MINSTER – The Minster Village Council passed a resolution at its Tuesday, April 20, meeting objecting to the passage of a Ohio House of Representative bill that would require refunds of village income taxes for some employees.

House Bill 157 addresses the situation when some employees of Minster businesses worked from home during the pandemic in 2020. For those employees who lived outside of the village corporation limits, HB 157 would require the village to issues income tax refunds, going back to March 2020.

“The Ohio Municipal League asked that every municipality to write a letter to their representatives asking House Bill 157 not be passed,” said Village Administrator Don Harrod. He said the process of refunds would be a difficult task.

In other actions, council approved the hiring of Jacob Winner as a part-time fire fighter with the Minster/Jackson Township Fire Department.

Council approved a motion to hire Buehler Asphalt Paving Inc. to pave a portion of Hamilton Street at a cost of $30,300. This is the final step in a project to cut down a hill on Hamilton that was a sight-clearance problem. Harrod said the project will be done as soon as the asphalt plants open.

Council also approved a motion to pay the quarterly bill of $18,125.50 to the city of St Marys for their income tax collection services. In a related action, council approved March 2021 income tax collection of $274,001.42. The year to date total is $1,035,742.

Harrod reported on projects and events in the village.

He said the Parks Department along with the Minster Tree Commission will be holding their annual Arbor Day celebration on April 30, 2021, at Four Seasons Park. The event will begin with the arrival of the fourth-grade students at 2:15 p.m., followed by a tree planting ceremony at 2:30 p.m. Each fourth-grade student will receive a swamp white oak seedling as part of the event.

Lake County Sewer was in the village recently doing work on the sanitary sewer line between Hanover and Lincoln streets and Third and Fifth streets. Harrod said crews have cleaned, grouted and relined the sanitary line in the alley.

The trucks for the electric department underwent the annual dielectric testing last week. All of the trucks except the newest truck passed the test. Harrod said the new truck needs to go back down to Utility Equipment to have some work done on the end of the boom.

Harrod said he and Travis Fishbaugh met with engineers from CDM Smith to discuss possible solutions to the village’s total dissolved solids issue at the waste water treatment plant. CDM Smith reviewed several possible solutions that could help the village reduce the amount of total dissolve solids coming from the treatment plant. He said they intend to set up a meeting with the Ohio EPA to discuss these possible solutions and determine what is acceptable to the Ohio EPA.