Village will get new message sign

FORT RECOVERY — Village officials will be purchasing a new radar message sign.

Fort Recovery Village Council heard from police chief Jared Laux about plans to purchase the new equipment Monday.

Laux explained the village received a grant from nonprofit organization Win on the Wabash Super Raffle, allowing him the funds to buy the new device. 

Plans are to purchase the SpeedAlert 24 from All Traffic Solutions of Pennsylvania. According to the company’s website, the sign measures 24 inches by 60 inches and folds for travel. It provides radar signage, giving drivers messages related to their speed or displaying messages such as flood warnings or Amber Alerts as needed. Operators can remotely access and monitor the sign over the internet. The weatherproof sign can also be mounted to a portable post or trailer or hitched to a vehicle.

After negotiations, Laux said the cost came to about $17,100. The cost is covered by the grant.

Laux shared plans to use the equipment similarly to the roughly 10-year-old sign the village has been sharing with the Village of St. Henry. (Plans are to hand over full ownership of that sign to St. Henry now that Fort Recovery will have its own.) The village’s police and street departments may use the sign for radar speeds, road work or other needs.

“I look at it all as safety, because if you can slow speeders down, that’s safety, if we can protect workers, that’s safety,” explained Laux after the meeting.

Also Monday, village council authorized village administrator Randy Diller to “zero out” the four real estate tax levies with the Mercer County auditor.

Approximately 73% of the vote earlier this month supported a 0.5-percentage-point increase in the village's income tax. 

Fort Recovery will begin collecting a 1.5% income tax from residents in 2026. The village council indicated it would “zero out” the village's real estate tax levies if the income tax increase passed.

Diller also announced plans for foundational work to begin soon for the Sawyer Overman Ninja Park near Fort Recovery Community Park.

A local fundraising committee has been raising dollars for the project for years. It’s named after Sawyer Overman, a Fort Recovery child who died in 2020 from injuries sustained in an ATV accident.

Also Monday, council members Lucas Knapke, Scott Pearson, Greg Schmitz, Al Post and Cliff Wendel, absent Erik Fiely:

•Authorized Diller to execute a capital improvement park grant agreement with the state, a formal process to receive the $450,000 allocated to Fort Recovery from Ohio’s capital budget bill for Ambassador Pool renovations.

•Learned the village is looking for applicants to the two council seats open in January. Council members Erik Fiely and Cliff Wendel did not seek re-election.  

•Heard the village is seeking requests for proposals through Dec. 10 for the Safe Routes to School project, an effort funded through an Ohio Department of Transportation grant. Plans are for the work — it involves installing 625 feet of sidewalk on the east side of Fort Recovery Elementary/Middle School and connecting it to Sharpsburg Road — to begin in summer 2027.

•Learned about Ohio House Bill 503, a recently introduced bill which if passed in its current state would require voter approval on changes to municipal tax reciprocity credits, and Ohio House Bill 92, which addresses unpaid utility bills by tenants.

•Heard the village’s old police cruiser sold for $2,724 in auction.