000 was raised for the People Tree and over 1500 items were donated. The mayor also reminded everyone that the first cruise night of the summer will be Memorial Day weekend.
If you’d like to know more of what is happening in your community, please attend a meeting. The next regular Village Council meeting will be held on March 13th at 7:30 p.m. at Village Hall. A Public Hearing will precede the meeting, in which proposed Ordinance 2013-1, the reorganization of the DRB, will be open for public discussion.
