By John Kiesewetter
The Cincinnati Enquirer

FAIRFIELD TWP. - Michael A. Fox has lost his name from the highway he championed, has lost the support of his own Republican Party, and could well lose his county commission job this fall.

But the colorful political maverick hasn't lost his sense of humor.

Butler County commissioner and former state representative Mike Fox talks on the phone in "The Cave", his dark and cluttered home office in Liberty Township. (Glenn Hartong photo)

"Come out the 'Butler County Veterans Highway,' " says Fox, laughing as he gives directions to his home in this Butler suburb.

Everyone else calls it the "Michael A. Fox Highway." But not for long. Gov. Bob Taft soon will sign legislation changing the name of the Ohio 129 freeway that links Interstate 75 to Hamilton, county seat in the fast-growing northern Greater Cincinnati area.

State Sen. Scott Nein, a Republican at odds with Fox, pushed the name-change legislation. Nein said such public works shouldn't be named for active politicians.

It's the latest blow for Fox in a bitter battle with leaders of his own party that could mean the end of the road for a 29-year political career, which includes seven years as commissioner following his resignation from the Ohio legislature after ethics violations.

That Republicans - who by tradition follow the national party's decades-old "11th commandment" of never speaking ill of a fellow Republican - are going after one of their own top vote-getters is a measure of Fox's ability to anger people with his noisy, charge-ahead style.

"I probably have a knack for making more people mad than other people," Fox reflects. "And the ones I make mad, I make real mad."

Those he's angered lately include:

• Butler domestic and juvenile court judges, furious after Fox issued a scathing 78-page report last year charging widespread violations of people's rights.

• Lakota Schools and West Chester leaders who were, if not mad, at least irritated by Fox's sudden push last month for special tax financing districts. They decided to discard his plan and develop their own.

• The Butler County Republican Party, which refused to endorse his re-election in November. Prodded by state GOP leaders, the party backed off a plan to run popular legislator Greg Jolivette against Fox in the March primary. But that did not stop Fox from recruiting more than 100 in a "self-defense" move challenging county party Central Committee members.

• Charles Chappell, West Chester developer and long-time GOP activist, who filed an ethics complaint against Fox alleging travel-expense abuses. Chappell admits his complaint is retaliation for Fox's challenge to the county party leadership.

Says Carlos Todd, county party chairman: "Mike has not helped himself. He has state senators, legislators and other prominent people adamantly against what he's done."

Stepping on big toes

Fox still has many admirers, those who have watched him lead the successful efforts to overhaul the county's children's services agency, build a new jail without raising taxes, and land the new highway,

"He gets things done," says Sam Fishman, a World War II veteran who lives in West Chester. "He steps on a lot of toes, but I guess you have to to get things done."

But Fox has stepped on the wrong ones in the past year.

"The battle I had with the Domestic Relations Court was a political disaster," Fox says today. "It's the most costly political battle of my career. It may cost me the election."

Domestic Relations Court Judge Leslie Spillane, who helped Chappell compile an Ohio Ethics Commission complaint against Fox in April, describes Fox as a meddler, a grandstander seeking headlines by helping the "common man," and a bully. Fox will call officials late at night from his cluttered basement office - "The Cave" - and send e-mails at 2:30 a.m.

"He wears everybody out, by sheer force of will," Spillane says. "But Mike has brought on this one himself. For Mike, it's his way or the highway - and that's a terrible pun."

Fox agrees that his biggest enemy is himself. His bounced checks cost an appointment to Gov. George Voinovich's cabinet in 1991. Accepting plane tickets from a lobbyist resulted in his censure by Ohio House peers, who stripped him of his Education Committee chairmanship in 1997. Four months later, he resigned to become commissioner, which pays him $69,808 annually.

"I've never had any political adversary more damaging to me than me," Fox says, laughing again. "I've done some really stupid things that were embarrassing and wrong. I wish I hadn't done them, but I did."

At times, Fox feels his most trusted companion is his well-worn 1993 Chevy Caprice - 294,520 miles and counting. That's what he drives each Friday evening to play in Bluegrass Club jam sessions in the small Butler city of Trenton, his getaway from politics.

It's Fox season again

This isn't the first time it's been open season on Fox. He was criticized in the legislature for proposing outside-the-box issues such as school vouchers and workfare for welfare recipients, before they became politically popular.

"One of my talents is thinking outside the box. If I see a hurdle, I try to go around it, or under it ... to solve a problem. I'm proud of that," says Fox, who served 22 years in the Ohio House. He was elected in 1974 at age 25.

But being different - and difficult - comes with a price. "Sometimes when you climb out of the box, you get eaten," he says.

His plan to create a Butler County Transportation Improvement District to build the "Hamilton connector" and two new Interstate 75 interchanges in the 1990s was opposed by state highway officials, Hamilton leaders, county engineers and Butler County residents. But the legislature approved it, paving the way for the Union Centre interchange in 1997 and the Fox Highway in 1999.

"Everything we were doing had never been done. So the state told local officials that was a hare-brained idea of Fox that won't work," Fox recalls. "There's nothing being said about me today that wasn't said at virtually every interval of my career."

Fox's vision not shared

Now Lakota and West Chester officials are questioning his latest obsession - placing unbuilt subdivisions into special taxing districts to pay for road and infrastructure improvements under a law intended to revitalize blighted neighborhoods.

At Fox's urging, commissioners rushed to announce "residential incentive districts" in May for unbuilt subdivisions in Liberty, Fairfield, Ross and West Chester townships with little warning to township or school officials. Fox proposed giving Lakota $64 million over 30 years, more than the schools would have collected in taxes without the districts. But Lakota officials questioned the legality of Fox's plan, and rejected it.

Fox fumes over those who don't share his tax-financing vision.

"This opportunity will define the character and quality of life for a generation, if we're able to pull this off. And when I see (Republican legislators) Gary Cates, Shawn Webster and Scott Nein working against this, I want to absolutely choke the life out of them! I have never heard of a legislative delegation declaring war on its own county," Fox says, adding quickly that he doesn't really wish physical harm to anyone.

"We just want to make sure the local governments have every opportunity to review and discuss it, before commissioners ram it down their throats," Nein responds.

Frequent critic Catherine Stoker, the Democratic West Chester Township trustee running for commissioner against Fox, says people are tired of Fox's "crazy schemes."

"He acts like he's spending Monopoly money. He has big ideas, but he doesn't think them through," says Stoker.

Fox is bracing for more attacks over the next six months from Stoker; from Fairfield Republican J. Michael Best, running as an independent for commissioner; and the anti-Fox Web site, www.foxtracker.com., whose webmaster remains a public mystery.

All the new battle scars have Fox pondering life without public office.

"My wife and kids really wanted me to hang it up (last year)," he says. "There were days in the last nine months when I had enough."

Then he adds with a laugh: "Maybe this is God's way of telling me it's time to do something else."

Fox timeline

1974: Elected to Ohio House at age 25.

1982: Introduces bill establishing workfare for people on welfare.

1991: Bounced checks cost him appointment as Ohio Department of Human Services director.

1992: Proposes Ohio school voucher program.

1993: Creates Butler County Transportation Improvement District.

1994: Authors bill for Fairfield Township to become Indian Springs village (declared unconstitutional in 1996).

1997: Censured by Ohio House for ethics violation; resigns to become county commissioner.

2000: Reforms Butler County Children Services; tries unsuccessfully to have himself appointed executive director.

2003: Blasts county Domestic Relations and Juvenile courts in a 78-page report; Ohio Supreme Court exonerates judges of misconduct.

2004: Attempts to control county Republican Party by recruiting 100 candidates for the Central Committee.

2004: Michael A. Fox Highway (Ohio 129) renamed Butler County Veterans Highway.

Fox facts

Born: Dec. 15, 1948

Home: Fairfield Township

Family: Wife, Mary Ann; son, Ryan, 22, graduating in August from Miami University; daughter, Ashley, 20, a Miami sophomore.

Education: Hamilton Taft High School, 1967; B.S. in education, Miami University, 1971.

Political career: Ohio representative, 1975-1997; Butler County commissioner, 1997-present.

Professional career: Substitute teacher, 1970-72; Butler County sheriff's deputy, 1971-72; staff of Republican National Committee, 1972; staff of U.S. Sen. Robert A. Taft, 1973-74; Hamilton Garfield High School social studies teacher, 1974; co-owner of Dixie Hamburgers restaurant in Hamilton, 1979-87; stockbroker for the Ohio Co., 1983-91; owner of home-based Fox Development and Distribution, 1985-present.

Relaxation: Reads or plays guitar.

On his nightstand: Stephen Coonts' Liberty; Rob Koepp's Clusters of Creativity: Enduring Lessons of Innovation and Entrepreneurship; Michael Mandel's Rational Exuberance: Silencing the Enemies of Growth and Why The Future Is Better Than You Think.

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E-mail jkiesewetter@enquirer.com