MANSFIELD — Mayor Tim Theaker said a week ago the city was looking at all options regarding its understaffed codes and permits department, a sore point with with many in the community concerned with urban blight.
The administration has apparently found the solutions it sought — significant changes involving two departments that are scheduled to reach City Council for discussion on Nov. 15.
According to the request, the administration wants to remove the “certified building division (codes and permits)” and the “community development division” to create the combined “economic development division” and the “permitting and development division.”
That new department would be led by current Community Development Director Adrian Ackerman, who has been in her current position for more than two years.
Ackerman, who had been the department’s finance officer for eight years before taking the leadership role, has been credited for helping push through several major projects, including the West End Neighborhood Improvement Plan.
Marc Milliron, the current building and codes manager, would be assigned duties within the new department.
According to Mansfield City Council At-large member Stephanie Zader, the city administration’s proposed new Permitting and Development Division would be staffed this way:
Positions
* Permitting and Development Director + (Administrative)
* Permitting and Development Official + (Administrative)
* Development Section
* Assistant Grant Specialist (Part-Time)
* Secretary III
* Finance Officer
* Rehabilitation Officer (2)
* Permitting Section
* Chief Building Official + (Professional)
* Demolition Coordinator/Residential Inspector (licensed) + (Administrative)
* Electrical Safety Inspector
* Building Official (licensed)
* Housing Inspector (4)
* Permit Technician (licensed)
* Account Clerk (2)
Zader said this alignment is based on her discussion with Public Works Director Dave Remy and Human Resources Director Sharon May.
One of those duties would apparently be to oversee the city’s demolition efforts, rather than paying the Richland County Land Bank for the service. The city pays the Land Bank $750 per demolition, a service that includes writing bid specifications and bidding the projects to contractors.
Land Bank board chair Bart Hamilton, the Richland County treasurer, recently told Richland Source the city pays the Land Bank “roughly $25,000 to $30,000” per year to oversee demolitions.
Theaker attended the Land Board meeting on Wednesday and said he wanted to dispel “rumors” the city was pulling out of the organization.
By statute, a representative from the county’s largest municipality must be on the board, though no financial participation is required. The mayor made no mention of the city’s plan to stop paying the Land Bank to oversee demolitions.
Theaker and Dave Remy, the city public works director and acting safety service director, declined to offer specifics of the proposal after the request for legislation reached the City Council clerk’s office Thursday.
In an emailed response to a Richland Source interview request Thursday, Remy wrote that the proposed reorganization “is the result of an evaluation of each of them and how we can better utilize their individual services to better serve the public and our residents.”
“It is a move that puts these divisions in line with how other cities similar in size to Mansfield provide community develop, building inspection, permitting, and codes enforcement,” Remy wrote.
“Cities with department like what we want to create are present in Lakewood and Kettering. Other cities with similar variants are Lima, Beavercreek and Westerville,” Remy wrote.
He said the proposal is scheduled to be discussed at multiple council meetings before a planned vote Dec. 20.
“With that in mind, there will be a full presentation of this proposal to city council at the November 15th meeting and administrative staff will be present to answer any questions posed regarding this matter,” Remy said.
“As with the proposed water rate changes, the administration is reserving specific comments and/or explanations about this proposal for the council meeting.”
Not surprisingly, the city’s efforts to enforce building codes and permits with a short-handed department was one of the topics identified by voters a year ago in the Richland Source Citizen’s Agenda that sprang from “Talk the Vote” listening sessions.
One 5th Ward resident, during a session, said, “Community development and codes departments should work hand-in-hand to address current issues and plan to move forward.”
In September, Theaker proposed some changes to the understaffed department, changes that met with questions and resistance from some City Council members.
One of those council members was At-large member Stephanie Zader, who said then it appeared the administration was trying to “piecemeal” changes and not address a needed restructuring of the department.
On Friday, Zader said she supported the idea of putting building codes and community development under one umbrella.
But Zader said she is not in favor of ending the demolition-funding relationship the city has established with the Land Bank since the quasi-public agency was founded in 2013.
“I have expressed my concerns about that (to the administration). That relationship has been a very valuable one for the city. Collaboration is something we have worked on for years and this decision seems very short-sided and will likely add more workload to a department that is already overworked,” Zader said.
Hamilton told Richland Source a city decision to oversee its own demolitions would “not be a make or break kind of thing.”
“We do work for the city by managing its demolitions. We are here to help the city in any way we can,” said Hamilton, adding he has not been notified the city wants to stop paying for the work.
The Land Bank is primarily funded through the collection of delinquent property taxes, which Hamilton said is around $275,000 to $280,00 annually.
Zader said she was also concerned the administration has not been more transparent in its planning with the Land Bank or the public.
“This is what people are tired of … the behind-closed-doors stuff. We need to be transparent about what we are thinking and planning. The citizens have a right to know.
“The proper thing would have been for the mayor and others to go sit down (with the Land Bank) and talk about these plans, how it would affect the Land Bank, etc.,” Zader said.
Zader pointed to examples of how the Land Bank has helped land millions of dollars in state grants to help demolish former Westinghouse properties and the former Ocie Hill Neighborhood Center.
“I understand that the Administration sees this as an opportunity to ‘save money,’ however, I do not see it that way.
“We pay the Land Bank to help manage the demolition processes, but we have received far more in support from the Land Bank,” she said. “We have received far more than we have spent.
“I also discussed with Director Remy and Director May that I thought that conversations should be had with the members of the Land Bank, before we moved forward with this, and they assured me they would encourage the Mayor to have those conversations.
“However, at the Land Bank meeting the other day, the mayor not only did not address this, he talked around the issue by assuring the Land Bank that we were not pulling out of the Land Bank — because we cannot by statute,” Zader said.
