Mount Vernon News

FREDERICKTOWN — Village Council heard from Knox County Commissioner Tom McLarnan and Fredericktown Fire Chief Scott Mast about safety concerns regarding the Montgomery Road bridge over the Kokosing River during Monday night’s council meeting.

County Engineer Jim Henry has said the bridge will likely be replaced some time after July 2009, when Ohio Public Works Commission funding for the project should become available.

The commissioners requested that Henry seek emergency funding for the replacement of the bridge from the OPWC, because fire department equipment can no longer travel across the bridge. The bridge is the fastest route to parts of Berlin, Monroe and Morris townships. The current weight limit on the bridge is 15 tons, less than what most fire engines weigh.

Mast told the commissioners during a meeting last week that detouring to a different route to avoid the bridge means a significantly slower response time to a large portion of the Fredericktown Community Fire District’s fire protection area.

Police Chief Jerry Day told council he is unable to enforce the weight limit on the bridge because his department does not have scales. The state patrol has been contacted regarding the high number of large trucks that use the bridge each day. Henry has said this truck traffic is speeding the deterioration of the bridge.

Because the county designated Montgomery Road, between Amity and Fredericktown, as a No Thru Trucks route, Mast requested that law enforcement pay special attention in the area to cut down on the number of large trucks.

McLarnan told council that the commissioners have also requested Henry to add more No Thru Trucks signs along Montgomery Road at Connector and Old Mansfield roads. McLarnan asked council to pass a measure making all of the village’s portion of Montgomery Road a No Thru Trucks road as well. Day said this would allow him to enforce the designation, and keep trucks off the bridge.

Council voted unanimously to ask Village Solicitor Todd Drown to begin work on a resolution that would temporarily designate Montgomery Road within the village as a No Thru Trucks route.

“Based on the testimony of Commissioner McLarnan and Chief Mast of the Fredericktown Fire Department, the village council unanimously voted to instruct the solicitor to draw up an emergency ordinance to designate the village’s portion of the Montgomery Road bridge as a No Thru Truck zone,” Drown said after the meeting. “Given the condition of the bridge, the council appears to have rejected the idea of simply reducing the load limits. This measure is meant as a stop-gap measure to prevent any accidents and perhaps prevent further deterioration of the bridge until 2009 when the county engineer plans to replace it. The council believes that this is a serious public safety issue which demands immediate action.”

“I’m very pleased that they did take it seriously and took immediate action to preserve the integrity of the bridge until it can be replaced,” Mast said after the meeting.

“The village’s proactive approach mirrors my opinion of the urgency of protecting the interest and safety of the public,” he continued.

He explained the fire department’s interest in the middle is very simple; it does not want anyone to be injured or killed as a result of slower response times.

“Our goal is to address the situation prior to someone being hurt,” he said.

Mast said he was also pleased with the attitude of village officials regarding the well-being of their neighbors who live in the townships outside the village.

“I am impressed that the village is looking outside their boundaries and are willing to take steps to help protect residents in the surrounding community,” he said.

The chief invited the council members to attend a fire department meeting to learn more about the Fredericktown firefighters which he called, “some of the best in the county.”

In other business, Resolution 2008-04, which defines wages for village employees, received its second reading while Ordinance 2008-05, the village budget for the year, was read for the first time. Both will receive their next reading at the March 17 council meeting.

Councilman Dave Munk said the snow plows have had difficulty plowing during recent snowfalls because of vehicles parked on Main Street, which is a marked snow route. Day said he would keep an eye out for vehicles that park on the street when there are two or more inches of snow in violation of the village ordinance regarding snow routes.

Village Administrator Gary Gallogly said the alarm siren at the fire station on Columbus Road — that before the era of cell phones and pagers was the fire department’s way of summoning volunteers to an emergency — will be repurposed after 12 to 15 years of silence. The village intends to use the siren as a tornado siren to alert the southern portion of the village. The siren downtown alerts the northern part of the village.

Gallogly also reported that he has been interviewed recently by investigators from the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency and The United States Department of Agriculture regarding a fuel spill last September at the sewer plant.

“They were in trying to wrap up the investigation,” Gallogly explained. “It still has not been resolved.”

Gallogly said he learned during the questioning that if the government agencies determine that PIE, the owner of the truck, violated the law during the incident, it could affect the sewer plant permit which is held jointly by PIE and the village. The diesel fuel leaked into a hole at the sewer plant, then into the water of the Kokosing River.

Drown added that shortly after the spill, he sent a strongly worded letter to PIE on behalf of the village demanding the situation be addressed.

Council then adjourned into executive session to discuss possible litigation regarding a letter received by the village from WODA Development of Ohio LLC, which outlined the company’s plans to build a 42-unit subsidized apartment complex near Ohio 13 on property owned by Dr. Scott Harmon.

Explaining that the land in that area is zoned Planned Neighborhood Development and not R3, Drown said the current zoning situation would not allow that sort of building in that part of the village. There are other places in the village zoned R3 which could be developed for subsidized apartments, but the village council sent a letter, followed by one from Drown, that informed the developer that the zoning situation as it stands currently would allow for the building of condominiums and townhouses but not apartment complexes.

“They want to build it in ’09,” Drown said. “We think it could turn into a zoning battle.”