Commissioners recognize Red Ribbon Week; hear recycling, investment updates

Highland County commissioners Terry Britton, David Daniels and Brad Roades recognized Oct. 23-27 as Red Ribbon Week in Highland County during their Wednesday, Oct. 18 meeting.

Accepting the Red Ribbon Week proclamation were Karie Emery of Bright Local Schools; Toni Lewis of Greenfield Exempted Village Schools; Jeff Meyer of Hope for Highland County and the Highland County Drug Abuse Prevention Coalition; Susan Rhoads of Hillsboro City Schools; and Bill Showman of Paint Valley ADAMH.

Congress established Red Ribbon Week in 1988. The week raises awareness of drug use and the problems related to drugs and encourages parents, educators, business owners and other community organizations to promote drug-free lifestyles. Red Ribbon Week encourages the entire community to adopt healthy, drug-free lifestyles.

The theme of this year’s national Red Ribbon Week campaign is “Be Kind to Your Mind. Live Drug Free.” According to redribbon.org, the annual theme serves as “a reminder that everyday Americans across the country make significant daily contributions to their communities by being the best they can be because they live drug-free.”

Showman, who is the PVADAMH manager of prevention and evaluation, discussed how PVADAMH is facilitating this year’s activities, as they have in years past.

“It's typically been a Highland County thing that we've done,” he said. “This year, we're expanding to Pike County and Fayette County also. “We’re working with all the schools in all those school districts.

“It's just to encourage kids in the community to remain drug free.”

Students will have an opportunity to compete in the annual Write In Red contest, which is sponsored by ADAMH for high school and middle school students within the ADAMH district (Highland, Fayette, Pickaway, Pike and Ross counties). Scholarships and prizes are awarded to school and county winners selected for their essays.

Students will also be encouraged to participate in themed dress-up days at school next week, according to Showman.

“There's a night today we're going to release the themes for each of the days,” he said. “There's a Barbie and Ken Day, there's a neon sunglass day, there's a stuffed animal day, there's pajama day and then wear red day.”

Meyer brought up that he had attended a commissioners meeting in August where the commission proclaimed Aug. 31 as Ohio Overdose Awareness Day in Highland County, ahead of a planned day of remembrance and awareness for local overdose victims.

“We were here remembering those that lost their lives to drug addiction and substance abuse,” Meyer said. “It's nice to see the positive side where we can have prevention ahead of time, thinking about how many lives will be saved because of so many people in our community who work so hard at teaching others that you can have fun without the substance.”

Britton agreed, saying early intervention is “very, very important.”

“Our Children Services deal with these issues [drugs] daily,” Britton said. “All the efforts that you all bring to this means a lot.”

After meeting with the group, Roades read the proclamation recognizing Oct. 23-27 as Red Ribbon Week in Highland County and “urging all citizens to join in this special observance.”

In other discussion:

• Commissioners approved a revision to a previously awarded recycling grant for the Village of Leesburg, at the request of county recycling coordinator Tara Campbell.

“ The Village of Leesburg was awarded that grant back in June, and they have emailed and asked for a revision to their grant,” Campbell said. “They were awarded a grant from Ohio EPA to get a new wood chipper, and that is to keep the village clean of debris, things like that.”

The Village is now seeking to use their recycling grant as a match for their Ohio EPA grant funding, Campbell said. She said the Ohio

EPA advised the village doing so would be “fine,” and Campbell said she also sought and obtained approval from the Solid Waste District board.

The county had approved the 2023 Recycling and Litter Management Grant in the amount of $2,000 for the village June 14, and the Ohio EPA announced July 31 that Leesburg had been awarded $17,948 to purchase recycling equipment and for litter cleanup.

“[Leesburg] had in their grant, their recycling weekend is usually what they do — an entire weekend of recycling, three roll-off dumpsters and some tire funds,” Campbell said. “They have reduced those amounts, paying for them out of their local funds, whatever's excess and using, and using $1,055 of the county recycling grant for the Vermeer chipper. They also said it's a much safer chipper than what they currently have in the village.”

Commissioners voted 3-0 to approve the revision.

In other recycling updates, Campbell said the county’s annual Tire and Electronics Disposal Day event, held Sept. 23 at the North High Business Center, was a big success.

“We had almost 120 vehicles come through,” she said. “We had a long line, and it went well. I haven't gotten the numbers back on how many tires were recycled, but we had a lot of farm equipment tires, we had a lot of passenger tires and the townships brought in a lot of tires from our streams, waterways and roadsides. I think that's always good, too, to be a part of getting all that cleaned up.”

• Highland County Treasurer Vickie Warnock conducted an investment advisory committee meeting, sharing interest figures from the month of September as well as quarterly and annual totals thus far.

Totals for the month of September presented by Warnock included:

—STAR Ohio: $29,249.19 interest, $6,472,272.35 balance and 5.52-percent interest rate;

—STAR Plus: $10,775.95 interest, $3,304,930.3u balance and 4.05-percent interest rate;

—Fifth Third (CDs): $5,448.71, interest, $10,359,822.43 balance and 1.98-percent average interest rate;

—Checking account: $40,363.97 interest, $10,146,000.18 current balance and 5.2-percent interest rate; and

—ICS account: $119,718.75 interest, $19,395,656.67 current balance and 5.52-percent interest rate.

“For the quarter, the interest that we made on our investments is $631,893.34,” Warnock said. “Overall interest so far for the year is $1,734,819.65.”

As far as making any changes, Warnock said they could look into an offer received from Wilmington Savings Bank recently, for a six- or 12-month CD at five percent. She said she has reached out to representatives at Fifth Third Bank  “to see if we have any liquid funds, since it is paying the least amount.

“If we did want to do any investments with Wilmington Savings, depending on what we have with Fifth Third, I would think that's where we would need to take it from,” Warnock said. “I haven't heard back from him yet. I just emailed him this morning.

“The rest of them are paying a pretty good interest rate, and mostly paying more than the five percent.”

Commissioners agreed and asked Warnock to report back once she speaks with Fifth Third.

• Daniels reported that “South Central Power has begun the work on the easement that we granted them last week to cross the airport property” with a project involving both electric and fiber lines at the site of the Highland County Airport.

“If you see some stuff going on around there, I’m guessing they’re beginning to put their plans in place for their fiber and internet rollout,” Daniels said. “There’s probably a lot of work left to do, but they're starting.”

Britton said he knew they were working “at the lake area,” while Roades said South Central crews have also been “running down 73 going toward Belfast.

“When they get done, at least the South Central people with their electric will have access to internet service,” Britton said.

• Daniels also spoke about the County Commissioners Association of Ohio’s regional meeting, which was hosted by Highland County commissioners office Monday, Oct. 16.

“They were talking about budget breakdown and what all is in the state budget and funding opportunities that are out there as a result,” Daniels said. “It was actually a pretty good meeting, and there are things that probably Highland County and Highland County residents can take part in some of those programs. We’ll probably be hearing some of that as we dive deeper into what those programs are and how we can access those funds.”

Britton agreed that it was a “great overview” from the state.

• Roades reported some progress on the construction of the new Ohio State University Extension office at the Highland County fairgrounds.

“They’re supposed to pour concrete for the floor tomorrow and then start framing Monday,” he said.

In other building updates, commissioners voted Wednesday to authorize a public improvement notice of commencement for the records storage building.

• Commissioners reminded the community that their Oct. 25 meeting has been moved up one day, to Tuesday, Oct. 24 at 9 a.m.

• After their regular meeting, commissioners held a work session with county records manager Julie Wallingford.

In other action, commissioners approved the following resolutions, each by a 3-0 vote:

• A resolution requested by the County Engineer, who deems it necessary to establish a new fund for road repair and maintenance titled “Solar Road Repair.” Also requested is an appropriation of $400,000.

“This is money that will come into county government from those solar companies to repair roads, and then the county engineer will then perform those road repairs and pay for it out of that,” Daniels said. “We have to ask the state auditor for permission to open that fund, and that's what we're doing with this resolution.”

• A modification within the County General, 1000 fund in the amount of $50,000.

• A budget modification within the County Miscellaneous, 1000 budget in the amount of $1,000.

• A transfer of funds from Child Support Enforcement Fund, 2015 to Public Assistance Account, 2050 in the amount of $25,563.13 for July 2023 to September 2023 Child Support Shared cost distribution.

• A transfer of funds from Children Services Fund, 2115 to Public Assistance Account, 2050 in the amount of $34,652.55 for July 2023 – September 2023 Child Support shared cost distribution.

• An additional appropriation from unappropriated funds within the Mowrystown Sewer, 5020 budget in the amount of $3,500.

• An additional appropriation from unappropriated funds within the Dog and Kennel 2000 budget in the amount of $500.

• A resolution authorizing the engineer to sell a list of items determined obsolete and no longer needed.

• Commissioners also voted 3-0 to authorize the execution of a change order for various county road resurfacing projects for fiscal year 2023. Britton said the revision involved “the edge lines, and it was a $1,200 change.”