Tiny offices lose key workers to higher-paid jobs elsewhere

Staff report

YOUNGSTOWN

Two of Mahoning County’s smallest departments lost key personnel through resignations the past two years.

Sarah Gartland, the $37,232-a-year floodplain administrator, who had been with the county for more than 12 years, left in May 2013 to become Boardman’s zoning inspector at $55,000 a year.

“We had to work within our budget. That’s what our budget allowed,” Michael O’Shaughnessy, commission director, said of Gartland’s county salary. “It was a positive move for her in all facets of her career,” he said of Gartland’s Boardman job.

Supported by the county’s general fund, the planning commission has a staff of three, consisting of its director, floodplain administrator and a secretary.

Coroner’s investigator Christopher Meditz, who had been with Mahoning County for nearly three years, left at a regular full-time salary of $24,731 a year in November 2013 and now earns $41,142 a year as a Cuyahoga County medical examiner’s investigator in Cleveland.

Coroner’s investigators take photos and gather evidence at death scenes, interview witnesses, take photos and notes during autopsies and write reports on death cases. A bachelor’s degree in forensic sciences or criminal justice is required for the investigator’s job.

The coroner’s offices consists of the part-time elected coroner, Dr. David Kennedy; and full-timers, Dr. Joseph Ohr, forensic pathologist and deputy coroner, four investigators and two secretaries.