TOLEDO — Regional water discussions took a meaningful step Wednesday morning, but the mayors of several
communities that buy Toledo’s water assured that city’s officials that their pursuit of alternatives is
not a negotiation tactic.
“If there is a feeling that this is a bluff from the suburbs, that is a major error,” Perrysburg Mayor
Mike Olmstead said, echoing comments made by Sylvania Mayor Craig Stough, who chairs the Regional Water
Planning Committee.
The group, part of the Toledo Metropolitan Area Council of Governments, has been meeting for months to
discuss the best way to form a partnership. Members voted unanimously on Wednesday to move ahead with
studying a regional water district, commonly referred to as a 6119, named for the 1971 section of Ohio
Revised Code that provides for their creation.
Toledo’s representatives first took a position that the city wants to work with customers on new,
“unified” contracts, rather than a district, which Toledo could either join or contract with for water
sales. Toledo Mayor Paula Hicks Hudson was notably missing from the meeting, as well as from a session
last week explaining information about regional water districts. Aides said her absence from Wednesday’s
meeting was due to a family emergency.
After some pressing by Lucas County Commissioner Pete Gerken and a few mayors, Hicks Hudson’s chief of
staff, Mark Sobczak, supported a motion to concentrate solely on the option of a district, rather than
negotiating new contracts. He said Toledo’s administration will discuss it with council members and
return with a proposal at the regional water committee’s next meeting on March 8.
“I think we can move forward with a 6119. I think we’re at the point where this group should recommend
that that’s what we focus on, and if Toledo does not want to do that, then we know,” said Maumee Mayor
Rich Carr. “But I think we’re at the point where we can’t keep spinning our wheels.”
“I guess it’s time to look at where the future may go,” said Jerry Greiner, president of Northwestern
Water and Sewer District, which provides Toledo water to areas in northern Wood County including
Rossford, Northwood and Perrysburg Middleton townships.
Stough outlined the reasons why the current relationship between Toledo and its customers is untenable.
Not only do those communities want equal rates and a tangible vote in a governmental structure, they
want something to show for their money that goes toward capital improvements at the Collins Park Water
Treatment Plant.
Toledo is currently in the middle of a $499 million campaign to construct improvements and replace
equipment, with much of the work tied to mandates from the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency.
Although Toledo is borrowing the money, communities with water contracts will help pay for those
upgrades through their rates and want to own a share in the plant one day.
While contract communities consumed 41 percent of Toledo’s water, those contracts bring in 53 percent of
the city’s water revenue, according to 2016 usage figures through October.
“As a leader, I don’t think I can go to my residents and say, ‘Yeah we’re going to put $25 or $30 million
into a plant and at the end, we’ve got nothing to show for it.’” Stough said.
“They are telling me take that chunk of money and put it into a new plant — ‘Do something with it so that
we do have an ownership in the end.’”
Stough also mentioned how Toledo has forced cities like Sylvania, in order to purchase water, to sign
agreements sharing income tax revenue, including 40 percent of what is generated by Flower Hospital.
“That is why there’s no trust from the suburbs. That’s why this current situation of having a single
owner dictating their terms is uncomfortable and not satisfactory to me and my residents,” Stough said.

But he also emphasized that forging a partnership and leveraging Toledo’s existing asset in its water
plant would result in the lowest rates for all. Building a new system would mean suburban communities
will pay more themselves, and Toledo would no longer have them as a revenue source to fund its capital
improvements.
“It is not the smart move to build our own plant, and there are many that say the suburbs are bluffing,”
Stough said. “I’ve heard my name bandied around saying the mayor of Sylvania is a bluff. I assure you I
am not.”
Perrysburg and Maumee’s mayors both indicated those cities will need to make decisions during 2017. The
time to build alternate water systems would be measured in years, leaving little time to still pursue
those options.
“In Maumee, we have to make a decision this year,” Carr said, “and it’s not a bluff, it’s not a threat.
… We want to be part of the regional water system. It’s the best for Northwest Ohio. But by December
this year, we’re at the timetable where we have to either have this agreement or we have to go somewhere
else. We can’t postpone our decision.
“The timetable is more of a rush than people realize.”