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Resident tells council an acoustical survey found endangered bats on Concordia Oaks site; urges action and electoral response
Summary
A resident told the Independence City Council that an acoustical bat survey detected multiple bat species, including four she called endangered, on the Concordia Oaks property and urged officials to have reported the findings and to heed habitat concerns.
Pamela Dengler, a resident, told the Independence City Council on Aug. 12 that an acoustical bat survey conducted July 1–10 detected multiple bat species on a parcel known as Concordia Oaks and urged city officials and the project developer to have reported the findings to federal wildlife authorities. Dengler said she emailed the study to the mayor and all seven council members on July 22 and asked the council to hold officials accountable.
Dengler said the survey — conducted by All Star Ecology of Fairmont, West Virginia — used four recorders placed at the edge of private properties next to the Concordia parcel. She said the recording period detected “all 10 Ohio bat species” and that the property contained four species she described as endangered, including federally listed species she identified as the Indiana bat and the long-eared bat. She told council she believes neither the developer, Petros Builders, nor city officials reported the results to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
The resident also said the state Division of Wildlife (ODNR) issued May 2025 guidance recommending limits on tree clearing where bats nest, and she told the council she believed that guidance was ignored. Dengler asked voters to remember the matter at the November election and named specific elected officials in her remarks.
The council did not take formal action during the meeting on the claims Dengler raised. No city staff member or council member responded in the public record during her remarks with an on-the-record explanation of whether the city or Petros Builders had notified the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service or otherwise followed any state or federal review process.
Dengler’s remarks appear in the public-comment portion of the Aug. 12 council meeting. Her statement, submitted for the public record, requested that citizens be informed about the survey and the fate of the wooded site now under development.
