By Katelyn Sattler
Staff Writer
On Feb. 13, Obetz City Council approved legislation to establish the identity of property owners and tenants, maintain accurate contact information, and ensure timely emergency notification for the provision of essential utility services, including water, gas, electric, refuse, sanitary sewer, and storm sewer.
“When someone comes in to establish a utility account, we haven’t had clear guidance in our code about what that should look like,” said Obetz City Administrator Rod Davisson.
Under the new regulation, property owners and tenants are required to provide the city with their full name, current mailing address, telephone number, valid email address, and proof of ownership or tenancy. This information must be updated every two years, or within 30 days of a change in property ownership or tenancy.
The city can temporarily suspend the usage of utility services if the required information is not provided or if the information is found to be inaccurate or outdated. The suspension of usage will not stop the accrual of base charges for the utility service. The city may also suspend usage in the event of the death of a property owner or the sale of the property until updated information is provided.
Any property owner or tenant who violates the ordinance is subject to a fine of up to $500 for each violation and each day that the violation continues is considered a separate violation.
“We want to make sure that we’re protecting our residents and everybody’s on the same page,” said Davisson.
Development agreement
Council authorized Davisson to enter into a development agreement with Kenmore Aggregates I, LLC.
“This project is bounded by the quarry on the west side of Alum Creek, just south of UPS, along with the land immediately on the other side of Alum Creek next to that are really the two parts of this,” said Davisson. “Those are part of our larger plan. Those two pieces of ground are owned by Kenmore Aggregates. The plan is to fill the lake in to make developable ground on the west side of Alum Creek. The east is mostly in the floodway, so it would get the quarry filled.”
Davisson said Kenmore would donate that land back to the city as a park.
“They’ve also reserved walking path room for us so we can create our path system,” said Davisson. “They are paying for it with UPS and some other partners that were working on a deal to pay for a light at the intersection of Alum Creek and Rathmell, which has become dangerous in the last few years with trucks trying to make that left turn. This cleans all that up.”
Big projects
Davisson said there are some big projects coming.
He said Alum Creek Drive is projected to go to three lanes wide on both sides from I-270 down to Rickenbacker.
“That’s a huge project,” said Davisson. “It’s going to take a lot of fill dirt to get that done. We think that project’s probably coming in 2027 or 2028. That’s not our project, but we have a piece of it. They have asked us to chip in to tune about $3.5 million. I think the total project is $60 million to $80 million.”
“This is a 20-year project,” continued Davisson. “And when we get to the end of this and we have a real opportunity to develop that Big Walnut corridor into something beautiful with some development on the west there, some nice park land on the east, and really accentuate that corridor. This runs all the way up to Greenfield Estates, the new projects we have going up there all the way back down Groveport Road catches the other quarry that’s being reclaimed there on Groveport Road. This is really the centerpiece to getting that done.”
