The Toledo City Council met on April 21, 2026, to consider a wide range of items including technology contracts, insurance renewals, economic development programs, event funding, and annual dues. All items were approved, with several receiving extensive discussion and support.
Brandon Sellhorst, Chief Growth Officer, presented item three to establish a new program providing up to $80,000 in reimbursable grants for pre-development assessments (environmental, geotechnical, feasibility studies) on vacant or underutilized properties. The program is intended to replace a lost federal brownfield assessment grant. Council members discussed the program’s scope, prioritization, match requirement (50-50), and measurement of success.
Mr. Sellhorst responded that the program will be rolling, with underwriting to ensure studies are catalytic, and that success will be measured by redevelopment outcomes. The program was approved by consent (SCP).
Rachel Hart (Chief of Communications) and Cheryl Hardy (CEO of Hardy Communications) presented item five, requesting $50,000 to support 19 free Friday night concerts (up from 13 in 2025) between Memorial Day and Labor Day. Total event budget is nearly $700,000, with funding from the city ($50,000), Lucas County ($100,000), Connect Toledo ($100,000), DTID ($150,000), and Destination Toledo ($100,000), plus private sponsorships. Last year’s series drew over 50,000 attendees and generated $1.15 million in direct economic impact, with 80% of attendees visiting a bar or restaurant. The 2026 schedule includes 45+ local bands, two new events, and seven coordinated activation events with other downtown stakeholders.
The item was approved (SEP).
Austin Mack (Mayor’s Office) and Carrie McCarthy (Executive Director of Ohio Mayors Alliance) presented items six and seven, requesting annual dues for the Ohio Mayors Alliance and the U.S. Conference of Mayors. The Ohio Mayors Alliance is a bipartisan coalition of the 30 largest Ohio cities advocating for fiscal health, home rule, and transportation funding. Ms. McCarthy highlighted recent wins: increased gas tax revenues for cities, $250 million in federal pass-through grants for public safety, and ongoing efforts to prevent unfunded pension mandates (which would cost Toledo $4.5 million annually).
$200,000 contract with JAVS. Javs is our audio visual vendor for the equipment inside the courtrooms that that uh create a permanent record of the proceedings. Uh if you might remember last year, Jeff and I were here. Uh I are uh to do the first three courtrooms. These are the next set of three courtrooms we're gonna do. The equipment is quite antiquated and old and breaks down with some consistency. Uh so we just come to uh seek an authorization to do the next set of three courtrooms, and we're requesting SAP. I would like to acknowledge Councilman Sarantu. There's Councilman Hobbes. All right. Councilman Hobbes, your recommendation. Thank you for your presentation. I read it. Thank you, NS SCP. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Item one is from the Department of Public Utilities. Uh good afternoon, Andy McClure, uh Commissioner Plan Operations from Department of Public Utilities. Uh item one is authorized or uh legislation uh looking for authorization to contract with a fire alarm uh company that specializes in the fire alarm repair at the water reclamation facility. Uh it's very complicated system and we do need uh to have them it be inspected from time to time and some seasonal and work done on it annually to make keep it in good functional order for the uh safety, health, and welfare of the employees and the equipment at the water reclamation facility. Um take any questions you have, and we would request SCP, please. President Williams, can you push the slide, please? Oh it's very helpful because we get to see the point. So I like that, and it that's not even it. Yeah, yes, it is. Thank you. Councilmember Gaddis. Thank you. Um is this for repair or maintenance or both? Like is there a part that's broken that we don't know about? There uh yeah, right now there is part that is broken, and they aren't doing a fire watch at the moment, so they need to get someone in to make that repair, but then it'll be further inspection. Okay, and then what's the timeline? Um this is going to be um it'll be an annual contract up to I believe it's three years. Okay, and the expenditures per year. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Uh Council Member Martinez, your recommendation? SCP. Thank you. Item two will be from the Department of Human Resources. Uh good afternoon, Mike Najelski, the director of the Department of Human Resources with me is uh Vicky Coleman, the uh deputy director, and also uh Jeff Riley from our health care consultant. Um item two is uh requesting authorization to enter an agreement with um Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield for the provision of stop loss insurance for our health care uh plan and also asking to waive competitive bidding under the total municipal code chapter 187. So our current contract with um stop loss or with Anthem, which is our current provider of this service, expires on June 4th. And um as is typical in the industry, the uh we can only typically these these contracts only last a year. So we're coming back to council this year for another uh another contract. What uh what Jeff and his team did over at Highland was we did an informal bid process um just to see what the market uh showed, and um as you'll see from the slide, only two companies uh besides Anthem responded, Berkshire Hathaway and Pan American. Uh both of them are frankly aren't um viable alternatives, just uh based upon the huge increase in cost as well as potentially additional liability. Um and so based upon that um we're asking for um for an approval to uh have a new one-year contract with um Anthem for um for the year for uh 26 into next uh 27.