EDGEWOOD — Northern Kentucky's long-awaited community college will be built in Boone County, with satellite operations in Covington and the Northern Kentucky suburbs, Gov. Paul Patton is to announce today.

        The main campus of the two-year college is to be built on Mount Zion Road, but classes will also be offered in Covington and most likely Edgewood, sources confirmed Tuesday.

        Details of the $10 million state-funded project will be announced this morning in Edgewood by Mr. Patton and Michael McCall, president of the Kentucky Community and Technical College System.

        Bryan Armstrong, director of public relations for the community and technical college system, declined comment Tuesday on specifics of the announcement.

        “This will be a very comprehensive approach to providing students community and technical education opportunities in the region,” Mr. Armstrong said.

        Northern Kentucky is the largest area of the state without a college offering a two-year degree program. The nearest two-year college in the state is in Maysville, about 60 miles east of Covington.

        Community colleges offer two-year degrees and provide a steppingstone for students to pursue a four-year bachelor's degree.

        Northern Kentucky University was started as a two-year community college in 1968 and became a four-year school in 1972.

        The community-college system began to expand in 1999, after the Kentucky General Assembly passed a bill — sponsored by House Majority Caucus Chairman Jim Callahan, D-Wilder — that basically took control of the system away from the University of Kentucky and turned it over to the state.

        Last year the Kentucky General Assembly appropriated $10 million to develop a Northern Kentucky community college.

        The sources did not know precisely where in Boone County the project will be built, only that it will be on land the state has purchased or is close to purchasing on Mount Zion Road, an east/west corridor that has an interchange at Interstate 75 between Florence and Richwood.

        Sources also said community-college classes will be offered at some or all of the existing technical schools in Northern Kentucky, which are in Edgewood, Park Hills and Highland Heights.

        Classes will also be offered in Covington's urban center, but the exact location has not been determined.

        Last week Mr. McCall and members of Southbank, a group coordinating development in Northern Kentucky's river cities, toured potential locations at or near the intersection of Seventh and Washington streets and in Peaselburg on a grassy vacant lot along I-75.

        Though the main campus won't be in Covington, at least some classes will be offered there, said Covington Schools Superintendent Jack Moreland.

        “I'm reasonably sure there will be a presence in the city of Covington or in the urban core area of Northern Kentucky,” Mr. Moreland said Tuesday.

        “It's important to the citizens who live down here and who can't or won't travel outside of the city to get higher education at a technical or community college,” he said.

        Fall enrollment in the state's community college and technical school system reached a record 69,031 students, a 15 percent increase over 2000, Mr. McCall announced Sept. 14.

        The reasons he mentioned for the growth were:

        • Increased student recruitment efforts.

        • Enrollment in distance learning via the Internet grew 300 percent between 2000 and 2001, enrolling 5,100 students total.

        • More courses for which students receive college credit for work force training.

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