Fifty years ago when a transplant, regarding Northern Kentucky for the first time, said to himself, “It’s just a big collection of small towns.”
It’s what Northern Kentucky remains today. A strain of thinking, such as the one offered lately by my friend Col Owens, is that we’d be a stronger and better entity if we were more united, our local distinctions diminished or packed away, if we were merged.
The presumption about Northern Kentucky’s multifariousness has been that so many local governments were duplicative, wasteful, and perpetuated by small-town politicians anxious to preserve their posts and parking spaces.
Mr. Owens notes that the combined population of Boone, Campbell, and Kenton counties is at or near 400,000 and larger than Fayette County’s 322,000. If Northern Kentucky were to merge, it would raise the region’s profile across Kentucky and nationally. Some qualification and context is necessary here. Expressed as a standard metropolitan statistical area, which includes surrounding counties, greater Lexington’s population is 518,000.
Beyond these drab demographic discussions about who in Kentucky is Number 2, the big question is, what would Northern Kentucky get as a merged polity than it doesn’t have now?
The data say we’re doing pretty well as it is. We’re well-educated here. In percentage of the adult population with Bachelor’s degrees, Campbell ranks fourth among Kentucky counties at 38.7 percent, Kenton fifth at 35.5 percent, Boone seventh at 34 percent.
In per capita income, Kenton County ranks second at $73,345, Campbell fourth at $66,22, Boone ninth at $62.066. Northern Kentucky booms in comparison to the rest of Kentucky
Health outcomes are harder to measure. But in access to quality care, Northern Kentucky, with its regional hospitals and its access to mighty health-care institutions across the Ohio in Cincinnati ranks second to none in the Commonwealth.
In the midst of a larger metro area, Northern Kentucky’s access to cultural institutions, professional and major college athletics, and other quality of life indicators, Northern Kentucky is also superior to anywhere else in the Commonwealth.
There is in Mr. Owens’s piece the suggestion that Northern Kentucky, by being merged, would present a better case to Frankfort to attract state dollars. This is a complicated question. Northern Kentucky does pay more in tax to Frankfort than it gets back. But it is the nature of representative government that some places are always going to pay more than they get back and that some will be net beneficiaries. Government at every level is inherently redistributive as it tries to equalize the effect of its services and provide a parity of opportunity.
Northern Kentucky is prosperous enough to generate wealth enough not to need to be a perennial supplicant to state government for basic services.
Northern Kentucky is a big collection of small towns. But when a public function is too big for one to manage, Northern Kentucky does it together.
The Transit Authority of Northern Kentucky has operated under authority of the three counties for 50 years, and meets its market.
The Northern Kentucky water and sanitation districts manage their respective bailiwicks professionally and without regard to whose political nest is feathered.
BE NKY Growth Partnership is a top-twenty economic development entity in the nation; involved in initiatives in advanced manufacturing, life sciences, information technology, and supply chain management.
The Catalytic Fund is a source of grants, regional collaboration, and good energy in the communities it serves, as is the Ohio-Kentucky-Indiana Regional Council of Governments.
Northern Kentucky University, a quintessentially regional institution, is a source of graduates ready for the world of work, and a continuing source of good ideas and regional pride.
But perhaps the grandest example of regional cooperation, and perhaps the best idea Northern Kentucky ever had is entering the competition to be the home of a great regional airport, winning it, and persisting at it for three-quarters of a century: Cincinnati-Northern Kentucky International Airport. Where is there a better example of regional cooperation than the airport, whose aviation code comes from the name of a city where it’s not located, owned and operated by a county government also where it’s not located, and serving a public mostly in another state?
When Northern Kentucky needs to act collectively, it does.
Then there’s what might be called the Northern Kentucky Intangible. It’s the benefit of having 27 cities, 13 public-school districts. When a couple is deciding where to buy a home, when retailers scout locations, when companies make big decisions on plant locations, chances are they can find what they’re looking for in Northern Kentucky.
In multifariousness lies diversity, What flies politically in Dayton would probably be shot down like a trespassing drone in Fort Wright. Some want closed-in walkable neighborhoods, others want a half-acre lot with easy access to shopping. Here we can get both.
Smaller government means that when a policy isn’t working, it’s a lot easier to change course. Smaller makes for more cohesive communities, relatable neighborhoods. Small government means a citizen at the supermarket can have a decent conversation with the local mayor or city manager.
What some call Balkanization some others might think of as variety, a place for every palate.
Small cities make for friendly competition among them, keeps local governments, for the most part, lean and nimble.
Northern Kentucky’s method of regional cooperation and local autonomy has brought prosperity and a high quality of life. Multifariousness of place and regional cooperation when appropriate has delivered it. Why change? Small is beautiful.
Jim Dady is a journalist and lawyer. He and his lives in Bellevue.