PERRYSBURG – The city is moving a step closer to determining what options it has if it leaves the TARTA
system.
By a vote of 3-0 Tuesday night the Health, Sanitation and Public Utilities Committee of council voted to
recommend the hiring of a consultant to perform a transportation study.
The matter will be before City Council at its Oct. 4 meeting.
"We need to do one," said HSPU Chair Todd Grayson of the study.
With the passage of the TARTA Voter’s Rights Amendment as part of the state’s biennium budget earlier
this year, each of the nine TARTA members have the ability to vote whether or not they wish to continue
with the service. The city has been looking into the possibility, but Grayson said it is not yet known
if Perrysburg will be able to put the matter before the public on next year’s May primary ballot, or if
they will have to wait until November.
The study, he said, "is independent of when it goes on the ballot."
"It’s just a matter of, do we act before the study is done or do we wait and act after the study’s
done, and it all comes down to the decision between saving dollars" or taking the time for the
finished study.
"Really, I want to go on (the May ballot) but that’s all conditioned on being able as a city to get
appropriate control on the 2.5 mills that TARTA currently takes," he said. The property taxes paid
by citizens for TARTA service amount to $1.3 million per year.
Grayson said if it were possible to bring that money back for the city’s use, they could keep paying
TARTA for service until the study is complete.
"If we wait until November, we’re still paying TARTA" in tax money into 2013, he said.