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Washington County Commission discusses levy money, timber

MARIETTA — The Washington County commissioners won’t reduce the amount of levy money distributed to the Washington County Developmental Disabilities Board by as much as previously stated.

At their weekly meeting Thursday, the commissioners signed a recommendation to the Budget Commission to revise the amount of a reduction in millage for the Washington County Board of Developmental Disabilities.

“On July 13, 2017, you approved the 2018 tax levy for Washington County. That levy included a reduction in millage for two levies: Developmental Disabilities a 0.5-mill reduction, and the public library a 0.35-mill reduction,” said clerk Rick Peoples. “There have been conversations from both organizations and after those discussions, the commissioners were inclined to change the reduction of Developmental Disabilities levy from 0.5-mills to 0.25-mills. The library would remain at .35-mills.”

It was previously reported that the 0.5-mill reduction would represent $900,000 less in levy funds for the year for the disabilities board.

A tax budget hearing with the budget commission was scheduled for later in the afternoon to approve or deny the recommendation. A call for comment from the Developmental Disabilities Board wasn’t returned Thursday.

The Washington County Home will be minus a few hundred trees after the county commissioners entered into an agreement with Haessly Timber and Logs LLC at Thursday’s meeting.

The county put out a request for bids and the locally owned lumber company was the only bidder, coming in at $25,100.

“The bid package was approved by our legal team so I am prepared to move to accept,” Commissioner David White said. Commissioners Ron Feathers and Rick Walters voted in favor.

The contract would include the cutting down and removal of 419 trees in an approximately 34-acre area. That comes out to 73,500 board feet of hardwood, including northern red oak, black walnut, sugar maple, poplar, black cherry, beech and sycamore. The trees are marked and any removal of trees that aren’t marked would be subject to a $1,000 per tree fine, according to Walters. Haessly has three years to complete the project.

“There’s value in these trees for the county,” White said.

Feathers said the recommendation came from the Ohio State University’s Washington County Extension office regarding trees that were too mature and taking over pasture land.

“About four years ago we entered into a discussion with the OSU extension to see what type of value there was for the farm land … this was one of the recommendations they made, this selective cutting,” he said. “This has been a longtime process to get somebody interested.”

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