rfox@tribtoday.com
WARREN Trumbull County commissioners said they will not entertain a request from county Engineer Randy Smith to be reinstated as sanitary engineer.
As the elected Trumbull County engineer, Smith heads the highway department. For about five years, commissioners also placed Smith in the position of sanitary engineer, an appointed post heading up the county’s sanitary department. In November, however, commissioners moved to replace him with deputy sanitary engineer, Gary Newbrough.
Smith wrote a letter to commissioners asking to be reinstated and appears to threaten litigation if he is not. The letter also requests an investigation into personnel matters at the sanitary engineer’s office, complains about conversations last year with commissioners Mauro Cantalamessa and Frank Fuda, and dredges up complaints about an attorney he used in the highway department who still works for the sanitary engineer’s department.
rfox@tribtoday.com
WARREN “It’s going to be a busy summer,” with numerous sewer and waterline projects, and plant upgrade projects in Trumbull County, said Gary Newbrough, head of the county Sanitary Engineer’s office.
By the time the projects are completed, approximately 257 new sewer and water connections to the county system will be in place.
Of the eight projects ready to go in 2021, three are improvements to the county’s utility infrastructure.
A $20 million upgrade to the treatment plant in Brookfield is scheduled to start in about a month and is expected to be completed in 2022, according to Newbrough’s documents.
rfox@tribtoday.com
WARREN Trumbull County commissioners are changing the way sanitary sewer projects are filtered through the county bureaucracy in an effort to make the process more transparent.
Commissioners said they do not want private developers meeting in closed-door sessions with county employees to pitch their ideas but want them to go through an official process.
Instead of meeting privately with county employees, the county commissioners decided all developers should present their plans first in an open meeting of the Trumbull County Planning Commission to first see if the development is in line with county plans and regulations.
The idea was presented to the planning commission Tuesday and accepted by director Julie Green, who said she would be happy to implement the process with the sanitary engineer’s office.
rfox@tribtoday.com
WARREN A study Trumbull County commissioners committed to in February, to look at how some residents get water and sewer and whether there’s a way to make it less expensive, should start soon after some delays.
The decision to study the services followed a series of utility-related concerns, the high water rates in Liberty Township and the efforts in Niles to annex parts of neighboring communities that use that city’s utilities.
Gary Newbrough, head of the Trumbull County Sanitary Engineer’s Office, said staff is reviewing the contract with consultant MS Consultants. Newbrough heads the office after the commissioners removed highway Engineer Randy Smith from serving in both engineer positions.