Bucyrus City Council examines community development, housing needs, utility insurance

Crawford Partnership, Servline and Ohio Regional Development Corporation representatives addressed Bucyrus City Council on Tuesday about attracting and retaining workforce, fostering community relations, insuring citizens and providing affordable housing.

David Zak, president and CEO of Crawford Partnership reminded council members Crawford County placed 16th out of 542 micropolitan counties in the US, according to the Site Selection magazine ranking released in March.

The ranking is made based on the number of projects, and Crawford, along with 10 other counties, had five.

Zak said the county focused on helping companies and businesses establish pipelines to local talent, and vice versa, in terms of connecting to the schools and other resources.

“Companies have open positions whether it’s one, whether it’s two, whether it’s 20,” Zak said. “We can provide them access to the resources – either refer them or make connections to.”

Developing the workforce, local talent

Additionally, according to Zak, the partnership continues to work on developing the workforce in Crawford County, in terms of securing access to talents of professional development programs and exposing students to potential career paths, and working with the teachers.

“Teachers are really on the frontlines of talking with the kids,” Zak said. “We are working together on how to align the educational system with the needs of the business community.”

Zak said the county submitted 13 projects to the House of Representatives for funding consideration, six of which made it to the Senate, including a project for a trail at Aumiller Park, Bucyrus YMCA project and more. Four of the six projects are located in Bucyrus.

“We are competing,” Zak said. “There were over 116 projects.”

Zak also touched upon a new program, Crawford Business Exchange, that assists businesses, investors, entrepreneurs and other community members in learning about acquisitions, franchises, investments and other start-up opportunities in Crawford County.

Servline update and housing grant

Mike Chambers and Christopher Rebar from Servline gave an update on the program and the collaboration with Bucyrus. Chambers said the program was designed to help the residents maintain and repair the service lines that they are responsible for, and they are often not aware of that until the lines collapse.

“A lot of times residents can become upset because they don’t realize they are responsible for these buried lines until they have these issues,” Chambers said.

He said the first step is educating residents about the lines being their responsibility and then offering insurance for the lines. Once the lines are insured customers can call Servline, and the company will contact contractors.

“That helps keep the dollars here in the community locally,” Chambers said.

Rebar said Servline has over 150 customers in Bucyrus.

“It’s been successful, but we wanted to grow larger,” Rebar said.

Affordable housing, home improvements, rental help

Ohio Regional Development Corporation President Dale W. Hartle concluded the first part of the council meeting, which was dedicated to community development, by addressing community housing.

He said he wanted to expand on the community housing improvement program that was designed to partner with Ohioan communities to preserve and improve affordable housing stock for low to moderate income individuals, and strengthen neighborhoods through the program.

Hartle said the program can address home improvements, rental assistance and down payment assistance provided the individuals meet income requirements.

He said the deadline to apply for program funding through the state is in June, and Crawford County is entitled to around $1 million – $400,000 for the county, $300,000 for the City of Bucyrus and $300,000 for the City of Galion.

This article originally appeared on Bucyrus Telegraph-Forum: Bucyrus leaders hear about developing local workforce, housing issues