WARREN — In advance of their regular meeting today, Trumbull County commissioners discussed during Wednesday’s workshop the recent meeting of government officials, private sector businesses and local planning, development and nonprofit entities to which the press was not admitted.

Trumbull County’s president of the board of commissioners, Mauro Cantalamessa, was invited to represent the county at the meeting to discuss a possible regional approach for using some of the American Rescue Plan funds being allocated to local communities. Nicholas Coggins, assistant director of the county planning commission, also attended.

Commissioner Niki Frenchko asked Cantalamessa what happened at the meeting and said the media should have been allowed to attend, and should be allowed to attend meetings in the future.

Cantalamessa said the attendees discussed strategies for using some of the funds — a collective $250 million is coming to the Mahoning Valley — on cross-county projects that might bolster improvements in the entire region by pulling the funds together to do something “meaningful.”

“We didn’t really delineate any projects; we were just brainstorming,” he said.

Frenchko asked how much of the county’s $38 million in ARP funding the group wants and how the funding would be controlled, and said she found it concerning the meeting wasn’t held in the public eye.

“I’m taken aback by the fact that everything related to the discussion was to stay in that room (where the meeting was held) when it is not their funding. It’s for the county, for our community,” she said.

The group discussed community-based projects, but no decisions were made and any decision would come back to the board first for a public discussion and vote.

“There is nothing nefarious going on,” Cantalamessa said.

Frenchko said the process appeared to lack transparency, and any discussion of how to use the funds should be done in public.

The first meeting wasn’t private to keep any secrets, but to field ideas in a brainstorming session, Cantalamessa said.

Sarah Boyarko of the Youngstown Warren Regional Chamber said the discussion was general and will become public when the communities discuss and vote on providing funding.

“There was private industry in the room, and they prefer things to be confidential and once there is next steps to be taken, that obviously involves those that get the money,” Boyarko said. “We don’t receive any ARP funding, so we don’t have a voice other than to share our thoughts.”

Frenchko asked if the private industry wanted a share of the money.

Boyarko said “no.”

“They just wanted to share their thoughts on different ways that we can be impactful to the community,” Boyarko said.

Cantalamessa said they are “pillars of the community” who were invited to sit at the table.

“We like to have that public-private partnership, and we like to have input from people that make investments in Trumbull County and Mahoning County,” Cantalamessa said.

County commissioners also discussed what types of scheduling should be done for commissioners with county employees. Frenchko questioned if county employees should be helping commissioners RSVP for events like golf outings and coordinate advertisements for commissioners for nonprofit fundraisers. Commissioners agreed to seek a prosecutor’s opinion to clarify the situation.

Frenchko also proposed creating a human resources review committee to examine and compare the HR policies in the county to other entities. Commissioners agreed to explore the idea.

Transit Administrator Mike Salamone reported to commissioners that the county is preparing to apply for a certain type of transit funding by the July 19 deadline, and up to $6 million may be available.

And, Frenchko proposed the county commissioners stop providing a call-in line for their meetings. The line was added during the pandemic and allows people who can’t attend in person to hear the meeting and comment. Though the state is no longer allowing officials to call in to participate, others can. Frenchko said the meetings are posted after they are completed and said people could listen to them that way, instead of live.

rfox@tribtoday.com