Willoughby Hills mayor looking to increase business relationships

EDITOR’S NOTE: The Willoughby Western Lake County Chamber of Commerce hosted officials from its communities on April 23 at La Vera Party Center in Willoughby Hills to discuss the “State of the Cities.” This is one in a series of articles detailing the speeches that were given.

Over the course of the year, Willoughby Hills has faced a great deal of economic development.

“Last year, at the end of the year, we welcomed a new Sheetz,” said Mayor Chris Hallum. “We’re happy with that. It’s doing really well. Coming up, we’re excited about the west end of the city. That area has been sitting dormant.”

Bishop Queen LLC. Owner J. Scott Scheel has been working to bring economic development to the west end of the city.

“They repaved parking lots and tried to clean it up to make it more interesting to businesses,” Hallum said. “He wanted it to be a nice shopping center, so we got an AutoZone, Burlington, Five Below and Ross Dress for Less coming. They knocked down the old Burger King and Blockbuster, which will be lot split for two additional locations, so great things are coming to the Shops at Willoughby Hills.”

In 2022, as the pandemic was coming to an end, the city had just over a $1 million carry over.

“We benefited from people working from home,” Hallum said. “We have a lot of people who were working in an office and came back to work from their home office, and then stayed. We ended up with a better income from payroll taxes than we had prior.”

In 2023, the city had another $1 million carry over.

“Back in 2008, the city had maybe $12,000 to $18,000 in our general fund,” Hallum said. “We’ve been fortunate. This year, we’re looking at about a $28,000 carry over. Things have kind of settled down.”

The city updated its master plan as it had been several years since it had been done.

“We’re trying to look at ways we can plan for our future and get more involved with our parks, and more connectivity with our city through the parks, as well as into the other cities,” Hallum said.

In addition to the new fire engine the fire department will be getting, a new command chase vehicle was purchased in order to assist in saving people when in accidents.

Additionally, five full-time police officers were hired.

“We’re excited about our police department,” Hallum said. “Our chief is doing a fantastic job of getting a good crew of people together to support our city, protect our city and residents.”

A new drone team and handheld photo enforcement tools have also been implemented within the police department in order to combat speeding.

“People just forgot about speed limits completely,” Hallum said. “We clocked somebody at 125 miles an hour — just dangerous. You make one mistake and it’s lights out.”

It was last year when Police Chief Matthew Naegele came to the city about implementing another tool to be put into the hands of his officers in order to help make the city and the roads safer.

“This is just another tool to be proactive and help bring speeds down,” Hallum said. “People are doing well over 100 miles an hour on our highways.”

The school zone photo enforcement has been implemented in the school zone on Route 91.

“Our kids are important,” Hallum said. “We clocked somebody doing over 100 miles an hour in a school zone while the lights were flashing. We’re being very open about how these programs work. You don’t get a ticket in a school zone unless you’re 11 or more over, which is pretty ridiculous. This year, we had a roller accident in the school zone during class. These are meant to make people slow down. That is our goal.”

A new salt storage facility has been built and has since been instrumental in helping neighboring cities with storing extra salt they had. The city also continues to host annual events, including the Classic Lexus 5K alongside Velosano to support the St. Noel Food Pantry.

“We have our Willoughby Hills Fire Department toy drive at WinterFest that we do every year for Toys for Tots and kick off the holiday season,” Hallum said. “Our police do a food drive every year and this year, we had 1,500 pounds of donated food. We appreciate all the work that goes there.”

The city’s holiday parade and Touch a Truck event remain well attended.

“Our parade is a sight to behold,” Hallum said. “We have a Grinch truck, all our vehicles decorated, Santa comes around and the residents love it. Touch a Truck — we bring people in from all over to see all of the great things and these big toys that our folks get to use.”

Alongside other localities and the county, seniors are on Willoughby Hills’ forefront.

“The fire department partnered with Red Cross to replace smoke detectors,” Hallum said. “We still have our WHISPER program. I see other localities, as well as the county getting involved and helping create other programs to help our seniors with things they can’t do on their own.”

The city is also working to find ways to improve its senior center.

This year, the added a new full-time recreation coordinator and replaced the police garage.

“Our service director was quick in doing that,” Hallum said.

Going forward, Hallum is looking to increase relationships with the business community.

“My plan is to start going around to our scheduled meetings with our local businesses to find out how can we help them accomplish whatever goals they might have,” he said.