By Andrew Walsh
awalsh@wbcowqel.com
The New Washington Village Council ended 2015 considering a way to make the village ordinances pay a financial dividend.
Police Chief Jeff Shook presented a plan to council that would see the village codify its own ordinance code. Currently, New Washington does not have its own code of ordinances, and police officers use the State Code to write all of their tickets.
The extreme drawback of this situation is that almost none of this ticket money comes back to New Washington funds. In the case of traffic tickets, literally none of that ticket money returns, and for criminal violations, a very small portion comes back.
New Washington is quite unusual in not having its own ordinance code, Shook said that during his research on multiple occasions he heard expressions of extreme surprise at this situation. As far as he can tell, New Washington is one of the very few, if not only, villages in the entire state of Ohio in this situation.
Back in the late 1990s, steps were taken to formally draft a code of ordinances, to the rather expensive tune of $12,000. For reasons that were never recorded, following through with the adoption of that code never took place.
There would be some costs associated with taking this step. Shook outlined them as initial fee of $4,000 to establish the code, and a yearly registry fee of $1,000. However, when Shook explained that the village would have collected $5,000 from the tickets officers wrote last year, the expenses seem quite worthwhile.
“We can’t afford not to take advantage of this,” Shook said, “It’s foolish for us not to entertain this.”
This policy is something that will be pursued more formally in the New Year through the Safety Committee. Mayor Ben Lash was not physically in attendance at Monday night’s meeting, but left a written report for Clerk Julie Cronau to read. In it, he stated his support for this course of action as well.
Council took action to amend their adoption of the income tax collection ordinance from earlier in the year. This was the ordinance that was mostly mandates from Columbus, but did contain a few line items where municipalities had some latitude. During passage of this, New Washington Village Council had elected to remove the existing 1.5-percent income tax credit for out of town workers. At Monday night’s meeting, council have reversed that decision, and inserted a 0.75-percent income tax credit to out of town workers.
In personnel, Officer Dwight Dyer was sworn in at the newly created post of auxiliary officer. This is part of Shook’s plan to build the auxiliary forces to the five to 10 person range. This gives the village access to additional manpower at a very minimal cost.
With the beginning of the New Year there will be three vacancies in the administration. The seats on council of Gert Durnwald and Joe Blum will be vacant, along with the post of Village Solicitor with the resignation of John Berger. Appointees cannot be made until the vacancies have actually become active, which will not take place until the calendar hits Jan. 1.
In his written report, Lash recommended that Blum and Butch Langjahr be appointed to the vacant council seats, with consideration of the solicitor position to take place in 2016. Clerk Julie Cronau added that one other person had expressed interest in one of the vacant council seats.
Council has 45 days from the creation of the vacancy to make a decision, if no decision is made in that time the decision falls to the mayor.