By Patricia A. Scheyer
NKyTribune reporter
Several Kenton County Mayors and other officials gathered at Taylor Mill Saturday for their monthly meeting, and first on the list was a report on a Shift meeting held earlier that prioritized different road projects in Northern Kentucky.
Shift meetings are usually held after an OKI (Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana Council of Governments) board meeting, every two years, preceding a full legislative session, when the two-year road plan is passed. The meetings were initiated by Governor Matt Bevin as an opportunity for the local transportation district to meet with local governments and boost the points originally assigned to state road projects in each of their districts.
“I gave you all the most recent updated list from the Shift meeting that took place after the OKI board meeting,” said Erlanger Mayor Jessica Fette. “I don’t know how many of you are familiar with this process, but I feel like in the past my city administrator had done this, so this was my first Shift meeting, and I felt like I came out of it with bloody knuckles; it was just a very intense meeting.”
She asked if anyone was familiar with the process and knows how “janky” the process is, she recommended that they get together with Sharmili Reddy, who is the Director of PDS, so that they can provide feedback on the meeting, which is critical to picking road projects to receive money and priority from the state. She said there is a chance they can make an impact on the process in the next two years.
“As you can see there are nine Kenton County projects on here,” explained Fette. “I think it is very interesting when you are walking into a Shift meeting this total pre-boosting, which is that first red line (on the paper) — it’s pretty much already decided before you go in that meeting. You’re only fighting for that local boost, and they’ll only boost 13 projects and give ten extra additional points to each of those 13 projects.”
In addition, Fette said they have already chosen those 13 projects before anyone sits down, so then people are vying for which project is most important. Any previous discussions, she maintained, were done without the cities.
“So I think there’s something that we can do better in the counties, and it’s that the county and the mayors should be on the same page when we walk into that meeting,” she said. “And having a tremendous amount of representation. Boone county was highly represented in that meeting, and Gary Moore knew that process inside and out, and he knew exactly which projects he wanted to pull boost points away from, shifting them over to this project — it was like a symphony.”
There were only two Kenton County mayors at the meeting, and several of the mayors said they had no idea the meeting was going to happen. Fette said that was part of the problem, making sure all the mayors were aware of the meeting.
County Administrator Joe Shriver said that although the county engineers were at the meeting, he hasn’t had the chance to meet with them yet, but he agreed that everyone in Northern Kentucky should be on the same page, and ideally have the information before they walked into the meeting.
“The whole system, I think, is flawed anyhow,” he said. “Because they put Lexington, Louisville, and Northern Kentucky all in the same region. We are competing for the same region, and the reason that Bob (Taylor) has explained this to me is because if they put us in a different region than the other two, then you guys would suck up all the projects. And as I said, because Shift is supposed to be basing this on merit, economic development, and return on investment, that should be a good thing. But downstate sees it differently. They want all three economic engines in the same region. It makes no sense.”
Shriver said he would like to get together with Transportation District 6, the division that is in charge of Northern Kentucky, ahead of time, and see what they are boosting, and why. He said he thought OKI might be a little more transparent. But he agreed with Fette, saying he was 100 percent behind the strategy of getting on the same page before the meeting.
He went on record saying he didn’t like that they downgraded a project involving Ky 536 in Kenton County, as well as one of the projects in Ft Mitchell, and while he understands that they might have cost more, he didn’t understand the rationale behind the moves.
“It doesn’t end with these rankings,” he said. “Go to your legislator and continue to push your agenda, because these rankings won’t overrule them putting our patience in for the future.”
The thirteen projects chosen to receive the extra 10 point boost included 6 in Kenton County, 5 in Boone County and 2 in Campbell County. Someone ventured that Campbell County might have picked up an extra project.
“My only point in bringing this up is it wasn’t the greatest situation, and what opportunities can we take away from that meeting and fix for next time,” said Fette. “There’s all kinds of things that can be learned from our experience. And making sure that this whole group knows about it is one of them. I didn’t know that you guys didn’t know. And that’s a change we can make going forward.”
She also said that OKI is under the assumption that District 6 is meeting on a regular basis with the cities and counties. She said she personally doesn’t meet with district 6 unless it is about a specific project.
Some of the mayors proclaimed themselves frustrated, and felt that they ought to have the legislators at the mayoral meetings.
“It is literally, what are their projects that they have in the pipeline, most of which are unfunded,” said Shriver, who has met with District 6. “We talked about three or four meaningful projects and all of a sudden it becomes a list of needs that won’t get funded. I agree with better coordination before the meeting, but I will also caveat that by we can have perfect coordination and it still isn’t going to get us the results we want, because of the way it is structured. It’s just not going to happen.”
He talked about 3L highway and I-275, and explained that that project was way down on the list and they had to fight to keep it on the list, but now it is at the top of the list.
“It’s not just getting them there, it is holding them there,” said Mayor Christopher Reinersman of Independence, citing the 536 project.
“It’s economic development and political, that’s what this list is,” said Taylor Mill Mayor Daniel Bell. “And if we don’t get involved in the politics, we’re about to suffer the consequences.”
Bob Porter, from Senator Thomas Massie’s office, spoke up and said from his observations he thought one of the problems is that even though there is federal transportation money, they have no state representative on the transportation committee.
“That’s part of your problem — we have two senators, both from Boone County,” he said. “Where’s your advocates for transportation?”
“Steve Doan needs to be on that committee,” said Fette. “I completely agree with you. Steve Doan represents both Boone County and Kenton County. And he’s a fighter — he will fight for us, and we need that voice.”
“Keep in mind, though, that these are state dollars, they are not federal dollars,” said Joe Shriver.
“We could talk about this forever,” Fette reminded everyone. “If you have suggestions about the Shift meeting, please get with Sharmili. We will make this better. We will figure out how to make it better, come hell or high water.”