Tuesday, September 18th, 2018
Fort council picks Knapke to fill vacancy
By Sydney Albert
FORT RECOVERY - Village council members on Monday voted after an executive session to name Luke Knapke as their newest member.
He will replace former council president Dave Bretz.
Knapke has lived in the village for three years but is raising a child in Fort Recovery and wants to join council to give back to the community, he said. In a questionnaire he had submitted before the meeting, Knapke stated some of the challenges he sees the village facing are modernizing while still retaining its history, drawing small businesses to town and adapting the council to an ever-changing world.
Jerry Byram and Marv Collins also sought the open seat. Byram told the council members he has lived in the village for 17 years and would like to give back to the community. Collins said his interest stemmed from his father, who he said had been mayor and had served on the council for about 20 years.
After a 45-minute executive session, Byram received one vote for the council position while Knapke received four votes.
Knapke is scheduled to be sworn in during the next council meeting on Oct. 1. He will complete Bretz's term, which will expire Dec. 31, 2021. He could then seek re-election.
In other business, council members approved a resolution urging Gov. John Kasich and the general assembly to invest surplus funds into the Ohio municipalities fund. Village solicitor Erin Minor said several other municipalities are also urging the state government to reinvest money into local government funds.
State officials recently announced their budget would have a surplus of about $145 million. Kasich said he wanted to use the money to bolster the rainy-day fund, but municipalities have been losing money from the local government fund over the last few years.
Council members also accepted the local government fund amount allotted to the village from the state, which Diller said was about 40 percent lower than what they had been receiving at one point.
Council members also,
• accepted amounts and rates provided by the budget commission and authorized levies.
• authorized an advance of $130,000 from the general fund to the Ohio Department of Natural Resources Grant Fund. The money will be used to pay for baseball diamond improvements, and the village will later be reimbursed by ODNR.
• approved various local banks as depositories of village funds.
• approved paying Bruns Construction $15,970 for final work on the courts project.
