By Cindi Andrews
The Cincinnati Enquirer

LEBANON - The Warren County commissioners blocked the sale of lots in a new subdivision Tuesday in a highly unusual 2-1 decision that once again pitted them against home builders.

The latest section of Regency Park already had been approved by Hamilton Township officials and county Planning Director Bob Craig as meeting regulations, and the commissioners' vote to accept a plat, or layout, of a subdivision usually is little more than a technicality.

OTHER ACTION

In other action Tuesday, the Warren County commissioners: Decided to appeal a ruling in favor of a proposed Union Township landfill to the Ohio Supreme Court. Today's the deadline for appealing a 12th District Court of Appeals decision. The commissioners refused several years ago to rezone 59 acres for a new landfill next to the closed Bigfoot Run landfill. Warren County Common Pleas Court and the appeals court, however, both sided with trash companies BFI and Allied Waste and against the commissioners. Said they're going to consider increasing the county's share of the real estate transfer tax from $2 per $1,000 of property value to $3 per $1,000. The state already collects $1, for a potential total of $4 per $1,000. The commissioners set public hearings on the proposal for 10:30 a.m. Feb. 11 and 10:30 a.m. Feb. 18. The increase would raise an additional $1 million a year, officials said, helping the county through the bad economy. Passed a $44.2 million budget that includes four new hires for the common pleas and county courts, and six new hires for the sheriff's department, according to Budget Director Tiffany Ferrell-Sauer. Law enforcement is 49 percent of the budget next year, compared to 41 percent this year, she said. General operating expenditures also rise from 40 percent of the budget to 44 percent. The construction budget goes from almost 10 percent of the budget to zero, and social services spending drops from 7 percent to 5 percent.

Lots cannot be sold and houses cannot be built until the commissioners accept the plats and the county records them.

"We're going to pull the trigger while we've got the gun in our hand," Commissioner Mike Kilburn said.

Mr. Kilburn said his aim is to slow growth, and that the trustees haven't done enough to staunch the flood of homes to Hamilton Township. The plat the commissioners refused to act on Tuesday is the fifth section of Regency Park, a subdivision that is planned for 877 homes.

"They don't get it," he said. "They're not good stewards - they've proven that they're not."

Commissioner Larry Crisenbery joined Mr. Kilburn in refusing to approve the plat until they talk to the township trustees and get an opinion on their options from the Warren County Prosecutor's Office.

But Hamilton Township Trustee Clyde Baston said the commissioners have no business second-guessing the township.

"That's why we have our own zoning," he said Tuesday evening. "Just because Mike Kilburn is mad at the Home Builders Association for not backing him is his problem, not ours."

The Home Builders Association of Greater Cincinnati and its members donated thousands of dollars to his opponent, Carolyn Tepe, and Mr. Kilburn has been on the offensive since winning re-election Nov. 5. He also delayed until January a rezoning request that would allow Robert C. Rhein Interests Inc. to build 390 homes at Butler-Warren and Hamilton roads in Turtlecreek Township.

"Somebody asked me the other day what I was going to do now that the election was over, and I said, `I'm going to keep doing what I've been doing, only more of it,'" Mr. Kilburn said Tuesday.

Terry Sievers, president of the home builders group, said he has never heard of a plat approval being delayed because of objections to growth. The commissioners' action on Regency Park is a breach of trust, he said.

"You get to the last step after you've sunk tons of money into this, and somebody says, `I've changed my mind,'" he said.

Officials with MI Schottenstein Homes, the developer of Regency Park, could not be reached for comment.

Pat South was the only commissioner who voted to approve the plat, saying it would be unfair to do otherwise.

"We do need to take active steps to slow (growth) down," she said. "What I'd like to see us do is not just arbitrarily, with the subdivision that's before us today, say, `It stops here.'"

County Prosecutor Tim Oliver confirmed that his office has received a request to clarify whether the commissioners can halt subdivisions by refusing to sign plats for them. Prosecutors - who represent the county commissioners - have not responded but will do so "rather quickly," Mr. Oliver said.

E-mail candrews@enquirer.com