Oxford City Council passes fire department funding agreement, condemns political violence

Oxford City Council passed two measures to formalize an agreement with Miami University to fund the Oxford Fire Department (OFD) and approved a resolution that will put more focus on historic preservation during its July 16 meeting.

Two city officials also denounced political violence in response to the assassination attempt on former president Donald Trump during the meeting.

Fire department funding agreement passes unanimously

Two resolutions on Tuesday aimed to finalize an agreement between Oxford and Miami University to secure funding for OFD. The first resolution required the city to formally earmark $270,000 per year for economic development initiatives, while the second formalized Miami's commitment to providing $1.27 million per year to OFD for 10 years, contingent on the city passing a Fire and EMS levy in November.

Both resolutions passed with unanimous support. Vice Mayor Chantel Raghu and Councilor Jason Bracken were absent from the meeting.

City Manager Doug Elliott said the city has invested $1.3 million in economic development initiatives in the past three years and plans to put $2 million toward similar initiatives in the next two years.

Councilor David Prytherch said the economic development measure already aligns with the city's goals, and encouraging future development is important to minimize the city's dependence on the university.

"We are not agreeing to spend more than we have already budgeted for," Councilor Alex French added. "This is just our, as Mayor Snavely put it, this is the floor. This is the minimum we agree to spend every year."

Under the levy agreement, Miami would no longer front a third of the cost for new capital equipment for OFD if the levy passes. Elliott explained that the cost of new equipment was rolled into the deficit estimates at the root of the agreement, so that contribution would no longer be needed if the levy passes and Miami contributes its $1.27 million per year.

"Our work is cut out for us, because now we have to sell a levy to the taxpayers," Elliott said. He expects the Butler County Board of Elections to assign an issue number to the measure soon.

Historic preservation at center of new contract

Later in the meeting, council unanimously passed a $199,000 contract with McKenna to work on three related initiatives to provide clear historic preservation guidance to developers in the city.

The initiatives include a creating a unified development ordinance and a historic preservation plan and establishing historic preservation guidelines. According to a staff report, the development ordinance will algin with a proposed economic development strategic plan.

Six consultants submitted proposals, community development director Sam Perry said, including four which could handle all three initiatives. While McKenna wasn't the cheapest option, he said it was the best option. As McKenna begins to work on the plan and code update, Perry said the public will have opportunities to offer feedback.

Prytherch said the city has not done a major overhaul of its code in decades, with the last major overhaul in 2003. He hopes the work McKenna does will last within the city's future code for a long time.

"We haven't made an investment like this in a long time," Prytherch said. "We've been updating our code pretty inexpensively for as long as I've been involved ... What we're paying for here is quality."

French, who serves on the Historic and Architecture and Planning Commission, said the plan will help preserve Oxford's small-town charm without sacrificing economic development opportunities.

"The number of times in the three years we've been on it that we've said we really need historic design guidelines and we really need a plan has been a lot," French said.

Trump assassination attempt a topic of discussion

Councilor Amber Franklin highlighted an initiative by the Interfaith Center to host its first Living Room Conversation training session on July 31 from 3:30-5:30 p.m. The goal of the training session is to help people "build bridges across differences," Franklin said, an especially important skill given national politics today.

"The theme for the one that we'll be doing during the training is 'Conversations in Troubled Times,'" Franklin said. "I believe we can all agree that we are living in troubled times, given the recent assassination attempt of former president Trump and all the polarization that we've experienced for many years now."

The training session is free but requires registration by emailing oxfordinterfaith@gmail.com and is limited to 30 participants.

Mayor Bill Snavely also touched on national politics during his comments at the end of the meeting. He said council condemns political violence and asked the community to dedicate itself to avoiding violent responses to disagreements.

"We can disagree with one another, and boy we've got a lot of disagreements on a lot of things, but violence is not the way to resolve that," Snavely said. "The ballot box is the way to resolve that, and civil discourse is the way to resolve that."

Oxford City Council will meet again in the Oxford Courthouse at 7:30 p.m. Aug. 6. The city also streams meetings live on its website.