ELYRIA — City Council voted to place a lien on the former General Industries property in hopes of recouping some money if the property is ever sold.

Now that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is cleaning up the property, city leaders decided Monday to move forward with the $40,000 lien.

Property owner John Peshek did not have insurance at the time of the July 2008 fire and does not have the funds to cleanup the debris pile to U.S. EPA standards. Therefore, the federal agency is doing the clean-up and will likely place a large lien on the property when they are done.

For that reason, Law Director Terry “Pete” Shilling said the city should move fast to be the first lien in line.

Safety Service Director Chris Eichenlaub said the lien amount will cover the money the city had to spend in the days following the blaze to clear debris and bricks from the streets surrounding the Olive Street property.

When the building — once a 206,000-square-foot factory — burned to the ground in dramatic fashion, the intensity of the blaze sent bricks, charred building remnants and other material flying into the streets.

As a result, Chris Eichenlaub said the city had to hire a crew to clear the debris from roads so residents could safely drive the neighborhoods.

In addition, in the days after the fire, the Ohio EPA deemed the debris pile to be asbestos contaminated. And, in order to keep residents off the debris pile, the city paid to have a chain link fence erected around two square block area.

Councilman Larry Tanner, D-1st Ward, said he champions any attempt to get back some of the city’s money.

“It’s a great thing,” he said. “Let’s slap a lien on it and hopefully one day we can get some money out of them.”

However, the biggest expense of the night — the countless hours of overtime and manpower city employees expended to extinguish the fire and control the crowd of watchers — will not be up for reimbursement.

Eichenlaub said police and fire protection are services the city provides to all taxpayers and doesn’t look for reimbursement even for large events.

While no dollar figure was ever attached to the hours of overtime and manpower used by the Police and Fire departments, safety leaders have said nearly every firefighter on the department and numerous police officers worked for nearly 16 hours on the fire.

Contact Lisa Roberson at 329-7121 or lroberson@chroniclet.com.

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