BY JANE PRENDERGAST
The Cincinnati Enquirer
COVINGTON -- Neighbors tired of being washed out by the perennial flooding of the Banklick Creek are looking for help from the courts, suing Kenton County, 10 cities and two planning agencies.
Resident Albert Carson, acting as a representative of others who live around the Banklick Creek Watershed, says the governmental entities involved should be held responsible for developing in the area without an adequate storm water control plan. Development, he says in the suit, has dramatically increased the flow rate and quantity of storm water that "invades" neighborhood houses. If certified as a class action, as the lawsuit requests, the outcome could affect thousands of landowners in the watershed area.
Also named in the lawsuit: the cities of Fort Wright, Fort Mitchell, Crestview Hills, Edgewood, Independence, Covington, Taylor Mill, Erlanger, Elsmere and Lakeside Park; the Northern Kentucky Area Planning Commission; and the Kenton County and Municipal Planning and Zoning Commission.
County officials plan to argue that the county, as an arm of state government, should be immune from the suit.
"In fact, we're a victim in it," said County Attorney Garry Edmondson. "It keeps blowing out Pioneer Park."
The county owns the park, which floods several times a year. Every time, he said, it costs the county money in repairs.
The neighbors' suit, filed in Kenton Circuit Court, also claims the water problems have made the houses in the area unlivable and unsellable.
They want compensation for cleanup expenses, loss of personal property and damages for emotional distress.
