Wooster Road project likely extended for $2.5 million water line replacement
By BOB MOREHEAD
BGNN senior staff writer
If an ordinance introduced to Barberton City Council Oct. 28 is approved, Wooster Road W will be tied up longer than originally thought.
The ordinance pays Kenmore Construction $2,462,159 to replace geriatric water line on the thoroughfare from Fourth to 25th street.
“There’s been an increase in breaks,” service director Todd Shreve told council. “We’ve had five since this project started.”
Shreve said part of the money can come from the water department’s capital fund but the rest will likely be notes. The debt is necessary, though, he said, to prevent the recurring and frustrating problem of ripping up a freshly paved road surface to fix a failing water line, inevitable since the line in question is about a century old.
Shreve said they hadn’t worked out yet how long this will extend the project, which had been scheduled to wrap up in November 2025.
The Utilities Committee approved the measure, sending it on to the full council.
That night, city council approved a lease agreement for the city’s sundry service departments; the request came at the Oct. 21 committee work session.
The city will now gradually replace 22 vehicles it owns in the water treatment plant, sewage treatment plant, water distribution and collection department and storm water department with new ones leased from Enterprise Fleet Management. Shreve said the arrangement will save more than $200,000 over 10 years.
Council also passed an amendment to Barberton’s community reinvestment area. The change expands CRA area 2 to be the entire city with the exception of area 1, which subsumes the Trucen Farm development. This provides a 100% tax abatement for 15 years on new residential construction in Area 2. The Trucen project has its own abatements.
Sandy Baker and Janice Low were reappointed to the Board of Health. Susan Wynn, Jolese Rogers were approved for the Design Review Board and David Wynn and Anthony Harmon were approved for the Planning Commission.
Council also renewed the prosecutor contracts with the cities of Green, New Franklin and Norton.
The grant application for $500,000 over 25 years to the Barberton Community Foundation for the justice center/municipal building project got a second reading and was sent for a third.
Emerging from committees that night was a measure to use $125,000 of Community Development Block Grant money to build restrooms at College Park and a tentative agreement with the local firefighters union.
Another measure appoints retired Metro RTA executive Charles Rector as Barberton’s representative on the Metro board.
