MILFORD - During Monday's meeting of the Milford Town Council, further input concerning the proposed ethanol refinery was the main topic of discussion.

Town attorney Jay Rigdon presented research regarding the question of annexation of property, as it would pertain to the land for the proposed site.

"The first thing to remember, and what the town needs to be aware of, is that annexation requires what is called a one-eight contiguity requirement," said Rigdon.Ê"What this means is that when you take the parcel that you seek to annex, it must already border the town by at least one-eighth of its own border."

Rigdon explained the purpose of this requirement is to provide for logical annexations of property.ÊBecause of the location of the proposed ethanol refinery, it would be difficult to meet the contiguity requirement with the rest of the town. Because of the requirement, the annexation would have to encompass the property all the way up Main Street and the Milford Junction area.ÊThe other option would be to extend the entire east boundary of the town out so that it would include the parcel in question.

"This brings a whole other set of problems," Rigdon said. "If you're going to annex all that land, you'd have to provide services. One of the requirements of annexation is to file what is called a fiscal plan. This requires the town to file its notice as to how it's going to meet the needs of the area to be annexed.ÊLand owners have to have access .. to everything that is currently being provided to the town."

Further discussion also involved the tax considerations, and the amount of time needed to complete an annexation.ÊRigdon said if an annexation was to be unchallenged, it could take four to six months to accomplish. If the plan was to be contested, however, the process could take longer and would incur quite a bit of expense for the town.

There would be a significant impact on the ability of the town to provide necessary services to the area. It was also mentioned that having a civil engineering firm look at options would be in Milford's best interest at this point.

"I think that time is on our side," said utilities superintendent Dallas Winchester.Ê "But, we have to address everything we can."

The council was then addressed by outgoing Fire Chief Todd Haines.Ê"This will be the last town council meeting I will be attending as fire chief," Haines said.Ê"Our officers this year are: Troy Ames, fire chief; Keith Umsburger, first assistant; Brian Ames, second assistant; Dave Rosenberry, secretary; and Rodney Bray will be treasurer.Ê There's a lot of experience on this board, and I feel they'll do a great job."

Officer Rich Miotto of the Milford Police Department addressed the council with a request.ÊThe department has the opportunity to participate in a regional training drug interdiction class.ÊThe class is held at a military facility and the department is considering having their officer accompany another officer from another agency to the classes. There is no charge to the department for the classes, and having officers from two departments make the trip together saves expenses.ÊApproval was granted.

Winchester provided an update on the East Catherine Street water main project.Ê There have been some changes on the project, involving the last 400 feet of work to be done, which has necessitated redesign and rebidding.

"The change is to allow the engineering group of Jones and Henry from Fort Wayne to go ahead and redesign part of the project, but not to exceed $4,000 in additional cost," said Winchester.Ê"The redesigning will begin now and will be ready to bid this spring.Ê Hopefully, it will be ready to go this summer." The plan was approved.

In other business:

• New EMS contracts will be presented soon.

• The Milford Parks Department announced it is still looking for a caretaker.

• Milford town offices will be closed Dec. 25-26 and Jan. 1.

Town council members are Gary Hurd, Robert Cockburn and Douglas Ruch. [[In-content Ad]]