Board of Control – Minus Bozanich – OKs Demolition Item
YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – Two of the three members of the city’s Board of Control today approved a liability waiver related to a demolition project by the Ohio National Guard, with the third member – Finance Director David Bozanich — absent.
Bozanich has been largely absent from City Hall since Thursday, when investigators executed search warrants Thursday at his house and that of his reported girlfriend, along with two other locations. Speculation has centered around a connection with the warrants executed in March at the offices of NYO Property Group and the home of developer Dominic Marchionda.
Kyle Miasek, deputy finance director, said this morning he had been under the impression Bozanich would be in the office today before being informed he would likely be back Tuesday.
The 50 members of the 112th Engineering Battalion were expected to begin demolition today on the 28 residential structures, five on the North Side and the rest on the South Side, Abigail Beniston, code enforcement and blight remediation superintendent, said. They arrived Saturday, she reported.
The release from liability approved this morning by the board’s other two members – Mayor John McNally and Law Director Martin Hume – absolves the Youngstown board of Education from liability related to the battalion’s use of the former Sheridan Elementary School, 3321 Hudson Ave.
The battalion will store equipment and setup its radio tower at the site, Beniston said. “It will be what they operate out of while they’re in town,” she said.
The guard is demolishing through the South Side Blight Removal and Greening project through the Department of Defense’s Civil-Military Innovative Readiness Training Program. The demolition work is slated to run through July 22.
The goal of the IRT project will be to demonstrate that the training is a benefit to the Department of Defense, so that can be leveraged into a larger IRT project of 100 to 200 houses, Beniston said.
“We already do have applications in,” she confirmed. The work getting underway today will save the city in the range of $159,000 in demolition expenses, she said.
Pictured: Youngstown City Hall.
Copyright 2024 The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.
