Litchfield trustees discuss whether to turn off tornado sirens

LITCHFIELD TWP. — Township trustees are debating whether to turn off the power on the tornado sirens throughout the township. The discussion occurred during the board's meeting on Tuesday. Fiscal Officer Pam Shaw said of the seven tornado sirens in the township, two do not work. The siren on the town circle stopped working in March 2022, and the one on Spieth Road was struck by lightning in August 2023. During the March trustees meeting, Shaw said the sirens cost about $600 a month in electricity, and the township was still being charged for the broken ones despite using zero watts of electricity. It would cost more than $30,000 apiece to replace them. Trustee Mike Pope said people do not typically hear them when they're inside their house. He gave an example of when he was in a hotel near Columbus and was unable to hear the sirens during a tornado warning. "I stepped outside, and I could barely hear the sirens, but they have them in the area," he said. "I would have never known if my phone did not go off." During Thursday's meeting, members of the public were asked if they wanted to keep the sirens, and no one raised their hand. "I have asked a lot of people about these sirens," Trustee Joe Seifert said. "I haven't found anybody yet who wants us to keep them." Trustee Dennis Horvath said the township would need to inform all the residents of the change if it were to happen in the future. "We need to have some type of mass communication with township residents somehow or another, letting them know that the sirens are no longer there," he said. "There are still people who live around there when that siren goes off, they still hear it." The trustees determined they needed to figure out how they would go about turning off the sirens before they voted on whether to do so. Therefore, a final decision has not been made yet. Contact reporter Madisyn Woodring at (330) 721-4049 or mwoodring@medina-gazette.com.