Trustee Reports began at 8:02 (plus or minus).
Jason: At the last meeting we talked about getting an ad together for The Community Journal for the cleanup day. I forwarded the information to The Record Courier just as an announcement.
He then passed out copies of a report on our roads.
Jason: I have went [sic] through and modified the spreadsheet to show either what is paved or had major work last year. The green items are not worries. The items in yellow were on the list for this year or need attention this year. The items in red are the ones that we need to take care of.
Because we did not get our grant this year, we have money for chip and seal. I called the county because I want to have t hem look at what we propose to chip and seal. The county is no longer going to do chip and seal for political subdivisions. I was not aware of this. Apparently doing that was taking too much time and too many resources away from county roads.
Jason then went through the list. Among the items [I am not sure I noted all of them] were Mantua Center Road from Rt. 82 to the bridge [Blogger: I am not sure which direction or which bridge. South on Center to Mennonite?]; Wayne from SR. 44 to Sheldon.
Last year we paid the county $18,100+ per mile. I figured a little more--$18,500. The total miles would come to $128,000. We will have to put this out for bids.
Chip and seal last year was for 1-1/2 miles and 3.18 miles of paving for Loris and Pioneer Trail.
Jason asked Marie Stehli what could be freed up. He thought it is about $100,000.
Marie: $90,000 in Road and Bridge and $93,800 in another fund. [Blogger: Getting numbers right, which I worked to do here, is hard. As a result, I think the name of the other fund got lost.]
Jason: I also went to to Remington Point [in Old Taylor Woods] with Todd Lamb. It looks like $25,000 spent there would help. Most of it looks pretty good, although there is a blow-out hole. We spent about $10,000-$12,000 lost year on this. That road is in such badc condition--it has about every problem it can have. There is nothing that can be done to it but pave it. We promised the home owners' association that we would keep working on it.
Also, what I wanted to mention too was that I had a good conversation with John Vechery about chip and seal. He asked about doing chip and seal at the cemetery. Jason thought it would be worth looking at some of the roads there for chip and seal.
Continuing: I also think we should do some at the garage. It gets nasty there when the trucks are washed.
Total: 6.9 miles of chip and seal-- $128,000
Crack sealing @ $2700/mile--$10,800
Remington Point -- $25,000
Cemetery chip and seal,
garage, and green --$20,000
Total: $183,000
Plus a contingency of 9% brings the total to about $200,000.
The county will give us chip and seal recommendations.
Vic: I have started a list for the Round 28 and can look at that. Vic asked if East Mennonite was on the list. Some of the ones on your (Jason's) list are the same as the ones I have on mine.
Jason asked Vic about equipment bids. [Blogger: This refers to the township's practice of asking for bids from contractors who have equipment that the township does not have because the equipment is not used very often.]
Vic: The equipment has not changed from last year. We just need to change the dates. If all is OK, an ad can be run requesting bids.
Jason: That is all I had for new business. (8:20)
Vic: I move that we run this ad for 2013 on April 23, 24, 25. Jason asked Marie to do that and seconded the motiion. Unanimous.
John Festa had nothing for new business.
Vic: Salt bid. Vic talked about last year and estimated that the township had used about 820 tons of salt. The contract was for 675 tons. We had a surplus from the previous year.
Vic: I recommend that we get 725 tons. He showed Jason and John Festa the figures and salt/cinder amounts. He had everything filled out and asked for Jason's signature.
Continuing: There looked to be about 225 tons still in the shed.
Vic: Made a motion to participate in the ODT 0-18-14 salt-sodium cooperative to purchase the 725 tons. Jason seconded. Unanimous.
Vic will send the original. He said, "I want to make sure they do not need a copy of the resolution."
Also: For spring cleanup, the contractor for this year has said that we can set one dumpster off to the side for construction materials. Anything over 5 tons will cost an extra $35.00/ton.
Vic said he had contacted Bill Steiner (Portage Recycling) and he knows we will need three dumpsters.
Vic: I have received a lot of calls about the veterans' memorial. To John Festa: do you know if we will be informed about any of the work out there?
John Festa: Yes. I don't expect that the work will begin right away.
[BLOGGER: If anyone has noticed this issue or is following it, here are the posts:
the post for this 4/18 meeting titled "Veterans' Memorial and the Green"
3/24 post on the March 21 meeting
4/7 post on the April 4 meeting ]
At this point in the meeting, John Festa made his remarks about the 2003 RP propsal of a study committee and a levy to finance the school purchase. That is in the 4/18 meeting, post titled "The Green and the school bldg."
Township Hall updates:
Vic: I don't know whether anyone has contacted Marco--he seemed to be very on point. He has 28 years of engineering and inspection work. He has done over 14,000 inspections and can identify where the moisture issues are occurring. I told him the paint is peeling. This is due I think to the moisture issues and the underlying paint.
No matter if we decide to paint or side it, he thought it would be wise to get an expert opinion where the moisture is coming from.
Vic commented more on what would be done. He had told me [that the inspection would cost] $395 with a total of $550 for everything. ["Everything" includes the report on the inspection.]
John Festa: When can he come out?
Vic: I think it would be money well spent. I talked with him and told him we painted the building 10 years ago. He said that 8-9 years is the life of the paint. What you have to watch is that every time you paint latex, you are sealing stuff because the layers get thicker. I told hjim about the windows and that maybe the buiilding was tighter now.
Jason: I make a motion to hire Ambassador Construction Consultants [Marco is the name of the owner] to come and do a moisture evaluation of the Town Hall for an amount not to exceed $600.
John Festa seconded; unanimous.
[Blogger: Here is some perspective on this, and if you want to comb back through previous blogs, you can see the discussions in more detail. If you want to do that, look first for meetings when Cal Brant spoke in Public Comment.
Months ago--during the autumn or even earlier--Cal Brant urged the trustees to get an engineer to analyze the hall. His advice was met with, at the mildest, resistance, if not outright hostility. If I remember correctly, Jason said that he was not willing to spend the $550 for the inspection and report. Vic, in his low-key, tenacious way, has repeated the idea over time. Now, finally, after months of avoidance and verbal hand-wringing, maybe we should actually do an inspection.
After that, how is the work to be done?
The Township Hall is on The National Register of Historic Places. The National Park Service, which is the authority over the National Register, has extensive published guidelines for preserving historic buildings and sites. Each state's historical society has those guidelines, called Preservation Briefs, which individuals and organizations--and townships, fancy that --can purchase or perhaps get a few just for the asking through the Ohio Historical Society online store.
The purpose of those briefs is to help those who want to preserve our heritage, not just make a quick, flashy cosmetic fix with no care for the consequences.
Siding, mentioned a couple of times for the Town Hall, is specifically NOT recommended for historic buildings for two reasons:
First, the proportions and design of modern materials like vinyl siding destroy the original character of a historic building. Photographs in one of the briefs show that very clearly.
Second, simply putting modern materials onto or into a building creates conditions that will damage it.
What that may mean is this, in my opinion based on reading those briefs and considering what seems to be occurring in the Township Hall: If indeed moisture is a problem, partly because there is still a dirt floor in part of the basement and partly because the windows installed with part of the NOPEC grant have sealed the building, then putting a plastic layer on the outside is going to trap that moisture. The wood will rot as a result.
Most of us have experienced something similar if we put on a rain slicker. Anyplace where the slicker is on bare skin, we start to sweat immediately--and there is nowhere for it to go because the slicker doesn't breathe.
More could be said about how the township's money is being spent, in defiance of the advice of one of the best fiscal officers in the county, if not in all of Northeast Ohio. However, it should be possible for an intelligent, thoughtful reader to see that without more comment from your faithful and frustrated blogger.]
About This Blog
The purpose of this blog is to give an accurate account of what is said during Public Comment at Mantua Township Trustees meetings.
Trustees' decisions are in the official minutes, available on request from the Mantua Township Fiscal Officer, Jodi Thompson, at 330-274-8443. The Township charges 10 cents per page. FAX, 330-274-8447. E-mail, fiscalofficer@mantuatownshipohio.gov. The minutes are also posted on the website after they have been approved. That means that there is usually a two-week lag between a given meeting and the minutes being available to read on the website.
Since meetings are the first and third Thursdays of the month, there is a three-week wait during months with five Thursdays.
Other items of interest or the writer's opinions will be included from time to time, clearly identified.
This is not a forum or chat room, but a source of information, so it is closed to outside input.
During the time I have been doing the blog, the posts have expanded to become very detailed accounts of the meetings. Doing that is time consuming, to say the least, and I am going to try to return to the public comment focus, with background and perspective (and the occasional pointed editorial comment). Such additions are usually enclosed in brackets. However, since some extended accounts of the meetings reveal significant things--and character--better than I could by commenting, there will probably still be a fair amount of semi-transcript. (Sigh.)
My thanks to the readers who have found the blog, and to the ones who from time to time tell me that they value it. You have encouraged me when the tedious work of keyboarding has made me wonder why I am doing this. Then you have reminded me, and I am grateful.
Trustees' decisions are in the official minutes, available on request from the Mantua Township Fiscal Officer, Jodi Thompson, at 330-274-8443. The Township charges 10 cents per page. FAX, 330-274-8447. E-mail, fiscalofficer@mantuatownshipohio.gov. The minutes are also posted on the website after they have been approved. That means that there is usually a two-week lag between a given meeting and the minutes being available to read on the website.
Since meetings are the first and third Thursdays of the month, there is a three-week wait during months with five Thursdays.
Other items of interest or the writer's opinions will be included from time to time, clearly identified.
This is not a forum or chat room, but a source of information, so it is closed to outside input.
During the time I have been doing the blog, the posts have expanded to become very detailed accounts of the meetings. Doing that is time consuming, to say the least, and I am going to try to return to the public comment focus, with background and perspective (and the occasional pointed editorial comment). Such additions are usually enclosed in brackets. However, since some extended accounts of the meetings reveal significant things--and character--better than I could by commenting, there will probably still be a fair amount of semi-transcript. (Sigh.)
My thanks to the readers who have found the blog, and to the ones who from time to time tell me that they value it. You have encouraged me when the tedious work of keyboarding has made me wonder why I am doing this. Then you have reminded me, and I am grateful.
Principles
Two ideas guide and support me:
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.
______Attributed to Edmund Burke
GOOD PREVAILS.
Those ideas are also the reason I have been doing the blog since late February 2011.
I have discovered that a transcript is almost impossible to do and that verbatim accounts are usually not absolutely necessary. When in doubt, I check against a recording.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.
______Attributed to Edmund Burke
GOOD PREVAILS.
Those ideas are also the reason I have been doing the blog since late February 2011.
I have discovered that a transcript is almost impossible to do and that verbatim accounts are usually not absolutely necessary. When in doubt, I check against a recording.
