YOUNGSTOWN — A city council committee is looking to add plasma centers to the list of businesses in Youngstown with moratoriums placed on them until May 1, 2026.

Council’s zoning committee discussed the moratorium on plasma centers Monday as a way to get better control of certain businesses in the city.

“We need time to develop a business licensing program,” said Councilwoman Samantha Turner, D-3rd Ward, and chairwoman of the zoning committee. “Businesses can come into the city without first presenting information to us. We need to get a better handle on businesses and their locations. We want to work with businesses and support the community in the best way possible.”

There are three plasma centers in Youngstown — two of them within a mile of each other — along with ones nearby in Liberty and Austintown. Hospitals would be exempt from the moratorium such as the one at St. Elizabeth Youngstown Hospital.

City council voted June 20 through resolutions — then had to rescind them July 29 and pass them as ordinances — to place moratoriums until May 1, 2026, on recreational marijuana businesses, dollar stores, car lots and auto repair shops.

The council zoning committee met a number of times to discuss those moratoriums before the votes.

Also, the committee met Nov. 18 to discuss a moratorium on housing rentals through Airbnb.

The plasma centers and Airbnb moratoriums will be further discussed by the committee next month.

Turner said she wants to create a licensing program that would require the businesses under moratoriums and the two being considered to be properly vetted so there weren’t too many of them in one part of the city and not an oversaturation in Youngstown.

She asked if the city has the staff to deal with the businesses in question and enforce laws. Erica Avery, the city’s housing coordinator, said the city doesn’t.

LANDMARK COMMISSION

The zoning committee again discussed the creation of a landmark district commission Monday that would give the city more control over historic businesses. The item was first discussed at the committee’s Nov. 18 meeting.

Turner said consideration of such a commission was initially broached about five years ago.

A proposed ordinance, written by the law department, would establish city landmarks and landmark districts to provide protection “by requiring thorough study of alternatives to incompatible alterations or demolition before such acts are performed.”

A seven-member commission would be established with “a commitment to historic preservation with a determination to maintain and safeguard the quality of city landmarks and landmark districts,” the proposed legislation reads.

Turner brought up the May 28 gas explosion and subsequent demolition of the former Realty Tower in downtown.

A commission could permit the city to do due diligence on historic buildings before they are demolished though it’s uncertain what could be done to stop the demolition of a historic building in Realty’s case.

The explosion caused significant damage to Realty Tower on East Federal Street, killing Akil Drake, who worked at the Chase Bank on the building’s ground floor, and injuring nine others.

Building owner YO Properties 47 LLC, over the objections of some council members, decided June 17 to demolish the 23-apartment structure. Work started almost a month later and was finished Sept. 25.

Turner said such a commission could have taken a lead role in helping to preserve the former Welsh Congregational Church on Elm Street, demolished April 27, 2022. Before it was demolished, the 161-year-old building was the city’s oldest church.