January 9, 2011
Dominion wants to build houses By MICHAEL J. MAURER ThisWeek Community Newspapers
The Delaware City Planning Commission on Jan. 5 approved 12 distinct rezoning amendments to allow Dominion Homes to proceed with the Communities at Glenross subdivision on Cheshire Road, in anticipation of a growing housing market in 2011. “We need to move fairly rapidly for this year’s construction season or Dominion is going to have to make some decisions about putting resources in
other places in central Ohio,” said David Efland, planning and community deWe need to move fairly rapidly for this year’s construction velopment director. season or Dominion is going to have to make some decisions Efland said Dominion was expected to begin roadway and other infrastrucabout putting resources in other places in central Ohio. ture construction in the spring, with the potential to start selling homes in the DAVID EFLAND fall. — planning and community development director “The two final subdivision plats are the applications of the most relevance, particularly important. one of eight lots and the other was 23 building homes.” Efland said related development at “There are a couple of ... developlots,” Efland said. “They will start with roadways and sewers and water lines, Cheshire has been successful and is al- ments that are not Dominion (projects) and that takes time, before you can start most exhausted, making the approvals in the area, but they’ve stalled quite a
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bit in this recession,” Efland said. “Cheshire Crossing West has been, on a permit number basis, an extremely successful development for the city of Delaware. ... That’s a Dominion/MI partnership ... that is ... being built out. Time is of the essence to continue that successful development, still within the city of Delaware, getting good units, and repaying the infrastructure cost, starting to repay what we have in the ground.” Planning and zoning administrator See DOMINION, page A2
Delaware County
BLOODMOBILE
Interim prosecutor, recorder are named By MICHAEL J. MAURER ThisWeek Community Newspapers
By Chris Parker/ThisWeek
Technicians Becky Green, right, and Mike Farington prepare the Red Cross Bloodmobile for donations in the parking lot of the Kroger store on U.S. Route 23 on the city’s southern edge. The Delaware County Chapter of the American Red Cross said the area is experiencing a blood shortage and donations are needed. Upcoming bloodmobile visits will be from 1 to 7 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 18, at St. Joan of Arc Church, Liberty Road, 1 to 7 p.m. Friday, Jan 21, at the Liberty-Powell YMCA, 7798 Liberty Road, and 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 22, at Kroger, Lewis Center Road and U.S. 23.
Sunbury mayor gives ‘state of village’ speech By JENNA GANT
cally and plan for a brighter future.” Weatherby said Sunbury has suffered the same turmoil as the rest of the nation since 2008, and In his “state of the village” improving the village’s economic condition will speech to Sunbury Village take time. Council on Jan. 5, mayor Len Weatherby said Sunbury and Delaware CounWeatherby said Sunbury’s staty still have a more than 8-percent unemploytus has improved in recent years ment rate and building permits have been “stagdespite the economic recession. nant” during the past three years. “During this time of slow “Our task was to live from day to day, pay our growth and economic down- Len Weatherby bills, hopefully keep our jobs and to help those turn we’ve been able to rewho didn’t,” Weatherby said. structure, review and enhance our organization,” He said the auto industry has “drastically cut Weatherby said. “We can go forward optimisti- work hours, eliminated some positions, reduced ThisWeek Community Newspapers
employee benefits and cut many hours of overtime.” Sunbury has an auto parts plant, American Showa. Weatherby said the village and its employees also saw those cuts. “We had to pay our debts and we had to maintain a level of services that our citizens have grown to expect over the past several years,” Weatherby said. “We have eliminated some positions through attrition. We have reduced our overtime dramatically. We’ve had our employees forgo across-the-board wage increases for al-
Delaware County commissioners on Jan. 7 named an interim county prosecutor and interim county recorder. The previous prosecutor, David Yost, was elected Ohio auditor and the previous recorder, Andy Brenner, was elected to the Ohio House 2nd District seat. William Owen will serve as interim county prosecutor before joining Yost later this month in the auditor’s office, and John Whitney will serve as interim county recorder before returning to his commercial printing business. Commissioner Tommy Thompson noted both men have other long-term goals and are serving the county by filling the vacancies temporarily. “It’s great that we have these people of high quality coming in,” and each is familiar with the offices’ operations and staffs, he said. Later this month, the Delaware County Republican Central Committee will name successors to the two unexpired terms of office. Owen spoke to the staff from the prosecutor’s office, along with his mother and other family members, in the commissioners’ meeting room. “I very much want to thank the staff here. It is the best staff I have ever worked with and a remarkable experience,” Owen said. Whitney said he does not expect much in the way of formal action during his brief tenure. “Andy asked me to help him out for the threeweek period,” Whitney said. “He wanted somebody who could fill the office but didn’t want to show favoritism to any of the candidates (for the permanent appointment). I don’t have any political aspirations. I’ll do it for three weeks and then be out.” Because the county buys services from Whitney Ink, Whitney has had to stop his business with the county during his time in office. He is not per-
See STATE OF, page A2
See COUNTY, page A2
Sunbury to develop City of Delaware chart for employees Council approves 2-percent pay increases By JENNA GANT
and then who’s going to basi-
ThisWeek Community Newspapers cally be responsible for report-
Sunbury village employees soon will have a defined command hierarchy as village council looks into the roles and expectations for each staff member. Council on Dec. 29 helped draft an organizational chart showing to whom each employee is supposed to report. On Jan. 5, councilman Sean Currie said the chart will help determine “who’s going to be judging the performance of the employees, who’s going to help set goals for those expectations
ing on whether or not they are following, meeting, achieving those expectations and goals.” Currie asked council in November 2010 to perform an internal audit of village employees to determine their baseline job description. Currie said the organizational chart is a good start in reconstructing employee expectations. “It’s going to be something that I think will give us some direction point forward that we can eventually work on establishing
By MICHAEL J. MAURER ThisWeek Community Newspapers
Delaware City Council wrapped up 2010 business by approving 2-percent pay increases for management and department heads and various part-time and seasonal personnel. Exceptions included police captain pay, which was increased by 4.5 percent and city manager pay, which was excluded from the ordinance and will be addressed in a later separate ordinance, said administrative services director Jackie Walker. “We are proposing to add the positions of assistant fire chief and assistant police chief,” Walker said. “We’re deleting language for the city manager’s pay from the
documents. We’re going to go back to how we had done that a number of years ago where the city manager’s pay is done by separate ordinance.” The city maintains 20 different management pay grades in five steps, with the lowest classification pay ranging from $14.71 per hour at step 1 to $17.19 per hour at step 5, and the highest classification ranging from $31.75 per hour at step 1 to $37.38 at step 5. The part-time and seasonal pay includes five classifications, the lowest ranging from $7.74 per hour at step 1 to $8.70 per hour at step 5, and the highest ranging from $17.76 per hour at step 1 to $20.58 per hour at step 5. Department head pay ranges from $25.03
to $49.94 per hour. The management pay plan calls for the city to pay 8.5 percent toward the state public employee pension fund, with the balance of any payment paid by the employee. The rate for nonunion police and fire employees is 10 percent. Council also approved resolutions authorizing the city manager to enter into agreements that would complete a federal Neighborhood Stabilization Grant program that allowed the demolition of the Delaware Hotel. The remaining funds available are estimated at about $236,000 and $40,000 for administrative costs. The city is formally acting as lead agency in the project, which also includes Delaware County, to demolish 11 dilapidated properties.
See SUNBURY, page A2
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