STRUTHERS — An ages-old rift between Struthers and Mahoning County has reopened. This time it’s flowing along Burgess Run in Poland Township.

The problem between the two governments comes down to sewage treatment, and the turmoil dates back almost 50 years, to at least 1979.

Though the issue often has been about money — and to a considerable degree, it still is — the 2026 conversation has much to do with economic development.

In October 2024, Mahoning County commissioners approved the primary plat for a new street off U.S. Route 224 in Poland Township, just south of the Inn at Poland Way senior living center. The developer, David Kosec of Hengst LLC, intends to build 16 villa-style homes on the new road, called Hines Run.

But the project cannot move forward until one detail is sorted out — where will Hines Run’s sewage empty? Struthers officials have stated it will not be their wastewater treatment plant because they do not have the capacity.

“We can’t accept any new flow. When we met with them, they said they wanted us to approve the houses, and we had to say no. Our Ohio EPA reps have told us that we cannot increase our plant’s capacity until the county takes more flow off of us,” said Struthers Mayor Catherine Cercone Miller. “This is not an ideal place to be in. We all know we have a housing crisis, and we do need new development, but now we have to be the ones to say no, at least until some of this flow is taken from us.”

DIFFERING VIEWPOINTS

Mahoning County Sanitary Engineer Bernie Petro said the county has been doing everything it can to work with Struthers and divert flow from its plant. But he also said Struthers has the capacity. He points to Ohio EPA permit-to-install (PTI) application documents signed by Mahoning County Engineer Patrick Ginnetti in July 2023, which state that Struthers’ average daily capacity is 6 million gallons per day. At that time, the documents stated Struthers was taking in 4 million daily.

City officials say that is not the case now.

“We’re somewhere between 90% and 95% of our designed hydraulic loading,” said retired Struthers wastewater treatment plant Superintendent Mark Ciccone. Ciccone has been dealing with the problems for most of his career and remains involved in the conversations, despite his April 30 retirement.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if, at this time of year, we’re over 100%. The flows fluctuate with the weather. It’s designed to take 6 million a day, but during a rain event, Mahoning County could send us 10 to 20 million per day. How is adding those 16 homes going to help the situation?”

Ciccone said the problem is not just excess daily flow. It’s also caused by stormwater infiltration from old pipes.

“I’m gonna tell you the coffee cup is full. Sanitary sewers overflow into our streets and into the Mahoning River. It’s coming from all the infiltration,” he said.

Much of that infiltration, he expects, is coming from those old lines around Burgess Run in Poland.

Petro’s office is working on the project.

The Burgess Run sewer line replacement project is expected to cost Mahoning County approximately $7.87 million. About $3.7 million of that was spent last year on Phase 1 of the project, which replaced the lines between Walker Mill Road and North Lima Road in Poland. Phase 2 will start this year at a cost of roughly $4.2 million. That work will finish all the remaining sewer lines between North Lima Road and state Route 170.

A list of completed and planned projects that affect Struthers, provided by Petro, shows the county also has completed more than $92,000 worth of sanitary sewer line repairs along Burgess Run.

He said that since Struthers and the county signed the PTI forms in 2023, the county has only reduced the flow to Struthers.

“Our position is we got flow data from Struthers, and by putting the Five Points pump station online at the end of 2024, we showed where we reduced it from 60% in 2024 to 48.5% in 2025,” Petro said. “And what we’re bringing in is average flow. We’re not bringing in more infiltration. And we’re paying for 64.5% of that plant.”

But Struthers’ new wastewater superintendent, Jason Hall, said that cost perspective is one area where the county is not framing the point correctly.

“Everyone’s basing it on flow, and I wouldn’t base that on flow as much as the number of people we service,” Hall said. “We’ve had basically the same population for decades, roughly 9,000 people, whereas our service area is 30,000 people.”

ONGOING CONFLICT

An article from The Vindicator shows the history of the city and county’s ongoing dispute about what Mahoning pays to Struthers. Starting in 1979, the two entities agreed that Mahoning County would pay 40% of the operational costs. A March 1, 1979, article shows that agreement was reached after arguments arose about the costs of lift station repairs, which the county argued were not serving its lines anyway. At that time, the usage distribution was about 42/58 county-to-city.

Almost 28 years ago to the day, a May 18, 1994, VIndicator article reported that the county would start paying 60% after Struthers threatened to stop any new tie-ins to its existing sewer lines. Petro said that since about 2002, Mahoning County has paid the 64.5% figure.

He pointed out that in 2025, Mahoning County sent 2.58 million gallons per day to Struthers while the city generated 2.76 million.

The county also has made investments in the system. Petro’s list of completed projects with flow into Struthers, including line repairs to Burgess Run, South Struthers and Poland Woods interceptors, and pump station replacements at Mitchells, Erskine, and Yellow Creek, as well as the $18.6-million Five Points Pump Station project, amount to more than $24.6 million.

The majority of those projects are designed to eliminate infiltration from stormwater and groundwater. The Five Points project has diverted the sewage flow from 855 homes in the Lake Club area of Poland from Struthers to Boardman.

The county also has another $15.1 million in proposed projects that affect flow to Struthers, including the New Middletown forcemain and pump station project at Lake Evans, along with Burgess Run, and the Poland Village pedestrian bridge replacement project.

Petro said he wants the two entities to work together to solve the problems.

“I’ve reached out to the mayor, and she hasn’t returned my call yet,” he said. “I just want to resolve this on a project-by-project basis. I don’t want to make this a big issue. I truly want to get together, with strong leadership, and work through this.”

But he also said he feels confident the county is making the better argument.

“I feel really good about my position, but we’ll let them plead their case. We have the data on our side,” he said.

DATA DISPUTE

But Hall said the data Petro is presenting does not match reality.

“They can say they’ve reduced flow, but that only goes so far,” he said. “They haven’t reduced it enough that I’m seeing an effect during my rain events. Maybe you’ve eliminated some people from the service area, but when wet weather events come, I’m not seeing evidence that they’ve done the same degree of reduction. When it rains, I flood. And I don’t flood from the city’s lines, I flood from the county’s line. And as the permit holder, I get stuck with it.”

Hall said multiple 100-year rain events every year leads to excess stormwater and groundwater, and it all places the burden on his plant.

“In 1999, I think, the numbers were 12.5 million gallons during peak flow. Now it’s 17.5 million.

And the city hasn’t gained more development or population, but the county has gotten bigger,” he said. “Everything we do is based off the sampling and testing we do daily, weekly and monthly, and we have to rely on those numbers as our gauge, as to whether we’re being efficient and responsible.”

Hall said failing to protect the Mahoning River and the city’s system would likely constitute a violation of his Ohio EPA license.

“This is my livelihood,” he said. “I’m not saying he doesn’t have reliable information, but my plant is the last place that water goes before it enters the river, so my data is what I use to make my decisions. He’s doing a lot of averaging, but my numbers are very specific, because I know what goes in and comes out. We’re very thorough with our calibrations.”