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Public hearing for gas program June 13 Cathryn

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Public hearing for gas program June 13

Cathryn Stanley

Associate Editor

A public hearing for a Governmental Energy Aggregation program will be held Monday, July 13 at 7:30 p.m. at the Barnesville Fire Department building.

The discussion was tabled from the June 8 meeting. At that meeting, Mayor Thomas Michelli estimated a $4,000 savings. He gave council members copies of the agreement for their review. The proposed program will require the passing of a issue by village voters (to be placed on the Nov. 3 ballot).

The topic was first brought up during a visit from Fred Holmes, director of municipal aggregation for Volunteer Energy Services, Inc., earlier this year.

Governmental gas aggregation allows an entire community - residents, businesses and other gas customers - to act as one large buying group. As a large buying power, the community is in a better position to negotiate lower prices, resulting in savings for all. According to Mayor Tom Michelli, the village would have saved about $4,000 on its gas bills last year (February 2008 to March 2009) if it had participated in the program.

The Village of Bridgeport voted to participate in the program last fall.

Looking ahead to a possible second round of stimulus funds, council authorized the advertisement for qualification requests, an advertisement inviting engineering firms to submit their qualifications to the village, for a water line project for the industrial park on SR 800 north of the village. A committee will review the qualifications and select a firm based on a scoring system.

"If there is going to be another round of stimulus funding, we should be ready," Michelli said.

At the Monday, June 22 meeting, council also authorized Village Administrator Roger Deal to apply for an Issue II grant from the Ohio Public Works Commission for sanitary sewer rehabilitation. The $191,599 grant will require a $50,599 (26 percent) match from the village. If approved the grant would be used for replacing some sewer line and relining others. If funded, the project would begin in 2010.

With an eye on more stimulus money, council authorized Fire Chief Bob Smith to apply for $250,000 of federal grant funds to refurbish the fire department building. Smith said the grant will not require matching funds and would be used to update the building to meet NFPA 1500 federal requirements for separate male and female restrooms and sleeping quarters, expand the back of the building 10 feet, install an exhaust system and raise the roof 10 feet. Smith said all costs would be included in the grant.

Council accepted a bid of $62,670 from Lexco Site Services of Zanesville for a Dam No. 1 improvement project as recommended by Buckeye Engineering. Lexco also worked on a recent sanitary sewer project as well as a boat ramp project.

Council authorized the mayor to submit an application for a $500,000 Small Cities Community Development Block Grant for a sludge improvement project for the waste water treatment plant.

The CDBG second public hearing for waste water treatment plant improvements was set for June 30 at 10 a.m.

Council approved a pay ordinance for $5,523.18, an expenditure of $1,628.77 and an ordinance amending the annual appropriations in the amount of $47,390.78. Council approved a then and now purchase order for $220 to Sensus for handheld meter repairs for the water department.

Building permits were approved for Mike Muffet, 211 Railroad St., new home construction; Darrell and Kim Hamilton, 720 E. Main St., room addition; Michael and Doris Welsh, 138 Bethesda St., roof and Keven Abel, 718, Wiley Ave., roof.

Frank Harmon and Brian Savage from Ohio Insurance Services met with council regarding expanding the company's health insurance services to the village.