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Resident escorted out of county commission meeting

Exchange gets heated during open public forum

T-L Photos/GAGE VOTA Belmont County resident Joyce Hartley yells at the Belmont County Board of Commissioners on Wednesday, demanding that the board fix a ditch that allegedly is destroying her property due to water flowing into her yard.

ST. CLAIRSVILLE — The Belmont County Board of Commissioners meeting Wednesday was tense for the third time in a month.

Resident Joyce Hartley addressed the commissioners regarding a long-standing issue related to her property. When it rains, she said, water runs across Cash Ridge Road onto her property because of a nearby ditch.

“I spoke to Edward Good. He said he ain’t going to do nothing because you gave him the money and the permission to do that job,” Hartley told the board Wednesday. “We’re going to have to do something about it because you gave him the money and you gave him the permission and my house is still getting damaged.”

Ed Good is a Mead Township trustee who commissioners had told Hartley to speak with when she approached the board at past meetings.

Contacted after the meeting Wednesday, Good said Gulfport Energy performed improvements to the road and that no county money was involved.

He added that Mead Township has provided Hartley with several resources, including a thorough response to a public records request as well as contact information for the Ohio Ethics Commission, Ohio Attorney General, the Ohio Auditor’s Office and the Ohio Township Association.

“Mead Township maintains 48 miles of road and, if there are issues, we pride ourselves on addressing them as soon as possible,” Good noted.

At the meeting Wednesday, Commissioner Josh Meyer responded to Hartley, saying that the board had already addressed the matter. Hartley interjected that at a commission meeting two weeks ago, the board gave her a letter that was a year old.

“I addressed that letter with your prosecutor Kevin Flanagan in his office,” she said.

Commissioner J.P. Dutton interrupted to clarify that Flanagan would be her prosecutor in the matter, pointing out that the prosecutor works for the people.

“Well, he’s our prosecutor. Whatever. You’re my commissioner and you’re not a commissioner,” Hartley replied. “I addressed that letter with him in his office, it’s full of lies. I pulled out all of my evidence to prove that it was all lies and put it in front of him. He read it and shoved it back in front of me and said, ‘This meeting is over.'”

When contacted after the meeting, Flanagan made a simple statement about the matter.

“I met with her to try to remedy the situation that she had with our commissioners and Mead Township Trustees regarding water runoff. She audio recorded our conversation, which she was welcome to do. Our discussion was not productive in large part due to her position and conduct during the meeting,” Flanagan wrote in a text message Wednesday evening.

Hartley on Wednesday added that she believes the letter that was given to her at the meeting two weeks ago wasn’t accurate and asked Meyer why he gave it to her. He responded that the commissioners gave her the letter because “we’ve addressed this multiple times.”

Hartley said she continues to address the commissioners because she believes they aren’t doing anything about the issue. The situation initially remained unresolved because the commissioners, Mead Township trustees and county Engineer Terry Lively disagreed about who had jurisdiction over the ditch. Commissioners submitted the matter to the prosecutor’s office for a legal opinion, which was received in September 2023.

According to the opinion written by Assistant Prosecutor Jacob Manning, the Ohio Revised Code is not entirely clear on the responsibility of maintaining roadside ditches. His letter referred to a legal opinion from the Ohio Attorney General in 1981, concluding that the township would have jurisdiction. Manning added that this seems to contradict the Ohio Township Handbook, which indicates responsibility would go to the county.

“We agree with the Ohio Attorney General’s analysis,” Manning wrote, adding that his office contacted the Ohio Auditor’s Office and was told that the Township Handbook was a resource and could not supersede the law. The state office also indicated it would review the issue.

Manning also noted that in 2018 Hartley had filed suit against a neighbor for allegedly causing the runoff and against the former owner of her home for allegedly concealing that runoff occurred. She dropped the suit in 2019.

Hartley on Wednesday asked the commissioners when they would take responsibility for the ditch. Meyer replied, noting that he believes Hartley hasn’t been completely truthful and tends to cherry-pick the information she relays. She asked for examples of what she had left out.

“We have addressed you on multiple occasions. You come in here and rant, yell and scream, and it’s not a conversation,” Meyer said. “As far as I’m concerned, this conversation is done for today.”

Hartley continued.

“As far as I’m concerned, I’ve been fighting you for five years on this conversation and I’m going to continue to fight until you do something about it,” she said.

Dutton said the commissioners have to work within the opinion provided by the prosecutor’s office.

“You’re a liar,” Hartley responded. “You’re a conniver and a conspirator.”

At that time Meyer, who was presiding over the meeting due to commission President Jerry Echemann’s absence, banged the gavel, prompting a response from Hartley.

“Don’t wave your magic wand,” she said. “I have every right to sit here and say what I want. I have rights, and you are taking my house away from me.”

Meyer responded that the commissioners were not taking her house away, which further angered her. She informed Dutton that she purchased her house from Sulek and Experts, which at the time was called Sulek and Dutton. Hartley blames Dutton’s family for selling her the house and said she believes the Sulek and Dutton firm was aware of issues with the house and hid the information from her. She claimed that Sulek and Dutton changed its name to Sulek and Experts because the Duttons sold their part of the business because of the events that transpired with her residence.

Dutton informed her that his family never owned that business and said it had nothing to do with him.

“They have never owned that business,” Dutton said. “I have a brother that worked there 15 years ago, well before any of this ever came up.”

Dutton and Meyer reiterated that they could not do anything to help her, and Dutton apologized for that. She demanded that they help her, repeating that she believes the ditch is the county’s responsibility and continuing to call the commissioners corrupt conspirators.

“The only person slandering people here is you, Ma’am,” Dutton said.

She told him she would continue to call him corrupt and dared him to do something about it.

She then aimed her verbal attack at Meyer, calling him a “little sissy” and telling him to “sit there and listen to what I’ve got to say.”

The commissioners then asked sheriff’s Deputy Rick Planey to escort her out of the meeting.

Once Heartley was escorted out, Meyer apologized to the other people in attendance, adding that the commissioners want to allow everyone to participate in the open public forum and believe that it is every resident’s right to have their voice heard. But he said the spectacle that had just occurred was unacceptable.

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