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Thursday, June 27, 2024
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Volume 10, Issue YY
Children Services levy sought for fall Dave O’Brien The Community Guide
ELYRIA — Lorain County commissioners have voted to start the process for placing a 1.8-mill renewal levy for Lorain County Children Services on the Nov. 5 ballot. The board voted unanimously to send the issue to the county auditor’s office for valuation. Children Services Executive Director Kristen Fox Berki and Board Chairman Jim Miller attended Friday’s meeting to ask for commissioners’ support in getting the five-year levy on the ballot.
Placing children in need in safe homes is getting harder and harder, county officials said. The levy provides slightly more than 50 percent of Children Services’ budget and as a renewal will not increase taxes, Fox Berki said. “We would really like to have this placed on the ballot for this coming November,” she said. Placing children in need in safe homes is getting harder and harder, Assistant Lorain County Prosecutor Dan Petticord and Fox Berki said. Some children are now being placed out-of-
state, which is “a hardship on the child,” Fox Berki said. In administrative business, the board approved a threeyear agreement worth $594,367 with NEOGOV of El Segundo, California, for web-based human resources software and programming. Armbruster said NEOGOV’s expertise will provide assistance in employee evaluations and for time and attendance. Employees will be able to clock
in from their desktop or laptop computer, he said. “It’s going to be open to everyone in the county if they would like to be part of the program,” Armbruster said. “This is taking us to the 2024 version of where we should be in the county.” The agreement also opens up “thousands of different training applications” for employees, he said. In other business, the board authorized the county Engineer’s Office to enter into three project agreements with ODOT for four
100-year anniversary of Lorain tornado
local road projects to be done in Lorain County through 2027. All four projects will be done with 80 percent federal funding. The projects include a $2,422,018 project to resurface Pyle-South Amherst Road in New Russia Township in 2026; a $1,076,968 project for East River Road in Carlisle Township in 2026; a $2,458,598 project to resurface Vermilion Road in Brownhelm Township in fiscal year 2027; and a $1,117,000 project for safety improvements to West Ridge Road in Elyria Township in 2027.
Rite Aid in Grafton, Wellington closing Dave O’Brien The Community Guide
PHOTOS COURTESY LORAIN HISTORICAL SOCIETY
Damage to buildings on Broadway in the aftermath of the 1924 Lorain tornado: The Cleveland Trust Co., 383 Broadway, left, and The Metzger & Robinson Building, 385-401 Broadway.
‘We had never heard the word tornado,’ resident recalls Carissa Woytach The Community Guide
LORAIN — It looked like a typical summer storm rolling in off Lake Erie. The weather was right for it — hot and muggy still around 5 p.m. June 28, 1924. Families were on the beach at Lakeview Park, or sitting out on porches trying to beat the heat as black clouds and fierce winds moved in. Pauline Crooks, 12, remembered her mother had sent her to a dime store downtown with instructions to hurry back to her West 12th Street home before the rain hit, she said in a 1981 oral history interview. “I started back down Broadway and it began to rain — just torrents of rain,” Crooks said in the interview. “So we stood in the doorway of a clothing store … I looked across Broadway and here was Rowley and Fischer Realtor, orange awning flapping away in the wind — it’s strange the things you remember — and then all of a sud-
Rite Aid has announced the closing of another 15 stores in Ohio as the company goes through bankruptcy. Though it wasn’t on the list of closings announced Monday in a bankruptcy court filing in Toledo, the Rite Aid at 479 Main St. in Grafton is one of those that will close within the next month-and-ahalf, an employee said. The Rite Aid at 267 N. Main St. in Wellington also is closing, a manager confirmed Thursday. The last day for the pharmacy is June 25, with prescriptions being transferred to the Grafton drugstore, and retail sales will stop July 25, he said. A manager at the Grafton store, who did not want to give their name, confirmed Thursday that the store would be closing within six weeks. A firm date for the closing is expected to be announced soon, the manager said, and all the employees at the location will be out of a job. All customer prescription information was purchased by Walgreens, the manager said,
and it will be automatically sent to the Walgreens at 100 Cleveland St. in Elyria for future filling or refills. The pharmacy corporation filed for bankruptcy protection in October, according to media reports, and is closing 200 stores nationwide as a result. The Chronicle-Telegram also contacted other Rite Aid locations in the county. Managers at the Rite Aid pharmacies at 2583 Grove Ave. in Lorain and 4580 Liberty Ave. in Vermilion referred a reporter to the corporate press office. An email seeking comment was left Thursday for a Rite Aid spokesperson. The Rite Aid in Amherst closed in January. A Lakewood store recently closed, and stores in Broadview Heights, Canton, East Liverpool, Fairlawn and Willoughby were also among the closings in November. Rite Aid’s corporate offices are in Philadelphia. The company celebrated its 60th anniversary in 2023, according to its website. Contact Dave O’Brien at (440) 3297129 or dobrien@chroniclet.com.
Heat just ducky to him Grown-ups were sweating but Caden Dedek, 3, of South Amherst, was having a great time hunting for a prize at the Third Thursday Summer Series on Ely Square. Music, games, vendors and community booths filled the square as well as surrounding streets.
A postcard shows an aerial view of Lake Erie front in the aftermath of the 1924 tornado. The postcard reads, “Lake Erie front Loraine tornado June 28, 1924.” den it seems a great big, black cloud came down and without knowing why we ran into the store and the glass began to smash.” What looked like an angry summer sky was the state’s deadliest tornado in history.
Crooks remembered the store owner hustling patrons and staff into the rows of suits and coats on display in the store. Minutes later, glass was up to 3 inches deep on the floor and the sidewalk had been See TORNADO, A2
Bruce Bishop / COMMUNITY GUIDE
INSIDE THIS WEEK Amherst
Fligner’s turns 100. A3
Oberlin
Chalking up beautiful sidewalks. A4
Wellington
Mural depicts downtown story. A5
SPORTS A6 • CROSSWORD A7 • SUDOKU A7 • KID SCOOP A8