Permissive sales tax receipts, OhioMeansJobs stats, new city fitness court proposal mulled at commission meeting

Highland County commissioners Brad Roades, Terry Britton and David Daniels heard updates on county permissive sales tax receipts, OhioMeansJobs statistics and a proposed new fitness court, plus made approvals for a number of county offices, at their Wednesday, April 23 meeting.

After a record-breaking $960,161.96 in permissive sales tax receipts collected in March, totals are leveling out again, according to Highland County Auditor Alex Butler.

“Last month, we did see a big distribution, and I attributed that to late payments from the Christmas time frame. I’m not surprised to see it go back down. We are almost exactly on track to where we were this time last year.”

For April, the county collected $681,143.60, which is comparable to other historic April totals.

“That is 5.27-percent less than we received this month last year, but our year to date versus year to date last year, we're almost identical,” Butler said. “It's just 0.1-percent higher.”

The county has topped $3.2 million in receipts on the year with $3,247,327.99 thus far, compared to $3,242,936.29 for the same four-month period in 2024.

Butler added that the numbers reported Wednesday are for “economic activity from February, which typically is not” a month with high “economic activity.”

In an unrelated appointment with another county office, Tara Campbell and Haylee Brown attended on behalf of the Highland County OhioMeansJobs office, with Campbell discussing a memorandum of understanding up for renewal and Brown recapping OMJ’s 2024 statistics.

Commissioners voted 3-0 to authorize the execution of the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) memorandum of understanding for Local Workforce Area 7 for July 1, 2025 to June 30, 2027.

“We have required partners, and then we have partners that have been with us at the OMJ center, contributing different different resources and things like that,” Campbell said. “The commissioners have always provided our space and utilities, so thank you very much for that. That saves us a lot of money. Being an Appalachian county, our funding is less than a lot of other counties.”

Campbell added that there are “no changes” to the two-year MOU renewal.

After Campbell explained the MOU, Brown reviewed the programs offered and number of individuals served by OMJ in 2024 at their locations in Hillsboro and Greenfield.

“ We had 3,330 visits in the OMJ room in 2024,” Brown said. “Seven hundred and eighty-seven of those visits were for unemployment meaningful assistance. While we're not the unemployment office, we do help folks put their claims in. We can help just be an intermediary between unemployment, as sometimes it's hard to get ahold of them.

“The percentages for demographics, 14- to 24-year-olds made up about 15 percent of our clients that visited us, 25- to 54- year-olds made up 61 percent and 55 and older made up roughly 25 percent of people served in the OMJ research rooms, just so that you know who we see every day and who's coming in to see us.”

Some of the program-specific statistics included:

• 95 households served in the vehicle repair program, assisting with car repairs so individuals could “get to and from work or their education and training programs.”

• 34 participants in the rural health care program, “an initiative to reach rural counties and pay for the education and training for health care programs for residents of rural counties.”

• 25 participants in the WIOA (Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act) Adults and Dislocated Worker program, including 18 who “went through their training program and gained or maintained new employment” and 15 who “earned a certificate, financial or licensure.”

• 19 participants in the Wellness, Recovery, and Employment Program (WREP), which “provides support through treatment and lifelong recovery from substance use disorders.” Of those 19 individuals, “nine of them attained employment and nine of them earned a certificate or credential,” and they participated in a total of “126 wellness activities” throughout the year.

•For youth participants in the Comprehensive Case Management and Employment Program (CCMEP), which involves “services that focus on setting and achieving goals related to education, training and employment with the ultimate goal to enter a career and break the cycle of poverty,” Brown said that they had 11 youths gain employment; nine who had a long-term paid internship work experience; four obtained a certificate or credential; and 11 earned their high school diploma.

• 10 adult participants in the Growing Rural Independence Together (GRIT) project, which “aims to aid both students and adults in uncovering financial independence through employment,” including six who “obtained employment, and four of them earned a certificate and credential.”

Commissioners thanked them for their insights on the OMJ program.

Also on Wednesday, commissioners agreed to issue a letter of support for the City of Hillsboro as it seeks federal grant funding for their proposed new fitness court from the National Fitness Campaign.

Highland County Health Commissioner Jared Warner discussed the potential National Fitness Campaign initiative at the February Hillsboro City Council meeting and through written communications for several months, including stressing the need for physical activity to improve health outcomes in the county.

Warner said Wednesday the idea came from a letter that the commissioners office received several months ago.

“Terry had an email from an organization that works on outdoor fitness courts, and it was a interesting opportunity where there was potentially some funding available and really a prepackaged fitness court that could be sited, and it kind of dropped into place if we had the space through our community partnerships to make that happen,” Warner said.

Similar “preestablished footprints of outdoor fitness centers” have been implemented in Ohio cities such as Cincinnati and Dayton, as well as more local areas such as Washington Court House, Warner told council in February. The health commissioner said the courts include “a lot of exercise equipment really focused on body weight exercises and low-impact exercises” on one half and “a big open area” for other activities on the other half.

“What we're working with the City of Hillsboro on is to try to identify funding to locate a fitness court out near where they've got the new pickleball courts, the newly resurfaced basketball courts, soon to be the Rails to Trails program,” Warner said. “What the City of Hillsboro is really doing is developing an outdoor activity hub for the whole community. They just had the new ninja course put in, so we've already got a lot of options and opportunities for physical fitness there. This would be, we think, an ideal place to put something like this to further increase access and opportunity for Highland County citizens to get out and get active.”

In February, Warner said the project costs can range from $150,000 to $260,000, with limited funding potentially available from the National Fitness Campaign. The letter of support approved by commissioners Wednesday was for potential “funding from the federal level.

“Just in the last couple of days, we’ve been kind of made aware of some congressionally directed spending from Senator Jon Husted’s office,” Warner said. “If we are able to act quickly, we may have the opportunity to get some funding from the federal level to support a project like this.

“What we're really asking for today from the commissioners is as a letter of support committing us to apply for that funding from Senator Husted’s office, and if that funding doesn't come through, or we don't win that award, I think there's more conversation down the road as to how we might be able to partner with the commissioners to be able to put something like this in place.”

In addition to commissioners, Warner said they have obtained letters of support from Highland District Hospital, from HealthSource’s Highland County office and Highland Health Providers.”

Hillsboro economic development director Lauren Walker, who was also in attendance Wednesday, said the city is “committed” to identifying, and contributing toward, funding for the project.

“The city has been in support of the project since it was brought to us, and I believe Bree [Abbott, Hillsboro safety and service director] has provided a letter of support as well for that funding option,” Walker said. “I believe city is committed to doing a match, whether it be funds or in kind.

“We are in support of the project as well and will look for other community partners if we can't get all the funding established. We look forward to the project.”

Commissioners agreed to send the letter.

“I think when you get the opportunity to kind of join in, to get people outside and moving I personally support it,” Roades said.

Commissioners also made the following approvals:

• After discussing whether to replace a “problematic” damper at the Sheriff’s Office at a cost of $31,000 or to “swap at all of them” at a cost of $111,000, as described by ARPA funding coordinator Nicole Oberrecht, commissioners asked Oberrecht to draft a proposal for funding the total replacement.

In response to a question from Daniels, Oberrecht said that the funding would come from the capital improvement line item.

“I think this whole energy efficiency upgrade was like $375,000, roughly,” Oberrecht said. “The grant only covered about $247,000, so we're already pledging some capital improvement dollars toward this project.”

Britton pointed out that the dampers are “all the same age.” Daniels agreed and said they “all need to be done,” and he asked Oberrecht to “make sure that this doesn’t cut us short in capital improvement” and to come up with a recommendation for their next meeting.
 
• An IV-D contract with Ohio Department of Job and Family Services and Common Pleas Court for domestic relations magistrate services.

“It allows us to pull down federal IV-D dollars to assist in paying some of the staffing costs of the magistrate's position, as she supports and oversees many child support cases,” Highland County JFS Director Jeremy Ratcliff said.

• An addendum (via resolution and contract) to a lease agreement with the Ohio Department of Public Safety and Hillsboro Bureau of Motor Vehicles for July 1, 2025 to June 30, 2027.

“It's for a total cost of $10,487.67,” Roades said.

• A five-year lease agreement with Quadient Leasing USA Inc. for the auditor’s office for a new postage machine.

“Although the current contract is valid through the end of the year, they offer some pricing incentives to go ahead and renew now,” Butler said. “We’ll get a new postage machine with that, and then the monthly fee is approximately $10 or less more a month with this new improvement, so a very small increase for the same service, and it's locked in for five years.”

• An agreement to split the cost of a new clean burn furnace at the county airport, in response to a request from Highland County Airport Authority president Bob Prosek at the April 16 meeting.

Prosek had provided a quote of $17,825, and Roades said that Monte Shaw of the Airport Authority “agreed that the airport would pay for half if we paid for the other half.”

• A contract with A & A Safety, Inc. and the county engineer for various county road pavement markings for fiscal year 2025.

• Three separate resolutions for the Probation department:

— A budget modification within the 2665 Specialized Docket Subs Fund in the amount of $9,230;

• An additional appropriation from unappropriated funds within the 2625 TCAP 24-25 Fund in the amount of $37,646.30; and

— An additional appropriation from unappropriated funds within the 2620 PSG FY 24-25 fund in the amount of $29,770.28.

• Commissioners agreed to “offer no comment,” as Daniels said, to the Division of Liquor Control regarding the renewal of liquor licenses in the county.

The remainder of the commissioners’ agenda included work sessions with county officials and various RFQ interviews and/or construction meetings.

For more from Wednesday’s meeting, go to: https://highlandcountypress.com/news/commissioners-proclaim-may-buddy-p….

Publisher's note: A free press is critical to having well-informed voters and citizens. While some news organizations opt for paid websites or costly paywalls, The Highland County Press has maintained a free newspaper and website for the last 25 years for our community. If you would like to contribute to this service, it would be greatly appreciated. Donations may be made to: The Highland County Press, P.O. Box 849, Hillsboro, Ohio 45133. Please include "for website" on the memo line.