Officials will discuss regional collaboration

BOARDMAN — About 80 elected and appointed government officials from Mahoning and Trumbull counties will meet Friday to talk about regional collaboration.

The conference, held by the Regional Chamber, includes sessions on regional economic revenue sharing, developing a plan for police consolidation and working as a team with other parts of northeast Ohio to make the area globally competitive.

But it’s the simple things — sharing information and ideas, forging relationships among the officials and working together to buy products, such as street salt — that will be the focus of the event, said Tony Paglia, the chamber’s vice president of government affairs.

“We need more leaders to promote regional collaboration and cooperation,” he said. “That will happen with more information. If the officials have relationships they’ll trust each other.”

And that will lead to progress, Paglia said.

“We need leaders who will say, ‘We all want to work together,’” he said. “We need a more progressive government. That will improve how people see us from the outside.”

For the complete story, read Thursday’s Vindicator or vindy.com