Regular Meeting
President Doug Baum called the meeting to order at
A motion was made by Charnetzky accepting the minutes and financials as presented. Seconded by Strad.
1st Public Speaks Session
A resident, who drives bus, thanked the road crew
for always being there when the drivers need them, as well as for how well they
take care of the roads. She also wanted
to ask everyone to remember the road crew and fire crew when they are voting
this November.
Tom O’Dell stated that at one time the Township was
contemplating filing a lawsuit against the landfill for odor nuisance. The Township put that on hold after long
discussions at that time, but he wanted to see what the Township was doing now regarding
the lawsuit as well as the conditional use permit. Sharon Perrine, the Zoning Inspector stated
that she had talked to our attorney about the situation and he said there were
a few things he was looking into about the potential of legal action. Strad then said that the Township was upset
with how the landfill was being monitored, thus were threatening to not renew
their conditional use permit. Action has
been taken by the Federal EPA at this time and after talking to our attorney,
it was decided to let the more powerful, better funded organizations battle the
landfill.
Jason Overly stated that he is a Township resident, and
he formally asked the Trustees to be a member of the BZA. He has been a resident for 3 years, has lived
in OH all of his life, and kept his residency here while he was in the Marine
Corp.
John Miller discussed the zoning meeting regarding
mining setbacks and how he wasn’t satisfied with how the meeting was
handled. He stated that when you have a
meeting with an issue, you are supposed to hear both sides of the story, and
only one side was presented. He went to
landowners in the community, because when Strad announced in the meeting about
how he wanted to hear from different people on the potential zone change, but
that is not what happened. So instead Mr.
Miller stated that he went out and talked to the people that actually owned
ground. When Mr. Strad announced that he
wanted to hear from all parties, Mr. Miller thought that’s what he meant. But that’s not what he meant, he had people
come that were only on one side. Flyers
were sent out and people went door to door telling residents from Deerwood
Circle, as well as other areas, that they had better come to the meeting
otherwise there would be mining
Monday, October 20th 08
at their back and front doors. This was all false information. Mark Cook’s mother was told by Strad that
the change in setback from 150’ to 600’ wouldn’t affect her farm at all, yet
they can’t
farm anymore because of their age so they will most
likely sell the farm and if there are restrictions on the use of the farm, the
valuation will go down. John also stated
that the truth should be told when
you’re telling the people something but that’s not what happened at all.
Also, Mr.Burkhart stood up and told the Trustees
that this was not the right thing to do and he has spent over 25 years
volunteering on the BZA yet the Trustees didn’t listen to him and now he has
decided to resign. The Zoning Inspector
stood up and said it was the wrong thing to do, yet the Trustees decided to go
against her as well. The Township
Attorney gave them his opinion which was to not recommend the change either,
yet the Trustees went against him as well.
Then during the meeting, Mr. Strad asking for a show
of hands as to who is in favor of the setback, already knowing that the
audience consisted of those in favor of the setback. Then the Zoning commission was intimidated
as well as you can’t have a group of people come in and intimidate everyone
else. Just because a group comes in, it
doesn’t mean that you vote just for those people. You, as Trustees, have the responsibility to
all of the residents and not just special interest groups, but that’s not what
happened in this situation at all.
Wayne Wood read a memo that he had written. The basis of the memo stated that he was
expecting good common sense by three trustees based on the facts, and help from
legal counsel, to come to a decision that was in the best interest of all
involved and not for just certain people, yet that’s not at all what
happened. The decision was made for a
certain group of people to the detriment of anyone in the Township who owns any
land at all. It was also noted that Mr.
Baum should be commended for going against the pressures of a loud majority,
and voting against the change. Mr. Strad
on the other hand, was unethical in his actions along with the Mayor of East
Sparta, and a disgrace to our community.
He and Mr. Charnetzky chose not to listen to legal counsel, and decided
to vote for a loud majority at the meeting instead of what was right.
The next hot topic may not be mining but some other
issue that a special interest group will decide something on and with a loud
majority and a few trustees being swayed, they will change the law instead of
doing the right thing. Small minded
officials like this are why the American people are losing their rights. The people of the Township need to do their
homework before the next election and elect a Trustee that is not easily swayed
by a few votes.
Louis Grooms thanked the road crew for a great job
that they’ve done on the mowing. He went
on to discuss the zoning meeting as well, and said it was the most disgusting
meeting he has ever been to. It was
handled horribly. Every time someone got
up to speak it was like they were receiving a certificate because everyone
would applaud. Also, this thing was
setup by one young man who was against the setback that we have. He went down to the allotment and stirred up
a lot of people and he doesn’t even own land except for his house and he’s not
even going to stay in the Township. He’s not proud of what the Trustees have
done for the landowners in this Township and he’s not talking about people that
own 100 x 100 lots, he’s talking about the farmers who built this
community. He’s been in the Township for
over 60 years and when zoning originally went in the setback was 25 feet for
mining, and then it was changed to a 150’ setback, and now it’s a 600’ setback. What’s next, no mining in the Township? He stated that he guessed that all they would
have to do is come in with the proposal and a big group of people
Monday, October 20th 08
who are clapping their hands and the Trustees will
vote it through. That is not the way to
run the Township.
Mr. Mosberger said that there are a few people here
now just trying to show the negative and get in the paper. He feels like he did what was right and
anyone could have come to the meeting. The
community makes the rules and he went through the process the right way.
Baum said it doesn’t end at the zoning meeting like
Mr. Mosberger said because this will be something that will come up years from
now.
Mr. Bob. Miller said that if things are supposed to
be decided by a vote as they were, then we don’t need the Trustees, then we
don’t need the BZA, and we should just let the people come in and vote.
Baum said that this is where he differs with Mr.
Mosberger, as a show of hands is a show of hands and Mr. Mosberger is the one
that sent all of the flyers out thus having more people in the audience thus
the show of hands. Baum already stated that you can’t make a decision on the
show of hands from the public, but rather on the correct decision even if the
show of hands doesn’t win.
Sharon Perrine speaking as a resident, said that she
was very disappointed on the show hands vote, because of lot of the people who
raised their hands were from the village and they don’t even fall under zoning
for the Township. This should have been
pointed out during the show of hands.
Dave Collier stated that during the entire hearing,
he didn’t hear one person say that the 600’ setback was going to make it any
better than the current 150’ setback is currently. All he heard was that they didn’t want
mining, not that it was going to make it better, but just that they didn’t want
it. All he heard was we don’t want
mining and that is what the hand count was based on, not a 600’ foot
setback. Make it a mile, it doesn’t matter,
the people at that meeting don’t want mining and that’s what they voted
on. Don’t say that it’s a setback issue,
but say that it’s a mining issue.
Charnetzky
said that he wanted to discuss a little bit about his decision the other night.
He had 28 phone calls about the issue He did what he thought was right. He may have been wrong. He listened to the people that voted, he
didn’t think the raising of the hands was good.
He hopes that you will find that he does what he thinks is right. He felt it infringed on the homeowners, those
people that Louis said shouldn’t count because they only own an acre. Well, he
felt they counted. He didn’t do this for
political reasons like
Monday, October 20th 08
He
then talked about a work session for the handbook. He wants to give a copy to the road crew and
see if they want anything changed.
He
also wanted to thank Bob Burkhart for the many years of service and was
impressed on the way he conducted meetings.
He was also looking forward to learning things from him, but instead
will wish him well along with everyone else.
Strad
said that we should at least appoint the first alternate to the BZA and that
would be Bob Miller, which will leave an open spot which will be appointed
later.
A
motion was made by Strad to appoint Bob Miller to the BZA and make Jerry first
alternate. Seconded by Charnetzky.
Roll
Call Vote: Charnetzky – Yes
Strad – Yes
Baum - Yes
He
also has been getting complaints about the blasting at Kimble Mining and may
try to get the parties together.
Baum
said that regional planning recommended the 600’ ft. setback, but that they
also said that the Township should review it with legal counsel. To him, that meant that Charlie should review
the wording, and also how wise this is to do and how well will it hold up in
court. Baum said to pass out the flyers
brought the hot crowd to the meeting. He
feels the other two Trustees didn’t listen enough to all of the experts in the
Township including our attorney, our Zoning Inspector, members of our Zoning
Boards, as well as the previous Zoning Inspector.
Knox
said that he doesn’t speak up very often, but the way the zoning change was
handled was totally wrong. He disagreed
with the way it was done, the way it was handled, that the people that know
zoning better than anyone sitting on this board and their opinions were not
taken into consideration, and that there were no negotiations in the process
and to just decide to go from 150’ feet to 600’ feet is ridiculous and
completely wrong and disappointing.
Nothing at this time.
Resolution #12-2008
to transfer $6,000 from 01-A-26 to 01-J-01.
Resolution #13-2008
to transfer $240.59 from 01-A-26 to 01-A-21.
Resolution #14-2008
Accepting the amounts and rates as determined by the budget commission and
authorizing the necessary tax levies and certifying them to the county auditor.
Pahanish read the road
report.
Monday, October 20th 08
One question was whether we
will supply the Village with salt this year and bill them for it because there
is supposed to be a shortage. The
Trustees said we would supply them as long as we don’t run out for Township
roads.
He said the flywheel on the
boom mower keeps coming loose. It’s
about $2,000 dollars for the torque wrench to tighten the blades when they
change them. The Trustees said to go
ahead and make the purchase.
He would like to get the
water valves fixed in the back room which would cost a few hundred dollars to
do it. The Trustees agreed that it would
be okay.
Don Charnetzky asked whether
we should have a work session on where we should and shouldn’t spread salt this
year since there is a shortage. Pahanish
said that we may want to do that.
She
also reminded people that the mailboxes shouldn’t have flyers placed in them.
Nothing
at this time.