Along the Way: Ravenna's volunteer groups brought positive change

Volunteer citizen group made positive contributions for Ravenna

The Core Team and Community Improvement Corporation, two citizen groups that have been working to strengthen Ravenna, are winding down after years of good work.

The Core Team, chaired by now-retired Portage Community Bank leader Rick Coe, grew out of restoration efforts that in 2014 saved the flagpole in front of the Portage County Courthouse.

That 150-foot structure, installed in 1893, was rescued from demolition by a citizen effort led by the late Jack Schafer, an architectural preservationist and industrialist. Schafer said the flagpole was installed with a method also used on the Eiffel Tower in Paris. While several American towns had similar flag poles at one time, Ravenna’s was one of the few remaining.

Schafer, assisted by attorney Peggy DiPaola, led an effort to raise the estimated $150,000 needed. Their effort was greatly assisted by contractor Eric Hummel, who donated his services.

The team not only saved the flagpole, but made important improvements. A secondary outcome of that effort was production of The Ravenna Record, a collection of historically oriented columns by the late Roger Di Paolo, editor of The Record-Courier. Sales from the book netted the flagpole restoration about $10,000.

While much of the fundraising came residents and former residents, the largest donations came from Schafer; Ravenna native Don Wilson III, an international banker who lives on the East Coast and retains a soft spot for Ravenna and Portage County; and industrialist Neil Mann.

Buoyed by the flagpole efforts, Ravenna City Council commissioned a Community Plan, which identified five strategies to improve the city.

One was to develop a private-public partnership. Some of the flagpole group’s participants regrouped under Coe and began meeting monthly in Portage Community Bank’s conference room to implement the plan.

Over the next five years, results have included hiring an economic development expert for the city and Ravenna Township, pledging three years of private financial support. Dennis West proved so successful in bringing in new industry and business that the city and township have covered his expenses since.

The establishment of Main Street Ravenna was another important accomplishment of the Core Team.

The agency taps into Heritage Ohio, which helps Ohio’s historic communities capitalize on their heritage to promote prosperity. Main Street Ravenna raised the money for the Jason Kentner Downtown Landscape Architecture Plan, which in 2021 was recognized by the Ohio Chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects.

The first project was the renovation of the city parking lot immediately west of Ravenna 7 Movies, along the lines envisioned in the Kentner Plan, again with assistance from Don Wilson III. Kentner and his firm, Implement, have designed the landscape improvements for Reed Memorial Library.

Other Core Team accomplishments also include cooperation between city and township in working to create Joint Economic Development Districts, promoting an updated Ravenna downtown district plan, looking for ways to link the downtown with The Portage Hike and Bike Trail, and generating better signage for the community.  The Core Team has invested more than $250,000.

There was cross over between the Core Team and the Ravenna Community Improvement Corporation, which was revitalized while Joseph Bica was the city’s mayor, and then continued by current Mayor Frank Seman.

The impetus for revitalizing the CIC was land-banking under expedited procedures set up in the Ohio legislature in 2009. At first, Rick Coe chaired the newly appointed CIC. For both the Core Team and the CIC, attorney Peggy DiPaola kept records and helped the two groups stay on track.

The CIC sold vacant city-owned properties to new owners who restored them to the community’s tax base and eliminated the necessity of the City maintaining the lots.

In time, responsibility for recycling properties gravitated to Dennis West, the economic director. The Ravenna CIC took on a more passive role, and Dominic Bellino, who assumed chairman duties after Rick Coe resigned in 2020, suggested the CIC might dissolve, which happened two weeks ago.

Money raised by the revitalized CIC – about $100,000 – is being turned over to Economic Development, led by Dennis West with 80% for the city and 20% for the township.

Three losses proved challenging for the Core Team – the retirement of the Rick Coe, who has been so loyal to Ravenna; the unanticipated 2018 death of Jack Schafer, a knowledgeable visionary; and the retirement of the Ravenna Community Plan by City Council to be replaced by the Comprehensive Plan under construction.

New players in Ravenna city and township governments, especially Economic Development Director Dennis West, Main Street Ravenna, Reed Memorial Library and the Ravenna Chamber, carry on.

David E. Dix is a former publisher of The Record-Courier.

This article originally appeared on The Repository: Ravenna volunteer groups brought positive contributions in town