Warren City Council members made the right move in holding off – at least temporarily – in funding Warren Worx.

Warren Worx officials had asked the city for $100,000 in funding as part of the city’s 2024 budget. The funding wasn’t included in the budget initially because the request came after the budget was developed.

Providing the money would have meant using an additional $100,000 from the city’s fund balance, increasing use of the surplus in the 2024 budget from $400,000 to $500,000. That’s a big one-shot of revenue to have to replace when the city begins work on the 2025 budget.

The sheer timing of the request made approval more of a pain than it was worth this year.

But council members still have questions, as do we, about how the program will work and the benefit the city will derive from participating. Council members should know how long they will be asked to pay for Warren Worx, and we can’t disagree with councilman Jared Villella’s question regarding city residents’ essentially paying double since the city and the county are both being approached for funding. A question by Councilwoman Danielle Flasher really needs to be answered before the city decides to invest its money into Warren Worx.

“What benefit are they going to provide to us?” she asked. “I think it’s important to get some details before we allocate money. Saying we’re (allocating) $100,000 into a brand is quite vague. They have yet to define how a communication or pathway” is going to work.

As it stands, the mission for Warren Worx is pretty vague – developing a common brand, strategic planning, project coordination and event support, funding and resources and communication and marketing. There is value in Warren Worx as a way to share common resources between varying levels of government in Warren County and non-profits. But, in our opinion, neither council members nor the county should be investing in Warren Worx without knowing a lot more about how the taxpayers’ money will be spent.