Mayor: Sheetz construction will proceed amid annexation appeal; city and county negotiating revenue sharing

Findlay Mayor Christina Mearn said Friday that construction of a Sheetz site on the city’s north side is proceeding despite a county denial of annexation and that city and county officials are negotiating revenue sharing.

Mearn said county commissioners denied annexation and the developer submitted an appeal. “We have an agreement. They have submitted an appeal, and we are allowing them to proceed with construction,” she said. The mayor said she did not want the developer to be penalized over what she described as intergovernmental disagreement.

She said she met with County Commissioner Bateson and Allen Township Trustee Kevin Flanagan and that officials are working through a revenue‑sharing template governed by the Ohio Revised Code. Mearn called revenue sharing part of the main hang‑up and said the city provided a template used with other townships and was awaiting feedback.

Why it matters: Annexation and revenue‑sharing terms affect tax distributions and future service responsibilities for developments at the city’s edge. The mayor said she expects the parties to resolve the issue in the coming months.

Context and next steps: The mayor said the administration hopes to finalize an agreement in the next couple of months and emphasized that development benefits the broader area regardless of municipal boundaries. The city is not covering annexation survey costs currently, she said elsewhere in the session.

Provenance: Transcript excerpts include the mayor’s explanation that the county denied annexation, the developer appealed, and the city is allowing construction to proceed while negotiating revenue‑sharing under the Ohio Revised Code.

Ending: The mayor said negotiations are ongoing and that officials expect to reach an arrangement that recognizes the development’s benefits to the region.