Local News
UPDATE: City property tax hike after all?
Council to set rate on Monday
SHARON — Sharon council set a special meeting for 3 p.m. Monday to vote on the 2010 budget and staffing level that failed to pass last week and, possibly, to raise the real estate tax rate.
Council last week voted to keep property taxes at 26.51 mills, but Monday’s meeting agenda shows an ordinance amending the rate with a blank space before the word “mills” instead of that number.
Council member Victor Heutsche on Tuesday said that after the $8 million budget was not approved by council on Thursday, City Manager Tom Lavorini found some projections “may be off a little bit.”
Heutsche said outgoing Mayor Bob Lucas and Lavorini, who was hired in November to take over city operations when Lucas’ term runs out at the end of December, are “reworking the budget figures to take that into account.”
That could mean the tax rate might change, Heutsche said. He said he hadn’t seen anything more specific from the mayor and manager yet.
Council President Mike Donato said he wasn’t going to comment on the issue because he hadn’t gotten any numbers yet.
Council Vice President Frank Connelly said he was unaware of the financial changes and wasn’t able to say if council was going to change the 2010 tax rate or not.
Donato said they called the special meeting to hammer out the budget rather than waiting until after the first of the year, as council members had said they would do last week.
Outgoing council member Darin Flower had suggested they tackle the spending plan at the reorganization set for Jan. 4 so that new council member Ed Palanski could be part of the discussion.
A message left for Lavorini was not immediately returned.
The main reason the vote to pass the 2010 budget last week was unsuccessful was because Heutsche, Donato and Flower said they didn’t think the city should give 3.75 percent raises to non-union employees while cutting 2.5 jobs.
For 2009, council members lowered real estate taxes from 39.5 mills and set the wage tax at 2.25 percent, including 0.5 percent that goes to the school district. The shift is allowed under the home rule charter passed by voters in 2007 but must be revenue neutral.
A mill is $1 for every $1,000 for a property’s 1970 assessed value and one mill brings about $92,000 to the city. A home assessed at $17,500, the average in the city in 2006, would have a city real estate tax bill of about $464 at 26.51 mills.
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Commissioners formally move to raise sewer fees
Hermitage commissioners introduced an ordinance Wednesday to increase sanitary user fees.
Residents tapped into the Hermitage Municipal Authority lines now pay $95 a quarter. That rate will bump up to $105 a quarter on Jan. 1, under the proposed rate hike.
Two more hikes on Jan. 1, 2012, and Jan. 1, 2013, will result in the rates increasing 50 percent from the current fee. -
Water is on at Forrest Brooke
Water service has been restored at Forrest Brooke Manufactured Home Community after well problems left the 165-unit complex dry Tuesday.
A boil and conserve water advisory has been issued by the DEP and will remain in place until tests confirm the water is safe to drink, Forrest Brooke’s manager Pete Havens said.
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Storm damages trees, wires
Thunderstorms ripped through parts of Mercer and neighboring counties Wednesday night, downing trees and wires and keeping rescue workers on their toes.
A Mercer County 911 dispatcher shortly after 8 p.m. said they were busy with calls across the northern part of the county. He said there had been a few reports of trees falling on homes.
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City leaders open to talks
Sharon officials aren’t opposed to sitting down with their counterparts in Farrell to revisit the idea of combining the two struggling cities.
“It never costs a penny to talk and there’s no (idea) that’s not worth looking at,” Sharon councilman Ed Palanski said. “I think it would be foolish to oppose looking at the idea.”
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Murphy’s Law doesn’t faze regional planners
A complicated, two-day public meeting blitz in 32 counties ran headlong into Murphy’s Law in Mercer County on Tuesday.
The group Power of 32 are looking to re-write the regional map and create a grand, 15-year strategic economic plan for the 32 counties in four states that make up the Ohio River basin and greater Pittsburgh area.
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Forrest Brooke copes with water outage
Residents of Forrest Brooke Mobile Home Community in Jefferson and Lackawannock Townships woke up Tuesday morning to find they didn’t have any water.
Managers of the park could not be reached for comment, but residents said they were told they won’t get water service back for at least another month.
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City facing bleak financial reality
LaVon Saternow has been Farrell’s city manager since 1992. Shortly after she took the job, Sharon Steel, the city’s economic engine, officially closed down.
Since, the city has struggled to remain solvent and Mrs. Saternow said it is facing its worst financial crisis in her tenure.
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Near-complete addition to let man come home
Although the weather delayed the start of Penny and Paul Strechansky’s construction project by about three weeks, the end of the sawing, hammering and stapling is in sight.
“It should be done by the middle of next week,” Strechansky said of the 15-by-20 foot addition being built onto the back of his garage in Hermitage, which will be the new home of his grandson, David Johnson.
Johnson was critically injured in a car crash June 19, 2009, on what is now Interstate 376 in Lawrence County. The crash rendered Johnson, who just turned 21, blind and brain damaged. He is unable to care for himself.
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Man prison-bound for role in drug buy shooting
It may never be known for certain who fired the two fatal shots that killed a Sharon teen on Nov. 6 on Wallis Avenue during a botched drug deal, prosecutors have said.
But Christopher Swogger, 24, Sharon, was fingered by at least one other suspect as the one whose bullets killed John B. Hosey III, 18, of 422 Meek St. Swogger was sentenced Monday.
Swogger was sent to prison for 1 1/2 to 3 years for having a firearm without a license, ending his role in the criminal prosecutions of the drug deal turned shooting.
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Farrell, Sharon to revisit merger
Times are tough.
In Farrell Monday night, city council heard a grim financial report from City Manager LaVon Saternow.
“It’s not a pretty picture,” Mrs. Saternow said. “We could conceivably run out of cash by the end of the year. I don’t know how to put it more bluntly.”
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Commissioners formally move to raise sewer fees
