By Linda Collins
Fairborn Daily Herald
ENON – Enon Mayor Tim Howard and village council members kicked off the New Year on Tuesday evening, Jan. 10 with village government’s annual organizational meeting for 2017.
As their first order of business, village council members approved a meeting schedule for the year. Council will continue to hold regular sessions of council at 7 p.m. on the second and fourth Tuesdays of each month. On evenings when a special meeting is held prior to the regular session, the special meeting will begin at 7 p.m., followed by a regular session of council. All regular meetings, which are open to the public, are held in council chambers at the Enon Government Center, located at 363 E. Main Street.
Once again, council members reelected Councilman Stephen Trout as council president for 2017 and approved the appointment of Attorney Paul J. Kavanagh as the village solicitor, at an established rate of pay of $125 per hour. Council members also adopted the 2017 Rules of Council in accordance with the Ohio Revised Code. However, Trout suggested that council members take a closer look at the rules and make any revisions where needed.
Salaries and wages for elected officials and village personnel remained the same, with the exception of three pay increases for a village police officer, police sergeant and police lieutenant. Officers will earn between $12-24 per hour; sergeants will earn between $18-25 per hour; and lieutenants will earn between $20-26 per hour.
Council unanimously approved Howard’s proposed budget for 2017 as an emergency ordinance. The mayor noted that the appropriations budget, Village Ordinance 2017-1, was a temporary budget until the village received an official Amended Certificate of Estimated Resources for the fiscal year from the Clark County Auditor’s Office.
The $1,993,083 budget proposal consists of a breakdown of projected revenues and expenses that Howard said would help chart the economic course for the village this year. The mayor underscored the fact that the village has seen a consisted decline in overall annual revenue from the state since 2014.
“I spent a lot of time on this budget. It is lean, but it is going to work,” Howard said.
Howard reappointed Councilman Rick Hanna as chair of the Streets and Sidewalks and the Public Safety Committees. Councilman Trout and Councilwoman Lorri DeVore will serve on the Streets and Sidewalks Committee, and Trout and Councilwoman Brenda Sweet will serve on the Public Safety Committee.
Devore will serve as chair of the Public Service Committee, along with Councilmen Jeremy Whitacre and Elmer Beard who will again serve as committee members. Howard also named DeVore as chair of the Legislative Committee that includes committee members Sweet and Whitacre.
Beard will chair the Parks and Beautification Committee for a second year, and Whitacre and Hanna will serve again as committee members.
Trout will once more chair the Finance Committee, which consists of Council Members Beard and Sweet, Village Fiscal Officer Diana McCubbin and Howard. He also reappointed Trout as the chair of the Drainage and Floodplain Committee, which was first established in 2016, and Hanna and DeVore as committee members.
Howard will continue to serve as the president of the Enon Planning Commission that will be comprised of Councilman Trout and village residents Edward Jaksic, Jerry Bennett and Rick Graver.
