At Monday’s Ellwood City Borough Council meeting, former council president Connie MacDonald criticized the current council’s decision to stop construction on a new electric building.
The building would have been located between Franklin Avenue and Park Avenue Extension and would have been paid for with a 2017 bond issue for over $2 million dollars.
At a special meeting on Feb. 1, the new council voted 5-2 to suspend construction, with previous council members George Celli and Michele Lamenza casting the dissenting votes.
According to MacDonald, the new building was designed, plans were finalized and the project was open for bid. The building would have lasted 50 years and have had an improved backup system and effective alarms and sprinklers. MacDonald said the current electric facilities have pollution and safety issues.
In addition, the current facilities are only designed for male employees and aren’t handicapped accessible.
“After being in office for less than 30 days, this council made the decision to throw away $120,000 dollars,” MacDonald said. “This was an opportunity to present Ellwood as a forward looking community with pride in our facilities. This decision has damaged our ability to compete with other communities.”
According to Dici, the bond was for $2.4 million, and $1.9 million is remaining. Per the bond requirements, the money will be used on electric infrastructure.
“The electric department felt they didn’t need a new building, and money could be better used elsewhere,” Dici said.
After being in office for 4 years as Council President, Connie MacDonald made the decision to throw away 2.1 million dollars on an Electric Facility that was, according to the lack of documentation otherwise, unnecessary. As for the rest of his pedantic speech, apparently he was not informed that the new Public Works facility behind CVS is large enough to house BOTH Public Works and the Electric Department. Employees of both Departments as well as their equipment are going to share the building, thereby cutting costs to the taxpayers of EC.