Struthers officials to air televised lesson on stormwater management

By jeanne starmack

starmack@vindy.com

struthers

Prepare to be educated about stormwater management.

This crash course will take only 26 seconds while you’re watching TV, and Struthers city officials are hoping it will make you aware that it’s a bad idea to clog culverts and catch basins with leaves this fall.

A commercial featuring those officials with that message will start running Wednesday on channels 21, 27, 33 and Fox.

It will be seen throughout the Youngstown area, so it benefits other communities as well, pointed out Bob Gentile, Struthers stormwater manager.

“We’re the first city to do this,” said Gentile, adding that the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency has requested a copy of the commercial.

The commercial was made with money from the $3.50 each resident pays to the city’s stormwater utility every month, and it fulfills an EPA regulation that cities have to educate the public about stormwater management.

The utility, which generates between $165,000 and $175,000 a year, also pays for other EPA mandates concerning stormwater management and for stormwater projects.

“We try to set aside between $6,000 and $7,000 for education,” Gentile said last week as he, Mayor Terry Stocker and stormwater secretary Linda Clyde watched the commercial on a computer monitor in Stocker’s office.

Read the full story Monday in The Vindicator and on Vindy.com.