St. Albans Township/Alexandria Merger Commission Meeting

Agenda/Minutes 2/26/25

1. Call to order, pledge of allegiance

Chairperson Carianne Meng calls to Order the St. Albans Township/Alexandria Merger Commission Meeting of February 26, 2025 at 7:01PM.

2. Committee Member Roll Call:  

Baer: Present / Not Present 

Barnes: Present /Not Present 

Burton: Present /Not Present

Lodder: Present / Not Present

Meng: Present / Not Present 

Robertson: Present / Not Present 

Schiller: Present / Not Present 

Taylor: Present / Not Present

Thorpe: Present / Not Present  

Zanks: Present / Not Present 

Additional Attendees:

David Lees, Tad VanNess, Zac Walker (Plank Law Firm), Andrew Bottar-Dillon, Mitch Peters

3. Review and Approval of Minutes

Minutes from St. Albans Township/Alexandria Merger Commission Meeting 2/5/25

Barnes made a motion; seconded by Lodder, to approve the 2/5/25 minutes. All in favor?

Chair declares motion failed / carried. 

4. Old Business 

Ensuring quorum for next meeting – looking at March 12 and 19


Line-items for the tax forms (1040) re: what will be taxed – posted on the Merger Commission website

Invoice submitted to Township and Village for Plank Law Services

PR talking points & examples (intangibles) created by the Merger Commission

• Home Rule – lawyer working on an example (see below)
• Control water/sewer, and perhaps other services
• Control over annexation
• Accountable government
• A larger, consolidated entity may have more influence at the county, state, and regional levels. A single governing body could improve efficiency in policy making, reducing bureaucratic redundancies.
• Expand community services
• Promote community pride: a unified government could foster a stronger sense of shared purpose and identity among residents.
• A larger, more structured entity could attract more resident participation in governance and community initiatives.
• Attract new investments 
• Enhanced local control. A unified approach to development, zoning, and long-term planning can provide more cohesive growth strategies.
• Better public facilities
• Reinstate Alexandria Community Assoc
• Road traffic control (except SR’s).
• Some state and federal grants prioritize larger municipalities, potentially bringing more investment to the area.
• Uniform services: residents benefit from more uniform services, such as road maintenance, emergency response, and community events.
• Better representation – 7 members of council vs. 3 Township
• More opportunity for dialogue among officials because it’s not a small group of trustees
• Better leverage for municipal contracts
• More financial flexibility (bonding)

From Plank Law: Examples for what a village can do versus being an unincorporated township

Home Rule provides for local police powers such as police, sanitary and other similar regulations as long as they do not conflict with general laws of the state. Chartered municipalities typically receive more deference than those without a charter. Certain things that fall into Home Rule are improvement and conveyance of municipal property, salaries and benefits of Municipal employees, qualifications for Municipal council members, recall of municipal elected officials, competitive bidding, manner and method of municipal expenditures, and organization of the municipal police force. The charter must set out the previously mentioned procedures for Home Rule to apply.

Townships have the option of adopting Limited Home Rule if they are over 2500 people. A township under 5000 people must have estimated resources of at least $3.5 million. Limited home rule is not as extensive as Home rule for a municipality, because a township cannot conflict with certain statutory law for townships. One such example is that townships do not have the ability to set salaries of their elected officials because these are set under Ohio statutory law. A township is also limited on what taxes they can enact compared to a municipality under Home Rule. Other laws a township is prohibited from enacting are regulations affecting hunting, trapping, or fishing, altering a township’s authority to control agriculture or natural resources, and regulations impacting firearm use and sales. The limited home rule township also does not have the authority to adopt its own building codes and it can only adopt those codes promulgated by the state or an organization that publishes a model code (ex. Plumbing code).

The township can also enact standards relating to soil erosion and water degradation from nonfarm developments. They cannot, however, establish their own subdivision regulations, road construction standards, urban sediment rules, or storm water and drainage regulations.

A chartered municipality provides flexibility in zoning. A non-chartered municipality or a township can only follow the rules as laid out in the Ohio revised code. A chartered municipality can enact zoning by method set forth in their charter within some limits. Specifically, a chartered municipality can go against their own zoning if their charter contains emergency ordinance provisions and the emergency ordinance is properly enacted.

Municipalities have the ability to internally review platting and floodplains. Townships are under the authority of the county for these types of reviews. Municipalities can contract this review out to the county if they do not want to undertake internal review.

A municipality can choose to annex territory. A county must approve annexations from the township as long as they meet certain statutory requirements and have no discretion into the process. The Village will have discretion over annexing new territory. There is a process for detachment of land from the Village but these instances are rare. This ability may be of particular interest if there is concern of losing township lands to other rapidly expanding municipalities.

5. New Business

Transition Plans: Members of the commission plan to visit the County Commissioners re: transition plans. Topics: roads and bridges, policing
To-Do: Barnes to set the meeting; Lodder and Burton happy to go to the meeting as well. Target: March 20, 27.

Discussion of the fire department and transition of municipal services.

Discussion of list of considerations from Plank Law Firm; will put considerations at the end of this document.*

Discussion of Conditions reviewed by Plank Law – switches to “recommending” language

These continue to be our conditions, and we can raise any issues to Plank as they continue to help us edit.

Future Timeline for Approval for Ballot

Each member of the Commission will need to have a statement/report that is read into the minutes that summarizes why they voted the way they voted about putting the merger on the ballot.

Target date: Wednesday, April 23 is the latest date for lawyered conditions to be in the Commission Members’ hands

Target date: Wednesday, May 7 is our deadline to have the Commission Decision about whether to put the merger on the ballot. We will meet on this date at 7PM.

General Updates:

6. Citizen Comments (3-minute time limit)

VanNess: Compliments to Merger Commission on thoroughness of the work. Questions on finances and where to find projected revenues/costs. Meng referred VanNess to THIS FOLDER. Also discussed salt for the Township Roads; he estimates that salt costs may quadruple and wanted to ensure the Commission had planned for this. Discussion of whether the Commission needs to account for hiring additional staff, etc. 

7. Meeting Announcements
Next meeting is March 12 at 7PM at the St. Albans Firehouse Meeting Room

8. Adjournment
Baer made a motion; Lodder seconded by to  adjourn.
All in favor? Chair declares motion carried / failed. 

Chairperson Meng declares the meeting adjourned at 9:01PM.

Merger Commission Items to Consider

1) The Commission needs to consider any departments/personnel that they wish to add to the new Municipality. These include things such as hiring an engineer, architect consultant, economic development department or officer, etc.

2) Is the commission going to set an income tax or changes to the current income tax system for Alexandria?

3) Does the Commission want to add zoning overlay districts such as adding a downtown district or a commercial district to focus types of development in certain parts of the community?

4) Has the Commission contacted Grow Licking County to see if they have economic development tips or suggestions for the New Municipality?

5) Has the Commission considered what sewer and tap fees will be or have an agreement in place for the Sewer and Tap fees?

6) Has the commission discussed potential state or federal grants for funding by talking with Licking County Development, Licking County Planning, Grow Licking County, or any State departments within this area? Can the New Municipality get any incentives to help with funding?

7) Has the Commission completed a full review of the current Alexandria charter and ordinances to verify whether there are additional amendments they want to require effective the date of merger?

8) Can the Commission confirm with us what they intend to do with employment contracts such as assuming all employment contracts or cutting certain overlapping personnel?

9) Are there currently adequate administrative offices and meeting locations for local officials and Council? Is there a need to recommend a community center or certain improvements for Administrative buildings?

10) Does Alexandria currently have thoroughfare plans (future roadway plans) that may need adjusted based on the merger?

11) Has the Commission considered Win/Win agreements for future annexations? This is for agreements with school districts when the area will be annexed into the New Municipality but the school districts and payments to the school districts will remain the same post annexation. The New Municipality already has many school districts within its potential area.