WARREN — A $400,000 grant will help the Trumbull County Planning Commission hire consultants to start studying and implementing strategies believed to make the air station in Vienna more safe from any future rounds of base closures.

The effort will include funding a feasibility study to look into closing and relocating Mathews High School, and the creation of new steps that involve the air base in zoning rules and economic development projects.

The grant from the Office of Economic Adjustment comes after the completion of a $200,000 grant-funded joint land use study that identified strengths, challenges and strategies to help secure the Youngstown Air Reserve Station if it is targeted in future rounds of base realignment and closures.

The two-year study was funded by a grant from the OEA and completed in 2019. The study can be viewed at www.yarsjlus.com.

The study looked to identify “compatibility issues” between the base and the surrounding community, and to “identify, prevent and / or reduce encroachment issues associated with current and future military missions and local community growth,” according to the grant application for the latest round of funding.

The project will help “ensure the long-term operational utility and sustainability of the air reserve station within our region through mindful land use planning, the examination of compatibility issues, and other related strategies recommended within the final planning document,” said Julie Green, director of the county planning commission.

One of the several goals outlined in the grant application for the funds is to study the possible ambient lighting impacts of development around the base and how that might affect night-flying training and operations missions at the base and the nearby Youngstown-Warren Regional Airport, including a feasibility study for the location of a new Mathews High School.

A message was left at the office of Mathews Superintendent Russell McQuaide.

A 2016 effort by the school district to ask voters for the money to build a new K-12 school complex for nearly $25 million failed by 52 percent of the vote. Mathews High School is more than 100 years old and the two elementary buildings were built in the 1960s. The bond issue would have raised $20.87 million in local funding for construction, with a state share at $3.97 million.

“It’s not that you can’t have these things in these areas, but it’s a check in the ‘negative’ column if buildings of a certain size or capacity are in these zones (noise or clear zone) when you want to land additional missions in the future,” said Vito Abruzzino, director of the Eastern Ohio Military Affairs Commission.

The hired consultants will also:

• Create a 3D imaging database tool that will model the area around the air base to show existing height regulations and vertical mapping;

• Create and update an information sharing curriculum and strategy to educate stakeholders about military compatibility, including training sessions for the real estate and economic development community and a public awareness campaign;

• Develop a process to include the air base in zoning and development decisions, amend the tax abatement application process to include the air base, develop and adopt a drone ordinance, develop and adopt an ordinance that establishes pointing lasers under certain conditions as harassment and prescribes violations and penalties, identify and implement best practices for lighting through zoning regulations, require applicants of renewable energy projects to coordinate with the Department of Defense Siting Clearinghouse and demonstrate that coordination occurred at the time the application submitted to a local government for approval, require that developers proposing large solar energy projects to demonstrate as part of their development application for local government approval that the siting of proposed facilities will not produce adverse impacts on military and other aircraft operations, require a”Finding of No Significant Impact” from the FAA to be submitted with a development application for local government approval;

• Conduct an ambient light assessment and a stormwater assessment for King Graves Road;

• Develop legislation to submit to the state’s General Assembly that would give local governments the zoning authority to regulate agricultural structures in clear zones surrounding Department of Defense military air facilities, and to existing law add proximity to a military installation and noise impacts from aircraft to the residential property disclosure form to ensure property buyers are aware that they are within an area impacted by military operations. And, amend the local building code to require sound attenuation measures for all new construction of noise sensitive land uses located within the noise contour and require future structures be designed and constructed so as to limit their interior noise level;

• Develop a public engagement plan, to include up to five public meetings.

“These are all strategies that have been historically viewed by the OEA and the Pentagon as being critical, and worth addressing at the earliest point possible in a (joint land use study) implementation,” Abruzzino said. “All stakeholders in the process looked closely at the recommendations, consulted with our study administrator, and created the final request list in coordination with the OEA. Conducting and achieving these initial tasks will benefit YARS and the surrounding communities for years to come.”

“Now is the time to get to work,” he said.