'An opportunity to grow and rebuild.' Stark Soil & Water recovering from employee exodus

MASSILLON − The Stark Soil & Water Conservation District continues work to hire new employees after the entire office quit their jobs.

Some of the district's work is being outsourced to nearby districts and Stow-based EnviroScience, while the Board of Supervisors and the interim executive director, Janine Rybka, are working to fill open positions.

Lindsay Short has been brought on as an office administrator, and Julie Berbari serves as an interim stormwater specialist. Starting Monday, Todd Clark will become the new stormwater inspector and Daniel Kunz will be the district program administrator, taking over the duties of the director.

The new employees impressed the board with their years of experience and ideas, Rybka said.

She sees their hiring as a new beginning for the agency, which handles drainage complaints, performs stormwater inspections and reviews development plans on projects of more than one acre across Stark County.

"The new staff has an opportunity to grow and rebuild," she said. "And hopefully strengthening the district and making it better than it was before."

More: 'Definition of a toxic work environment.' Every worker quits Stark Soil & Water District

Stark Soil & Water employee exodus in 2023 and 2024

When Rybka joined the Soil & Water staff in the beginning of April, the previous staff of seven was gone.

Running the office "has been a whirlwind," Rybka said. Her first priority was to pick up abandoned projects and do anything possible to avoid delays.

Rybka was assisted by Rebecca O’Neill and Tom Holmes with the Ohio Department of Agriculture Division of Soil & Water Conservation.

"Day one, we were gathering information and figuring out where we are and top priority," she said.

One of the major responsibilities of county conservation districts is to do inspections and review plans for stormwater before, during and after construction projects.

For new developments of one acre or greater, the developer must submit a Stormwater Pollution Prevention Plan to be approved by the conservation district. Once submitted, the district has 30 days to review plans and respond. The time constraint made this a top priority.

The district enlisted the help of soil & water conservation districts in Summit and Cuyahoga counties to get the reviews done.

"This way, projects aren't being held up in Stark County," said Brian Prunty, district program administrator at the Summit County district. "They can continue to go through the process of submitting plans and starting the construction process."

Summit is being reimbursed $75 per hour for the work.

Prunty said it is typical for conservation districts to collaborate.

"We just want to see everyone succeed and help each other out," he said.

Stark County Assistant Prosecutor Gerard Yost is helping on the legal side.

In that roll, Yost helped prepare and review the agreements with EnviroScience, Summit County and Cuyahoga County.

What's next for Stark Soil & Water?

The district will continue its search for new employees: another stormwater inspector at some point and possibly other positions as needed.

Down the line, Rybka hopes the district will be in a comfortable enough position to stop outsourcing work.

"We'll be getting people trained and fully transitioned so we won't have to rely on other districts or EnviroScience as much," she said. "That's going to take a little while."

What are soil & water conservation districts?

Each of Ohio's 88 counties has a district governed by a five-member board of supervisors.

Their job is to promote conservation in the local community by improving land use in agriculture and in urban areas, said Janelle Mead, CEO of the Ohio Federation of Soil and Water Conservation Districts.

"[Duties] depend on the area the district is in," she said. "Districts in Northwest Ohio are working a lot on H2Ohio and working with agriculture producers to reduce phosphorus runoff ... A lot of urban districts work on education programs, they work on stormwater issues, they work on construction in their communities, so it can vary."

Size of district's staff also varies across the state.

"We have some districts that have one employee and we have other districts that have a team," Mead said.

Members of the governing board of supervisors can be anyone who lives in the county interested in conservation.

"Some of our more urban districts have a lot of people that are interested in urban stormwater or pollinators," Mead said. "Some areas, depending on where they're located, might have five farmers on their districts because their land use is largely agricultural."

Reach Grace at 330-580-8364 or gspringer@gannett.com. Follow her on X @GraceSpringer16.

This article originally appeared on The Repository: Stark Soil & Water hiring, outsourcing work after employee exodus