Youngstown Mayor Tito Brown delivers state of city address

Community members gathered Thursday morning for a celebration of the city called Good Morning, Youngstown!

The Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber hosted the event.

Youngstown Mayor Tito Brown delivered his annual State of the City speech at 7:30 a.m. at the event at Stambaugh Auditorium.

Event organizers said it was the largest Good Morning, Youngstown! in 15 years; according to hosts of the event.

“We’re moving in the right direction. Whether it’s two inches or three inches, we’re moving in the right direction,” Brown said. “I want you to give it up for all the women in the room. We want to celebrate women for national women’s month right now.”

Here are a few main takeaways from the mayor’s state of the city address:

A focus on mental health and wellness

The mayor emphasized his office’s focus on mental health and wellness. Brown said they’re finding ways to connect people with available resources and reposition them into better states.

“We must ensure that everyone is in the right place, in the right position, and help those who need the services to do it,” said Brown.

He discussed seeking outside advice from a social services navigator.

“As mayor, I want to make sure those families who are facing suicide, overdose, gun violence, homelessness are receiving the proper service is given to them,” he said. “A social service navigator [would be] someone who can ensure that people get where they need to go... Say someone’s a veteran. They’re homeless. Where can they go? [We would say] there’s this person, call this person, and we’re visiting some of them because some people might check one or two boxes, but they don’t check all the boxes.”

What the mayor tells people wanting to do business in Youngstown

Brown said he has a few messages to developers and new business owners.

“We know that affordable quality housing is an issue,” he said. “We’ve got to make sure that individuals, where they want to do business in the city of Youngstown, have to put some skin in the game...As a developer, we will help you, but you’ve got to come in. It’s put some skin in the game. Housing is a key issue. Quality housing is a bigger issue. And we will work with you in the community.”

He also praised members of his administration for organizing the first inaugural Business Solutions Summit yesterday.

How Youngstown wants to maintain its workforce

Brown, as well as other speakers at the event, focused on retaining the Youngstown workforce, as well as creating new jobs in the city.

He said workforce development and team collaboration are the only way to do this.

“If I asked everyone in this room what their definition of workforce development was, probably many of you would have a different answer. And what I want us to do as a team to start realizing what that means?,” Brown asked. “It, for me, is getting an individual job ready, training, and access to the upcoming industries. We need to make sure when we start talking about this innovation hub, I had one of my grandchildren, my children’s children, to be ready for the technologies is going to be there.”

How Youngstown is handling health care

As the nation faces an ambulance and EMT shortage crisis, the city of Youngstown is no exception.

His office focuses on front-line healthcare workers, improving fire departments in the city and access to affordable healthcare.

“Now, I wanted to give you this update last year. We talked about being an accredited health department. And now we have community health workers in our neighborhoods ... and we are accredited health departments throughout the state,” he said.

Drivers urged to slow down in school zones

Finally, Brown reminded the community about slowing down and keeping kids safe in school zones, enforced now by speed cameras.

“Our babies deserve to be safe going to school,” Brown said. “Just slow down. In all honesty, our babies need what many other communities do the same going and coming from the schools.”

Brown said city officials are ready to help

“President Barack Obama said, in essence, ‘We are the people we’re waiting for,’” Brown said. “We’ve been talking about who’s talking who’s going to start the battle in our neighborhood, who first who’s going to spark the housing development, who’s going to make sure reinvestment happens in our neighborhood. We are the people that are waiting for you.”

Key speakers at the breakfast included Youngstown City Schools Superintendent Justin M. Jennings and Youngstown/Warrenn Regional Chamber CEO Guy Coviello.

Businesses who sponsored the event included: Premier Bank, Trivium Packaging, Akron Children’s Hospital Mahoning Valley,

Mike Wood from Trivium in Youngstown shared how his bottle-manufacturing business benefited from partnering with the city, opening its doors to students in the area for Manufacturing Day.

Akron Children’s Hospital Mahoning Valley representatives also shared news of a new emergency department opening on April 19 in Youngstown.

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This story was originally published March 30, 2023 at 11:35 AM.