YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – Heat and hot water service to downtown businesses and residents could resume in several days, as officials anticipate the delivery of a new mobile boiler at SOBE Thermal Systems’ plant on North Avenue.

Once the unit arrives, it will take a couple of days to install and then perhaps another day for inspection, a source involved in the transaction told The Business Journal on Thursday.

The unit is coming from Virginia, the source noted, and may not be delivered until the weekend.

An effort to connect SOBE’s pipeline infrastructure to Youngstown State University’s system on Wednesday failed, and securing a new steam unit presented the most viable alternative.

Late Thursday, SOBE was waiting to sign off on a contract to supply the new unit. Once the contract is approved, then it can be shipped.

Meantime, some downtown businesses and residents are without steam heat and hot water service.

“We have no hot water,” said Steve Bernard, general manager at West 34, a downtown restaurant on the ground floor of Wick Tower. The business is able to remain open by boiling water on its gas stoves to meet health codes, he said. 

Heat isn’t a major issue at the moment, since the weather is still warm, he said.

“We’ll be OK,” he said. “We’ve already talked with the health department. It’s more of an inconvenience.”

Other downtown stakeholders also made adjustments. The YMCA, for example, closed its shallow pool Thursday because there’s no steam heat serving the building.

Other customers on SOBE’s system include City Hall.

“We’re customers,” Mayor Jamael Tito Brown said Thursday.  “And we demand that we get services like anyone else across the city, and we will seek legal action if that’s not happening.”

On Sept. 30, Wabash Power Equipment Co. disconnected and repossessed a mobile steam heating trailer that it leased to SOBE so the company could provide heat and chilled water to 27 buildings downtown and approximately 90 apartment units. SOBE had failed to make lease payments on the unit, and a Mahoning County Common Pleas Court ruled in August that Wabash had the right to repossess the equipment.

The court on Sept. 26 appointed a receiver to manage the assets of SOBE, citing the likelihood of insolvency. Last minute attempts by the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio to stay the repossession failed, since the unit had already been decommissioned, according to documents filed with the Mahoning County Common Pleas Court.

The city on Thursday sent a letter urging the PUCO and the court-appointed receiver to use “all statutory powers” to restart operations at SOBE Thermal Energy Systems’ North Avenue steam heating plant.

The city’s letter, drafted Thursday by Law Director Lori Shells Simmons, called the situation “unacceptable” and noted the city has no authority to operate the district heating plant.

Moreover, the letter emphasized that the city has “gone above and beyond” its obligations to provide enough time for authorities to step in and assume control over the troubled district heating company.

“The repossession of this trailer has left many downtown businesses and residents without heat or hot water,” Shells Simmons wrote. “This situation is unacceptable and constitutes a failure of SOBE Thermal’s statutory obligation to provide public utilities as required by law.”

The letter requests that the PUCO and the receiver contact the city’s law department within the next 24 hours to inform them of how they intend to resume SOBE’s operations so the city can advise its downtown residents and businesses.

“They need to do their job, so it’s critical. We’re serious about it,” the mayor said of the PUCO and the receiver. “We’re serious about safety. We’re serious about our citizens. We’re serious about our downtown. We’re looking to the future, and everything’s moving in the right direction, and we want to make sure that they get the service they deserve.”

A PUCO spokesman said the commission is engaging all stakeholders.

“We are continuing to talk with all the relative parties,” PUCO spokesman Matt Schilling said Thursday. These include discussions with SOBE, the receiver, the city and YSU.

“It’s a very fluid situation,” he said.