MIDDLETOWN, Ohio — Middletown City Council pledged to ask for a slate of changes related to how their residents are charged for flood protections Monday in response to a plan by the Miami Conservancy District's effort to raise fees and reassess amounts due by property owners in the Great Miami River's flood zone.
The previous amounts due were based on 2012 property values, and Middletown city administrators calculated that the new charge shared by the city and property owners would nearly double from $763,360.60 to $1,312,980.23 if the current plan progresses.
At Monday's special meeting to address the cost shift, council member Steve West expressed his frustration that no member of the three-person board of directors attended to answer questions.
MCD Chief Engineer Don O'Connor did attend.
"I wish the board members were here," West told O'Connor. "It's ridiculous that they're not."
West said the proposed hike would largely affect the historic downtown and many neighborhoods bordering the river that are old and largely low-income.
He said the hike would force many who already make hard decisions between basic necessities and groceries even harder, even if the burden doesn't approach the assessment changes facing Hamilton further down-river.
O'Connor said there was much he couldn't answer since he wasn't on the board and privy to many of the planning conversations, but he did stress that the need for greater investment into the river's infrastructure was great.
"One thing I want to emphasize is the historic amount of this work that is needed. We are over 100 years old," O'Connor said.
O'Connor joined MCD General Manager Marylynn Lodor's earlier comments that the aging levies, dams, flood walls and other infrastructure were struggling to handle the increased demand from more common flood events along the Greater Miami River.
"We are struggling to pay for it," O'Connor said.
Lodor said, despite the need for additional funding, she will ask the board to "pause" the reassessment until they can find a solution to concerns raised by citizens in Middletown and Hamilton at a meeting at Hamilton City Council Friday.
"What we've got to do is really take a step back and look at how we currently make assessments. Each district does it differently," Lodor said.
She said the pause would definitely include a halt on reassessing property values beyond 2012, but it wasn't clear if she would urge the board to "pause" a proposed rate hike and capital fee.
Middletown approved the drafting of a letter to be sent to Hamilton and MCD urging the district to enact a full pause for two years, spread the burden of paying for flood control beyond the flood plane, change the law governing the district's ability to reassess charges at the state level, and urge them to take better advantage of state and federal funding when available.
If you want to know how your assessment will change, you can submit for information by clicking this link to the district's website.
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