Business View Civil & Municipal - May 2023

34 CIVIL AND MUNICIPAL VOLUME 4, ISSUE 5 East Liverpool City Hospital, a member of Prime Healthcare Foundation, founded in 1905, is a 130 bed, acute care hospital located in the tri-state region of Ohio, West Virginia, and Pennsylvania. ELCH’s affiliates include East Liverpool Medical Group, East Liverpool Home Health, East Liverpool Therapy, East Liverpool City Hospital, Wellsville Clinic and East Liverpool City Hospital, East Palestine Clinic. In 2022 East Liverpool City Hospital was recognized by Fortune/Merative 100 Top Hospitals for the fifth consecutive year. This top performance award recognizes them as one of the highest performing hospitals in the United States. The hospital was awarded the Leapfrog Safety Grade A award from 2018 to 2022. Not only is this East Liverpool City Hospital’s 10th Grade A award in 5 consecutive years, ELCH is the only hospital in the region to receive Grade A. These quality awards speak to the continued focus on providing the highest quality of healthcare and exceptional patient experience. East Liverpool City Hospital represents the commitment and priority to work Prime Healthcare Foundation’s promise to provide compassionate care, and clinical excellence to all patients, while enhancing access, and doing it in a way that will benefit our community members and the patients we serve. For more information, please visit ELCH social media sites (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram). For more information, visit: www.elch.org He maintains, “We’ve just been looking at it as a way to cut our costs. Scout Solar came in and did a nice presentation for us, and said, this is no cost to the city. The end result is that we’ll be able to reduce our electric bills, which is perfect timing because electricity has gone up 30% here in our area. That way we can put that money into our infrastructure and improve the city with the savings that we incur.” Scout Solar has also purchased a decommissioned catholic school building to be used as dormitories for workers, as well as storage and office space. Updated housing, and attracting new development is also a priority for Bricker, who acknowledges, “My number one initiative, and a big reason I ran for mayor to begin with, is our housing was a mess. It’s still in need of some repair, but we are recognizing that and finding ways to fix it.” Partnering with the Youngstown Neighborhood Development Corporation has been a step in the right direction. “They have done a phenomenal job in Youngstown, I think they’ve torn down over 2,500 homes, but they’ve also rehabbed over 1,000,” he says, “So, we partnered with them, and they did a housing quality survey for us here in East Liverpool.” With this survey a GIS map was produced, outlining homes that require tear-down, repair, and other efforts. “So, we’ve been using that and getting strategic about the homes that we’re going after and tearing down,” adds the mayor. He also mentions a phenomenal partnership with the Columbiana County Land Bank, state representatives and county commissioners who have helped to secure grant money to keep this initiative moving. Although at this point over 100 homes have been torn down, Bricker admits, “There’s still some blight left in the city and we’re working toward resolving that issue. But the goal EAST L I VERPOOL , OHIO