The Fund for Our Economic Future, a collaborative effort to strengthen regional economic competitiveness in Northeast Ohio, received 65 project abstracts from partnerships of governmental entities looking to compete for EfficientGovNow awards. We’ve compiled the following summaries of the project abstracts, which will be posted in full on the EfficientGovNow web site on May 1 for public review and comment.
1. Wadsworth Community Partners
The Wadsworth Community Partners (Wadsworth Public Library, City of Wadsworth, Wadsworth City Schools and Summa Wadsworth-Rittman Hospital) hope to improve the quality of life in Wadsworth by constructing a new facility to house a high school with auditorium, field house and competition gymnasium, a branch of the Wadsworth Public Library, a community recreation center, a Center for Older Adults, a medical/office complex for Summa Wadsworth-Rittman Hospital and an outdoor pool facility.
2. Geauga County Board of MRDD and West Geauga Local Schools
The Geauga County Board of MRDD and West Geauga Local Schools hope to construct a shared transportation facility that will serve both the Metzenbaum fleet and the West Geauga Local Schools fleet. In addition, the site will serve as a fuel depot for any state or local agency that has vehicles in the area.
3. Village of Fairport Harbor Fire Dept., Grand River Fire Dept. and Painesville Township Fire Dept.
The fire departments in these three communities would like to purchase and share an ambulance and fire engine. The fire engine will be housed at a single central location and be immediately available to each of the three communities, and the ambulance will serve as a back-up to all 3 communities.
4-7. Southern Suburbs Council of Governments (SSCG)
The SSCG (consisting of Broadview Heights, Brooklyn Heights, Cuyahoga Heights, Independence, Seven Hills, Valley View, and Walton Hills) would like to draft and publish a Communities’ Council Consortium Model to educate and inform other collaborative community groups on how to replicate the SSCG.
The SSCG proposes to establish a Joint Fire District for the communities of Broadview Heights, Brooklyn Heights, Cuyahoga Heights, Independence, Seven Hills, Valley View and Walton Hills. By reducing management personnel overlap in the participating member communities, operating expenses will decrease with no corresponding decrease in the level of service.
The SSCG to establish a Joint Interstate Safety Force along the Central Cuyahoga County Interstate 77 and 480 corridors. The projected savings will be used to assist in financing the construction of a Regional Safety Center, further enhancing the economic attractiveness of the area.
The SSCG proposes a Joint Dispatch District for Safety Forces. The projected savings will assist in funding the construction of a Regional Dispatch Safety Center, providing enhanced security and safety for commercial and residential customers.
8. Village of Geneva-on-the-Lake, City of Geneva, Geneva Township, Harpersfield Township, Saybrook Township and Trumbull Township
These six communities wish to conduct a feasibility study to examine the possible expansion of an existing five-entity ambulance district, located in northwest Ashtabula County, to include two more communities as well as five fire departments for the purpose of forming one combined emergency medical service and fire district.
9. Lowellville Village
Lowellville Village wants to expand and upgrade the police and fire departments. Their collaborative partner is unclear.
10. City of Cuyahoga Falls, City of Hudson and City of Stow
The cities of Cuyahoga Falls, Hudson and Stow have set a 250-acre cooperative zone at their community corners, known as the Western Reserve Joint Economic Development Zone, which shares a new highway interchange. They hope to use funds to raise the quality of consultant crafted zoning and site plan standards to cement the joint venture and be transferrable to other joint development zones.
11. City of Strongsville, Cuyahoga County Engineers and Ohio Department of Transportation
These organizations want to work together to widen Pearl Road by removing the existing two lane asphalt road and replacing it with a five lane concrete roadway from Shurmer Road to 1000 feet south of Drake Road in Strongsville. Along with the lane widening, all of the major culverts will be replaced.
12. Cities of Kent and Ravenna, Village of Sugar Bush Knolls and Townships of Brimfield, Charlestown, Franklin and Ravenna
The Portage Area Fire & EMS Research Study Committee (PAFERS) is a formal organization comprised of seven contiguous communities from across Portage County. The purpose and mission of the PAFERS committee is to study and research issues and options to improve the delivery of fire and EMS services to the residents of our respective communities.
13. City of Strongsville, City of North Royalton and Cuyahoga County Engineers
This project consists of the widening of the Royalton Road / West 130th Street intersection located in Strongsville and North Royalton. Included in this project are the lengthening of storage lanes, traffic signal modifications, additional eastbound and westbound through lanes, a northbound right turn lane, a southbound left turn lane, storm sewers and sanitary sewers.
14. Euclid City Schools, Cleveland Hts./University Hts. City Schools and Shaker Hts. City Schools
This proposal is being submitted by these 3 school systems to purchase software needed to consolidate automated human resource and payroll processing among the three systems. Euclid City Schools will own and operate the software and establish itself as an application service provider for other school districts and governmental entities.
15. Liberty Township and Brookfield Township
Liberty Township, in partnership with Brookfield Township, will provide an alternative dispatch service to police departments that cannot dispatch on their own. By combining resources into a central dispatching service, the costs saved by the joining communities can be used in other needed programs, such as economic development; engineering studies and similar endeavors, all needed to expand the growth of the communities of Trumbull County.
16. New Russia Township, Oberlin City Schools and City of Oberlin
These three entities propose to collaborate on fleet management services. This project is expected to include equipment maintenance for light duty vehicles, heavy equipment and school buses, joint fueling and construction of a storage facility to extend the life of school buses.
17. Cleveland/Cuyahoga County Workforce Investment Board, Polaris Career Center, Cuyahoga Valley Career Center, and Max S. Hayes Career and Technical High School
Four government entities are collaborating to increase delivery of their services by reducing service duplication, sharing their resources and addressing transportation barriers that prevent customers from participating in skills training and employment assistance. Cost efficiency resulting from this project will enable the Workforce Investment Board to stretch its limited resources and increase training and employment opportunities to more customers across the county.
18. Summit County Combined General Health District, Summit County and City of Akron on behalf of the Health Department
Summit County government, in partnership with the City of Akron and Akron area hospitals, is developing a plan to consolidate services provided by its three health departments. Coordinating these services through the use of innovative technology would lead to greater efficiency and effectiveness of service delivery, especially in the case of environmental problems and disease patterns.
19. Stark Council of Governments, Stark County Commissioners, City of Canton, City of Massillon, Jackson Twp., Plain Twp. and approximately 30 additional county subdivisions
This collaborative effort would consolidate ten dispatch centers and one call center to provide a county-wide dispatch center that would provide more effective, cost-efficient service and save taxpayer dollars. The considerable savings generated could in turn be used by municipalities to strengthen their safety forces, purchase new equipment, implement needed programs or fill many other vital needs.
20. YMCA of Greater Cleveland, City of South Euclid, City of University Heights and City of Richmond Heights
This collaborative effort proposes to build the Stephanie Tubbs Jones Tri-City Regional Recreation, Wellness and Workforce Development Center operated by the YMCA of Greater Cleveland to serve the 50,000 residents in the cities of South Euclid, University Heights, Richmond Heights and surrounding communities. The new building will include a wellness center, gymnasium, child care center, natatoriums, computer lab, locker rooms and administrative offices, as well as a Work Force Development Program focused on training and retraining residents with current marketable skills.
21. City of Cleveland and Cuyahoga County
The goal of this collaboration is to develop an integrated data system that links and tracks already established data sets, which will provide the City of Cleveland and the newly formed County Land Bank real-time information to take immediate action. The system will provide for a proactive prevention program to improve the city’s capacity for enforcing existing city laws, allowing multiple city departments and County Land Bank to quickly identify actionable activities for stabilizing housing disinvestment as related to the high levels of abandonment, foreclosures and destructive market activities.
22. First Suburbs Consortium and Case Western Reserve University Mandel School of Applied Social Sciences Center on Urban Poverty and Community Development
The partners aim to build on Case Western Reserve University’s existing free, publicly accessible NEO CANDO database to provide the 17 First Suburbs Consortium municipalities with a web-based database that captures a variety of locally collected property information. If cities could integrate the data available through NEO CANDO (ownership, foreclosures, tax values) with their locally collected information on code enforcement, property condition, permits, police activity, vacant properties, etc., the result would be a powerful planning and decision making tool which would help cities and the region as a whole.
23. Rittman Exempted Village Schools and Orrville City Schools
This proposal indicates the need for group calendaring software, desktop conferencing equipment, laptop/notebook computers with wireless access, wireless access points, as well as a networked group file storage server to be shared between the two school districts. This would allow them to expand the number of course offerings for students at the high school level by sharing teachers.
24. Cleveland State University and Louis Stokes Veterans Hospital
The goal of this collaboration is to provide funds to start a Supportive Education for the Returning Veteran (SERV) program, which is designed to help returning OEF/OIF veterans return to college and obtain college degrees.
25. Village of Malvern and Brown Township
This collaboration would like plan and build a community center, including office space and community rooms. The goal is to unify the village and township, and begin revitalizing the community, building pride and economic growth.
26. Cuyahoga County, City of Cleveland and Cleveland-Cuyahoga County Port Authority
Three government entities, who have established the Northcoast Brownfield Coalition, are collaborating to create cost savings and more efficiently serve the region with a consolidated Brownfield Assessment Program. The coalition proposes to make strategic investments to assess environmental conditions at Brownfield sites to support productive reuse and urban gardening.
27. Trumbull County Engineer’s Office, Howland Township and Champion Township
The project partners propose to create a regional truck wash facility, with the aim of extending the life of government highway and safety vehicles. This project’s goal is to increase intergovernmental cooperation and eliminate or minimize duplicate and overlapping services.
28. Lake County Information Technology Department, Lake County Sheriff Central Communications, Lake County Sheriff Information Technology Department, Lake County Telecommunications Department, Concord Township Fire Department, Fairport Harbor Village Fire Department, Grand River Village Fire Department, Leroy Township Fire Department, Madison Fire District, Painesville City Fire Department, Painesville Township Fire Department and Perry Joint Fire District
This collaboration’s purpose is to interconnect the 911 Dispatch Center database to the records management systems of eight fire departments that serve 11 communities. Centralizing everything at the county would reduce costs and leverage the sophisticated technology and telecommunications infrastructure. Also, it would improve efficiency by integrating all of the records management systems into the 911 dispatch database.
29. Mahoning County, City of Youngstown, Village of Canfield, Village of Austintown, Boardman Township and Canfield Township
The project partners aim to create the Mahoning/Youngstown Regional Information System to provide high speed connectivity to local governmental units for the purpose of providing three primary services: access to critical information to assist law enforcement agencies within the participating political subdivisions; general IT Support; and disaster recovery. The goal is to enhance the quality of life for all Mahoning Valley citizens by providing efficient and cost effective government services through cooperative IT solutions.
30. City of South Euclid, City of University Heights and Home Repair Resource Center
The collaborative partners aim to create a “Home Repair Resource Center (HRRC) Regionalization Initiative,” which is seeking funding to expand the non-profit organization’s public services beyond its historical geographical boundaries of serving only Cleveland Heights. The goal is to expand into a new regional collaborative organization serving neighboring communities, including South Euclid and University Heights.
31. City of Painesville, Concord Township and Concord Township/City of Painesville JEDD Board
The project partners would like to complete an extension of an existing City of Painesville broadband network to the JEDD territory at State Route 44/Auburn Road/Crile Road area, which is underserved by broadband technology. The goals of the project are to enhance the interconnectivity of the communities to improve service availability to health care, expand the availability of technology to the JEDD and increase economic development potential in Concord Township.
32. City of Bay Village, City of Rocky River, City of Westlake, City of Fairview Park, City of Lakewood and City of North Olmsted
The Westshore Council of Governments intends to collectively hire a sustainability manager to plan and implement sustainable practices in the six member cities. The goal is to increase efficiency, reduce costs and reduce the communities’ carbon footprint.
33. First Ring Superintendents’ Collaborative
The collaborative, which consists of superintendents representing the 15 inner ring school districts around Cleveland, proposes to improve the student registration process by implementing electronic transfer of student records. The goal is to increase efficiency of student registration among Cleveland’s First Ring school districts.
34. Stark County and 13 cities, villages and townships
The Stark County Regional Planning Commission (SCRPC) would like to collaborate with 13 cities, villages and townships in Stark County to map the Storm Water Conveyance Systems, as required by the EPA Clean Water Act. Making this a collaborative effort will save money in the managing of the project, employment, hardware and software purchases.
35. Jackson Local Schools and Jackson Township Government
Jointly, the partners aim to enhance the township park system; share maintenance services; and improve communications between the school, township and residents. They would achieve this by: the Jackson Local School District leasing property to Jackson Township to enhance the existing park system; the Township helping to maintain the leased property along with the schools; and the partners jointly maintaining a community web calendar.
36. City of Bay Village, City of Fairview Park, City of Lakewood, City of North Olmsted, City of North Ridgeville, City of Rocky River and City of Westlake
The Westshore Council of Governments is working toward a comprehensive regionalization of its entire Fire and EMS operations, which covers more than 75 square miles and serves more than 250,000 residents. The intent of the fire district is to provide the most cost effective solution to the emergency needs of its constituents by utilizing the economies of scale corporate model. By autumn of 2009, partners expect to employ an experienced firm to direct the multifaceted regional fire district transition, and would use funding toward that end.
37. City of North Royalton, City of Brooklyn and City of Strongsville
The partners, which participate in Southwest Regional Council of Governments to combine resources to provide multijurisdictional police and fire specialty teams, propose to create a regional dispatch/emergency operations center. Because an existing site may have been identified, the project partners are seeking funds for a design consultant to identify the communication requirements for the participating communities and note the needed building modifications.
38. City of Pepper Pike, Village of Orange and Village of Moreland Hills
This collaborative endeavor, called “Operation Clean Sweep,” involves purchasing a combination street sweeper/catch basin cleaner to improve the quality of air and storm waters in the three communities at a substantial savings to taxpayers. The project goal is to improve collaborative efforts, enhance city services and reduce pollutants while keeping operational costs to a minimum.
39. Portage County EMA, Portage County Sheriff’s Office, City of Ravenna, City of Kent, City of Aurora, City of Streetsboro, Mantua Village, Windham Village, Hiram Village, Garrettsville Village, Brady Lake Village, Sugar Bush Knolls Village and 17 townships
Because Portage County consists of 507 square miles of which 15 square miles are water, the project partners created a Dive/ Swift Water Rescue Team several years ago, with the goal of each community to having a fully functioning dive team without duplicated costs. However, the teams’ needs still far exceed available local funding. The team seeks funds to purchase secondary breathing supplies, additional dry suits, a boat equipped with side sonar (to allow underwater searches) and additional equipment to make rescues safer and more efficient.
40. City of Norton and Norton City Schools
The project partners propose the creation of a heavy lift garage for the service of large vehicles (including salt trucks, fire trucks and school busses) that service Norton City (Fire and Service), Norton City Schools, Barberton City School Busses and additional local government entities. The goal of the project is to save money through the shared use of vehicle repair resources.
41. City of Lorain, City of Elyria, City of Sheffield Lake and Sheffield Village
The partners propose to consolidate the Lorain and Elyria service garage functions, including both physical infrastructure and personnel, which will result in significant cost savings for both municipalities and the taxpayers they serve. Additionally, the City of Sheffield Lake and Sheffield Village, which do not currently have fully operational service garages, have engaged as full partners and will share materials/supplies, as well as forward vehicle and fleet maintenance work through the consolidated facility.
42. Portage County Solid Waste Management District, Portage County Board of Commissioners, Aurora City School District, Crestwood Local School District, Field Local School District, James A. Garfield Local School District, Kent City School District, Ravenna City School District, Rootstown Local School District, Southeast Local School District, Streetsboro City School District, Waterloo Local School District and Windham Exempted Village District
The Portage County Solid Waste Management District is proposing the purchase of 12,000 curbside containers and 40 front load containers, allowing the district to provide curbside service to an additional 14,100 households or 22,300 residents. Also, recycling at the school systems would serve as an educational tool for students. The program has the potential to add three jobs to the district, while at the same time promote a green initiative. The project goal is to engage youth in the recycling movement, as well as increase the recycling participation rate in rural communities.
43. Mahoning River Corridor Mayors’ Association communities (Lowellville, Struthers, Campbell, Youngstown, Girard, McDonald, Niles, Warren and Newton Falls)
The partnering communities propose to implement an interactive and comprehensive web site featuring in-depth information regarding sites available for economic development in the river corridor. The participating communities would share in providing the matching funds to implement the project and, thereafter, would share the cost of managing the web site, providing an enhanced service and reducing their cost.
44. City of Mentor, Lakeland Community College, Lake Erie College and Lake County Port Authority
The project partners aim to create a coordinated entrepreneur development and support program called the Lake County Entrepreneur Cooperative, a non-traditional business incubator designed to meet the complete needs of today’s entrepreneur. The partners are seeking funds to provide the administrative support needed to establish early-stage funding for new business start-ups. In addition, the funds will be used to supplement the rent voucher program envisioned for the business incubator effort.
45. Trumbull County Sheriff Thomas Altiere, Mahoning County Sheriff Randall A. Wellington and Ashtabula County Sheriff William Johnson
These entities propose a Northeast Ohio Regional Integrated Justice Information Project to help 44 full time and seven part-time police departments to efficiently and effectively set up one consistent communications system. The partners will then share information with the Ohio Local Law Enforcement Information Network, providing information to all of the law enforcement agencies in the state.
46. City of Ashland and Ashland County Commissioners
This is a joint economic development project to create The Greater Ashland County Commerce and Outreach Center, devoted exclusively for the development and continued support of business and commerce activities in the greater Ashland County Community. The facility will consolidate several organizations with similar objectives into one location to provide assistance, training and support for the local economy. The funding requested will assist the city in remodeling its former utility office facility to accommodate these organizations, as well as develop a meeting and training facility.
47. The University of Akron and Lorain County Community College
The partners propose the creation and proof-of-concept of a shared administrative services model that would allow the two institutions to share technology and personnel to more effectively manage the enterprise resource planning system. The vision for shared services is to create an independent, third-party center that consolidates technical and non-competing business functions. The partners note that providing these services centrally reduces administrative costs by 20-40% according to some estimates.
48. Cuyahoga County, City of Cleveland, Cleveland Hopkins International Airport, Ohio Department of Job & Family Service and OneCommunity
OneCommunity proposes to help extend Cuyahoga County’s network and voice over IP services to the City of Cleveland, the Regional Transit Authority, Hopkins International Airport and Ohio Department of Job & Family Services. The partners aim to benefit from using Cuyahoga County and OneCommunity’s wide-area network (WAN) and shared voice services infrastructure to allow local, county and state government the freedom to leverage today’s converged network technology solutions, including videoconferencing and wireless Internet access. The project goal is to enable the governmental partners to save millions of dollars and improve efficiency.
49. Geauga Soil and Water Conservation District, Portage Soil and Water Conservation District and Ashland University
The Geauga and Portage Soil and Water Conservation Districts are collaborating with Ashland University to host the Wonders of Watersheds Workshops, June through July, 2010. The purpose of the workshops is to give Northeast Ohio teachers an in-depth look at the natural wonders of our region, while providing invaluable training and lasting educational experiences. The project goal is to provide Northeast Ohio teachers with the tools and resources to promote watershed education and enhance their curriculum.
50. Copley Township, City of Norton, Village of Richfield and Bath Township
The partners, who entered into a Memorandum of Understanding pilot program to create a joint dispatch to handle fire and police calls, would like to move to a permanent arrangement and bring additional communities into the program. They would further improve service and save money eliminating duplication of services and cost of equipment by creating a consolidated communications platform.
51. 17 Political Jurisdictions in Lorain County
The partners would like to implement an effective and efficient storm water management system, which will be finalized by July/August 2009 out of a feasibility study. The communities of Lorain County recognize the urgent need to reduce the potential for reoccurring flooding and storm water damages, and so the goal of the project is to work collaboratively to reduce costs associated with maintenance, infrastructure repair, over-flow into treatment facilities and other costs passed onto local taxpayers.
52. City of Pepper Pike, City of Beachwood, City of Gates Mills, City of Highland Heights, City of Lyndhurst, City of Mayfield Heights, City of Mayfield Village, City of Richmond Heights and City of South Euclid
The partners propose the creation of the Hillcrest Regional Fire Investigative Unit: Mobile Arson Laboratory. The goal of the project is to provide mobilization of investigators, together with allied resources, to apply high intensity investigative efforts to a fire incident in the field.
53. City of Olmsted Falls and Olmsted Township
An Olmsted Falls/Olmsted Township merger study project has been put on the November 2009 ballot. If it passes, the communities propose to hire an independent moderator, a civil engineer, a municipal finance expert and a municipal law expert to study all aspects of merging the two communities.
54. City of Mentor and Concord Township
The partners desire to collaborate in the installation, maintenance and usage of a 2,000-gallon heated emulsion storage tank for their respective street maintenance programs. Both Mentor and Concord will be utilizing a “Dura Patcher” machine to perform street repairs in 2009 and beyond. The machine requires emulsion, which is currently housed in a distant location. The project goal is to consolidate resources and install a centralized local storage tank to serve multiple governmental agencies.
55. Ashtabula County Commissioners, Ashtabula County Joint Vocational School and FirstEnergy Corporation
The partners are requesting funding to conduct a study to determine the feasibility, benefits and constraints to establishing a county central dispatch center. The study would determine if a central dispatch center would result in lower government costs and connect communications of first responders.
56. Boardman Township, Poland Township, Austintown Township, City of Struthers, Coitsville Township and New Middletown
The partners propose a Mahoning Metro Leaders Lighting and Energy Efficiency Program. The program would focus on energy savings realized via the upgrade of existing lighting systems and address the large consumers of electric power, such as air compressors and HVAC units, and make them more efficient. The project goal is to reduce the cost of electricity being consumed by the communities and establish a collage grant program for high school students with cost savings generated from the project.
57. This abstract has been rescinded at the request of the submitter.
58. County of Ashland, City Of Ashland, Village of Loudonville
The partners propose to purchase required hardware and software to upgrade Ashland County 9-1-1/Communications Systems to meet the Federal Next Generation 9-1-1 (NG9-1-1) Standards. By upgrading equipment, the partners would be able to receive emergency 9-1-1 calls from newer technology sources and efficiently route those calls, along with location information, to the appropriate authorities. By implementing state-of-the-art technologies, communities would receive long-term financial benefits through more efficient, cost-effective use of public community resources.
59. City of South Euclid and City of Lyndhurst
The partners propose to create a regional Road Salt-Brine Production Facility to produce winter road-brine. This project aims to significantly reduce taxpayer costs for road salt and increase safety through the adoption of pre-wetting and anti-icing practices that are more environmentally friendly and provide safer winter roadways. The partners note that this innovative and creative regional collaboration would be the first of its kind in Northeast Ohio.
60. Cuyahoga County, Case Western Reserve University, City of Cleveland and local governments and utility providers expanded from initial study
The partners propose to implement smart metering systems throughout linked pilot community facilities. Heating, air conditioning and lighting costs would be managed through baseline building improvements; smart metering integrated with shared, real time, building management systems; and energy conservation education. The approach identifies investments, technologies, partnerships, incentives and technical support needed to produce energy-saving expectations. The results will confirm a framework for successful duplication and expansion to communities region wide.
61. City of Cleveland Heights and City of Lakewood
The partners propose the deployment of a WiMax Wireless Broadband pilot to provide low cost connectivity to municipal departments and constituents. The pilot would replace many/most existing connections with low cost, high-speed wireless connections. A project partner with existing broadband Internet connectivity and wireless technology expertise has been identified to support the project. The project goal is to combine regional government resources and collectively outsource broadband service a flexible, expandable, low cost high speed network that can be sustained and leveraged for the benefit of participating government entities and selected constituents.
62. This abstract has been rescinded at the request of the submitter.
63. City of Hudson, City of Cuyahoga Falls and City of Independence
The project partners seek to implement a collaborative map-based solution that enables utilities, municipalities and highway agencies to share construction and maintenance project information online. The goal of the project is to secure the start-up funding to allow 20 to 25 cities, counties and associated utilities to quickly implement an infrastructure collaboration system that fosters regional coordination, cooperation and communication between the stakeholders.
64. Cleveland Division of Police; Cleveland Emergency Medical Services; Cleveland Emergency Medical Service; Cleveland Emergency Operations Center; Cleveland Division of Fire; Cleveland Department of Public Health; the Emergency Management Agencies; and public health departments of Cuyahoga County, Medina County, Lake County, Lorain County, Geauga County and Ashtabula County
The partners propose implement a regional video conferencing network throughout Northeast Ohio, with the goal of enhancing public safety and health in a six-county area through cost-effective means of fostering immediate coordinated emergency responses.
65. City of Geneva and Ashtabula County
The partners propose to implement an automated meter reading system to provide more accurate and precise measurement of water consumption, as well as more efficient utility operations. The city had an analysis prepared, which showed a $260,000 dollar savings per year.