By Gary Ogle
gogle@wbcowqel.com
To SCAT or not to SCAT? That is the question on Galion Mayor Tom O’Leary’s mind along with several others when it comes to public transportation in Crawford County.
The landscape of public transportation in Crawford County will definitely change in 2017. O’Leary is concerned how the change will directly affect his community, and whether or not it will be positive.
“This is a pretty big issue, especially in Galion where people feel their access to services isn’t as good as it should be,” O’Leary said earlier this week at a mayoral press conference.
Crawford County Council on Aging has been the vendor for public transportation. The agency’s first priority was serving seniors and the disabled, especially as the transportation requests pertained to medical needs. Although the service was available to anyone, the Council on Aging’s vans were only available during the day and unable to handle all of the requests by the public at-large that came its way.
A recently completed survey by the Ohio Department of Transportation indicated that there were a “high number of trip denials and limitations on the hours and frequency of service.” ODOT officials, and Crawford County commissioners, determined that the issue was significant enough to warrant action.
The solution was to continue to have the Council on Aging provide service to senior citizens and the disabled, but after the first of the year another provider will handle the needs of the general public.
Enter SCAT, or Seneca County Agency Transportation. SCAT is in charge of public transportation in Seneca County and, at the urging of ODOT, was the option looked at by Crawford County commissioners to be the public transit vendor for the general public here.
The commissioners held off making a final decision at a meeting last week, citing the need for the boards of the Crawford County Council on Aging and SCAT to approve SCAT making applications for the necessary grant which is controlled by ODOT.
Both boards have since done so, the SCAT board making it clear that ODOT was the driving force behind SCAT coming into Crawford County. That is the point the Galion mayor takes issue with.
O’Leary was at the meeting last week involving county commissioners, Council on Aging, ODOT, SCAT and other officials from Crawford County.
“It was pretty clear they (ODOT officials) were there to force the commissioners to make a decision,” O’Leary said. “To my knowledge, that was the only county there was discussion about.”
O’Leary contends that the commissioners did not follow through on a due diligence responsibility to see what other options were available to be considered and how they might compare to SCAT. He specifically cited Marion County as a possibility and Crawford County’s success in partnering with its southern neighbor on other services in the past like the ADAMH Board.
“My whole point of this, it’s the process, the role of ODOT in this,” said O’Leary. The mayor once worked for ODOT and was at one a time county commissioner, a position he stressed he was not campaigning to return to. “It becomes a problem when local government officials want to take the recommendation of a state agency before hearing from the people that elected them.”
The mayor said he believed that in order for the needs of Galionites and people on the east side of the county to be met, it is imperative that the new provider have a hub in Galion where transit vehicles begin and end the day.
“Certainly the city of Galion has to work with the vendor selected by the county and we intend to do that,” O’Leary said.
The mayor’s larger concern is an ongoing one regarding regional services and the decisions that affect his community.
“Regionalism – got to do something about that,” O’Leary said. “If regionalism is going to work . . . . then you have to have some semblance of equality in the meetings.”
Public meetings were held this week in Bucyrus, Crestline and Galion to share the information and conclusions gleaned from the survey on transportation services in Crawford County.
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