Wilmington Weekly with Matt Purkey

Latest Episodes:

Episode Thirty-Eight - Council Wrap Up (10/1/26) and Reflections Oct 12, 2026

Show notes

A wrap-up of the October 1st council workshop and regular meeting, with a look ahead to Thursday's meeting. It covers the Brooks ruling on the data center emergency clauses, the Flock license plate reader presentation, a seven to zero vote after executive session, and Matt's reflections on how council handles new technology.

Episode Thirty-Six - Council Wrap Up (9/17/26) and Reflections Sep 27, 2026

Show notes

Council passed the new camping and bodily obstruction ordinances Thursday night, then voted down its own motion to adjourn so the service director could reveal, only after the vote, that the city has no legal path for treatment facilities to exist and that two of the few options in town are operating without a certificate of occupancy. This episode asks why that came up only after there was nothing left to vote on, and traces the same pattern through recycling and the AWS-related zoning fights.

Episode Thirty-Five - Council Wrap Up (9/3/26) and Reflections Sep 09, 2026

Show notes

In Episode Thirty-Five, Matt wraps up Wilmington City Council's September 3, 2026 workshop and regular meeting, including the nearly two-hour public hearing on the US 68 data center rezoning. He covers the death of the old camping ordinance and its two replacements, a $200,000 unexplained jump in the city's Consultant Services line, the first reading of a CivicPlus contract to replace the city's Google Drive system, and the passage of the data center zoning and rezoning ordinances tied to the Sharp v. Wilmington consent order. The hearing itself included testimony citing recent Ohio Supreme Court rulings, a resident's AI-assisted legal brief, and a First Amendment exchange with the council president. Matt also announces a format change for the show going forward, retiring the Wednesday preview episode in favor of wrap-ups and special episodes, and walks through a corrected legal timeline for the referendum effort now facing the city, including why Wilmington's status as a statutory (not charter) city matters for when, or if, voters actually get a say.

Episode Thirty-Four - Council Preview (9/3/26) Sep 02, 2026

Show notes

Thursday's meeting could be one of the biggest of the season. Two ordinances tied to a federal consent order, including the data center zoning amendment at the center of this year's biggest story, are positioned to pass with emergency clauses intact, foreclosing a public referendum, the same way a similar ordinance did at the last meeting without a single council member explaining why. A public hearing on a related rezoning runs the same night under the same unlimited-time format as the last one. This episode walks through the suspension-of-rules math, what happened last time, and what's still unexplained heading into Thursday.

Episode Thirty-Three - Council Wrap Up (8/20/26) and Reflections Aug 21, 2026

Show notes

Thursday's special meeting produced the strongest finding this show has surfaced all season: sworn testimony that the data center zoning amendment at the heart of this fight may never have been legally initiated in the first place. Fourteen people spoke. Seven raised the same specific legal question about whether either ordinance actually meets the standard for an emergency. Council asked zero follow-up questions, three separate times. Two council members carried nearly all the substantive engagement in the room. Two others never spoke at all. One ordinance passed that night with its emergency clause intact, no referendum window. The other moves to September 3rd, with the same math already on the table. This episode is a full accounting of what happened, what didn't, and what it means that the public has a right to a referendum this council chose not to explain taking away.

Episode Thirty-Two - Special Meeting Preview (8/20/26) Aug 19, 2026

Show notes

Thursday isn't a normal council meeting - it's a special meeting built around two public hearings on the AWS-related ordinances that aren't the big one, both carrying emergency clauses. This episode digs into what's actually in each ordinance, applies a brand-new Ohio Supreme Court ruling on emergency legislation and referendum rights, and lays out the exact vote math that decides what happens Thursday night. Also: a Public Works Committee meeting on fluoride that deserves its own look, with the deeper dive coming this weekend.

Episode Thirty-One - Council Wrap Up (8/6/26) and Reflections Aug 10, 2026

Show notes

Council came within one vote of fast-tracking a new public camping ban Thursday night, despite the city's own police chief, prosecutor, and cleanup crew all saying it wasn't ready. It failed to suspend the rules 4-2 and heads to a second reading September 3rd. Its companion, a public urination and defecation ordinance, passed clean the same night, built the right way from the start. Also this week: a fire department ordinance authorizing nearly double the current staffing passed with zero discussion, a family connection on the dais nobody mentioned, and a string of real solutions raised and dismissed with nothing but "we don't have the money." Matt closes by asking the question nobody on the dais did: if this is really the city's biggest problem, why didn’t the administration ask for help with that instead of a new safety building?

Episode Thirty - Council Preview (8/6/26) Aug 05, 2026

Show notes

In this episode: the AZEK Group decision, Thursday's light agenda, why the public hearing notice actually matters, the August 20th/September 3rd split on the data center ordinances, and a closer look at O-26-45's history.

Episode Twenty-Nine - Repeal, Replace, or What? Jul 23, 2026

Show notes

Three ordinances are headed to Wilmington City Council’s August 20th public hearing, all carrying emergency language, all tied to the data center project. In this special episode, Matt breaks down what “emergency” actually means under Ohio law, and walks through a piece of process almost nobody talks about.

Episode Twenty-Eight - Council Wrap Up (7/16/26) and Reflections Jul 18, 2026

Show notes

Council voted down a previously unanimous data center ordinance, five to one, with no discussion on the floor, right after the longest executive session of the year. The same night, the city quietly added three public hearings to address the federal court's order on the AWS ordinances. A department raise and a twenty-year fire department framework both moved forward with little scrutiny, and seven of eight public commenters independently called the court's order a gift, a reset, a second chance. Matt walks through what happened, what wasn't explained, and why the silence itself is this week's story.

Our TOPPODCAST Picks

Follow Us

Stay Connected

Wilmington Weekly with Matt Purkey

Related Podcasts

Links

Stay Connected