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City leaders concerned over back-up generator failure during recent outage
By ROBERT CONNELLY
CANFIELD
City officials expressed concerns over generators that failed in a recent power outage.
City Manager Joe Warino and city attorney Mark Fortunato talked about the need to figure out what went wrong when the backup generators for city hall and the police department did not kick on during outages in Canfield on Feb. 4.
“We don’t have an answer for why they didn’t work when we needed them,” Warino said at Wednesday’s council session. “It’s unacceptable to all of us.”
He noted that 911 service, landline and cellphone services were out for a time during the outage. Warino added that city workers were able to manually start the city-hall generator.
“I would empower council to take all steps necessary to get that fixed as soon as possible. That’s a delicate legal issue to have a system that we are aware” has a problem, Fortunato said.
Council also approved two contracts totaling $535,593 for the replacement of about 2,600 feet of a 24-inch waterline. That section runs parallel to state Route 11.
Michael Benza and Associates of Brecksville was appointed as the project engineer at a cost not to exceed $57,373. Kirila Contractors Inc. of Brookfield was approved as the contractor at a cost not to exceed $478,220. The city has a 30-year, no-interest loan on the project through the Ohio Public Works Commission.
Previous work was done on the line, but it was discovered it was far worse than expected.
The project was stopped, and not all funding through the Appalachian Regional Commission for the job was used, Warino explained.
The ARC has allowed the city to use the unused funds to help pay for the project, which is about $47,000.
“I’m hopeful that we can get it started in the next few weeks,” Warino said of the project that is now expected to take four weeks to complete. While that work is being done, city water will be directed through a 12-inch line.
Warino revealed that after A.P. O’Horo of Youngstown is finished with the estimated $5.4 million replacement of the U.S. Route 224 bridge over state Route 11, Canfield will be spelled out in black letters on the bridge. That work, through the Ohio Department of Transportation, is expected to begin in March and be finished in October.
City officials have moved the second council meeting of March to 5:30 p.m. March 25, with a public hearing for city residents on the tentative joint economic-development district with Canfield Township to begin at 5 p.m. that day.