Allegations toward the city of Marietta have the town buzzing. Marietta Mayor Josh Schlicher and Safety Service Director Steve Wetz Spoke with WMOA News recently to explain more and reflect on Monday's City Council Meeting.
"For someone who doesn't know the details and doesn't know the work and diligence we put in behind it to make these allegations is really unfair for really anybody" Mayor Josh Schlicher there referring to allegations toward leased vehicles in the city. According to him, some of the vehicles needed replaced badly.
"The breakdown was really just to get the worse of the worse vehicles we had in the fleet identified which we did."
Each department is paid out of different funds in the city. The biggest concern was the vehicle the mayor uses. A 2021 Ford Explorer, paid for out of capital improvement funds. These funds are also used on police vehicles in the city. Newer water trucks the city now uses were paid out of water funds. The vehicles sold, depending on the department, will receive the amount they were sold for.
26 vehicles were set to be replaced, This number went to 25 when it was learned that the Water Department began a lease a short time ago. The 26th slot went to the mayor's car. Safety Service Director Steve Wetz explained the need for the vehicle.
" We allocated the funds for that to be an administration vehicle. It is used by everyone in our office here. The mayor, Human resources and myself. It has been used by code enforcement, so for liability reasons, we felt that was one that was needed because this mayor is not a mayor who just sits in the office and doesn't know what's going on. He goes out in about in public. He goes out to where our work crews are, and he actually works with them. He can't just take his personal vehicle and park it at a scene and turn the lights on and it be legal. This way he has a vehicle that has city markings on it, has strobe lights in it, and it's a representative of the city."
Mayor Schlicher provided numbers today on the Explorer used by him. The price new was just over 38,000. The city paid 34,016 dollars for the Explorer. Other allegations in recent days say the Mayor Drives around in a 65,000-dollar vehicle. Never in history has a ford explorer retailed for that amount of money. The highest trim level, the Limited, has an MSRP of around 45,000. The special edition Explorer is the ST, it has an MSRP of 49,000. The SXT package is driven by the Mayor.
"We were able to lease 26 vehicles for the first year and offset that first year with the (approximately) 170,000 dollars we got from the sale of the vehicles and we actually increased the sale of the vehicles by 27% over what they appraised them at."
Schlicher said most of the vehicles that were sent out of the city were rusted out.
"Just totally not road worthy"
Others were in decent condition but were high mileage. Police cars run almost constantly, in some areas "idle hours" are posted when they are for sale.
"You know after five years those vehicles start getting a little weak and a little worn" said, Mayor Schlicher.
Mayor Schlicher also says a brand-new fleet will be in within 2 years. Something the city has never seen before. Another allegation was that the City had Twenty-eight million dollars in the bank which could be used for school systems, safety, and infrastructure. The Mayor simply said on Friday, that the account balance was absolutely false and referred to local resident Ari Gold who attended Monday's meeting and who made the allegations.
"We have reserved funds for water and wastewater each of those being enterprise funds. Those can not be used for the school system. Those can not be used for fixing the street. Those can't be used for building a park building. He's incorrect when he says we have 28 million dollars at our disposal that we can buy whatever we want."
The mayor added again that it seemed unfair to tell the public this information.
"Really just a complete fabrication of inaccurate statements that's being made"
The Mayor added the money cannot be used on schools as it is municipal money. It is used for roads, police, and fire according to Mayor Schlicher.
