ST. CLAIRSVILLE — St. Clairsville City Council heard updates on a swath of issues during Monday’s council meeting.

Vandalism has become an issue at the park and amphitheater. Safety and Service Director Jeremy Greenwood said obscene and vulgar graffiti has been found on the outside of restrooms and facilities.

“It started last week. It was a Friday. There were a couple kids down there,” Greenwood said after the meeting.

Mayor Kathryn Thalman had a stern warning for the perpetrators.

“I spent part of Saturday trying to scrub graffiti off of the playground, picnic tables and benches,” Thalman said.

“The police will be reviewing camera tapes. The people who have done this and put this graffiti up will be dealt with harshly and severely.”

In other matters, Greenwood referred to the city’s appropriations and said money was saved in 2020 compared to past years. He said appropriations for 2020 were $11,088,521.84, counting government aid for losses incurred during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“If you take out the $451,508 we spent because of COVID … we’re down to $10,637,013.84,” he said.

Greenwood compared that amount to 2019’s appropriations of $12,283,979.96; 2018’s appropriations of $12,843,474.80; and 2017’s appropriations of $13,074,691.14.

“The city in general since 2017 has saved over $3 million,” Greenwood said.

“We’re trying to be a lot wiser with our money.”

Greenwood said good financial practices such as “watching what we’re doing, not overextending ourselves” helped the city save money in numerous small ways.

He also said the city in previous years had been paying attorneys’ fees for lawsuits and had contracted a public relations firm to promote a plan to sell the city water and sewer system.

He noted the savings occurred during a period when the city has been tasked with upgrades to the aging water system to comply with the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency.

“It’s just being more fiscally responsible with things,” Greenwood said.

“We had an outside consultant ordering computers for us,” he said of past practice and adding that more recently the city instead purchased directly from the Dell government site. “Basically price-shopping things. … We’re trying to be fiscally responsible with taxpayers’ money.”

He said another positive move was hiring a wastewater superintendent for $65,000 plus benefits — for a total of nearly $90,000 yearly. He said this led to savings of about $10,000-$15,000 a year, since the city previously had subcontracted with a private entity to supervise the system for $105,000 annually.

“(We’re saving) $10,000 here, $20,000 there. It adds up pretty quick,” Greenwood said.

Greenwood also updated council on the state of the water system. The city is still awaiting permission from the Ohio Department of Transportation to run a new permanent waterline under Interstate 70 after a water leak was discovered in the main line that passed beneath the highway from the water treatment plant to the rest of the city during the summer.

“We’re still waiting on a review. There’s no time frame for that yet,” Greenwood said.

Plans call for the new line to use the old waterline’s channel. This would be less costly than boring a new path under the interstate.

Water is currently being run through a temporary line laid on the surface of Reservoir Road, which crosses over I-70. Greenwood hopes the project will be completed before winter.

“I know the weather’s going to start turning, but we have some options with the temporary line,” he said. “All of our water’s flowing through there so it shouldn’t freeze, but there’s no guarantee it won’t. If that happens, we’ll go and put some heat tape and some blankets around the temporary line where it’s exposed.”

He said about 1,000 feet of line is exposed.

In other matters, council approved amending the ordinance to solicit bids for street paving not to exceed $200,000. Greenwood said the first ordinance set the limit at $185,000.

“The bids came in at $190,000,” Greenwood said, adding the law director advised him he could not remove one of the streets but that council would have to amend the legislation to allow for more money to be spent. The bids were received Sept. 3.

The city received bids of $237,863.20 from NLS Paving; $196,456 from Shelly & Sands; and $190,297 from Cast & Baker. The streets or portions of streets to be paved include Forest Lawn Avenue, Broad Street, Crescent Street, Center Street, Edinburgh Way, High Street Extension, McBeth Court, Overlook Court, Reservoir Road and South Marietta Street.