City can seize and demolish Grenga Machine

YOUNGSTOWN — A magistrate’s decision has cleared the way for the city to seize and demolish the Grenga Machine and Welding Co. storage building under eminent domain.

Dan Pribich, deputy city law director, said the decision allows the city to take possession of the building at 128 W. Rayen Ave., which the city plans to do on April 14. The city plans to have its contractor perform a pre-demolition assessment that day, he added.

At the end of a Friday hearing, Magistrate Daniel P. Dascenzo of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court, denied building owner Joseph Grenga’s request for a preliminary injunction to prevent the city from altering or demolishing the building until the case is resolved.

The magistrate’s ruling came in a hearing concerning a $500,000 lawsuit, in which Grenga accuses the city of violating his right to due process and of causing him financial losses in the city’s quest to take his property.

The city will take and raze Grenga’s building to enable a northward extension of Hazel Street in conjunction with Youngstown State University’s new $34.3 million business school, for which construction will begin this spring.