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Youngstown plans to relocate its health department from a Mahoning County building to the city hall annex late next year
YOUNGSTOWN
About 8,000 square feet of empty space at the city hall annex, the future home of municipal court, will be the new location of the city’s health department by the end of next year.
The city will relocate the health department from Mahoning County’s Oakhill Renaissance Place on Oak Hill Avenue, its home for about a dozen years, to the annex at the corner of Front and Market streets.
Also, the city is relocating the police vice squad from the third floor of the annex to the basement as part of the project.
The work is expected to add $750,000 to $800,000 to the annex project, said Mayor John A. McNally.
The city is paying $173,000 annually to the county for about 12,000 square feet at Oakhill and will save that expense by housing the department in a city-owned building, McNally said.
Though the annex location is 8,000 square feet on the first and second floors, it is large enough to accommodate the health department, McNally said.
Moving from a place where the city is paying rent to a city-owned building makes sense, McNally said.
The city’s lease is renewed monthly, and 30 days’ notice is all that’s needed to get out of the deal, he said.
McNally, who opposed the purchase of Oakhill a decade ago when he was a Mahoning County commissioner, said his objection to Oakhill has nothing to do with this decision. He added that it was the right move for the city to relocate to Oakhill in 1999 from cramped quarters on the seventh floor of city hall when George M. McKelvey was mayor.
“We’re doing this for financial reasons and because we have space in a city-owned building,” he said. “Also, employees have had concerns over security” at Oakhill.
Carol Rimedio-Righetti, chairwoman of the Mahoning County commissioners, said she understands that “moving out of Oakhill is financially better for the city. It’s their own building, and they wouldn’t have to pay any rent.”
The county will look at options starting next month to fill the space being vacated late next year by the city health department and other empty space at Oakhill, she said.
One possibility, Rimedio-Righetti said, is seeing if the Purple Cat, which offers day programs for adults with mental and physical challenges and operates a cafeteria in Oakhill’s basement, is interested in expanding.
Meanwhile, city council will consider an ordinance Wednesday allowing the city to borrow up to $5.6 million to pay for the annex improvements. The interest rate will be below 3 percent, Finance Director David Bozanich said.
Total cost for the project is about $8.7 million with $7.1 million for the new municipal court on the third floor and clerk of courts on the first floor, Bozanich said. There also are architectural and project-management expenses in addition to the health department and vice-squad work.
The court, which is moving at the end of next year, is providing about $2.5 million from fees it’s collected over the years for a new home, and the city is using about $500,000 of its water and wastewater funds for work at the annex, Bozanich said.
Municipal court is on the second floor of city hall on Phelps Street. Judges have complained about the court’s conditions for several years.
The judges filed a complaint with the Ohio Supreme Court in 2009 stating the court, among other issues, is too small and unsafe as there’s no way to keep witnesses separate from those in the courtrooms.
The city’s three branches of government reached an agreement in June 2015 to relocate the court and the clerk of courts office to the annex.
The city anticipates relocating its community planning and economic development department from the sixth floor of 20 Federal Place, an office building it owns on West Federal Street, to the second floor of city hall at some point after the court moves to the annex, McNally said.