Floyd named chairman of Port Authority, Klingle vice chair

By Ed Runyan

runyan@vindy.com

VIENNA

Atty. James Floyd was selected as chairman of the Western Reserve Port Authority on Wednesday, and new port-authority member Ron Klingle was chosen as vice chairman during Klingle’s first meeting Wednesday.

Floyd, whose law practice is in Youngstown, but who lives in Trumbull County, says he hopes to bring clarity to economic development in the two counties during his time as chairman and thinks Klingle’s business acumen will help attract investment in the area’s growing gas and oil industry.

Klingle said one of the first things he learned during recent port-authority committee meetings was who the other economic-development organizations are that work in the Mahoning Valley.

Floyd, who was appointed to the unpaid port-authority position three years ago by Trumbull commissioners, feels the cooperation among the port authority and several other economic development groups in recent years has been beneficial.

For instance, the port authority and the Mahoning River Corridor Initiative and its Mayors’ Association now work closely, as do the port authority and the private Mahoning Valley Economic Development Corp. in Liberty, Floyd said.

He would like to see the port authority, which also runs the Youngstown-Warren Regional Airport, “be a coordinator and have a relationship with the Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber,” he said.

“Many people are baffled by all the economic-development efforts,” he said.

Klingle, of Howland, chairman and controlling shareholder of Avalon Holdings Corp., which works in the environmental-services business, also owns the three-facility Avalon Golf and Country Club.

The one fellow port-authority official who didn’t give an affirmative vote to Floyd as chairman was Don Hanni III, who said later he abstained from voting on Floyd’s selection as chairman because Floyd had indicated that the intermodal committee, for which Hanni was chairman, was going to be abolished.

The intermodal committee addressed the convergence of rail and truck hauling.

Floyd said he felt the fourth committee was unnecessary because intermodal issues could be better addressed in the economic-development committee.

Martin Loney, training director for the Plumbers and Pipefitters Local 396 in Boardman, also attended his first meeting after being recently appointed by the Mahoning County commissioners.

In other business, the port authority approved a $1 million grant application to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The grant would be used to administer cleanup projects involving industrial and commercial sites in Mahoning and Trumbull counties.

The port authority also committed to providing the 20 percent match for the grant, which would be $200,000 in cash and in-kind services such as grant administration, if the grant is approved.

Sarah Lown, the port authority’s senior manager for economic development, said the money might be used in locations where removal of asbestos could allow a building to be re-used or industrial sites along the Mahoning River that could be cleaned up for re-use.

Potential sites are the county-owned Wean Building in Warren or the Rayen Building on the Youngstown State University campus, Lown said.

The port authority also approved creation of a marketing position for the airport.