PERRYSBURG – The city will ask voters in November to recycle its often-approved refuse levy.
At the Tuesday council meeting, members voted to submit the 1-mill replacement levy for the fall ballot.
If approved, the property tax would continue to collect about $530,000 annually and would cost the owner
of a $100,000-home about $46 per year for a period of two years. It would replace the existing levy,
which was approved in 2007 and expires at the end of this year.
The proposed measure would not cost residents any additional money.
"This is not an increase," said member Tom Mackin, the Finance Committee chair. "This is
the same rate we’ve been assessing."
Jon Eckel, director of public service, said after the meeting that voters first approved the tax at the
same rate in 1987. It generates about half of the total refuse and recycling services budget. Services
covered by levy funds include unlimited refuse pickup, the recycling program, the yard waste program and
special item pickups.
"We like to call it a Cadillac service," Eckel said. "It’s a little bit unusual, but it’s
what our residents are used to having."
Council also held a public hearing before its regular meeting for a portion of the proposed St. Clare
Commons retirement community that Franciscan Living Communities plans to develop adjacent to the nearby
Blessed John XXIII Catholic Community at 24250 Dixie Highway.
The site plans call for independent and assisted living units and health care facilities. The first phase
would include an approximately 60-unit assisted living facility and a 36-unit dementia assisted living
facility. These health care facilities would abut Five Point Road.
The group then anticipates construction of a 60-bed nursing facility and about 130 independent living
units.
Council was asked to consider a Planning Commission recommendation to rezone about 28 acres east of the
parish from Institutional to Multiple Family Residential.
Bart Wagenman, an FLC attorney, told council that the Planned Unit Development classification recommended
by the commission would allow for construction of multiple buildings on a phased basis under single
ownership.
"This isn’t a subdivision," Wagenman said. "The living units will not be sold."
FLC President Rick Ryan said plans would also allow for Housing and Urban Development – consisting of
about 30 affordable units for seniors – if HUD approved a housing program for the area.
But, considering the plans for development in the city’s economic development corridor, member Joe
Rutherford asked whether FLC anticipated any problems if an office park or more light manufacturing
operations started to set up shop in the area. Acknowledging the "clout" of the church and the
FLC, he said, "it’s not a fight we want to have."
Ryan called the area a "great" location for development that would provide access to various
activities for seniors.
"I don’t see it being a major problem for us," he said.
Still, council President Joe Lawless expressed concern that the proposed development would conflict with
the city’s comprehensive plan and may signal a move toward multi-family housing in the area. He wondered
how the city would be able to turn down housing requests in the corridor in the future if it set an
unintended precedent now.
"If we’re going to ignore (the comprehensive plan), how are we going to turn down projects in the
future that are asking the same kind of question," he said.
Mackin said other changes have been made to accommodate certain projects when necessary.
"We know how to say ‘no,’ and we know how to say ‘yes,’" he said.
In response to a question from Lawless about the zoning timeline for the church properties, Zoning
Administrator Rick Thielen said council would be asked to approve zoning for the property in pieces.
"Until council makes the final decision on permanent zoning either for the half of the project or
the whole project, it’s not zoned" for its requested purpose, he said.
The Planning and Zoning Committee will review the zoning request at 5:30 tonight.
In other action, the city approved ordinances or heard reports as presented by committees:
¥ Service-Safety: approved an application for a $182,500 Ohio Department of Transportation Safe Routes to
School grant, which would cost the city $46,000 for design and administration if accepted; purchased a
replacement front-end loader at a cost not to exceed $74,950 from Southeastern Equipment Company.
¥ Finance: heard the committee’s recommendation to convert about $13 million in mostly sewer debt notes
into bonds, leaving $2.5 million in notes. The idea was supported by the city clerk who cited the lack
of extra cash flow in the current economy; approved lighting assessments totaling $170,000; heard tax
collections were down 9 percent for July and down 19 percent from January to the present.
¥ Personnel: read in a committee summary that sergeants and dispatchers in the city police division are
looking for a judge to declare that residency sections in their contracts are invalid.
¥ Planning and Zoning: approved renaming part of Ft. Meigs Road to "Ft. Meigs Court" pending
approval by appropriate Wood County officials.
¥ Recreation: heard $4,000 would be budgeted for 2010 to cover a third of expenses accrued by the
Perrysburg Soccer Club to expand their parking lot at the Ohio 199 soccer fields; heard storage facility
restrooms at the city park will be permanently locked and that restrooms by the shelter house will be
opened only during the day due to increased vandalism.
