Are you aware of the local issue that’s going to be on November’s ballot? Resolution 2024-23 was passed by city council in March. The city administration calls it “the Edgewood Road Project,” which is misleading when it fact Edgewood is only a small portion of the city’s traffic plan for Mount Vernon. A larger part of the project is the proposed widening of East High Street over to Stevens Street, and merging it into New Gambier Road. A lovely home will be demolished in the process. No one knew of this part of the plan till a copy of the application filed by the city to ODOT was obtained with a Public Records request to the state. The city was not forthcoming with the information. It was a secret plan the city administration failed to disclose. They hid the information, not only from the citizens of Mount Vernon, but from the city council, who had to vote for it, as well.

City administration has told us Center Street is part of the overall plan to help ease the burden of traffic in the east end. It’s already the supposed route to KCH (Knox Community Hospital). Do you take Center Street to get to the hospital? I doubt it gets any local traffic as a route to KCH, and won’t in the future, no matter how much widening and improving is done to it.

Another plan to get trucks out of the east end is to reroute St. Rt. 13. I seriously doubt trucks headed in the direction of Fredericktown are ever in the east end, unless they come from the east end of the county. What neighborhoods will be destroyed by this new rerouting of 13?

Please vote to protect Mount Vernon neighborhoods in November. Your neighborhood could be next.

Tammy Swingle  

Mount Vernon, Ohio