CSU annexation bad

Editor:

I am the President of the Wilberforce Community Property Owners and Voters Association. Regarding the proposed annexation of Central State University. All members of the organization are against it. The only people who are for it are the upper level administration of the college and the city council members. None of the people from Central State who are for it live in either Xenia or Wilberforce.

The entire process has been done in secret and without public input.

Information about what the annexation will do for either entity has been vague and non-specific. Words are bandied about like “economic development.” What kind of economic development and where? Central State has 600 acres, but some of their properties are sprinkled in residential areas. The field across the street from my house, left to them by a deceased resident who presumed the college would try to be a good neighbor, has been the object of repeated attempts to rezone it from residential to accommodate some kind of business. They have failed each time. Is this what is in the works with Xenia, they will approve spot zoning and reduce the quality of life in Wilberforce for the residents?

What do you really have in mind? Xenia will not gain enough money to make this feasible, not even with the imposition of a tax on the CSU workers and the only thing promised to CSU is a cheaper water bill and emergency services, things they could have gotten funded by the state if there is a need for more money for the safety of the campus and its operation. Why has there not been more specific information shared about what is planned under the nebulous term “economic development.” Why was there no open forum? What guarantees do the people of the Wilberforce Community and Xenia Township have that you will not only lower our quality of life to make money, but that you will not try to annex us next? I eagerly await your public response.

— M. Cookie Newsom, Wilberforce