Council met on the 10th of September, one of the first orders of business taken up by Council was recognizing Lieutenant Ken Mifflin for his retirement after 25 years of service to the City of Stow. Lt. Mifflin served in the detective bureau for 17 years in the City and was named Top Cop by the Summit County Prosecutor’s Office in 2010. Lt. Mifflin worked an aggravated arson case which turned into a murder case which garnered national television coverage. He was also a member of the Metro SWAT team for 12 years and served as a polygraph examiner for the city as well. Due to COVID-19 we were unable to have Lt. Mifflin in to award this commendation but we did have him virtually join our meeting and it was a pleasure to hear the nice things members of Council and the Administration had to say about Lt. Mifflin and we all wish him the best in his retirement.
Council also passed a resolution to support the renaming of the Steels Corner Bridge over Route 8 in honor of civil rights leader John Lewis. The idea for this renaming began with Councilman Hailer with the intention of creating an ongoing discussion point regarding the civil rights movement in America and to ensure that the educational importance of such is not lost. Mr. Hailer stated it best in our Council meeting when he stated that the ultimate goal is “to treat others as you wish to be treated.” This legislation passed unanimously by Council. When Council passed a resolution in May for racial equality I was hopeful it would spark continued discussion, training, and education related to ongoing equality issues we face locally and across the country. This is a first step in that direction. We will be taking another step in the positive direction with training setup by Mr. Wren for Councilmembers and employees of the City later this month.
We also had 2 moral claims come before Council that were denied. Moral claims involve some type of property damage suffered by someone that they feel was caused by the City. The first of these claims involved damage caused by the police department in their response to a call on a potential person in danger at a storage unit. This claim was denied by the City so it came to Council for review, Council also denied this claim. The damage was done in the line of duty for the police department and the property owner have other potential avenues to recover the damages. The second involved a tree limb hanging over a road way that was struck by a driver and damaged his mirror. In situations where it relates to the City maintaining a road way (like pot holes or tree trimming), the City must have notice of such issue in advance of any damage and failed to have made the necessary repairs prior to be responsible for any damage. Here, the City had no notice that there was a tree limb that needed trimmed prior to the driver striking the limb. The City denied the claim so it came to Council for review, Council denied the claim by a 5-2 vote.
I also posted a rather long blog post over the weekend which summarized the lawsuit filed by our Law Director related to Charter Review recommendations, I would highly recommend review if you are at all curious about the process and outcome of the case.
Our next Council meeting will be Thursday September 24, 2020, which committee meeting times to be set closer to the dates.