Trending
WARREN -- City council chose not to have a second reading of legislation that would increase the salaries of the mayor, city auditor, law director and members of council at its meeting yesterday.
Council Finance Chairman Greg Greathouse, D-3rd Ward, said he chose to withdraw the ordinance because of council absences.
Ashley McBride, D-1st Ward, Cheryl Saffold, D-6th Ward, and Ron White, D-7th Ward, were not in attendance at Wednesday's council meeting.
"I pulled it off the agenda because of the absences," Greathouse said. "I mean, we've only got seven people here and I felt like it needed full consideration."
Under the proposed ordinance, the salary of the mayor of Warren would have to remain one percent higher than the base salary of the highest-paid, wage-earning employee of the city.
Other employees, including the auditor, law director, safety / service director and council members, would have their salaries tied, based on percentages, to the mayor's salary.
Greathouse said the second reading of the pay raise legislation likely will be delayed again at council's next meeting Oct. 11.
"I won't be here at the next meeting, so it probably won't be until the end of October until it comes forward," Greathouse said.
The last regular council meeting in October is on the 25th.
In the meantime, councilman Ken MacPherson, D-at-large, asked council president John Brown about scheduling additional meetings for discussion regarding the pay raise legislation.
"Is this the time to maybe ask about doing a council as a whole meeting on (the pay raise ordinance) to allow citizens to come in and us to discuss this as a group as a formal kind of meeting?" MacPherson asked. "I'd like to propose that."
Brown said MacPherson can have a meeting regarding the legislation organized and scheduled with the clerk of council, Brenda Smith.
Because of the several missing members, council did not adopt any legislation at the meeting. Five ordinances were given first readings. One ordinance was given a second reading. The pay raise ordinance was the only piece of legislation that was withdrawn from the agenda.
Pump station
In other business, an ordinance authorizing the mayor and director of public service to enter into an agreement to purchase certain parcels of land on the corner of Dover Avenue and Highland Avenue and to lease other parcels near the property for the purpose of installing a pump station for the Clean Energy Future – Trumbull, LLC, was given its first reading.
"We need to have a plot of land in which to construct a pump station. That pump station is going to be the primary pump station that will provide five million gallons of water per day to the Trumbull Energy Center in the Village of Lordstown," Franco Lucarelli, city water director, said.
Lucarelli said the contractor constructing the pump station will lease land from private property owners near the site for a laydown construction area.
"All of which is at no cost to the city of Warren," Lucarelli stated.. "Trumbull Energy and Clean Energy Future are paying the complete bill."
Lucarelli said neither the construction of the pump station, nor the finished product, will have an impact on the citizens of Warren.
"This pump station, similar to the one we have on state Route 45 that was built many moons ago in the early 1960s for the General Motors facility, is essentially being built for the sole purpose of supplying water to the energy center," Lucarelli said. "It will not affect the pressures, it will not affect the citizens of Warren whatsoever."
Lucarelli said that the energy center and its construction will be a benefit for the city.
"Its a definite benefit to the city of Warren," Lucarelli said. "Its a benefit to all of Trumbull County because of that energy center coming online and all of the construction jobs that its going to create for the next three to four years."