Is Piqua's Battery Burning Committee Being Set Up to Fail?

After six months, the City seems no further in getting answers to important questions

It has been nearly one year when a resident of Piqua came in front of their City Commission and informed the commissioners that lithium batteries were being burned in the open at the city’s former water treatment plant. This began a series of events that eventually lead to the battery burning to stop, but also put commissioners in a position to publically admit that they wanted to understand what happened and more importantly, how something like this could be prevented.

After the first of the year, newly elected City Commissioner Frank DeBrosse recommended the formation of a citizens’ committee of five individuals that would look into this issue. This publication looked into this committee when it was proposed back in January:

Well, six months into their work and in all honesty, it appears that this committee is no further in answering questions about the battery burning than when they started in earnest back in April. Granted, some of that slow start is due to having a full understanding of the committee’s charge and coming to an agreement on how the committee was going to undertake their work.

However, as this committee is reporting their progress back to the City Commission on a monthly basis, it is becoming an open question whether the City Commission really wants this committee to complete the work that it was asked to do.

Back in June, the committee explicitly asked the Commission for their help in compelling current city employees, such as the City Manager, to answer in person questions that the committee had in the course of their work. In particular, the committee reported that the City Manager had agreed to an interview and then abruptly cancelled the engagement. The Commission wasn’t keen on helping the committee, but encouraged the group to issue written questions for a response rather than having an in-person interview with the City Manager.

The Commission also peppered the committee members about how the committee meetings have been recorded, about the committee not being “neutral”, and other ancillary issues.

Moving ahead to July, the relationship between the Commission and their committee has seemed to deteriorate further. The committee again broached the subject of having their own legal counsel. The Commission was not against the hiring of the committee, but the new legal counsel would work at the pleasure of the Commission and not the committee. Furthermore, this counsel could not issue subpoenas or compel individuals to talk to the committee, those would come from the Law Director.

The discussion deteriorated further as Commissioner Thomas Hohman complained that members of the committee did not wear personal protective equipment when they recently toured the city’s old water treatment plant where the burnings took place. He opined that the there are numerous theories on the contamination of the site with reports of animals and fish dying in nearby waterways, and that by failing to wear protective equipment, the members of the committee were not taking their jobs seriously.

That is an interesting take, to say the least. Especially considering, this volunteer committee has met every Thursday for at least thirteen weeks and has put in hours of time to do their work, often in spite of the obstacles that have been put in front of them.

The committee was never formed to determine the level of the contamination at the site. In fact, if the City has reason to believe that there are serious safety concerns, as the owners of the property in question, they should require visitors to wear personal protective equipment. But taking a Commission-created committee on a guilt-trip for not wearing personal protective equipment is weak tea for an elected official. The committee was formed for a simple reason, to answer these questions:

The City Commission has a responsibility to the committee and the public to help the committee answer these questions. Seeing members of the Commission and members of the committee getting into petty squabbles during Commission meetings does not help. If anything, it just alienates more and more citizens from believing that the City Commission really wants answers to the questions they have asked the committee to answer.

What do you think? Is the committee overstepping their boundaries? Could the City Commission do more to help the committee? Our paid subscribers are welcome to leave their ideas in the comment thread.

Thanks for reading today’s Civic Capacity Newsletter! Please feel free to share this information with your friends and neighbors.

Also, please consider subscribing to our work. If you are a free subscriber, please consider becoming a paid subscriber. For less than $1 a week, you can get timely and conversational updates about the decisions that are impacting you and your community!

Finally, our reader survey for July is looking for responses! Feel free to share your thoughts and ideas on your hometown! You can access the survey here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/PF6SPPN