The Cincinnati Enquirer from Cincinnati, Ohio • Page 86

Tomorrow: First-class shots A joint project between The Enquirer and Bigg's lets first-graders capture the first day of school in photographs. The Cincinnati Enquirer HOMSPOWN News tips: Editor: Nancy Beriier 768-8395, Fax 860-5190! Saturday, Skptember 9, 1995 B3 Covering Hamilton County west of 1-75 Fair traffic study urged. Forest Park wants Fairfield to split cost BY SUE KIESEWETTER Enquirer Contributor Officials in Forest Park want to improve access and alleviate traffic congestion around Forest Fair Mall and are willing to help pay for a study to look at long-term solutions. just east of South Gilmore, said Fairfield Councilman Jeff Holte-gel. "Our biggest concern is if that area bogs down, will we lose people because emergency vehicles couldn't get through and ambulances couldn't get to the hospital," Holtegel said.

"What we're looking for are alternatives to a barrier," said Ray Hodges, Forest Park city manager. "The study will go way beyond a barrier." For almost a year, Fairfield has been studying possible road changes to improve traffic flow through the corridor. Under a 1979 agreement, a 2.4-mile stretch of Winton-South Gilmore was annexed to Fairfield from Forest Park, which gives Fairfield authority over the roadway. Earlier this year, Lockwood Jones Beals Inc. prepared a five-step approach to improve traffic flow which included a recommendation that barriers be erected to prevent left turns from the westbound Interstate 275 off-ramp onto Omniplex DriveForest Fair Mall Drive.

Although Fairfield council has taken no action on that recommendation, it prompted some businesses in Forest Park to sue Fairfield, asking that the road be returned to Forest Park. That complaint is set for trial in June 1996, said John Clem-mons, Fairfield's law director. $35,000 for a traffic engineering study to be done jointly by CDS Associates Forest Park's engineers; and Lockwood Jones Beals, Fairfield's engineers. If approved by both cities, the $70,000 cost would be evenly split. The proposed 36-week study would look at WintonSouth Gilmore between Smiley Road in Forest Park and Mack Road in Fairfield.

Recommendations would be made on improving intersections, traffic flow and access from Interstate 275. Included in the report would be cost estimates and funding sources. Winton Road becomes South Gilmore Road when it crosses from Forest Park into Fairfield. Fairfield council has not yet set a date to discuss the matter. "It's a good idea, I think there is value to both communities looking at it long-range, but it cannot be the only thing being looked at," said Cheryl Hilvert, Fairfield city manager.

"We can't wait and watch traffic break down." Besides providing access to several businesses in both cities, the road is the major access to Mercy Hospital on Mack Road, Officials in adjacent Fairfield are not opposed to a long-range study, but are more interested in immediate solutions to keep traffic flowing along WintonSouth Gilmore Road. This week, Forest Park City Council authorized spending up to Bar-coded ID cards help track Princeton students mt W1-Hf 1 i 'TSIIIISlSIifi llfelS! tfMWim' i iii tum iff Mmmm. YOUR TOWN School board to vote on pact MOUNT HEALTHY The Mount Healthy school board meets Monday to vote on a three-year teachers' contract that the Mount Healthy Teachers Association ratified Aug. 31. High school business teacher Johnnie Huston, association president, said 92 of the 220 teachers voting favored the 1995-98 contract.

It calls for 2.7 salary increases in the first year; 2.25 raises the second year; and 3.75 raises the third year, she said. During 1995-96, that would raise the average Mount Healthy teacher's salary from $39,733 to $40,806. Though the association asked for at least 3 percent raises annually, "We felt that the board had given us basically what they could afford to give us," Huston said Friday. Superintendent Joseph Epplen declined comment until the board ratifies a contract. Tax-sharing deal approved FOREST PARK An agreement spelling out when enterprise zone tax sharing between the Winton Woods school board and Forest Park City Council is appropriate was approved by Forest Park this week.

City manager Ray Hodges was authorized to enter into the agreement with the school district. Under the agreement, the school district would receive payments on property with a tax abatement in an enterprise zone only when the new development had a payroll of $1 million or more. Hodges said there will be few cases where it will be invoked. "Most of the areas we have remaining are at the (Forest Fair) mall or Omniplex Complex," Hodges said. "We don't normally provide abatement on retail projects.

The smaller, industrial parcels we have left probably won't generate payrolls of $1 million or more but if they do, we're ready." Athletes to be honored GLENDALE John and Joe Saunders, former residents who dominated track and field events in the 1930s, will be remembered Sunday when the village renames a local park for them in a dedication ceremony. John Saunders, 76, who now lives in Kennedy Heights, was inducted into the National High School Sports Hall of Fame last summer. His brother Joe died of cancer in 1988. The ceremony will begin at 4 p.m. at Saunders Park on Washington Avenue.

Children in Glendale Youth Sports organization will participate in a "fun run" from nearby Washington Park to the ceremony. Mayor Alec Brockmeier will present Saunders a proclamation and plaque, and his trophies will be displayed in a case at Town Hall. "It will be a festive occasion," said Councilman Dr. Thomas Todd, who helped organize the event. Me 1 zr i J.

mmmmmm i I i 1 "'fL'n II i i if1 1 mm1 p. 1 X- "helped us find out where kids were a lot quicker," Lima principal Mitchell Black said Friday. "A lot of times when you're dealing with a large student body, you don't get it done until 1 p.m. or 1:30 p.m. and the day's almost over." Outside the seventh- and eighth-grade offices, keypads will be mounted at the junior high for Princeton students who forget their cards.

With the keypads and scanners taking over roll call duty for homeroom teachers, "we can eliminate the homeroom," Mackey said. Students "go to their first-period teacher right off the bat." The card also protects anonymity of students who qualify for free and reduced-price lunches, since it acts as either a debit card for non-qualifying students or a pass for those receiving free lunches. "Now, with everybody using a card, it's absolutely impossible to tell," said Linda Bass Wiley, the food service director, who hopes more of the 25 percent of students qualifying for reduced price lunches will take advantage of the program. With students' cafeteria purchases downloaded into a computer, Bass Wiley easily can generate state reports that once had to be entered by hand. And head cashier Barbara Prather said cafeteria workers spend less time counting change.

"In the long run, it's really going BY KATHLEEN HILLENMEYER The Cincinnati Enquirer SHARONVILLE About three hours into the eighth-grade English teacher Mike Pogue learns which of his Princeton Junior High School students are absent that day. But by then, he's taught two sections and the third-period bell has rung. Bar-coded identification cards, which students will slide over scanners at the school's main entrances, soon will eliminate that wait by generating a computerized list of students who arrive by 8:30 a.m. "With the new system, I'll know right away who should be here during the day," Pogue said. This month, Princeton Junior High students will get laminated photo ID cards, replacing temporary bar-coded cards they now use in the cafeteria and school library.

An attendance checking function, which the district is piloting at the junior high, will be added to automate monitoring of the school's 1,100 students. "We'll be able to get an attendance list out about three hours earlier than we have in the past," said principal Aaron Mackey, who modeled the program after a system used at Lima Senior High School in Lima, Ohio. Princeton is the first Hamilton County district to use the system, developed by former principal John Hoke's Kettering-based IAMCARD Inc. Installed at Lima Senior High in 1993, the card scanners UK. I f1' ,1, V'.

I i( 1 i' ii 11 ta, PMKHjtltfdr itsstp -Kfiiri sl'm, 51 1 I1 The Cincinnati EnquirerDick Swaim Temporary cards will be replaced by laminated photo ID cards. to make things easier," Prather said. "Eventually, we could go to a cashless line." For students whose wallets might only have contained photos and a season pass to Kings Island, keeping track of the new cards might be difficult, 13-year-old Stephanie Seiter said. "But it's less money to lose," the Spring-dale eighth-grader added. "We don't really have to bring money to school because the card is like money," said Lee Cureton, 12, of Lincoln Heights.

Last year, librarian Sue Ap-king used a more cumbersome bar code system. When students checked out books, she asked their names, looked them up by HjaiiiithHUi4i4iiM iH? sUiil iHUii Uih Ltui i ruin i ri ggSBSSgaiT1 1 The Cincinnati EnquirerDick SwSim Zack Ketring, 13, slides his bar-coded ID through a register in the cafeteria at Princeton Junior High School. homeroom in a 2-inch-thick bind- card, er of bar codes, then scanned the appropriate code. Occasionally, students posed "We feel verv secure that as other students a prank they when they have their card, we're won't easily get away with now checking it out to the right stu- that each carries a personalized dent," Apking said. Superintendent list narrows Princeton school board sorting through prospects BY KATHLEEN HILLENMEYER The Cincinnati Enquirer SHARONVILLE After 86 applicants nationwide applied for the job, the Princeton school mil WfwA -wi I IL i I 1: i.il 1 board starts sorting through prospects today to succeed Superintendent Richard Denoyer.

Consultants from the Illinois-based firm Hazard, Young and Associates are to present the board with five or six candidates in a closed session this morning, school board Presi- During private meetings set for Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday, the board will narrow the field to two or three finalists for second interviews, Goetz said. "We will not be exposing a candidate to the public until it's down to the final (one)," he said. "That candidate will be coming in for a full day in the district," allowing parents, teachers and other district a chance to meet the prospective administrator. "I'm glad they're still intending to involve the community," said Kathy Carlberg, a Sharonville mother who had asked the board to include parents, teachers, administrators, support staff and business professionals on its search team. "I would hope that the community, in order for this to really matter, would be able to hear this candidate and provide input before the decision is finalized," said Carlberg, vice president of Princeton Junior High School's parent-faculty group.

CONGRATS Doctor to be councilor Louis Brockmeier of Glendale will be sworn in as a councilor at the Academy of Medicine of Cincinnati on Sept. 28. Brockmeier is the director of cardiology and the assistant director of the department of medicine at Providence Hospital. Jonathan Schuermann of West-wood is the recipient of a Memorial Scholarship from the National Foundation for Ectodermal Dysplasias. The award is based on scholastic achievements, community service and extracurricular accomplishments.

Schuermann is a graduate of St. Xavier High School and a student at St. Louis University. Christopher Travis of North College Hill has qualified for the AP Scholar with Honor Award. Travis is a 1995 graduate of North College High School.

Please send announcements of community honors, achievements, promotions and activities with pictures to Phyllis Greene, Enquirer Tricounty Bureau, 4820 Business Center Way, Cincinnati 45246. Or call 860-7102 4 J- dent Richard Goetz said Friday. 0 Boarc members remain on track witn tneir goal 01 naming The Cincinnati EnquirerErnest Coleman Wheee! Elizabeth Helphinstine, Oxford, left, and Kathryn Bishop, Westwood, enjoy the Harvest Home Fair on Friday. Goetz Denoyer's successor in Octo ber, he said. During the spring, Denoyer announced plans to step down from the post which he's held for 20 years in July 1996.

Hotel builder gave blacks a place for social events DAYBOOK ALLEN HOWARD NEIGHBORHOODS tribute to an African-American businessman who believed that self-help was the greatest tool against racial prejudice. The business hall of fame induction ceremony is sponsored by Junior Achievement of Greater Cincinnati and the Cincinnati Historical Society, a division of the Cincinnati Museum Center. ROSELAWN: The first Taste of Rose-lawn will be 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sunday at the Valley Shopping Center in the 7600 block of Reading Road.

It will feature food, entertainment and a rededication of the Roselawn Wishing Well in the center. The event is sponsored by the Rose-lawn Business Association and the Rose-lawn Community Council. MOUNT ADAMS: NIP Magazine will celebrate its 40th birthday from 5 to 8 p.m. Monday at Cincinnati's Playhouse in the Park in Eden Park. Under new ownership, SESH the monthly magazine is planning for distribution throughout the Tristate.

Community events Forest Park: A Punt, Pass and Kick competition will be held 10 a.m. at Winton Woods High School, 1231 W. Kemper Road. Open to children ages 8-15. Call 595-5252 for information.

Wyoming: Fall Festival; 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Wyoming Avenue business district. Civil War fashion show, food and music. dren.

But that's not the real Horace Sudduth story. His dream to build a first-class hotel for African-Americans started in the early 20th century, when he traveled the country as a Pullman porter and had to stay in rundown boarding houses in inner-city ghettos because of racial discrimination. While he was required to offer first-class service on a train, he wasn't allowed to stay in first-class hotels when the train stopped. "He was probably Cincinnati's most notable African-American citizen," said Ernie Waits, a retired businessman and an understudy of Sudduth. "I learned a lot from him.

He believed firmly that African-Americans should create businesses, and he set the example. "The Manse Hotel, in its heydey, was unquestionably one of the finest hotels in the country for African-Americans." By the late 1960s, a dusty ballroom with smudged carpeting and a transient clientele were all that was left of Sudduth's dream. The building and its annex were renovated into an apartment complex in the late 1970s. A hall of fame honor will be a fitting A If he were alive today, Horace Sudduth wouldn't recognize what remains of the legacy he left at 1047 Chapel Ave. in Walnut Hills.

What used to be the Manse Hotel where the upper class of African-American society held social functions has withered to a low-income apartment complex. Time destroyed some of it. Time brought about social change in the late 1950s when African-Americans were no longer barred from hotels in downtown Cincinnati. By the mid-1950s, it became a less prestigious place to hold functions for African-Americans. Time changed the Walnut Hills neighborhood around it, too.

But unscathed is the vision Sudduth had when he built the hotel in 1937. For that vision and many other ventures, he will be inducted into the Greater Cincinnati Business Hall of Fame on Sept. 20, along with three others. He will be the first African-American inducted in the five-year history of the organization. Sudduth, a former redcap and Pullman porter, will be named along with Arthur C.

Avril, president of Sakrete Clement L. Buenger, former chairman of the board and retired chief executive officer of Fifth Third Bank; and the late Powel Crosley president of the Crosley Radio Corp. and Crosley Manufacturing Co. The honors will be bestowed at a black-tie dinner starting at 6 p.m. in the Westin Hotel with Baseball Hall of Famer Johnny Bench serving as master of ceremonies.

Most accounts show Sudduth was born in 1888 and died in 1957. He started the Creative Realty Co. in 1910 and Industrial Federal Savings in 1919 both in Cincinnati. He headed the National Negro Business League, was a catalyst for building the old Ninth Street YMCA and was a president of the New Orphan Asylum for Colored Chil- HOW TO REACH US Address 4820 Business Center Way, Cincinnati 45246 Telephone 860-71 00, 1 -800-336-7003 Fax 860-5190 Jim Rohrer 860-7114 Assistant Suburban Editor. Allen Howard writes a neighborhood column every Saturday.

Call him at 768-8362 or write him at The Enquirer, 312 Elm Cincinnati 45202..