Land Bank takes down 100th Structure
Land Bank takes down 100thstructure
By Bill Shope
Scioto Voice Writer
In what seems to be a never-ending battle to clean up the county, the Scioto County Land Reutilization Corporation (SCLRC) announced that it had recently brought down the 100thdilapidated structure within Scioto County, with another quickly following.
“The 100thbuilding to come down was locate on Russell Ave. in Portsmouth-we did not get to do that with any fanfare, due to a personal illness, but it went well and a crew is currently removing rock from that property so that they may proceed with the hydro-seeding process,” Bryan Davis told the audience at a Scioto County Commissioners meeting. “As far as I know, we now have 101, but Angie Malone relayed to me just this morning that there is a structure in Lucasville that needs to come down quickly, it’s almost ready to fall down. There are a total of 17 houses that were out for bid, but I do not have an update on how many of those have been taken down. We are preparing for the next round this Thursday, where we will discuss bids on the lawn care and grass cutting. We have had several companies place bids to provide that service and we’ll be reviewing and awarding those bids this Thursday. I’m sure everyone has noticed that grass is growing pretty quickly right now, with all of the rain we have had this spring, so there is a need for expediency.”
Davis also acknowledged he has asked for the public’s help in keeping the Land Bank’s properties nice and litter free. “We only have so much money allotted for that and for grass cutting and keep the areas looking nice for the period in which they belong to us. We are experiencing a lot of illegal dumping on some of these properties, which is costing the Land Bank money to have them cleaned up. We had a property on 8thStreet where there were over 20 grocery carts placed there. Any dumping on Land Bank properties is illegal and we will prosecute. If any citizen sees this taking place, please let us know by calling into the Commissioner’s office.”
In other legislation, a contract between Scioto County Job and Family Services and Executive Coach of Chillicothe, dba Portsmouth Taxi Service, was approved, adding $250,000 which takes the total amount of the agreement from $325,000 up to $600,000, effective March 1stof 2019 through June 20, 2019.
Permissive sales tax collected for February 2019 reflected a surprising increase-$533,830.49 plus an additional $266,916.13 from the sales act, brought in a total of $800,746.62. This amount represented an increase of $22,260.09 from February 2018. The amount is even more unexpected when it was revealed the total loss to date from the ending of the MCO tax collection to counties now stands at $2,013,368.71 in Scioto County alone.
Finally, the Commissioners authorized the Scioto County Commissioner’s Clerk to advertise a notice to bidders on Thursday, May 9th, May 16thand May 23 2109 for a sealed bid for the guardrail project overseen by Scioto County Engineer Darren LeBrun. The sealed bids, it was announced, must be received by the Commissioner’s Clerk by 11:00 A.M. on Thursday, May 2019.
