Hillsboro City Council overturns mayor's veto; OKs Marriott Hotel, electric aggregation ordinances

The first veto of Hillsboro Mayor Justin Harsha’s tenure was ultimately unsuccessful, as Hillsboro City Council overturned the veto in a split, somewhat contentious vote Thursday, Aug. 14.

As previously reported, council voted to revise the city’s pay ordinance June 12, following a 53-minute executive session called by city law director Randalyn Worley to discuss compensation (and by safety and service director Brianne Abbott to discuss properties).

The pay ordinance revision — the third such change since January 2024 — added or revised several positions and their salary or wage ranges. Those include: code enforcement/meter reader, $23 to $30 an hour (new position); victim rights director, $41,600 to $52,000 (changed from $20-$25/hour), plus a new, additional $30,000 per year for criminal and civil paralegal; paralegal - civil, $10,000 (changed from city building paralegal); and paralegal - criminal, $45,000-$55,000 (changed from municipal court paralegal). 

The code enforcement/meter reader position was revised at the meeting prior to its passage, following a motion from finance committee chair Mary Stanforth. The original legislation presented to council had the range at $23-$35 instead of the eventually approved $23-$30 range. 

Harsha sent a written notice of his veto and rationale June 18, with council president Tom Eichinger also reading Harsha’s objections at the July 17 city council meeting.

Harsha alleged that council member Kathryn Hapner’s vote was a “conflict of interest” due to the legislation “pertain[ing] to the salary of the Code Enforcement Officer,” as Hapner “had an unresolved, open code enforcement violation against her property.” Harsha further claimed that the passage of the ordinance at the June meeting was “premature and potentially in violation of recommended oversight and best practices for municipal governance,” as city auditor Dawson Barreras was still awaiting “a written legal opinion” on the draft of the ordinance. Finally, Harsha pointed out that the “recommendation for modification referenced in support of Ordinance 2025-20 did not explicitly identify or refer to a specific title or position.” Although the legislation was presumably discussed in executive session, there was no reason for the proposal given on the record, nor was there any discussion in open session on what changes were being made. 

At Stanforth’s request, the legislation was placed back on the agenda Aug. 15 for further review.

“I really think we need to have that back so we can get all the positions because they had added code enforcement and meter reader and also the paralegal,” Stanforth said. “Those positions, I feel, are very needed, and they need to be taken care of. I’d like us to reconsider that.”

In response to a question from council member Greg Maurer, Eichinger explained that it would take a two-thirds majority to “override the veto.” Stanforth made the motion, which was seconded by council member Jason Brown. 

The motion to override passed 5-2, with council members (and finance committee members) Maurer and Adam Wilkin dissenting. 

As Eichinger began to introduce the next portion of the agenda, soon-to-be safety and service director and current public works superintendent Shawn Adkins interrupted to refer to Harsha’s veto objections regarding Hapner.

“Does Ms. Hapner not have to abstain from this?” Adkins asked.

“I do not have an outstanding citation,” Hapner said. 

“Yes, you do,” council clerk Lauren Walker said.

“I would challenge you to show that to me, then, because I do not,” Hapner said. “I have a letter. I have no citation, so I’m not abstaining.”

In other action, council approved all of the legislation on their agenda Thursday, including passing another ordinance regarding the long-discussed Marriott Hotel development as an emergency. Bond counsel Richard Spoor was on hand to explain the proposal. 

Council voted 7-0 to suspend the three-reading rule and to approve and adopt the ordinance “authorizing the city’s participation in financing public improvements in cooperation with the [Southwest Ohio Regional Development] Port Authority and authorizing the execution of documents to effectuate such financing.”

As previously reported, both Hillsboro City Council and Hillsboro City Schools agreed in October 2019 to establish a tax increment financing [TIF] district for the proposed multimillion-dollar hotel project in the city of Hillsboro, near the state Route 73/Harry Sauner Road intersection. At the time of that approval, Spoor said that it would offset the cost of infrastructure, then estimated at $3 million.

An ordinance approved by the city in 2019 declared a five-acre tract at 1308 North West Street (state Route 73) “to be exempt from real property taxation” and “requiring annual statutory service payments in lieu of taxes.” The ordinance also creates the TIF fund for “the deposit of the balance of such statutory service payments.”

Council voted in May 2025 to suspend the three-reading rule and to approve and adopt an ordinance providing for the issuance and sale of not to exceed $3 million of special obligation development revenue bonds, series 2025 (Leo Capital/Hillsboro project), of the City of Hillsboro under Chapter 5709 of the Ohio Revised Code for the purpose of paying the cost of certain public improvements; authorizing a pledge of and lien on certain service payments to secure such bonds; authorizing the execution and delivery of a trust agreement to secure such bonds; and authorizing and approving related matters.

Spoor said Thursday that the new legislation approved in August will place the responsibility for the TIF administration on the Southwest Ohio Regional Development Authority, the port authority in Mount Orab, instead of the city administration.

“They would actually issue the bonds instead of the city,” Spoor said. “That way, the bond issue would not be on the books of the city, nor would there be any administrative duties involved, such as approving disbursement requests or handling annual administrative duties. 

“What it would involve would be the TIF money would come in — again, just to review, the TIF money is the increased taxes resulting from the development — those taxes would come from the county to the city, and then the city would assign those to the Mount Orab port authority, and they would pay off the bonds.”

Spoor added that “it does have an advantage to the city by taking it off the books of the city and also not putting the duty on the administration,” as he said the Southwest Ohio Regional Development Authority has done similar TIF administration for projects in the area.

Brown asked if the plan will “affect the revenue the city’s going to get.”

“No,” Spoor said. “The revenue is the TIF money, and that's pledged for the bonds, so whether the city issues bonds or the port authority, those monies are reserved to pay off the bonds, so it doesn't affect it.”

In answer to a question from Maurer, Spoor said the port authority would be involved for the previously approved 25-year term of the TIF agreement.

“All they would do is issue the bonds and then annually make payments, so there's really not a lot of duty involved,” Spoor said. “There's no reporting.

“It never was a true debt of the city, don't get me wrong, but now it's not even a non-debt. It’s on somebody else's books.”

Stanforth pointed out the city “has been dealing with this since 2019” and asked about this proposal coming up “all of a sudden.”

“Well, the port authority has always been there, but it's not always been issuing bonds,” Spoor said. “Also, there were some other incentives we're looking at to talk to the port authority about, and since we're going to be doing that, it makes sense to do the bond issue.
 
“I talked to them after a meeting in May on some other matters, and they said they'd be willing to do it, so that's how it came up.”

Brown asked “why” the port authority would agree and “what benefits” they would see “for taking this over.”

“It's part of what they do,” Spoor said. “The port authority is funded by the city of Mount Orab, and they also have fee income from a bond issue, so they'll get a small fee to issue the bond. It’s not much, but they get their income from other sources — sales tax exemptions, applications, things like that. 

“They're mainly doing it as a government function. They're not a business. They're doing it to help other governments.”

For an unrelated ordinance, council heard from senior energy consultant John Theibert of Aspen Energy before voting on a new deal for the city’s Electric Aggregation Program.

As previously reported, council voted in January 2023 approve an emergency ordinance to place an issue on the May 2 primary ballot for Hillsboro voters to consider an opt-out electric service aggregation program. Voters approved the measure in the May 2023 primary.

Under this plan, the city can “administer an opt-out governmental aggregation program that will automatically include all eligible electric accounts and will seek to aggregate the retail electric loads of consumers located in the City’s boundaries to negotiate the best rates for the supply of electric power,” according to legislation passed in 2023.

As noted by Theibert, the current two-year plan with Dynegy (formerly Energy Harbor) is at a rate of 6.59 cents per kilowatt hour and expires in October 2025. The new supplier plan approved by council is also with Dynegy, this time for 18 months at 9.56 cents per kilowatt hour.

Theibert said that for the residences and small businesses who opted into the current program, they have seen a combined savings of $738,440.

“We still have three more months of very high AEP rates, so that number is going to be right around $850,000 total when the program's done,” Theibert said. “Where AEP has been compared to our price, which is the blue line [in a graph he shared with council], we’ve been under the entire time. 

“This is a grand slam. This is exactly what you want. You want to be under AEP price the entire time. That's what we did, and it worked out perfectly, so again, it resulted in quite a bit of savings for the city.”

Unfortunately, Theibert said “capacity is reaching all-time highs for the next couple of years,” which will lead to increased prices for all energy consumers.

“There's nothing you can do about this,” he said. “This is our national grid. This is the operator that controls it, and they set these capacity marks. We're just all in for next couple years. People are going to be affected, and the main reason why this big increase is because AI and data centers have ballooned up everywhere. The grid's not ready for it.”

Theibert said the hope is that after the 18 months of the new contract, “the market can come down, and we can take advantage of” potential savings then. He also noted that the 9.56-cent rate is “about a penny lower” than AEP’s current 10.52-cent rate.

Brown asked about notifying residents, and Theibert said another letter with information about opting out will be sent out to residents. Anyone can opt in or out at any time, he said, and he encouraged anyone with questions or wanting to make a change to their participation status to contact him.

“If you don't do anything, you're in the program, but if you fill out the opt out that letter, you say, ‘No, I don't want to be in,’ you mail it back,” Theibert said. “Or you call me and you say, ‘No, I don’t want to be in,’ we’ll just mark you off, so it’s easy as that.”

An ordinance to amend appropriations for the city’s 2025 budget was also passed by a 7-0 vote. In July, council voted to repeal the city budget ordinance and to approve a new, revised ordinance in order to correct the previous legislation. That was done to account for a $1,840,000 over-appropriation.

Barreras said the revision passed Thursday was to “fix a typo in the last month's legislation to fix a fund account,” as one fund number was incorrect.

Council also approved two separate ordinances making supplemental appropriations for the city. The first was a $57,317.94 appropriation from Hillsboro City Schools to pay for their school resource officer through the city’s police department, while the second was a $2,544.97 appropriation “received through an insurance claim for a damaged police cruiser,” according to Barreras.

In other discussion:

• For a second straight month, Adkins gave the SSD’s report in the absence of Abbott, whose previously announced resignation is effective Sept. 12. 

For city construction projects, Adkins said the Beech and Railroad Street reconstruction is “99-percent complete,” with the development of several new parking lots in the uptown area set to “begin shortly” and paving of Harry Sauner Road “still scheduled for September.” Private developments in various stages of construction and/or planning include Aldi, Amazon, Glo Fiber and the aforementioned Marriott Hotel.

Adkins reported that the city issued 11 commercial and 19 residential building permits in July, while the Hillsboro Planning Commission “approved one variance and one site plan.” The Movies Under the Stars events hosted by the city each summer have also concluded for 2025.

Adkins also addressed the council president and law director under new business to make a request to have Municipal Court added to the monthly reports submitted to council.

“I’d like to have a report given by the judge in municipal court on how many cases they handle per month and have them separated out whether they're city or county,” Adkins said. “I’d also like to request either the law director or the judge to apply for the VOCA [Victims of Crime Act] grant to help pay for the victims rights [advocate]. We used to apply for that. It's quite a bit of money that would help pay for the salary.

“All other departments are required to give reports. I have not seen any reports from the court. I'd like to see how many cases are actually county cases versus city cases.”

Worley said that Adkins would need to talk to the judge and/or chief clerk at municipal court, as they would have control over the reports. 

Adkins acknowledged he doesn’t “have any control over [Worley] or the judge” and asked how such a request could be made.

“I mean, if council's requesting reports, that's fine,” Worley said. “If the safety and service director wants reports, I can give reports to whomever wants reports. That's not a problem. The reports for the cases, though, will have to come from the judge and the clerk. I don't have those reports.”

Eichinger said they would “draft a request.”

• During the citizens’ comments portion of the meeting, council heard from an uptown property owner who had a heated exchange with Harsha and Eichinger, as the property owner expressed concerns about a notice from the city’s code enforcement officer.

The property owner said he sent an email to “most of you guys” detailing his concerns and said that he came to the meeting because “the mayor doesn’t return phone calls.” Harsha said he was advised by Worley “not to contact” the property owner due to threats of litigation in the property owner’s email.

The property owner repeatedly asked for the “qualifications” of the code enforcement officer, and he asked Harsha for his opinions on the safety of the building in question.

The exchange continued for approximately five minutes before Eichinger intervened, telling the property owner “this is not a council issue.

“If you look at your letter that you got, there is provision in there for you to appeal this to the board of zoning appeals,” Eichinger said. “Your avenue for resolving this isn't here at council.”

The property owner and Eichinger then went back and forth for another minute or two before the property owner and Harsha then sparred again for a couple minutes. The discussion concluded with the property owner again threatening litigation against the city. 

• Stanforth said that the finance committee met July 21 to review a wage study conducted for the city.

“The study compared the city's current paid ranges to 17 comparable municipalities and counties,” Stanforth said. “The consultant recommended adopting a proposed wage scale, including eight pay grades. The committee decided that further discussion was needed, as a couple of positions were missing. The committee will meet at a future date.”

• Barreras said “minimal changes” to the city’s handbook will be completed this month for the civil service/employee relations committee’s review.

• Harsha declined to give a mayor’s report.

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