The following is a presentation of FCB Faith. This is Keeping America First with Bishop Shawn Teacoats and Reverend Jeff Jemison on FCB Faith. So happy to have with us today Dynamite elected official none other than Lorraine County Commissioner Jeff Riddell. Jeff, are you doing today? I'm having a great day. Okay, good, good. A lot of exciting things happening in Lorraine County. Would you tell us a. Little bit about what you're doing and what's going on in your tenure as Lorraine County Commissioner. I'd be glad to there's a lot going on because there were a lot of things that had been discussed and contemplated but never been acted upon. And when I arrived three years ago, we decided our motto was going to be that we're not going to kick one can down the road. Whenever we run into something that needs to be done, We're going to put the team together to figure out how to do it and and actually get it done. So it's been kind of refreshing, and I think that the media has has picked up on the fact that we're doing things all the time, and that's because this current board and I'm pleased to be a protagonist in that board. We have decided that we're going to handle things. We're not just going to talk about it and hope they. Go away awesome. What are some of the things that you've done that you're working on as county commissioner. Well, they run the full gamut. Some of the things are are very public and and and create a lot of stir and some things are behind the scenes as we try to make generational change in the efficiency of government and service to the public. So I'll start with the stuff that people don't see. We have cut our budget by eleven million dollars from twenty five to twenty six, and we balanced it and we earned with our process. We earned the cooperation of thirteen out of the sixteen other electeds who rolled up their sleeves under our direction. And we are very pleased to announce that we have shrunk the size of government and eliminated some things that weren't necessary. We built a cybersecurity network to protect all the records and data of our citizens. Many communities have had problems with bad actors getting involved in stealing data and using it for profit for themselves and our County Commissioner Network survived an attack and continues to survive almost weekly attempts to get into our data by other people. So the third thing is that you'll notice if you come to the fourth floor the building is that we took all of the staff that has public interaction. Not every member of our staff does, but for those that deal with the public and a direct face to face, we condensed our staff from two floors to one staff one floor, so that when you come into the building, you get off the elevator, you will immediately see everybody that's there, and whoever it is that you need to have a meeting with or a discussion with. Government efficiency is oh, I'm sorry. Because that's important to us. It was very difficult for people to come. When they needed to be referred from one person to another person for collaboration, they often had to go to another floor, they had to get buzzed in, they had to do a lot with private offices, and we have eliminated all that. As a taxpayer, when you arrive, you will see all the people busy at work. So that's one thing that people always talk about. Voters always want more government efficiency, so that's something that you're not just talking about, but you've actually implemented different measures to make sure that government is more efficient. Like you said, people can just come now to one floor and they don't have to go all around searching for answers and for the right person to help them with different things. Could you talk about this a little bit in this day and age where people are concerned about their taxes and spending and the costs of things. What about your budget cuts Because everyone always says they want to shrink government, they don't want waste. Can you get into that a little bit more, because that's something everybody wants. So, Jeff Riddell, you're actually doing You've done it. Talk about that a little bit more. Well, we've not only reduced the budget, but we reduced the taxes that feed that budget three times, focused primarily on senior citizens with a doubling of the homestead exemption. We also owner occupied homes got a doubling of their state exemption, so we reduced the money coming in. We took a vote to the voters last November about sales tax. We wanted the voters to decide on restoring a quarter percent sales tax that previous board had implemented without a vote and then eliminated it for whatever reason. And so we took it to the voters, and the voters, you know, seventy thirty said, we do not want to raise the taxes. So we cut the budget and we cut the taxes beyond that sales tax, so that we are working with about the same level of money that we did in twenty and sixteen, plus a little for inflation. And we have brought back the government down on both ends. Less money coming in and way less money going out. That's what people always talk about, that's what they always want. Everyone wants lower taxes and want to keep as much money in their pockets as possible. So doubling the homestead exemption that really helps seniors keep their homes. And is that right? Could you talk about that a little bit. Well, that affected twenty two thousand seniors in Lorraine County that are over sixty five and living on less than forty thousand dollars worth of earned income. So that really was focused on the people that are having the most difficult time finishing out their lives trying to do that in their own home. Yeah, what made you take that action along with your two colleagues. You know, what did you hear from we're seniors calling you saying that we're paying too much, we're being taxed out of our homes. What caused you to take that action? Well, there was there was a general public outcry. In twenty five most people experienced a twenty five thirty percent increase in their property taxes and that was just due to the inflation of construction over the last three or four years, due to. A lot of it due to COVID. But everybody was complaining about their taxes. But as we looked at this opportunity that the legislature and Columbus handed the commissioners, they gave us the ability to do it if we wanted to or not do it, and we were one of eleven out of eighty eight counties that did affect it. And our rationale for doing that is that as we looked at the demographics of Lera County. As I said, out of about one hundred and fifty thousand or so households in Lorraine County, we actually had twenty two thousand that were living there on the edge, over sixty five retired, living on fixed income and trying to stay in their homes. We looked at the sacrifices which it would mean that some of the school systems would experience a small reduction in their budget. But we looked at the fact that these folks had paid their taxes for a long time, they had worked and been productive, and now they needed a little help from those that were coming behind them, and we decided that it was the right thing to do. That the benefit to the seniors outweighed a little bit of discomfort to the rest of us. Oh, that's awesome. I'd like to move to another issue that's going on. It's been in the news quite a bit. There've been folks putting out yard signs, have been protests. You know, you see folks uh standing on the streets in different areas saying we don't want this, megasite, we don't want that. Can you kind of clear that up. Some people believe that you're preparing to put a data center in and could you talk about that a little bit, And I know that's not accurate, but could you talk. About that absolutely. Yes. The job of the county commissioners is to is to promote the best welfare of the county. We like to say to do the most good for the most people. No one issue is going to make everybody happy. Not everybody is going to agree on a particular subject or issue, and this is one of those. But this is where the commissioners were responding to the world that we see, which we think is our job to help help get Lorraine County ready for a future. And we have we have a we have a government in Washington that is moving to bring jobs back and bring the middle class back to the United States. We have a legacy of manufacturing. We have a great state with a great culture. We're in the northern half of the state. We have Lake Erie, and we want to attract some of those jobs. If we're going to bring back tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of jobs back to the United States, we want Lorraine County to get their share. We are still twenty thousand jobs short of where we were in nineteen seventy four when I came back after college to start my career, and I think that we need to be we need to do something to replace those jobs that have been lost at the shipyards. And General Motors in Ollyria. And the Ford plant in Lorraine, US Steel and because those jobs actually support the economy. Those manufacturing jobs create subsidiary jobs and vendor jobs, and those jobs create economic activity, and they helped build the middle class. And so we are responding that Ohio has been looked at, and Loreen County has been looked at several times over the last five or six years for location of major manufacturing, high tech manufacturing cell phones, batteries, computers, computer chips, all those kinds of things, and good clean manufacturing, and so we've got passed over twice, and we made a decision that we wanted to make sure that we were ready the next time. And it doesn't guarantee us that we're going to land somebody, but we have to be ready to get into the game. Unfortunately, these newer facilities require a lot of land, and that leads us to the townships where open land is available, some of it being farmed, some of it not being farmed. And so that particular location was good because it was near the airport and it had highway access and so forth. So we proceeded to build the infrastructure that would make sure that the next time we get looked at, we can say to somebody, you can come. Here, We're ready. So We're all in favor of jobs all across the state of Ohio, and that's very important for Lorraine County to be prepared for good manufacturing jobs. Can you tell us why I know you were, why you should be re elected, or why you're the better choice, because I know there's a primary coming up just in a couple of days. Talk about that a. Little bit, sure, the primary in a couple of days. The larger issue between my opponent myself is the is the Megasite, and there's a there's a reluctance. We feel that we feel that the consequences of the Megasite are well worth the benefit. We're talking about an additional six hundred acres, six hundred and sixty acres of current farmland that would be converted to light manufacturing. We currently have ninety eight thousand acres of farmland, not all of it even being farmed, but zoned farmland, and so we feel that that's a reasonable contribution to the to the process. It's not much different than when four hundred and eighty acres of farmland were turned into the Ford plant back in the fifties, you know, almost seventy years ago. So at the end of the day. You know, the whole country was farmland, and we have built cities and suburbs and and so forth, you know, and obviously there's a sacrifice farmland, but as farmland gets more productive, they can compensate for that sacrifice. So that's the major issue for my opponent. I believe that that's that's the way the system should work. I believe though, that I'm still the better candidate. I got elected three years ago on my resume and my experience accumulated quite a diverse resume over over fifty years working and living in Raine County, and I think that that diversity has shown up in what we've done and what I've been able to help us lead to do over the last three years. And I think that, you know, County Commissioner's job is not a one issue job. We handle any myriad of things from transportation to children's services, to the jail to you know, law and order, to the courts. We are the budget authority for ninety million dollars a year. The job is much broader than whether we want to have a megasite or not. And we don't control whether that megasite, by the way, whether it's going to have a data center or not. Is controlled by the township where it's going, and they're zoning regulations. Absolutely, thank you for clearing that up. Jeff. Keep doing what you're doing. You're fighting a good fight, providing great leadership for the County of Lorraine. Glad to have you with us again. We'd like to have you back sometime, would that be okay? Absolutely all right? Thank you so much. And to our audience again, thank you. Keep fighting the good fight and let's all make this place a better place to live.
