Barb Lewis selected as 2013 Genoa chair

By LENNY C. LEPOLA

News Assis­tant Man­ag­ing Editor

Last Thurs­day evening mem­bers of the Genoa Town­ship Board of Trustees held their annual reor­ga­ni­za­tion meet­ing. Ohio Revised Code man­dates that polit­i­cal sub­di­vi­sion leg­isla­tive bod­ies statewide select chair­per­sons, approve rules, set fees and wages, and per­form a host of other essen­tial orga­ni­za­tional tasks before busi­ness can begin for the year ahead.

Open­ing last Thursday’s ses­sion, the trustees passed the gavel from 2012 trustee chair Karl Geb­hardt to trustee Barb Lewis. Lewis will serve as 2013 chair­per­son and trustee Rick Carfagna will serve as 2013 vice-chair.

Lewis assumed office in 2008 and was reelected to serve a sec­ond four-year term dur­ing the Novem­ber, 2011, Gen­eral Elec­tion. Carfagna and Geb­hardt assumed office in 2010.

Dur­ing 2013 Lewis will serve as the township’s rep­re­sen­ta­tive to the Delaware Gen­eral Health Dis­trict Health Board.

Zon­ing Inspec­tor and assis­tant admin­is­tra­tor Joe Clase was appointed to rep­re­sent the town­ship on the Delaware County Regional Plan­ning Com­mis­sion, with Geb­hardt serv­ing as alternate.

Trustee Carfagna was appointed to the Genoa Town­ship Invest­ment Com­mit­tee; and Geb­hardt was appointed to serve on the Genoa Town­ship Finance and Audit Committee.

Dur­ing the ses­sion the trustees approved the pro­mo­tion of Linda Greco to the posi­tion of Human Resources/Community Out­reach Director.

The trustees com­mended Greco for her ini­tia­tive in iden­ti­fy­ing numer­ous cost sav­ings on insur­ance cov­er­age and other expenses for the township.

“Linda has done a lot to save us thou­sands and thou­sands of dol­lars every year,” Lewis said. “She’s a very hard-working woman.”

Trustee Carfagna said the money Greco saves for the town­ship has a rip­ple effect.

“Through Linda’s efforts tens of thou­sands of dol­lars are saved every year for our tax­pay­ers,” Carfagna added.

In other busi­ness, Genoa Police Chief Robert Tay­lor noted the coop­er­a­tive effort with the West­er­ville Police Depart­ment for addi­tional cov­er­age at West­er­ville schools in the town­ship dur­ing the weeks fol­low­ing the Con­necti­cut school shooting.

“The West­er­ville Police Depart­ment and our agency col­lab­o­rated for extra cov­er­age in the school park­ing lots, and we will con­tinue that,” Chief Tay­lor said, adding that there are sched­uled meet­ings with the West­er­ville PD and board of edu­ca­tion about con­tin­ued extra police cov­er­age at schools.

Tay­lor also noted that Genoa Town­ship has two School Resource Offi­cers, one at West­er­ville Cen­tral High School and one at Genoa Mid­dle School. He said the City of West­er­ville pays half of the SRO’s salary dur­ing the nine months that school is in session.

The trustees approved a three-year con­tract between Genoa Town­ship and IAFF Local 4307, as well as the Ohio Patrolmen’s Benev­o­lent Asso­ci­a­tion Supervisors/Patrol Offi­cers. The three con­tracts will be effec­tive 2013 through the end of 2015.

“With these new con­tracts it’s time to reflect on our first respon­ders,” trustee Carfagna said. “A nor­mal day for our police depart­ment and fire depart­ment has to do with other people’s worst days. We appre­ci­ate you guys being avail­able and look­ing out for us.”

Chief Hon­ey­cutt pre­sented a $2,500 check from the Ohio Depart­ment of Pub­lic Safety to be used for train­ing and equip­ment. The board approved the check to be deposited in the Fire Fund.

The trustees accepted the res­ig­na­tion of Richard “Dick” Rano who has served for nearly a decade on the Genoa Town­ship Parks Advi­sory Board (PAB).

“Mr. Rano brought a lot of expe­ri­ence to Genoa Town­ship, includ­ing his prior ser­vice to West­er­ville parks,” Geb­hardt said. “We sin­cerely thank him for ded­i­cat­ing so many years of ser­vice on the Parks Advi­sory Board.”

The trustees said they wel­come appli­ca­tions from res­i­dents inter­ested in serv­ing a vol­un­tary role on the township’s vol­un­tary boards.

The trustees also noted that Giammarco’s Pizza & Pasta owner Tom Bernardo is being rec­og­nized by the West­er­ville Cham­ber of Com­merce as busi­nessper­son of the year.

The trustees announced a Trustee/Zoning hear­ing at 7 p.m. tonight (Thurs­day, Jan­u­ary 10) to con­sider amend­ments to the Zon­ing Res­o­lu­tion and allow­ing park­ing of rental trucks and trail­ers in the Home Depot park­ing lot.

The trustees announced a Trustee/Zoning hear­ing at 6 p.m. on Thurs­day, Jan­u­ary 17, to con­sider a rezon­ing of land pro­posed by Romanelli & Hughes for con­struc­tion of 169 homes north of Vin­mar Farms and Sheffield Park subdivisions.

The next reg­u­larly sched­uled meet­ing of the Genoa Town­ship Board of Trustees is at 7 p.m. on Thurs­day, Jan­u­ary 17, at the Genoa Town­ship Hall, 5111 South Old 3C High­way, Westerville.

An updated list of town­ship meet­ings is avail­able on the township’s web­site at < genoatwp.com >.

The Genoa Town­ship Admin­is­tra­tive Offices are located at the Genoa Town­ship Hall, 5111 South Old 3C High­way, West­er­ville, and are reg­u­larly open to the pub­lic Mon­day through Fri­day from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. The offices will be closed on Mon­day, Jan­u­ary 21, in obser­vance of Mar­tin Luther King, Jr. Day.

Posted by Gary Henery on Jan 9 2013. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.