SALEM — City council gave first readings to several pieces of legislation in its meeting Tuesday.

The council’s agenda originally had six items with the emergency clause to potentially be given all three readings in a single night. However, with only five members of council in attendance, they lacked the requisite six votes required to enact the clause, meaning that council could only give them their first reading.

Among those items was a resolution adopting the revised city tax budget for fiscal year 2026 and submitting it to the Columbiana County Auditor’s Office which was originally rejected by the finance committee on July 9 before receiving approval at the committee level following revision on July 29, requiring the city to seek an extension from the original July 20 deadline. Councilman Andrew Null told the rest of council that since they had been unable to pass the tax budget with the emergency, they would need to meet again prior to their next regularly scheduled meeting on Aug. 19 to ensure it was approved and submitted to the county before the deadline.

The council also gave first readings to several financial items including an update to the city’s wage ordinance which would add the full-time IT Manager position which was discussed in the finance committee’s July 29 meeting, which would have an hourly rate of $37.50. First readings were also held for a resolution authorizing Service Safety Director Joe Cappuzzello to apply for a $90,000 grant from the Ohio Department of Natural Resources Urban Forestry Grant program for a tree planting initiative; and a resolution authorizing Mayor Cyndi Baronzzi Dickey to apply for a $438,943.25 grant from the Ohio Mid-Eastern Governments Association Regional Transportation Planning Organization Capital Allocation Program for phase two of the Historic Downtown Salem Sidewalks Program.

The council also gave first readings to two ordinances without the emergency clause pertaining to the annexation of the 67.3258-acre property set to be the location of the Salem City School District’s new K-8 school building. One ordinance consents to the property being annexed into the city and designates what services the city will provide, and the other ordinance accepts the property into the city and designates the zoning of the property as RS2.

Council was also addressed by Kimberly Salvino regarding morale within city government, taking issue with that fact that “some members of council have chosen to speak publicly and disparagingly about the city auditor [Sal Salvino].” She argued that “these comments made both in public forums and to the news are not only inappropriate but deeply damaging and frankly misleading.”

“Let me be clear, the city auditor is not incompetent. He is not the problem. He has been fixing problems and helping update and improve operations for the city since he took over the position. There were many problems before he took over the position that were left for him to learn on his own and solve on his own and that is exactly what he’s been doing,” said Salvino.

She argued that “the role of a city council member is not to tear down other city officials and staff, but to work with them…and ensure that city operations are conducted with integrity, efficiency, and with the best interest of the community at heart,” and that “attending two one-hour meetings a month was not enough to understand the complexity of city business.” Salvino insinuated that the members of council had made “no additional effort to learn about the systems, finances, and operations [they] oversee” and to instead publicly criticize other city officials or employees was “not leadership, it’s negligence.” She also said that she hoped the members of city council “care enough about the city and the people who elected you to serve it to put the effort in to understand what’s going on and how impactful [their] words and [their] position are.”

“City employees deserve dignity and respect. They deserve a council that asks questions and seeks understanding and works collaboratively toward solutions. Instead, we’ve witnessed bullying and finger pointing in complete disregard for professional conduct. Not only is it disrespectful to whom you’re scrutinizing, it’s disrespectful to the people you were elected to serve,” said Salvino. “It undermines the trust in our government systems, it damages morale, and it sets a terrible example for how public servants should engage for one another. Why would anybody want to come work for our city to help us as a community if this is the treatment they’re at risk to endure and for those that already work in the city why would they want to even try to do a good job if they’re just going to get torn down. If you truly care about the city, you’ll stop using your platform to belittle and blame and start using it to learn and engage and lead.”

Councilman Evan Newman said that he appreciated Salvino sharing her concerns with city council, but that “with all due respect” to characterize the work put in by the members of city council as two one-hour meetings per month was disingenuous.

“It’s more than two one-hour meetings. There’s multiple committee meetings, there’s multiple hours of research and time spent meeting constituents, business owners, and stakeholders in the community to ensure we understand the different needs of folks,” said Newman. “I’m not saying your comments are wrong, I just think saying that there’s certain people that aren’t spending time focused on the city is somewhat reprehensible in itself; and the individual whose aid your coming to is also an elected official and not just an employee of the city. So, he and all of us should be held to the standard that you have provided.”

During his report councilman Jeff Stockman announced that the rules and ordinances committee would meet prior to the city council’s next meeting at 6 p.m. Aug. 19 to discuss fencing, food trucks, mobile vending, and outdoor fire. Stockman also said that he would like to organize a public meeting with the law director to discuss ordinances which have been updated in the last two years, to make sure city residents and safety forces were all up to date and to address any questions or concerns with those ordinances, noting that he’d like to make the session an annual occurrence.

The meeting concluded with an executive session for the discussion of personnel matters, and an executive session for the discussion of legal matters, both of which had no action to follow.

The city council will meet next at 7 p.m. on Aug. 19.