Elyria waits on funding Elyria Community Partnership until budget set

Elyria City Council voted last week to table a funding request from the nonprofit Elyria Community Partnership until the full 2026 budget is completed. Elyria Community Partnership is an organization that seeks to foster investment and redevelopment in Elyria, particularly downtown. It is housed in the same building as The Chronicle-Telegram, but is a fully separate organization. Last week, ECP Executive Director Mone't Roberts went before Council's Finance Committee to request $75,000 in city funding to help continue its operations, the same amount that it was awarded by the city last year. Finance Director Ted Pileski suggested that the city had about $25,000 ready to grant to the partnership, so Council could grant that money prior to the full budget and follow with the additional $50,000. Law Director Amanda Deery said that in the past, the city had made such donations as one-time contributions, but added that if the committee felt strongly it could vote to go against that. Councilwoman Brenda Davis, D-2nd Ward, made a motion to table the item until the 2026 budget was complete, and the committee approved the motion. Elyria's temporary budget is in place, and last year, Council did not begin discussing its 2025 permanent appropriations until February. Prior to the vote, Roberts presented an impact report outlining some of the work that ECP had done for the community in the past year. "You all are helping us bring a higher quality of life and positioning our community for further investment," she said. "I believe in building this community as a place that my child will definitely enjoy and appreciate as she continues to grow up in this world." Roberts said that the report found that downtown Elyria has about 3,000 residents, but receives approximately 10,000 visitors every day. The busiest single day was the Saturday of the 2025 Elyria Apple Festival, Roberts said, which brought more than 60,000 people into downtown. By far the largest project that ECP participated in last year was the construction of the Foster Senior Lofts on the property of the former Thomas Jefferson School. The project, which broke ground in May, will bring 40 apartments for people 55 years or older and about $18 million of investment. The Community Partnership helped spearhead a team of developers and contributors to get the project off the ground. The city made a one-time contribution of $250,000 to help the project. In 2026, Roberts said that the organization was working on another project in partnership with the city, this one to reimagine the entryways to the city of Elyria "This is an exciting opportunity because it is not just for downtown," she said. "This is an entryway and wayfinding for all of Elyria, so it is an opportunity to help build that investment and make it more welcoming when people turn into our community." Roberts said she was expecting to have final schematics for the new entryway design in February. Those designs will be presented to Council for final approval, and she said they would provide a more cohesive, marketable design for the city. She also spoke about ECP's mural program, which has already painted several murals throughout downtown Elyria. The Community Partnership is currently seeking artists for future murals, and applications are open at elyriatogether.org/explore/art until Feb. 10. Contact Owen MacMillan at (440) 329-7123 or omacmillan@chroniclet.com.