Forest Park Council adopts labor contract, names new fire chief and ratifies legal appointments

Forest Park, Ohio — The Forest Park City Council on Dec. 16 unanimously approved several administrative and personnel actions, including a tentative labor agreement with Public Works employees, salary adjustments for city staff, the appointment of Germaine Hill as fire chief, and ordinances formalizing the city's public defender and law director.

The council voted to adopt Resolution 54-2024, authorizing the city manager to enter a contract with Teamsters Local 100, the union representing Public Works employees. The tentative agreement, described during the meeting, extends the probationary period up to 90 days, reduces progressive disciplinary action after one year, recognizes Juneteenth as an official holiday, allows up to 80 hours of sick leave for postnatal care for spouses, and sets wage increases of 3.5% in 2025 and 3% in both 2026 and 2027. Council members urged adoption; the roll-call vote was recorded as unanimous.

The council also adopted Resolution 55-2024 to amend rates of pay for civil and non-union service employees to reflect a 3.5% increase for 2025, matching the negotiated public-works adjustments.

On personnel moves, the council adopted Resolution 56-2024 to appoint Germaine Hill as fire chief effective Dec. 9, 2024, and authorized a transition period during which outgoing Chief Alfie Jones will provide training and documentation through Jan. 31, 2025, at which point Chief Jones will begin terminal leave. Law Director John Woff told council he had approved the resolution earlier in his office's process.

In other formal actions, the council passed Ordinance 32-2024 appointing "Darren e NY" (as shown in the meeting transcript) as the city's public defender and Ordinance 33-2024 appointing John Woff as law director and city prosecutor; both ordinances passed on unanimous roll-call votes. The meeting transcript records these as routine, procedural votes with no substantive debate.

Council approved Resolution 53-2024, a change order for the Sharon Roll Improvement project to address additional poor base material discovered after milling operations began. The transcript notes the change order was requested because deteriorated base was not visible until milling commenced. The dollar amount for the change order as spoken in the transcript was not clearly transcribed and is therefore not stated here.

The council also confirmed a slate of appointments to boards and commissions (Beautification, Charter Revision, Civil Service, Economic Development, Recreation, Storm Water Utility), with expiration dates noted in the administrative motion; those appointments were approved by voice or unanimous vote.

The meeting concluded with Mayor remarks about continued city events and requests for resident patience during building and development projects. No substantive policy items were tabled or postponed; the actions taken implement personnel changes, contractual terms and routine administrative matters.

The council did not set additional public hearings on these items during the meeting; implementation steps include executing the union contract and completing the fire-department transition as directed.