MAHONING COUNTY Lowellville officials OK village's own Web site

Offering incentives to village workers who retire early could save $30,000.
By MARALINE KUBIK
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
LOWELLVILLE -- An official Web site for the village will be up and running by Tuesday. Council approved the site during a regular meeting Wednesday evening and voted to put it online.
Jennifer Coppola Johnson, the daughter of councilman Bob Coppola, designed the site as part of a class project.
Johnson is studying for her master's degree in business administration.
The site will include information on the village, biographical information on village employees and council members, and links to various departments, Coppola said.
Cost of site
Because Johnson designed the site for free, the only cost the village will incur is $195 per year for registering the domain name -- www.villageoflowellville.com -- and paying a server to host the site, Coppola said.
Quarterly updates, including a newsletter, would run an additional $500 to $1,000 a year, Coppola added. The newsletter would be available online as well as at area businesses for residents who don't have access to the Internet.
For fire department
Council also authorized the fire chief to purchase a new paging system.
Cost of the new system, which would include 16 pagers for volunteer firefighters, would be $6,900, Coppola said. A five-year maintenance plan, which would cover lost or damaged pagers, would add another $1,100, for a total initial cost of $8,000, he said. "But we would save $1,800 a year in service so we would recoup what we'd put out in three years and the new system is better. It's the latest technology; what we have is outdated."
During council's next regular meeting, Coppola said, his finance committee will recommend passage of an ordinance that will raise the salary of the village's part-time tax commissioner to $7,200 a year. The current salary is $6,180, he said, "and we're having a problem keeping tax commissioners."
Early retirement
In other matters, council discussed offering incentives to village employees who agree to retire early.
The retirement incentives would be available to employees with a specified number of years of service and could save the village between $30,000 and $40,000 per year in the case of village administrator Phil Alfano, Coppola said.
The village would be relieved of paying for Alfano's health insurance and retirement plan and, if the position were converted from full-time to part-time, would save on the administrator's base salary, Coppola said.
If the proposal is accepted, he said, some of the administrator's street department duties would be eliminated and part-time workers would be hired "as needed" using the savings.
Council's next meeting will be Wednesday at 7 p.m.
kubik@vindy.com