Public Safety & Environmental Committee

Thursday, July 30, 2026 Public Safety & Environmental Committee 6:30pm Council Chambers at City Hall Page A. CALL TO ORDER B. APPROVAL OF MINUTES 1. Approval of Minutes from May 11, 2026 2 05-11-2026 Safety and Environmental Committee Minutes DRAFT.pdf C. BUSINESS D. ADJOURNMENT City of Brooklyn, Ohio - Public Safety & Environmental Committee Page 1 of 5  DRAFT PUBLIC SAFETY AND ENVIRONMENTAL COMMITTEE May 11, 2026 6:00 PM Chair Aaron Borowski called the meeting to order. Roll Call Present: Aaron Borowski, Sue Grodek, Steven Coyle Absent: None Chair Aaron Borowski asked for approval of the previous minutes. MOTION by Coyle, second by Grodek to approve the minutes of January 12, 2026. VOTE: Yes: Borowski, Grodek, Coyle. No: None. (APPROVED) Chair Borowski stated that with speaking with council colleagues, one of the big concerns right now are issues with safety in the community when it comes to our e-bike laws. Are they being followed? Enforced? Are there educational opportunities for our residents to learn the do's and don'ts? Before I open the floor to Acting Chief Eschweiler representing the police department and Mr. Mosley on this matter, do any of the committee members have any comments or questions? There were none. Councilman Mosley stated in the past, probably been two years or so, I've been talking about this and I know that our officers are seeing the same issues that I am. The changes of this ordinance are just amending what we already have in place. I have a red line version that I can share with you guys, but essentially what it's doing is in section A1, the operation of a class one electric bike and class two electric bicycle is permitted on a path set aside for exclusive use of bicycles or on a shared used path. Now, that's what it says now, but it used to say unless the municipality by resolution, ordinance or rule prohibits the use of class one electric bikes, class two electric bikes on such a path except as provided in this section. It's kind of just eliminating that unless a municipality states otherwise. So now this essentially states otherwise. And when I was talking to our law director, Kevin Butler about this, he had said that he had already been in talks with the Mayor about this and he had some legislation already drafted and he shared it with me and I read through it and I liked it enough and I said, can you put my name on it also. Not saying that this is going to be the final version of this whatsoever, but I do want to sponsor it as in saying that this is a big problem in my opinion and this needs to be addressed. Now, the issue I think at hand is that the class one and class two all have a motor on them. Class one, the motor will only work when you're pedaling. Class two will work whether you're pedaling or not. Those two classes go up to 20 miles an hour. Pretty fast, right? I think if you're sprinting, you might be able to do 12 miles an hour. Class three is essentially a low grade moped. It goes up to 28mph. I wouldn't call it pedal assist. It's just an electric motor. So, the issue is that people are walking on the sidewalk, walking three, four miles an hour, and then there's a class one or class two e-bike riding past them or at Marquardt Park doing laps or at Memorial Park when it's going to be open doing laps and there are going to be e-bikes flying past them. This essentially means that you can have the bike on the path. You just cannot have the motor engaged. That's the synopsis of the legislation. Page 2 of 5 Safety and Environmental Committee Minutes May 11, 2026 Page 2 Chair Borowski thanked Councilman Mosley and stated Chief Eschweiler, I had emailed you any concerns, any issues that we've had with the residents that have reached out to the police department. Anything that you can update us on? Chief Eschweiler stated the issue is safety on shared paths. When she and Lieutenant McQuaid look at the statistics of bicycles, there were only four bicycle crashes, two were e-bikes. Despite that, we do know that the incidence of injury, even if there's small numbers of crashes, still can be significant because of the speed, which they are. We looked at specific numbers and a number of crashes, again, not related simply just to bicycles, but the fact that we're seeing crashes around the schools. On Biddulph, within the last three months, we looked at the data for three hours prior to school start and three hours after. We had six crashes within that three-month period of time, three hours before, three hours after. There are opportunities for significant injuries, especially if the individuals are riding these vehicles without protection, and they are often younger juveniles. Council President Grodek asked, do you think there are unreported crashes, too, or injuries with these bikes? If I was a parent and my under 18-year-old was involved, I don't know that I would necessarily think, oh, I should report this to the police as if it was a car or a motorcycle, because in my mind, I think many people view these as bicycles rather than vehicles, like you are calling them, which they are. Chair Borowski opened the floor to all Council colleagues for questions and comments. Councilwoman Pucci stated I know when we adopted, or I should say amended our ordinances to reflect the e-bikes, we did not change anything with the helmets. Do you think that there should be different requirements because of how fast these actually can go for people under 18? Chief Eschweiler stated we still have our existing helmet requirement, which is actually 14. Councilwoman Pucci asked if you think we should be covering like 14 to 16. I just think it's something we should think about because there's a huge difference. I was part of the original legislation for bike helmets here in Brooklyn, and there's a huge difference between you're on a bicycle and basically how fast can you pedal and you're falling or potentially getting hit by something or colliding with something versus the e-bikes, which can go up to the 28 miles per hour. It's such a huge difference. And I also think nowadays we know so much more about the traumatic brain injuries. I'm just thinking that we should probably revisit that and have a discussion on helmet usage above 14. Just kind of throwing that out there. I know this is only on first reading. If people could maybe give it some thought and maybe we could check with some other cities. What I've read just anecdotally because anytime any city's doing anything relating to something that could potentially impact us, I read about it and it seems like most cities have the requirement above 14. It seems like we're on the low side, especially in light of the e- bikes. Councilman Mosley stated I've been asking the helmet question for quite some time. I think Strongsville, I looked up theirs and they had a 16 and under were required to wear helmets, which I would be for. I have to know the legality of how to go about doing something like that, but I am in favor of doing that. I don't call the police every time I see an e-bike doing something crazy. I could, but they don't have the time to answer every single one of my calls. I just know that when I'm at a park, if there's five kids there and there's five e-bikes and it doesn't matter who's walking on the path, they're zooming past them and it might not be the kid that gets hurt. It might be the senior walker who falls down and breaks her hip or it can be any of that. And that's just what I'm trying to prevent. And I'm not really blaming, I'm not trying to put blame on anybody, but if I was a kid, if I was 10, 12, 14 years old and somebody gave me one of these, I would ride it all over the city. I think that we as council members living in different parts Page 3 of 5 Safety and Environmental Committee Minutes May 11, 2026 Page 3 of the city, we as a city entity, whether it's police department or administration, we have the power to walk out door to door and telling people, hey, these are the rules, just so you know. I'm not trying to get anybody a $25 ticket. What good is that going to do? I'd rather save the kid's head from hitting a windshield. So that's my opinions on it and I hope we can do something collectively for this. Councilwoman Pucci stated one thing we did for several summers after we instituted our bike helmet law was we got some businesses in the community to donate certificates and then the police were catching the kids wearing the helmets. I just wonder if we could maybe look at something because it goes to like the positive reinforcement versus the punitive. I think Marcos Pizza might have been one of them. I don't remember everybody who participated, but it also was good as far as community policing goes because, you know, the police were, hey, I see you're wearing a helmet. Good job, here's a certificate. Councilman Celcherts stated if you want to change the age limits, kind of adjust it, that's fine. It's just with some of the young, young adults that are riding these things, it's attitude. I had one cut me off in front of me, kind of beeped a horn on I get flipped off and everything. So it's like even if you want to be safer, I'm concerned about their safety. Councilwoman Pucci stated that earlier in the year, I had brought up with Chief Mielke about the idea of the Citizens Police Academy. This has really been brought up numerous times over the years. And Lieutenant, I don't know if he pursued anything on that or not because he seemed very receptive to it. Councilwoman Pucci discussed information gathered from other communities regarding Citizen Police Academy programs. It was noted that several nearby cities, including Bay Village, Westlake, Lakewood, Cleveland Heights, Parma Heights, Parma, Shaker Heights, South Euclid, and Rocky River, currently operate similar programs. Rocky River’s program was highlighted as a strong model, with discussion including program naming, participant requirements, scheduling, curriculum, class size, and community engagement strategies. Discussion included program eligibility requirements, scheduling preferences, the use of rotating police personnel as presenters, ride-alongs, simulator training exercises, surveys for participant feedback, and graduation ceremonies. It was also noted that Rocky River’s Police Chief expressed willingness to share materials and allow interested individuals to observe a future session. Councilwoman Pucci stated we saw the information on the enforcement zone on 480 that the different communities are going to do. I don't know if you have specific information about exactly what our participation is going to be, but one thing I thought of and I actually had questions from residents also, you know we have the horrible problem of the motorcycles on 480 and every year it seems to get worse. And I don't even live that close to 480 and it is so loud, it's unbelievable. I guess I'm wondering why they cut it off. Is it like 8 p.m., I think, because one of the biggest problems there, in addition to the regular speeding, are these people who are crazy on these motorcycles. Chief Eschweiler responded, I'll only respond as much as I can. They organize the slowing of crashes. When it comes to addressing the motorcycles, obviously we don't want to see them racing. However, the enforcement, if they stop for us, then we're in a good place to enforce. Oftentimes because their engine power is a lot more powerful, it is not worth the risk to engage in a pursuit for traffic enforcement. But I can tell you that there are other methods that we are instituting to address it. We do know that they used to hang out at a lot in certain locations and they are no longer welcome spots to attend. Our officers have frequented those areas as well, in an opportunity for community engagement, and it is no longer a favored meeting spot. We try to address it as much as we can. Page 4 of 5 Safety and Environmental Committee Minutes May 11, 2026 Page 4 Councilwoman Pucci asked Chief Eschweiler in your opinion, I know, and I've talked to Chief Mielke numerous times about this over the years, and I know that our officers were going up specifically to, I won't name where they are, but you know where I'm talking about, and engaging them on body cam and everything, and sometimes getting license plates. And I know that we caught some offenders after that because of that. Do you think that they're no longer using some of the places in Brooklyn as like their meet-up places because of that? Chief Eschweiler responded I think a lot of the regulars have moved on to other voids. Someone fills that void. Councilman Tanski stated that the new spot is Sheetz on Pearl and Brookpark. So that's where they're hanging out now. I mean, there must have been 30, 40 last year. We got them out of the city, and then we're 30 seconds from Brooklyn. And it's loaded up there. And they all get right on 480. Unless Cleveland steps up the game, we're back in the same position we were. I don't know how in the world you're going to stop a motorcycle at 140, 150 miles an hour standing up on the seat with that thing straight up in the air on one wheel. I mean, it's impossible. They're moving that fast. They're at that third exit before you can even get the cop car out on the freeway. Unless you knew what exit they would get off and you're hanging on the other end and block it. I don't know. It's tough. There being no further business, MOTION by Coyle, second by Grodek to adjourn. VOTE: Yes: Borowski, Grodek, Coyle. No: None. Meeting adjourned. Michelle Bronowski, Clerk of Council Minutes approved: Page 5 of 5