Below is the full text of the letter Ms. Lexi Dole read at the Tuesday, March 7, 2023. I was not able to attend the meeting due to my travel obligations for work. That evening City council voted 5-1 to approve $300,000 for the West Road overpass. All through the process, this was advertised as a 100% Ohio Department of Transportation (ODOT) Safety Grant. I would encourage you to continue to write your state representative and senator, encouraging them to keep their promises, fully fund this projects like this, or quit collecting state taxes for roads and let local governments figure out how best to build, maintain and improve our road ways. What does the state and federal government do well? I would suggest that our city needs to be freed from the shackles of a large repressive state and federal government. This is why I support state wide initiatives, like ranked choice voting, ballot access for third parties and the Convention of States.
West Road Overpass
Dear Mayor and Council,
I would like to apologize for missing yet another council meeting, especially with tonight’s important vote. I have started a new position at The Modal Shop, as a Product Specialist III, that will require quite a bit of travel in my first year as I learn the products and meet with customers. Going forward I should be able to schedule my travel around council meetings, with the hope that I won’t miss any more meetings this year. While I have missed two council meeting in a row, I believe the record will show that I’ve missed very few council meetings during my 5+ years on council.
On a very dark and rainy night in September of 2018 a 55-year-old woman, Tracy Ann Davidson, aka “John Wayne”, was found deceased on the West Rd overpass. I don’t think anyone that has ever driven over, walked across or ridden their bicycle over, would have been surprised that this happened. It’s unfortunate that a fatality made everyone in this community gravely aware that pedestrian access over this bridge was long overdue.
I have blueprints that date the design of this bridge from 1959 as the Federal Highway interstate system was being developed and Interstate 74 passed through Harrison connecting Cincinnati to Indianapolis and changing our city forever. At the time this overpass was surrounded by fields of hay, corn and soybeans. Cornerbrook was the only road in the nearby area that had any houses. Soon after the completion of the Interstate and in large part due to its construction, our town began to grow. We went from a village to a city, a new High school was built in the late 60’s at the corner of Dry Fork and West Road. Roughly 10 years later a new high school was built adjacent to the existing high school that was destined to become the Junior high school. The next thirty years would see the addition of three new subdivisions to the northeast of the overpass and the addition of an elementary school and new junior high on the Southwest Local School district campus. To the southwest we have seen much commercial development including not one, but two Kroger grocery stores built as well as numerous shopping and restaurants, including a new development being planned across from the existing Kroger supermarket. Harrison was once known for its many churches, fast food restaurants and corn fields. The cornfields are quickly disappearing and we are the fastest growing municipality in western Hamilton County! At the next streets committee following the fatality on September 9th, 2018 we were told nothing could be done. Perhaps the city could place a sidewalk up to the bridge and maybe add some lights and signage, but that the bridge itself was owned by the Ohio Department of Transportation (ODOT). Through the network I had developed while advocating for the Motocross track, I contacted Caroline Duffy of 143 Engineers and she told me that this would be a perfect project for ODOT safety money and that these kinds of project were funded 100% by the state. We began the process by contracting 143 Engineers to perform a traffic count. This traffic count used cameras and recoded numerous pedestrians crossing the bridge on foot and bicycle, many of the pedestrians being school age. At this point the city’s long time engineering firm, JMA took over and stepped out the process to obtain the design of a 7-foot-wide pedestrian bridge along the northwest side of the bridge with planned construction for spring of 2023. In January it was reported to Jim Leslie, our public works director that inflation took the project from $1 to $1.8 million. The State was able to find another $500k in state funding but claimed they could not honor the 100% funding that they had promised, so tonight here we are voting to approve $300k in city funds so that the project forward can move forward this year.
I feel like the State of Ohio broke their promise to the citizens of Harrison. While I realize that the state had no way to know that we would experience inflation that we haven’t seen since the late 70’s and early 80’s, it’s was never mentioned in our discussions that this project would be funded at anything less than 100%. This puts our city council in a very difficult position, do we vote to fund the remaining $300,000 to fund this project, from a budget measured in millions not the state’s billions, or do we wait until next year for the state to perhaps fund the project at 100% as promised. Why can’t the state keep their promise to the residents in the Harrison area? What happens if the project costs climb over $2 million next year? More importantly, what happens if a pedestrian is injured or killed in the meantime? I do not envy the position my fellow council members are in this evening, my prayers are with you as you cast your vote.
I have encouraged everyone I know to send a letter to State Representative Cindy Abrams and State Senator Louis W. “Bill” Blessing, III. The letters I wrote to each of them are posted on my Facebook page for you to use as a template. No matter the vote tonight I would encourage you to continue sending letters, encouraging our local state elected officials to lobby their fellow state legislators for the funds that our state promised.
Sincerely, Michael L. Mains
Harrison City Councilman
Update 5/20/2024
This project was recently completed check out the article that was written by the city back in November.
“Councilmember Mike Mains pretty much spearheaded this project,” said Harrison Mayor Bill Neyer. “We gave him the support but he was the driving force behind it.”
SIDEWALK COMPLETED ON WEST ROAD OVERPASS
https://www.harrisonohio.gov/CivicAlerts.aspx?AID=357
Mike for Ohio 
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