Fees to be allocated to Niles streets

The city will collect nearly $180,000 from the license-plate fees this year only.

BY JORDAN COHEN

VINDICATOR CORRESPONDENT

NILES—Revenue from two license- plate fees, nearly $180,000, will be allocated to city’s street resurfacing program this year as proposed by Mayor Ralph Infante.

Council members and several department directors met in Infante’s office Tuesday to discuss the distribution of $180,000 to be collected from the tax this year only. Repeal of the two $5 fees does not take effect until 2011.

“We can only use the permissive tax money for road-related [matters] such as resurfacing, salt and materials,” the mayor said.

However Councilman Steve Papalas, D-at large, said he would rather see the money allocated elsewhere.

“I’d rather see it go towards something everybody will be able to see, such as the bike trail or maybe the library,” Papalas said. Council President Robert Marino said he would like to see the city set up a business incubator similar to those in Youngstown and Warren.

However, Infante said that such uses would not be permitted under the state laws governing permissive taxes such as the license-plate fees.

Mark Hess, engineering grant and development coordinator, said the tax money will mean sizable savings for the Niles general fund.

“We would have had to take $225,000 from the general fund for resurfacing this year, but with the tax money, we’ll only need $100,000,” Hess said. “In bad times, that makes sense to me.”

Hess said that last year, 12 streets were resurfaced, and he expects a similar number this year.

Asked for a show of hands for support for resurfacing, four council members raised theirs—a majority of the seven-member council.

Council had passed the two additional fees last October so that the city could collect the revenue in the event two similar county-wide issues were approved by voters in November. At the time, council promised to repeal the fees if the county issues failed, which they did by a wide margin. However, council’s repeal came too late, according to the Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles, which informed the city that the fees had to be collected this year.

Council had considered allocating the revenue to refunds in Niles electric and water bills but decided against it after the mayor said he was advised against it by the bureau.