SHELBY — Smoother streets are ahead for Shelby drivers if voters approve a 0.2% income tax renewal on the May 2 primary ballot, according to city officials.
If passed, Shelby will continue to collect the tax for the next five years, starting in 2024 and ending in 2028. The purpose of the renewal is to continue the city’s efforts repairing and improving roads and sidewalks.
City project manager Joe Gies said the tax brings in approximately $450,000 per year — more than $2 million over five years. He said 97% of the funds go towards road improvements, and 3% for sidewalk improvements.
Voters in Shelby initially approved the levy in 2013, which paved the way for major projects in partnership with the Ohio Department of Transportation.
State route projects like Main Street, Gamble Street and Mansfield Avenue were completed, costing the city only 22% of a $6.1 million project.
Gies has plans to continue to leverage the money from the income tax to go after more federal grants. The next major paving project planned is Mickey Road.
“We’ve been very successful in leveraging these dollars to get even bigger dollars, and we’ll be applying for money to do a total rebuild of Mickey Road,” Gies said.
“The amount of money we would use to pave Mickey Road, we can leverage that to get it completely redone with new curbs and everything, using the same amount of city money plus federal highway dollars. (This levy) is very important.”
Gies said the plan is to rebuild the entirety of Mickey Road, from Ohio 39 to Gamble Street. He said the road “took a beating” while being used as a detour route during other major repaving projects.
A five-year plan will be created to rank and prioritize other streets to be paved using renewal funds, he said.
The city also hopes to bring back the sidewalk fund, a popular program that has gone by the wayside in recent years. The program allows citizens to share the cost of repairing their sidewalks with the city.
“When I first started with the city 21 years ago, they had a sidewalk fund and it was very popular,” Gies said. “People lined up at the door, but we stopped because there wasn’t a demand. Now we’re getting a lot more calls about it, so we’re ready to fire it back up.”
Gies said the program works by accepting applications from citizens on a first-come, first-served basis. The amount paid by the city vs. the homeowner is based on the homeowner’s income.
Once funds set aside for sidewalk repair are all claimed, the city puts the projects out to bid and hires a contractor to fix the sidewalk.
Gies said applications for the sidewalk fund will be made available sometime around May 1.
