Thursday, October 21, 1999
Group plans protest of jail location
BY RAY SCHAEFER
Enquirer Contributor
ELSMERE — Beth Wulfeck never thought she would spend Wednesday at the Elsmere Senior Center planning to protest a jail being built near her Autumn Road home.
Mrs. Wulfeck was one of 70 Northern Kentucky residents who attended a meeting to determine how to fight the Kenton Fiscal Court's decision last month to build the new county jail at a site off New Buffington Road in Elsmere.
“This is everybody's fight,” Mrs. Wulfeck said.
The meeting was organized by a group called People of Elsmere Against the Prison (PEAP). Organizers asked residents to join committees covering everything from contacting media to collecting signatures on petitions to attending city council meetings throughout Kenton County and neighboring Florence.
Proposals included:
• Filing a lawsuit against the county.
• Protesting in front of the homes of Kenton Judge-executive Dick Murgatroyd and fiscal court members Dan Humpert, Adam Koenig and Barb Black.
• Forming a 4.5-mile human chain from the TGI Friday's restaurant off Turkeyfoot Road in Crestview Hills to New Buffington Road.
“I'd be part of anything that would stop this jail,” said Greg Knight, who has lived on Feather Lane in Elsmere for about 15 years. “It appears to me the fiscal court is ignoring the will of the people, the will of the police departments, the will of the fire departments.”
A previous fiscal court recommended a site near Interstate 275 and Ky. 17 in Covington, but current county officials ruled out the so-called “3L” site because of what they said was the high cost of environmental cleanup at the former auto parts junkyard.
Mr. Koenig said Tuesday the Elsmere site was flat, had willing sellers and was environmentally clean.
Opponents complain that the Elsmere site is surrounded by subdivisions, has poor access, is one of the farthest from the Kenton County Courthouse in Covington and has a negative financial impact on one of Northern Kentucky's poorest cities.
As early as May, Elsmere was listed as one of four potential locations. But Mrs. Wulfeck, who is PEAP's spokeswoman, said Elsmere residents didn't protest before because they may have thought the 3L location was an obvious choice because it was closest to the jail.
“I really firmly believed that nobody thought it would go (in Elsmere),” Mrs. Wulfeck said. “It was such a dumb location.”
Shelli Phelps, who spent $800 on T-shirts bearing the words “No jailyards in our backyards,” said she and her husband would take drastic measures if the jail is built.
“My husband said we are going to get a gun and we are going to learn to use it,” Mrs. Phelps said. “We're getting additional security lights. I just can't believe this is happening.”
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