43
County to accept credit cards
YOUNGSTOWN
The Mahoning County commissioners approved enabling credit- and debit-card acceptance over the counter for the first time by county courts and agencies for things such as fine, court cost, fee and tax payments.
Besides county and common pleas courts, county agencies authorized to accept those cards are the auditor’s, treasurer’s, recorder’s, sheriff’s, prosecutor’s, coroner’s, commissioners’, engineer’s and sanitary engineer’s offices, board of health and auto title department.
The credit-card companies’ service fees would be paid by the people electing to pay by credit card, said Gina Bricker, the assistant county prosecutor who drafted the resolution. The resolution says that convenience surcharge can’t exceed 3 percent of the amount being paid.
When the program is launched, “You would be able to pay for any county expense through the use of a credit card, including auto-title fees,” Bricker said.
The commissioners also adopted an administrative order to abate unsanitary conditions on Pineview Drive in the northwest corner of Austintown, where home septic systems are failing near Meander Reservoir, which supplies drinking water for Youngstown and surrounding communities.
The order sets the stage for a new sanitary sewer to be built to serve 17 single-family Pineview Drive homes, and that sewer would go into service next year and connect to an existing sanitary sewer that runs along Ohltown Road, said Bill Coleman, office manager in the sanitary engineer’s office.
The failing septic systems will be eliminated when the sewer goes into service.
After tests found unacceptable levels of fecal coliform bacteria in Ohltown Road storm sewers, the county health board passed a resolution of complaint to the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency, which threatened enforcement action against the county if the problem isn’t resolved.
On another issue, Anthony Traficanti, chairman of the commissioners, said he will try to get management and the Teamsters union to the table to see if there’s any way to prevent the closing of the Tamarkin Co. warehouse on Victoria Road in Austintown, which employs 200 people and supplies Giant Eagle supermarkets.