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Ohio Utilities Protection Service to relocate next year
By Kalea Hall
NORTH JACKSON
When it came to finding a new home for the nearly 45-year-old Ohio Utilities Protection Service, its leaders knew the agency should stay local.
“It was an obvious choice that we needed to stay in the Mahoning Valley because we have a great workforce here,” said Roger Lipscomb, president and executive director of the agency.
On Tuesday morning, OUPS leaders broke ground on the agency’s new home at Bailey Road and Mahoning Avenue.
Next year, more than 50 employees will relocate from OUPS offices on Belmont Avenue to the new North Jackson site, an about 17,000-square-foot office building with a wellness center and woods with walking trails.
“Excavation activity is on the rise, and we have outgrown our facilities because of it,” Lipscomb said.
OUPS was founded in 1972 as a nonprofit collaboration of the Ohio Bell Telephone Co., East Ohio Gas Co. and Cleveland Electric Illuminating Co.
The nonprofit was established to protect Ohio’s underground infrastructure with notification to facility owners about planned excavations.
“We serve as the communication link between people who have the need to excavate and those who maintain and operate buried utilities throughout the state,” Lipscomb explained. “We are the call before you dig.”
In 1989, Senate Bill 174 required all Ohio utility companies to participate in the protection service. In 1990, Senate Bill 264 required all Ohioans to call before digging.
OUPS is funded by its more than 1,300 member companies. Last year, the agency took in more than 1.2 million requests for excavation throughout the state and sent out 8.3 million notices to member companies.
“The key is new housing,” Lipscomb said. “We are seeing a lot of businesses going up. Subdivisions are showing tremendous activity.”
In 2014, Senate Bill 378 passed the House and Senate and was signed into law in December. The bill provides the enforcement needed for Ohio’s underground-damage-prevention laws.
State Sen. Joe Schiavoni of Boardman, D-33rd, was in attendance at Tuesday’s groundbreaking and talked about his first meeting with the agency about eight years ago.
“All I knew when I left was we needed a realistic way to have safe excavating,” he said. “We continued to work through it, and we finally got legislation passed.”
Schiavoni shoveled some dirt and posed for pictures at the groundbreaking.
“The reason why they are staying here is because of the workforce,” he said.
OUPS also found a prime piece of land that was shown to agency leaders by the Mahoning Valley Economic Development Corp.
Olsavsky Jaminet Architects Inc. of Youngstown is the project architect. A general contractor on the $3.2 million project has yet to be selected.
“We are looking to be in place by August 2017,” Lipscomb said.