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Young pastor named to Warren Civil Service Commission
By Ed Runyan
WARREN
Todd Johnson, a young senior pastor at Agape Assembly Church on Nevada Avenue Southwest, has been named to the three-member Warren Civil Service Commission.
The appointment, by Mayor Doug Franklin, is for six years.
He replaces 15-year civil service commission member the Rev. Frank Hearns, who has retired after 23 years as pastor of Second Baptist Church and moved from the area.
Pastor Johnson, 31, and his church have had numerous events in recent years to address the plight of the low-income neighborhood surrounding the church, which was built in 2004 on the edge of the former Westlawn Homes neighborhood.
Last fall, Pastor Johnson organized the Invasion of Hope, what he called a “white and black partnership” that involved carnival games, giveaways, music and other activities to address community needs in southwest Warren.
Last March, he organized a forum that focused on the needs of young Warren residents to pick positive activities to help them lead productive lives.
The forum, featuring about a dozen Warren teens, came one month after six other Warren teens drowned in an overturned sport utility vehicle that crashed into a pond just south of downtown Warren in the early-morning hours of March 10.
Pastor Johnson also is a member of the board of directors of the Mahoning Valley Hope Center at Surrey Road and Eastland Avenue Northeast. The Hope Center also addresses community needs through ministry.
He’s also the director and founder of the Warren City-Wide Youth Choir and a member of the Trumbull County Interdenominational Ministerial Alliance, which has taken part in public dialogue regarding racial issues in recent years.
Among the issues the alliance has spoken on were a reprimand of a white Warren police officer for ordering black boys age 7, 9 and 10 to the ground at gunpoint in their backyard after he saw them “running stumped down, trying to avoid detection” in 2010.
Another was the disciplinary action and later promotion of a white lieutenant for the Warren Police Department who admitted making derogatory comments to black men in 2009 while he was off duty.
The civil service commission oversees testing and challenges to test results that determine promotion to Warren police chief, fire chief and other leadership positions.
The Rev. Mr. Hearns was outspoken in recent years in his belief that the Warren Fire Department should have at least one female firefighter.
A committee created by the civil service commission formulated proposals last year aimed at encouraging minorities to get hired into jobs with the police and fire departments.
Pastor Johnson said he doesn’t have any specific goals yet as civil service commission member, only to learn as much as possible in the coming weeks about the issues it faces.