By Kevin Aldridge
Enquirer staff writer

THE DEAL AT A GLANCE

The city gets: • Paddock Park/Mill Creek Psychiatric Center for Children. Hamilton County bought this site from the state for $1.5 million with the intention of building a 60-bed juvenile-detention facility. The city would take ownership of the land under the deal. • Assurances from the county that it would make its best efforts to locate future detention facilities - other than those in the Central Business District - outside city limits. The county gets: • $300,000 in cash. • Drake Hospital. The city sold the hospital to the county in 1927, but a contract clause gave Cincinnati the right to take the property back if commissioners decided to use the property for anything but a hospital. The agreement would terminate that clause. • Hillcrest School. This 85-acre site in Springfield Township is a county-operated juvenile detention facility. Hamilton County has leased the building and land from the city since 1973 for $1 a year. The county would take ownership under the condition that if the land is sold, rented or swapped for any purpose other than a jail in the next 25 years, the city would get 50 percent of the money. The county could expand the juvenile facility. • B&B parking lot at Eggleston and Reading roads. The county leases this lot from the city for $20 a parking space per month. The county gets the property if it agrees to repair and maintain it as a parking lot and reserve a portion abutting Central Parkway for realignment of the intersection of Central Parkway and Reading Road.

A proposed city-county land swap could end a 10-year-old fight over Hamilton County's plan to build a 60-bed jail for youth at the former Mill Creek Psychiatric Center for Children in Bond Hill.

Cincinnati City Council on Thursday reviewed a deal with Hamilton County commissioners that would allow the city to take ownership of the Mill Creek site - which the county owns - in exchange for three parcels of city-owned land. Those parcels are Drake Hospital, the Hillcrest School site in Springfield Township and the B&B parking lot at Eggleston and Reading roads.

The deal also includes promises for the city to pay the county $300,000 and for the county to try to locate any future detention centers - except those in the central business district - outside city limits.

City and county officials have been in a court battle over the proposed juvenile jail since 1998.

"I'm thrilled that saner minds have prevailed on this," said Hamilton County Commissioner Todd Portune. "The city will be able to put this property to its highest and best use and a use that is compatible with the interests of the surrounding community."

Bond Hill residents had complained that a jail on the Mill Creek site would hamper efforts to revitalize their community. Some residents argued a jail would hurt real-estate values and deter new housing.

Vice Mayor Alicia Reece, who lives in Bond Hill, said the agreement "has been a long time coming." Reece said the proposal would be reviewed by the city's Planning Commission and Finance Committee and could be approved by council in two weeks.

Reece said the city had set aside $850,000 for the possible purchase of the psychiatric center. She said $300,000 of that money would be used to close the deal with the county. The remainder of the money would be used for a land-use study of the area, Reece said.

"A lot of people thought this would never get done," Reece said. "There were times when even I thought it might not get done, but we kept working. It's been a long hard struggle."

In 1998, city leaders tried to block the county's attempt to build the jail by changing the zoning. The county took the city to court claiming "unfair restriction on the use of the property." Hamilton County lost the initial case, but won later on an appeal.

City leaders followed with an appeal of their own and the case has been tied up in the courts ever since.

Portune said a key move for county commissioners was acquisition of the B&B parking. He said acquiring the triangular-shaped parcel near the Hamilton County Justice Center would enable the county to expand the jail.

Councilman Jim Tarbell cast the lone dissenting vote to the proposal Thursday. Tarbell said he supported every aspect of the deal except for trading away the B&B lot.

Tarbell expressed concerns that losing the property could create development problems for the yet-to-be-realized Broadway Commons.

E-mail kaldridge@enquirer.com