CANFIELD — City council members learned at their meeting Tuesday that the Mahoning County OVI Task Force will receive a $250,000 grant for enforcement and education efforts in 2025.

This is the 14th year for the OVI Task Force, which is administered by the Canfield Police Department. The funding comes from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, according to Canfield Council President Christine Oliver, and is administered through the Ohio Department of Public Safety’s Traffic Safety Office.

“To qualify, a county has to be in the top 10 in OVI crashes and fatalities,” said Canfield police Chief Chuck Colucci. “If you have it, then fall out of the top 10, you can still get partial funding the following year.”

He said that happened one year, but the full amount came back the next year when the numbers went back up.

Canfield has served as financial administrator for the OVI Task Force. The department receives a very small fee from the grant, but the vast majority of the federal funds go to pay officers who take part in the OVI Task Force. They come from departments all over Mahoning County who want to help lower the county’s alcohol and drug-related crashes and fatalities.

“To take part in the OVI Task Force requires us to hold a number of OVI checkpoints and saturation patrols,” Colucci said. “The checkpoints are set up in areas of high OVI activity.”

He said the main routes in Boardman, Austintown and Youngstown have seen a good number of checkpoints. Canfield Township had a few over the past 13 years, but there has never been one in the city of Canfield.

The checkpoint is set up along a well-traveled route and vehicles going through it could be diverted if officers suspect something. A saturation patrol is when dozens of police cars “saturate” a specific area looking for violators. A final avenue is a corridor blitz, where every agency along a specific route puts on extra officers to cover the entire corridor. All three are funded out of the Task Force grant money.

While notice was given during the council meeting by Oliver, the grant isn’t official until council sets up a fund in the city’s budget to accept the grant. That formality likely will take place at the first council meeting in October. The grant year runs from Oct. 1, 2024 through Sept. 30, 2025.