AUSTINTOWN Trustees address loss of powers

It may be necessary to appeal to state legislators to restrict exotic animals, a trustee says.
By PETER H. MILLIKEN
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
AUSTINTOWN -- The township will continue to progress and solve its problems despite the defeat of home rule in last week's general election, trustees said Tuesday.
"Austintown's going to go forward. Austintown's going to continue to grow. We're going to have problems. We'll solve them. It might take more work than it took before. It might take us longer to do it," said Trustee Richard E. Edwards.
"The board of trustees will find ways to address local problems with or without home rule. It may be more cumbersome," said Trustee Warren "Bo'' Pritchard. For example, he said trustees may have to persuade state legislators to enact statewide restrictions on exotic animal possession.
"Outside of home rule, we'll move on. We'll find other ways," to address public nuisances, said Trustee Chairman David Ditzler.
After home rule was defeated by the voters three times during the 1990s, trustees voted unanimously to impose it in March of this year, thereby giving themselves expanded powers to regulate health, safety and nuisance matters.
After trustees enacted restrictions on exotic animals, such as alligators and caimans, as their first home rule ordinance in August, home rule was defeated again in last week's referendum, with 7,178 votes against its continuation and 6,190 in favor.
Not surprised
Pritchard said he was saddened, but not surprised, by the results of last week's referendum. He said he knew home rule was likely to fail when he saw that residents of the College Park development, where a six-foot caiman escaped from a home in August 2001, had voted it down. Caimans are members of the crocodile family.
As evidence that Austintown remains a desirable and progressive community, trustees called attention to the decision by Snyder's Drugs of Minnesota to lease the former Tamco warehouse and hire many former Tamco drivers and to the decision by Marc's discount drugs to open a store in the former Phar-Mor location.
Ditzler asked Road Superintendent Michael Bertilacci whether the flooding of the eastbound curb lane of Mahoning Avenue at state Route 46 with six inches of water during Sunday night's heavy rain was something to be expected.
Bertilacci said such flooding can be expected during the autumn when fallen leaves impede drainage by blocking catch basins.