43
Officials: Counties need to cooperate
By Ed Runyan
WARREN
County commissioners from Mahoning and Trumbull conducted a 20-minute discussion about economic development in front of the public Wednesday, limiting the discussion mostly to items they agree upon.
The best way for the Youngstown-Warren area to prosper is for officials in both counties to “be on the same team,” and the two main economic development agencies need to cooperate better, they said.
The Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber and the 2-year-old economic-development office for the Western Reserve Port Authority need to pull together for the betterment of the area, they said.
And, the members of the port authority — four appointed by the commissioners of each county — also need to cooperate more, said Mahoning Commissioner John A. McNally IV.
“This is a start,” Mahoning Commissioner Carol Rimedio-Righetti said of the discussion the commissioners had at the Trumbull commissioners meeting room. They plan to continue the discussion May 4 at Vernon’s restaurant in Youngstown.
The port authority runs the Youngstown-Warren Regional Airport and oversees the work of Rose Ann DeLeon, who was hired in November 2009 to start up a full-time economic-development office for Mahoning and Trumbull counties.
Mahoning Commissioner Anthony Traficanti was the only one who addressed directly the matter that has gotten the most attention in recent weeks — whether Mahoning County commissioners should increase Mahoning’s bed tax by 2 percent to provide the port authority with about $500,000 more per year, partly so it can continue with DeLeon’s economic-development work.
“I just want to see how the performance of the port authority has gone under Rose’s tutelage,” Traficanti said.
“Congressman [Tim] Ryan promised us an evaluation when we agreed to contribute $100,000 for three years, and that’s all I’ve asked for.”
Ryan, of Niles, D-17th, was one of the chief proponents of creating DeLeon’s position in 2008, convincing Mahoning and Trumbull commissioners to contribute $100,000 per year for three years to fund the office.
The rest of the funding came from the cities of Youngstown, Warren and Niles, Howland Township and the Western Reserve Building Trades Council.
“The chamber has brought us a lot of deals in Mahoning County, and they’ve never charged us a dime,” Traficanti said. “So I’m hoping in this evaluation that we see that both of our communities have something to show for what we have funded the port authority.”
In recent weeks, Rimedio-Righetti and McNally have supported a bed-tax increase, Traficanti has opposed it. Public hearings on it are planned for later this month.
Trumbull Commissioner Paul Heltzel was the main advocate for DeLeon, saying it takes someone like her to understand and explain concepts like synthetic leasing, for instance, and how it could help a business expand.
“The companies don’t know about that. They have to learn about that from the port authority, and they [the port authority] have to learn about that company from the Chamber, so that’s got to be hand in hand there to work toward a common goal, not everybody jumping on everybody else’s turf.”
Heltzel said DeLeon has “done a good job” during her two years, three months here. He said it would still be difficult to evaluate DeLeon’s work after this amount of time.
DeLeon has been seriously ill and on sick leave for about five weeks. Her assistant, Sarah Lown, has filled in.
Jerry Usselman of Champion, a member of the board of the Trumbull Tourism Bureau attending the meeting, said he was disappointed that the discussion didn’t produce more answers.
“They said a lot, but they didn’t say anything. They agreed to meet again in the future, where hopefully there won’t be so many people around.”