To help raise funds for college scholarships and their other benevolent works, the Swanton Lions Club held their annual golf outing at White Pines Golf Course in Swanton. One of the money-raising activities was having the male golfers pay five dollars to wear a dress and tee off from the women’s tee box. Photos from the event are on the link above, including many from the fashion show.
1st place was Team #12: Joel Studer, Jason Ramirez, Nicholas Cooper, Matt Pelland (4 rounds of golf with cart +$200)
2nd Place: Team #4: Jason Fredrick, Robb Shadday, Kyle Leatherman, Max Reese( 4 rounds of golf with a cart)
Fresh from winning their second consecutive NWOAL Softball Championship, the Evergreen Lady Vikings defeated the Archbold Lady Blue Streaks 3-1 for back-to-back DIII Sectional Softball titles at William “Bill” Steck Field on Friday. Evergreen had earned its spot in the championship match-up with a decisive 12-0 win over Montpelier and Archbold came in after a 15-5 victory over Delta.
It was a tight defensive battle against the Streaks, one of two teams the Vikings shared the NWOAL title with, along with Wauseon. All the scoring came in the first inning then pitching and defense, from both sides, took over from there. Evergreen senior Jocelyn Schuster turned in a Gold Glove performance in center field robbing several Archbold batters of what looked like sure hits, one with a full out diving grab. “I just rely on teammates. Communication is a really big part and if we’re communicating, we’re doing really well,” she explained. I trusted my teammates to back me up in case I missed it. We all just work together.”
The Archbold defense came up just as big in some spots including in the bottom of the third when the Vikings loaded the bases with nobody out and clean-up hitter Kennedy Coolman coming to the plate. Coolman drilled a shot on one hop to third baseman Harley Phillips who fired to catcher Meghan Taylor at the plate for one out. Base runner Skylee Raker stumbled rounding third, got caught in a rundown and was eventually tagged out at the plate by pitcher Natalie Nofziger for the double play.
There were no real scoring opportunities until the Lady Streaks’ first two batters singled to start the top of the seventh inning. Viking pitcher Brooklyn Richardson then settled down and easily retired the next three hitters to preserve the victory.
“We knew Archbold was going to be a tough team coming in. It’s not the same team we played earlier in the year when we beat them 8-0,” said veteran softball coach Jim Zoltowski who is in his first year at the helm of the Lady Viking program. Coach Zoltowski gave a lot of credit to his senior pitcher, Richardson, who was in the circle for most of the season for the first time in her career. “She has really been stellar this year,” he said.
Zoltowski also commented on the defensive effort in the game by Schuster. “Jocelyn is a tremendous leader. We need her leadership out there in the outfield. We knew she was capable of making plays like that,” he said.
Evergreen now takes on the top-seeded Otsego Lady Knights next Wednesday at 4:00 p.m. at Blue Devils Fields located at 1041 Albon Road in Holland.
Click on the link above to access photos from the game. Photos are in then jpeg format to allow for editing and can be downloaded fore no charge courtesy of the fultoncountymedia.com website.
North Star’s Expansion Project Creates More Than 100 New Jobs, Will Boost Production May 13, 2022
DELTA, OH – North Star BlueScope Steel opened its new expansion project on May 9th. The expansion project, which began in 2019 and cost over $700 million, has created more than 100 new jobs and will increase the plant’s annual production of hot-rolled coil by 950,000 net tons.
Lieutenant Governor Jon Husted, the event’s keynote speaker, said, “When you make a $700 million investment, that’s no small deal; that’s a big deal. You can’t just pick up a steel mill and move it if things don’t go right. And so, the reassurances from the State of Ohio and local economic development officials, particularly regarding energy, were very important to North Star’s decision. We appreciate the collaboration between the company and our state officials to make sure we could sort out all those issues.”
“We continued to run throughout the build,” said North Star’s President Doug Lange. “It took a tremendous amount of coordination to build a steel mill in the middle of another steel mill.” Lange noted that the new building wouldn’t have been possible without help from the State of Ohio, Fulton County, the Fulton County Economic Development Corporation, Jobs Ohio, the local community and North Star’s team members.”
“This was a difficult build because of the pandemic,” said Patrick Finan, BlueScope’s Chief Executive Officer, “but we were still able to complete the project. Next month, we’ll be making the first slab off the new caster, which is part of the expansion.”
Attendees enjoyed lunch, video presentations and various speakers, including BlueScope’s Board of Directors, who flew from Australia to the U.S. for the first time since the pandemic began to attend the event. Ohio Senators Sherrod Brown and Robert Portman sent representatives to formally congratulate North Star on the addition. Following the opening ceremonies, attendees toured the new building.
“We value great companies making great investments, creating great jobs and improving quality of life in communities within Ohio,” said Husted. “North Star is the supply chain for many things that get built throughout the Midwest. This project is important in helping many other businesses get materials that they rely on for success.”
To commemorate the expansion, Mark Vassella, BlueScope’s CEO and Managing Director, presented a large, framed photo of the mini-mill. He also announced that the North Star team earned the CEO’s Health and Safety Excellence Award for 2021.
Pictured: Lieutenant Governor Jon Husted, the event’s keynote speaker, addresses the attendees.
The Swanton Bulldogs closed out their home varsity baseball season with a 19-0 victory over the Toledo Rogers Rams. Four seniors, Hunter Gowing, John Heckert, Wes Coon and Garret Swank played their final game wearing a home jersey for the Bulldogs.
Click on the link above for access to photos from the game and the Senior Night ceremony.
Worthington Industries (WI), the steel processing company in Delta, shuts down all operations once a year and sends groups of its employees out into several local communities to work on various projects or help out in any way they can. Most of the workers wear t-shirts bearing their slogan for the day, “Our Philosophy, Our People, Our Community”. In Swanton, a group of approximately 20 WI employees gathered at Memorial Park to help clean the grounds and paint some of the playground equipment.
The Swanton Lions Club awarded one of two Joe D. Kahl Memorial Scholarships in the amount of $1,000 to Swanton senior Reese Oberheim. Reese was chosen on the basis of his community service during his high school career and his high academic standing achieved in the past four years. He plans on attending Miami University in Oxford, Ohio and majoring in Accounting.
The late Mr. Kahl was a long-time teacher and coach in the Swanton Local School District and a charter member of the Swanton Lions Club, founded in 2009. Carolyn Kahl, wife of Mr. Kahl, presented Reese with the scholarship along with Lions Club President Jeff Patch.
Rosanna Hoelzle, Village Administrator who was hired on March 7, 2016, has submitted her resignation with an effective date of July 5, 2022. Ms. Hoelzle informed the Village Council of her plans to resign during an Executive Session this past Monday evening. Council returned to Chambers following the session and voted to accept her resignation. The need to focus on family health issues was the reason Ms. Hoelzle gave for leaving the position. According to Swanton mayor Neil Toeppe, the search for a new administrator has begun with job postings placed on various web sites including Ohio Means Jobs. Mr. Toeppe said that several applications have already been received.
Mother Nature, who has wreaked havoc on the local high school Spring sports schedule, finally provided a weather-friendly day on Monday for the JV baseball game between the visiting Wauseon Indians and the Swanton Bulldogs. Unfortunately, she was not able to provide an officiating crew for the contest and the game was reduced to a scrimmage with the opposing coaches calling balls and strikes. Lousy weather and an umpire shortage. It’s been a brutal Spring.
One of the campaign promises made by all four Swanton Village Council candidates prior to last November’s election was to implement the live streaming of all Council meeting to bring transparency to Swanton’s local government. Mayor Neil Toeppe had strongly advocated to make it permanent after the Council was forced by the Ohio Revised Code to live stream meetings when pandemic mitigation guidelines did not allow them to be held in person in Council Chambers.
Relocating to a larger venue allowed the Council, as it was seated in 2021, to discontinue the practice and, subsequently, all requests by Mayor Toeppe and repeated pleas from members of the public to continue, were summarily rejected. Once the new Council was sworn in and seated for 2022, the live streaming issue was placed back on the agenda. Legislation was drafted, reviewed by the Village Solicitor, approved unanimously by Council and equipment was ordered.
After experiencing some supply chain issues, the equipment finally arrived and was installed. Tonight’s meeting, 5/9/22, was the first to be live streamed on the Village of Swanton Facebook page. Village Administrator Rosanna Hoelzle said there will be some bugs to work out but, overall, the process was smooth. Anyone may now watch future meetings in real time or, because the meetings are recorded, at their convenience. Recordings will remain on the Village’s website for 12 months.
More than two months after advertising to fill the vacancy of Chief of the Swanton Fire and Rescue Department and conducting countless interviews, the Swanton Village Council voted to promote Captain Ed Dziengelewski to the top-raking position. The Council started the process with nine applications from very qualified individuals from both inside and outside the department. The list was pared down to five, then three then two before a decision was finalized during a special Council Executive Session last Monday night followed by the official vote in open session.
Captain Dziegielewski will be officially sworn in and begin his duties as Chief on May 15, 2022. He will be ceremoniously sworn in during the Village Council meeting on May 23, 2022.
Fulton County Ohio Media 