Friday, February 21, 2014
By Ed Runyan
WARREN
The Trumbull County commissioners on Thursday approved the purchase of the former First Place Bank at 159 and 185 E. Market St. for $750,000.
The county will use the 57,000-square foot building a half-block east of Courthouse Square for its planning commission, building inspection department and records storage.
The building has 44,000 square feet on the first, second and third floors and 13,000 square feet in the basement. The sale is expected to close in the next few weeks.
Resolutions the commissioners approved Thursday give them authorization to enter into a purchase agreement with Talmer Bank and Trust of Troy, Mich., successor to First Place Bank, and to pay Atty. Michael Grove up to $2,000 to review the purchase documents.
Another resolution approves the sale of bonds of up to $800,000 to pay for it.
The planning and building-inspection departments will move into the building in the coming months from their present location in the Wean Building on North Park Avenue, Commissioner Frank Fuda said.
Books of records maintained by various departments, especially the Trumbull County Recorder’s Office, will also go into the First Place location.
Shelving units already have been installed in the basement of the First Place building.
“They’ve never had flooding problems there as far as we know,” Commissioner Paul Heltzel said of the First Place building.
Commissioner Frank Fuda said the county has entertained the idea of selling the Wean Building but is more likely to demolish it and provide additional parking, especially if the Western Reserve Port Authority can secure brownfield funds from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for the demolition.
The Wean Building has a poor heating and air-conditioning system and has leaks throughout, Fuda said.
The city of Warren bought the similarly-sized but newer Gibson Building not far away from First Place in December for $2.5 million.
In other business, commissioners held off on approving a 49 percent, 10-year property-tax exemption for a proposed 86-unit Comfort Suites hotel on Belmont Avenue in Liberty.
Fuda said one reason commissioners delayed the measure was to amend an earlier resolution because ownership of the project has changed.
At the time, the owners were Perni, Perni Equities LLC of Hubbard. Now the owners are Liberty Belmont Properties LLC of Hubbard, which is owned 70 percent by Perni, Perni and 30 percent by a hotel group that owns the Boardman Holiday Inn, Liberty Township Administrator Pat Ungaro said.
Another reason for waiting is so commissioners can discuss concerns local labor leaders have expressed regarding local contractors being hired to construct the hotel.
Mike Rapovy of the local Council of Carpenters said Thursday most of the workers building local hotels in recent years have come from places such as North Dakota and South Dakota.
Ungaro said he will meet with labor leaders “any time to make it work,” adding that he believes it “won’t be a problem” to ensure that local contractors are used.