VIENNA — Township trustees approved the appointment of trustee Phil Pegg to Trumbull County’s new 12-member Water Advisory Council on Monday.

County Commissioner Tony Bernard called for the group’s formation alongside a state performance audit — the first conducted on the county water department in its 58-year history — at an April 1 meeting.

Trustee Mike Haddle explained to residents that the council was intended as an oversight so a rate increase spike — like the flat $11.75 per 1,000 gallons across all county districts that was implemented — doesn’t happen again 12 years later.

The sanitary department is currently attempting to do a study to see if they can construct a water facility that the township can draw water from in a nearby location, such as Mosquito Lake, Haddle added.

Pegg said the sanitary department is unsure about how many meetings they’ll hold yearly, but added that once it gets established, the meetings will be quarterly.

The council is expected to meet sometime over the next month.

RECORDING

Trustees tabled action on changing the township’s policy on filming and video recording meetings.

Pegg said he spoke to a former trustee and current lawyer who explained there was a previous motion in place requiring filming to be done from the meeting room’s back rows. Pegg added that he spoke with a second lawyer, Christine Davis, who said they had a right to make meetings only recordable by tripod, but he didn’t think it was necessary.

“We’ve had complaints about filming people in the audience and things of that nature,” Pegg said.

Pegg clarified to a resident who believed they were prohibiting filming completely that in today’s world, it was not feasible.

“We can make it so that no one is being directly scanned,” Pegg said. “By putting it in either the last row or the back, we’re compliant.”

FIRE LEVY

Trustees also approved formally retiring the two pre-existing 1-mill levies ahead of the May 6 general election when the 3.5 mill levy is officially collected on.

Pegg said he had residents question whether they actually planned on getting rid of the 1-mill levies, which he deemed a “total falsity.”

Pegg added that the levy description on the May 6 ballot was not written by trustees or Fiscal Officer Jason Miner, but a statutory requirement the county prosecutor puts in writing, via the Ohio Revised Code.