City Council - Regular Meeting

All right, good evening, ladies and gentlemen. The time is 7:30 p.m. It is Tuesday, April 28th, 2026. We are at the Twinsburg Government Center, and I'm going to call the regular council meeting to session. Shannon, please call the roll. Mr. Belden? I'm here. Mrs. Labby?

Here. Mrs. Walker? Present. Mr. Costello? Here. Mr. Benacci? Here. Mr. Post? Here. Mr. Fury? All right. Mrs. Labby will lead us in the invocation and pledge of allegiance this evening. Oh God, from whom all power comes, by whose divine we all must abide, we thank you for our civil liberties and freedoms, for for our opportunities and our privileges. We beg of you to bless, assist, and enlighten this council and representatives of the city of Twinsburg. May we prove worthy of the confidence placed in us by our fellow citizens. May we be just and upright in their thinking, honest in on all of our actions, and ever be guided by a true conscience in the legislation we propose to vote upon. Amen. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you, Mrs. Labby. Has everyone had a chance to review the minutes from the regular council meetings of March 24th and April 14th, 2026? Uh make a motion to approve the minutes uh from both dates. Thank you, Mr. Rzasa. Just Are we good to approve both minutes in a single motion? Is that okay? Thank you, sir. Second.

Mr. Uh Mr. Costello seconds. Any additional discussion? Shannon, please call the roll. Mr. Post? Yes. Mr. Costello? Yes. Mrs. Walker? Yes. Mr. Benacci? Yes. Mrs. Labby? Yes.

Mr. Belden? Yes. All right. Approval of the minutes passes 6-0 for both March 24th and April 14th, 2026 as submitted. Are there any awards and presentations this evening? There are none. All right, do we have any audience participation this evening? We do. First, we have Jonah Pichette. Jonah, good evening, sir. Good afternoon, everybody. Jonah Pichette, 11146 Heritage Drive. I just really want to talk about the successful Arbor Day Earth Day event. Conservatively, we think I think we had over 100 people attend the event, honestly. I was talking with some of the vendors. They were expecting, you know, 35 to 50 people. With 30-40 minutes left of the event, they were telling me they were well over that number. And so, they were very pleased. I was incredibly pleased with the turnout. Every vendor I seemed to talk to was very happy with the community participation and with everybody that attended. This was probably our biggest event yet, and I was thinking, you know, during the event and I've I've been, you know, reminiscing since. Four years ago, when I first joined the commission, we really started off Liberty Park with a small little table under the pavilion shelter, 30-degree weather, and we'd have maybe six people. And it has really grown in four years to what it is now. A big thank you to all my commission members for making this what it was. Gina, Virginia, Michael, Deborah, Julie, Helen. Could not have done this without them. They very much made this the successful event it was. I also have to thank all of our vendors. I mean, the people there spending their Saturday morning from 9:00 a.m. to to 1:00, 1:30, setting up, greeting 100-plus people, tabling. We had the Twinsburg Native Habitat Association, Twinsburg Garden Club, Environmental Commission, Parks and Rec Commission. We had the Twinsburg High School students that brought by Ms. Cindy Kurt. We had Journey Church, which gave out food and

sandwiches. I feel like oh yeah, the Tinker Creek Watershed partners. We had so many wonderful community partners as well as Girl Scouts handing out reusable bags, which were a hit because there were so many free goodies. So it was incredibly grateful to all of them as well as I'm grateful for Director Bettencourt and Laura for all of their help in letting us use the community center and helping set up the morning of. I got there 8:30 trying to beat Laura and she was somehow there doors open. She's like I am ready to set up and she helped me set up all 20 plus tables, moved them around and it was incredibly accommodating. My commission got there at 9:00 and they said what do we need to set up and I said guys I Laura got it all. So I felt a little bad for them but they were ready and they were really excited for the event. We're already thinking about how we can improve for next year and I appreciate all the council members and members of the city who came and attended in no particular order Councilman Post, Minachi, Councilman Lobby and Councilman Costello. Thank you guys for being there. It was great to see you and I know that members of the community I appreciated seeing you. That's all I have for my report and thank you. Thank you Jonah. Can I jump in here real quick since this is really stealing my report for later on let me just jump in and say that it really was a fabulous event and Jonah went above and beyond and Jen Bettencourt as well. I mean it was really a shared a shared project but Jonah really he put a lot of time and effort into this and rallying troops and I just want to say bravo. It was it really was a really great event and I learned quite a bit and I know Ms. Kurt had a lot of students there which is a was a big part of it as well. And so I want to thank her for having everyone with those tables set up and that's it. Thank that's all I have. Thank you Ms. Kurt. Thank you. Anybody else Janette? Next we have Sheila Williams.

Ms. Williams, good evening. Good evening. Sheila Williams, 10392 West Cobblestone Lane. I gave my address today, David. I'm going to talk about two things. I want to again invite everybody to the kids day graduation. It is on May 8th. Just a pinning ceremony. They do a testimony of how they got into nursing and what it's meant to them and they usually have their mother, father, sometimes their kids pin them. That's at 12:00. Uh the mayor can tell you it's it's very emotional when you listen to some of these stories. So, if you're off from work or you're playing hooky from work and you want to cruise through, we'd be happy to have you. You're always welcome. And then I'm going to say to everybody, please get out and vote. Uh every time we look at what the numbers look like in May, we could do better. You cannot complain if you're not participating. Your vote counts whether it's in favor of what I may think or what anybody on council may think, you should get out and vote. Please get out and vote. We have a lot of important things going on in our community. And finally, I have a complaint and an apology. I need to apologize on behalf of Cobblestone Estates. Uh my neighbor, Dana Benjamin, is walking around. I see your smile on your face. It's getting worse. He's walking around insulting service people, guys. The people that work in the city, making very unreasonable demands. I think it twice. Huh? I did not know that. Yeah. And you know, it's not even on his property what we're trying to address. And I just want to apologize to Patrick and all the guys in the service department because they are such

gentlemen. Patrick came out and worked with me and he gave me a lot of insight as to the water issue I was talking about the last time I was there. And I I feel bad because you say all kind of nasty things about me like I really care. God will take care of that. But when you start picking on people that they're just trying to do their job. I I told my neighbor I said I feel I need to apologize publicly to say, "Please do not let him talk to you any kind of way. You can ring my doorbell. You can ring John Carabeck's doorbell. We are board members. We are trying to address it. He lives across He has gray hair. And well wait a minute, you won't forget him if if you met him. Trust me. But I think it's very unfair when you want to talk to people in a disparaging way and think it's okay. You know, part of what makes Twinsburg Twinsburg is we are polite to people. Even when they're not necessarily polite to us, we are still polite to them. And um I think the fact that we have such a quiet environment with two babysitters tonight shows what politeness does cuz you all have shown holding your head up, taking things, and no retaliation. So please, if you see the guys, please encourage them and tell them they can ring my doorbell and I really do appreciate it. Come to graduation. Bye-bye. Thank you, Jill. Thank you. That's all we have this evening.

Thank you. All right. Moving on to council communications and committee reports. Mr. Post, do you have anything additional this evening? Um yes, I completely forgot to bring my parks and rec paper with me. Uh but the parks and rec commission did meet. We spoke about a questionnaire. Uh it was the pretty much the biggest part of it where they want to have a QR code around town. Uh ask different questions throughout different times and have the same QR code jump from one question to the next. And and actually have them on um throughout the parks when people are actually visiting the park they can see it. They are going to do a trail cleanup. And more information be coming about that. Do you remember the date for that? I don't know. June 13th is one of June the 13th. June 13th is one of them. They're going to do They want to do them once a month. Uh so June, July, August. So they're going to have a trail cleanup. So that's that's great that they're going to do that. And um so I'm real I'm real happy that they are finding um more purpose I suppose than what they had in previous years. We also had an incredible speech from the um T N H A uh uh Nora Sudo Riley. And who was the name of the other gentleman? Patty Spring. Patty Spring. Thank you. I I apologize. Like I said, I left I got here and like, "Oh my gosh, I left it all there." So um they came out and had a really really good talk with us about the meadow area behind the brick house off of Liberty. And we were I was floored by the speech and they had a consultant go out there and look at that meadow. And they said that that meadow y'all know where I'm talking about, behind that stone house close to Cannon Road, that whole big field there that I didn't even realize was

um it had purpose. Stanley Stein created this meadow. And he over the years was planting and planting and made this from what she said one of the greatest meadows in the in the entire region anywhere. And it's really because of Stanley Stein's effort. And should I Yeah, might want to as well. So, at this event on Saturday um we were talking with Miss Labue, we were talking with we talked with Nora and we were Beth Egan and Beth Egan who and we were we were just all talking about it and we just spawned the idea that we would love to somehow move forward renaming that area the Stanley Stein Meadow Reservation. And over time and just renaming that and honoring him because it is so great and it is because of him and it's just a conversation to be had. Um a conversation at least. Bullet. Oh. So, it's just a conversation to be had about maybe doing that and honoring him in that way because we think he is awesome and that meadow is awesome. It's just at least if nothing else a conversation. So. Anyways. Um Yeah, Jen did you have something to say regarding that? Oh, okay. That okay. Right. So, just a thought. And um that's my report. Thank you, Mr. Post. Thanks Jonathan for stealing my environmental report also. Mr. Benacci, good evening. Since our last meeting I attended the architectural review board meeting which swore in two members, heard case number 26. It's at 1874 Glenwood Drive. Uh It's a detached garage. The resident is rebuilding, replacing the existing garage and it was approved 3-0. Uh next architectural review board is May 7th in these chambers. Uh

Next safety committee meeting is May 12th here. Uh also I attended Prosecutor Kokovich and our Stow Municipal Clerk, they put on a women's self-defense and sexual assault awareness program for sexual assault awareness month in Twinsburg. They brought that resource to Twinsburg. My spouse was there. The the self-defense program, she said, was better than any she's ever attended. Um, which is kudos to the folks that put that together. Uh, Earth Day was fabulous. So was the uh, mini golf at the library. And uh, that concludes my report for this week. Thank you, sir. Uh, good evening, everyone. Prior to Council this evening, I attended the Finance Committee meeting. Uh, Ms. Conway gave us updates on quarterly revenue, expenses, as well as income tax report for the March month of March 2026, as well as capital expenses. The next meeting of the Finance Committee will be on Tuesday, May 26th at 6:30 p.m. here in Chambers. Safety Committee will be on May the 12th at 6:00 p.m. And Public Works will be on Tuesday, June 9th at 6:00 p.m. here in Chambers. This is Lenny. Good evening. Thank you. Good evening. I attended the Planning Commission meeting on April 20th. It was my pleasure to swear in new members, Lori Stewart and Greg Rahl. Mr. Sheback will be chairman this year. The Commission discussed a a pre- preliminary site plan, two lot splits, and one conditional use permit permit will which I will have a motion for later that this evening. The next meeting of the Planning Commission will be May 18th at 6:30. The next Jedi meeting is Monday, May 11th at 6:00. Um, I also attended the Finance meeting tonight. Thank you, Mr. Bellin, for reporting. And uh, I attended the Environmental Commission's Arbor Day celebration, as Jonas said, on Saturday. I brought home a beautiful bouquet made by the garden with the gardens club, and a recycled

out of t-shirts uh, tote from Patrick's daughter in the Girl Scouts, which was they were delightful. Um very well done, Jonah. We do appreciate everything you do. It's a very you do so much. It's It's It's over and above. So, um on a and I learn also learned that the Garden Club will be having its annual plant sale on Saturday, May 9th at the Historical Society barn from 9:00 to 12:00. And also Journey Church, which was there giving out free sandwiches, cookies, etc. Um Um they will have a free produce for those in need on Saturday, May 16th from 10:30 to 12:00. It's Hope Day for them. So, if you'd like more information, um see the Journey Church. Um that's all for me tonight. Thank you.

Thank you. This is Walker. Good evening. Good evening, everyone. Uh the Jedi Committee will be meeting sometime this month. We're going to go over uh all the ones who are a part of Jedi, the ones who want to be a part of Jedi, and the ones that want to leave Jedi. So, I'll give my report uh the next time we have council meeting. Thank you.

Thank you. That's all I have. Mr. Costello, good evening, sir. Good evening. Uh everybody's pretty much mentioned the community activities have taken place. So, a quick note, Earth Day Arbor Day was a great success. Thank you to the commissions that put that on. Uh it was good to see colleagues out at different events and programs during the week. Uh the mini golf event, I believe was a success. There's no broken windows, so I think they count that as a success. Um but uh last night I attended the BZA meeting, and I will have a motion coming up about splitting parcel at uh Vantage Point. The address is 2181 East Aurora Road. That'll be coming up shortly. Thank you. Mr. Post. Uh yeah, I forgot one thing. Uh if everyone in this room has not yet ordered their Rotary flags, uh go to uh Twinsburgflags.com and order your flags. Only $45. All the money goes to great causes here in Twinsburg and it does help the scouts as well, as we were mentioning.

Can I ask a question? Go ahead. I think I I I I started doing it. I'm not sure if I finished. Is there a way for me to figure it out? Absolutely. I I will get you that answer very quickly. So, you go online and you click on you actually click on the picture of the flag. Yes.

you to Yeah. I It may have been oh, I got to go get my credit card and then, you know, squirrel ran by. I will make sure I will make sure you are on there. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Mayor, good evening, sir. I'm watching all of you. Good evening. Thank you. Yeah, I just had a couple of things. The Tinker's Creek Watershed Partners they held their annual Good morning. All right. I'm back. Um the Good evening. The Tinker Creek Tinker's Creek Watershed Partners held their annual Mayors' Breakfast at the Blue Canyon last week and I attended that uh and you know, it's a really it's always a nice event ended by many of the mayors on the watershed on the Tinker's Creek watershed. And so, several mayors are there and it it's a nice morning and and you know what? Again, I I always say this that the the Watershed Partners do a whole lot for all of us, all of our communities with regards to water, clean water and and and everything with the environment as well. So, um I my shout out to those those folks there at the watershed. They really do a great job. I too attended attended the sexual assault awareness month event that was held over at the community center. It was sponsored by Prosecutor Elliot Kolkovich and also co-sponsored by Nicole Kowalski. So, and that was a really good event as well. They had It was very well attended. A lot of people there. They had some great information at all the tables that was given out. And then the Mr. Bernacci mentioned the training that they had. I just saw that I didn't stay for that, but I did see the videos and it seemed like there was a full house as well. So, shout out to them on a great job. Um Rebecca and I were again took our show on the road. We went to visit another one of our business one of the businesses, C&G Thermal Business. Um they are located actually the their office is in the township, but they have all of their and I'll tell you real quick it's an advanced manufacturing company specializing in

graphite and ceramic heat exchanger technology. Which you know again, we see these businesses and we don't even know that they're operating in our community or in or around our community. They have clients across the US and international. Uh we met with their leadership team Mr. Rick Chandler, Gregory Beecher, and Joan Bova. Which they were very welcoming to us and and really very informative. It was a great it was a great meeting with them. Like I said, the headquarters is on Enterprise which is in the township. However, their manufacturing area is on Dutton Drive. Um they're going to be launching a new product line and so they're planning to acquire building close to the Dutton Drive location. So, that's a a win-win there. And they're expecting to add maybe 20 more employees. So, they're growing and and it's a it's a great company, great people. And they're you know they're a strong example of the high-skill and high-value manufacturing that's going on in our community that you know if you don't if you don't go visit these people, you don't know it's there. And so they did a great job. And that was a nice visit. Uh finally, again getting back to what I mentioned earlier, we swore in two new uh uh fire medics yesterday. Mario Melito Melletti and Nolan Staab. Is that how you say his name? Staab, right? Nolan Staab. Two young men that we swore in and again in keeping with trying to bring uh, focusing on bringing our our forces up to staff Uh along with now we've got the and and we're going to be looking at two more. We're going to be hiring two more fire medics as well and that'll bring the fire department up to full staff. So, we'll have police, we'll have fire and then the addition of our our hopefully third fire station that uh should be coming on board not too long from now. So, um you know, we're we're getting the safety forces up to where they belong and I think the people of Twinsburg could be feel very comfortable in what we have. We have some great great staff here. So, I appreciate that. Um other than that, that's the end

of my report tonight. Great. Thanks, Mayor. Do you have any department heads this evening? Uh nobody. No? All right. All right, moving on to legislation. Resolution 2026-46. A resolution authorizing the mayor to enter into a contract with Richard L. Bowen and Associates for professional services relative to the amphitheater renovation project. At this time I'd like to make a motion to adopt resolution 2026-46. May I have a second? I second. Uh Mrs. Labby seconds. Any discussion? Cheryl, please call the roll. Mr. Belding? Yes. Mrs. Labby? Yes. Mrs. Walker? Yes. Mr. Costilow? Yes. Mr. Benacci? Yes.

Mr. Post? Yes. All right. Resolution 2026-46 passes 6 to 0. Ordinance 2026-63. An ordinance updating the investment policy for the City of Twinsburg. All right. Ordinance 2026-63 now stands on its second reading. Ordinance 2026-64. An ordinance authorizing the mayor to enter into an agreement with Western Reserve Wire Products Incorporated to provide tax incentives under the terms and conditions of the Twinsburg Occupancy Program. It now stands on its second reading. Ordinance 2026-66. An ordinance amending part 11 of the codified ordinances of the City of Twinsburg to change the symbols used to identify the use permissions in certain tables within the planning and zoning code. It now stands on its second reading. Resolution 2026-67. A resolution authorizing the mayor to enter into an agreement with Twinsburg Township for the construction and outfitting of a fire protection and emergency medical service station to be located in Twinsburg Township. It now stands on its first reading. Resolution 2020-68. A resolution accepting the bid of Municipal and Contractor Sealing Products LLC for the storm sewer lining project and declaring emergency. This now stands on its first reading. All right, moving on to fund finish business, new business, and miscellaneous. Mr. Costello. Uh I have a motion that I'd like to enter from BZA's meeting last night. The motion is to waive the 30-day notification period as authorized in charter section 7.10 for the BZA's decision to approve an appeal for a variance in case number 02-2 uh 026 as determined at their meeting April 27th, 2026. Do I have a second?

I'll second. Perfect. And now I just want to just read a little bit about that uh variance that you know there's 10 parking lot side setback for variance for parcel A B and C or excuse me, parcel A and B. A 50-ft front parking lot setback variance for parcel A. A 63.3-ft front building setback for parcel A. A 13.05 rear building setback for parcel B. Um thank you. Second. Do I have uh Is there any other discussion? Any further discussion on this? Sorry. Lots of numbers in that one. Okay, can you call the roll for that? Mr. Costello. Yes. Mrs. Labby. Yes.

Mr. Post. Yes. Mrs. Walker. Yes. Mr. Benacci. Yes. Mr. Bellin. Yes. All right, thank you. Nothing else? All right. Mrs. Walker, good evening. I have nothing. Thank you. Mrs. Labby. I also have a motion. This time I'd like to make a motion to approve a conditional use permit for the New Level Gym, a wrestling training facility, located at 8252 Darrow Road, Unit 1, in an IM Innovation and Manufacturing Zone, as recommended by the Planning Commission at their April 20th, 2026 meeting. May I have a second?

David Post votes right here. Yes. Chair, uh any discussion? Who Who was the second? David. David Post. Mr. Post, thank you. Any discussion? No. No. Mrs. Labby? Yes. Mr. Post? Yes. Mrs. Walker? Yes. Mr. Castillo?

Yes. Mr. Banachi? Yes. Mr. Belouin? Yes. Thank you. Motion passes 6-0. Thank you. Nothing further for me today. All right. Um I just wanted to make one um clarification or point. We had We had been asked at the last council meeting about potentially setting up a um a resident group to talk through data centers and those kind of things. I I think that's probably a good idea, but I also think it's a little bit premature. We just passed the moratorium uh last meeting, uh which kind of gives the city 12-month moratorium. So, I think we will certainly revisit that when when the administration comes back kind of with their findings, and we'll we'll certainly go from there. So, uh nothing further this evening for me. Mr. Banachi? Uh just a reminder about uh the e-bikes and being safe out in the community. Had a couple residents reach out again about uh recklessness of youth riding these things, and uh if we can keep it safe, I think it will keep our police and fire a little bit better off as well. So, be safe out there. Mr. Post? Uh yeah. Uh Mr. Banachi just reminded me. I was going to ask him later, but if you brought it up now, uh the the Environmental Commission meeting is on uh May 5th, which happens to be Cinco de Mayo. And I cannot make it that night. Not because I am participating in Cinco de Mayo, it's because I will be working with the Rotary. You know, we we help out as a fundraiser that night. That's why we're working all night at El Cholo Bravo. There's a little plug for El Cholo and we'll see you there. I'll be there all night. And your flags are not ordered. All right, that's all I got. Mine are not ordered. That's it. That's all I got. Um Mr. Skiffy. Yeah, I do have one thing. Mr. Bonacci just shook my head as well. Um the e-bikes. I just had a meeting with Chief

and um Sergeant Quinn and Lieutenant uh Lieutenant Walters and Lieutenant Walters. Yeah, yeah, Lieutenant Walters was there. Yeah, we've got three or four lieutenants. Uh Lieutenant Walters and and the two of those guys they sat down and they um they came up with a plan for the e-bikes. And we're going to be releasing some really good information. We've got some a whole plan set out. There's going to be ways to, you know, site basically the parents and and because the kids are are young and it's really up to the parents to be in charge. And you know, I don't want to spoil this thing or or throw anything out there too soon, but you know, look for that to be coming in the really near future because it's they've got a they put a great program together. So, I think you're going to be all of us are going to be really pleased with that. And that's all I have. Great. Mr. Vazana. Mrs. Connolly. Nothing. Mrs. Collins. Nothing. All right. Uh this time I'd like to make a motion to excuse Mr. Fury from tonight's meeting. May I have a second? Second. Mr. Bonacci seconds. Shannon, please call the roll. Mr. Bellin.

Yes. Mr. Bonacci. Yes. Mrs. Labby. Yes. Mr. Post. Yes. Mrs. Walker. Yes. Mr. Castillo? Uh yes, and a happy birthday to Mr. Fury. Yes, sir. Yes, indeed. All right. Uh motion passes 6 to 0. I just wanted to one clarification I've got on my script here. Mr. Castillo, that was case 02-2026 that you made a motion for? Thank you. I just wanted to make sure that I didn't miss it. Thank you very much. All right. With that said, I will adjourn the city council meeting at 7:58 p.m.