City of Athens, Ohio Mayor's Press Conference 2023, 12 Apr 2023

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From YouTube: Mayor's Press Conference - April 12, 2023

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Mayor's Press Conference - April 12, 2023

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Good afternoon and welcome once again to the weekly update with Kyle Johansen and the mayor, we're doing things a little bit different today, because Kyle is currently with his best friend or friends, but best friend Rufus at a ball game today, down at Wren, Stadium or somewhere, but uh Kyle I'm going to turn it to you to give us all things. Weather and sports related.

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Cloudy Skies High 79, 12, 50 Saturday, probably cloudy five semi-line full 54 Sunday rainy position, size, 73, 12, 45, Monday, probably cloudy 5, 59, 12, 41.

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Baseball Saturday and some baseball on Sunday, and then we got the birthday parade next weekend.

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All right, thank you, Kyle all right! You take care.

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So there's Kyle Kyle hanging with his his good buddy Rufus, where apparently Kyle has over 5 000 photographs with with Rufus um huge huge number one Rufus fan and he shares he shares postcards with Rufus. He Rufus gets him things. He gets Rufus things. They've got quite the relationship all right happenings around the city, the north Shafer Street West, State, Street traffic restriction update. This is that storm drain repair that's going on the Storm tunnel.

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The these restrictions will be in place, starting today that North Shafer Street will be open to local and business traffic. Only between West Washington, Street and West State Street, the West Washington Street North Shafer Street intersection is completely closed. All traffic a detour is in place. I noticed detour signs on Court, Street I noticed one on West Union at the intersection of court and Union, so know that the detour signs are out there again. This is a pretty major, extensive repair.

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The restrictions will be in place through the remainder of the week and possibly into the week of April 17th, so buckle up as we work through those repairs, something new in the city. We have an accessible or accessibility Grant, where we are granting up to fifteen thousand dollars available to Athens businesses, you're interested you can reach out to Anna um corpy um at a-n-n-a-h.

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B- u r r gmail.com and get more information on this um again. These are accessibility grants for up to fifteen thousand dollars. Fifteen thousand dollars for businesses. This is to Aid them in becoming ADA Compliant with their business, so um really encourage people to check that out. I'm sure you can find it on the city's website as well. So just know that that this is a interesting and good program.

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You know for including ramps, making an a restroom accessible, adding automatic door openers improving, accessible parking, so the the guidelines are such that it is only for Ada improvements for a business, so uh you can find applications here at the city building through the mayor's office, or you can go on the city's website and get more information on that also. This is interesting. I received this from Meredith earlwein as she is really um finding and identifying some interesting things. There's a survey, that's out there on inclusive Sports.

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Now this is for Ohio youth with disabilities and basically, uh how can we make our inclusive Sports, make inclusive, Sports, better or Ohio youth with disabilities? So you can share your experiences by going to go Dot osu.edu.

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Slash inclusive Sports, again: go dot, osu.edu, inclusive Sports. Take the survey they're interested in finding out from youth grades K through 12 in the Ohio public schools, parents and caregivers of those youth and the Ohio public school professionals who work with students in grades K through 12..

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So please check that out help out with this survey, where we can figure out how to make more inclusive sports available here in the state of Ohio and for sure here in the city of Athens, speaking of sports, Athens, Arts, Parks and Rec indoor basketball courts at the community center will be closed today, uh April 12th or Ohio Means Jobs job fair, so just know that the basketball courts have a job fair, taking place as opposed to Hoops or pickleball Go Bus Miner schedule change for go bus routes, A and E beginning the 12th.

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Today there will be uh they're implementing a minor schedule, change route, A's schedule, 50, 51, 52 and 55, which travels Athens to Columbus and then route e schedule, 22, which goes to Van Wert from Columbus. That schedule is changed um and a minor change at that. So these changes allow for more connection time at the downtown, Columbus, Greyhound location and swap swaps. The reservation only stop from Nelsonville Hawkin College to the Logan. Stop so check it out. If you want more information there, it is on this flyer.

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um You can call 888-954-6287.

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Or email gobus hapcap.org, uh let's see what else do we have here?

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ah We also have something: I've talked about already the Athens Hawking County spring recycling days. We've got a flyer for this as well. We've talked about this. A lot I think the most interesting thing is. It was hard to get rid of items. Tires Tires on rims for four bucks tires off rims 50 cents, flat screen, TVs tube, TVs fluorescent tubes, compact bulbs.

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There you see the prices for all of those other things, it's free bring it down and they will help you dispose of books, DVDs e-ways, scrap metal tools, building materials so on and so forth. Those things are all accepted, free down at the Athens County Fairgrounds. Again, that's going to be April 22nd from 9 00 a.m, to 1 P.M, invisible ground. This is cool. I ran into um Brian Costo.

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He was uh up on the intersection of court and Washington Street and he was kind of looking around and so on and so forth and I asked him what he was up to. He was with uh Sherry Oliver as well, and he said you know we're looking at the the placement of these basically adhesive pucks that are on the sidewalk and it's part of the invisible ground project and apparently um there's a QR code attached or associated with these pucks.

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And if you, if you um take out your cell phone and engage with that QR code, invisible ground will come up and it'll show one of three different image: historic images. One of them is the Athena or not the Athena. The drinking fountain that used to exist on the uh the Athens County Courthouse campus way back in the day and was taken down and removed in the late 50s early 60s and currently resides down at the Athens city, water, Department, water treatment plant.

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But it's these immersive historic markers um again at the courthouse, one of them as I understand it is of Teddy Roosevelt when Teddy Roosevelt came into Athens back in the early 1900s, and so you go to another one of these pucks and you take a image of it and they're standing in front of you through your cell phone.

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Is the county courthouse with Eddie Roosevelt standing there, so it's pretty cool one of them is near the Presbyterian Church one is across from the courthouse steps by Chase Bank and another one is at the corner of the courthouse near where the historic stood back in the day so check it out. These are these are really cool? You know, Brian did this for the berry.

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Hotel he's done this for Mountain Zion, Baptist Church, so encourage you to take part and enjoy those I should also mention that this is the week of the Athens International Film and Video Festival. Here in the city of Athens, this Saturday uh around eight o'clock, 8 30ish. There will be a a showing of one of the films from the International Film and Video Festival on Court Street.

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um The screen will be down in the vicinity of Brennan's and you can be outside and enjoy something on the big screen which I, don't believe, has ever happened before. So as the film festival kind of expands, they also expand their venues, which this year will include Court Street. So that's this Saturday uh other things that are going to be going on this Saturday. So would encourage you to kind of avoid.

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If you will um High Street, the High Street uh High Fest will be taking place on Saturday in the daytime hours and then the week after that, on Palmer Street will be Palmer Fest, so again encouraging people to steer clear of those areas for the next couple weekends and then the weekend after that um is uh yeah who used commencement is right around the corner, which is hard for me to get. My header opt around that it's that time again and then we're going to see move out.

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So the big move out effort will be taking place right after commencement and uh know that there will be a limited number of dumpsters that will be deployed. There'll be one on Court Street, but there will not be um the large numbers of dumpsters that we deployed last year and even more so the the two years before that during the pandemic, with our desire to help with the disposal of want unwanted things this year again, it will be pretty minimal in terms of the dumpsters that we get Uptown.

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So we're strongly encouraging people that are not going to be taking items home with them and instead wanting to leave them behind. If they are usable items, we would encourage you to drop them off at the restore down on West Union Street, because they would happily take your gently used or used items and get them into the hands of people who can reuse them or repurpose them.

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The upcoming meetings that we have, we have the Athens Municipal Arts commission, which is meeting today that'll, be at Arts West, 5 30 to 7 P.M, shade tree commission is meeting tomorrow, 7 P.M here in council chambers and as usual on the 17th of April Monday evening, 7 P.M here in council chambers, will be city council for a regular session.

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Given that we just came out of committees last Monday night, that's all I've got I hope that you are enjoying the amazingly nice weather outside I know that I have been out walking, Court, Street and elsewhere. Whenever I get a chance to number one um recharge, my solar batteries, but also just to enjoy the outdoors. It's it's super Pleasant super nice out. There hope you're enjoying it please get out and enjoy it responsibly and join me next week for our next weekly update with Kyle Johansen and the mayor. Take care.