Kroger announced Friday that its family of stores would be hiring for an estimated 20,000 permanent positions in its supermarket divisions. 

"Kroger's growth trajectory creates more job opportunities for current and future employees," said Katy Barclay, Kroger's senior vice president of human resources. "Right now in our stores across the country we have openings for bright, hard-working associates who are passionate about making a difference for customers every day."

Kroger invites interested applicants to visit www.kroger.com/careers where they can join Kroger's talent network, sign up to receive job alerts and apply for jobs.

Over the last six years, Kroger has created more than 40,000 new jobs. This figure does not include jobs created as a result of capital investment, such as temporary construction jobs, nor does it include Harris Teeter's approximately 25,000 associates who joined the Kroger family earlier this year. 

Kroger has hired more than 22,500 veterans since 2009.  In addition, Kroger is proud to have helped the "100,000 Jobs Mission" surpass its original goal in January 2014, seven years early.  The "100,000 Jobs Mission" is a coalition of more than 130 companies with the common goal of hiring more than 100,000 transitioning service members and military veterans by 2020.

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From Kroger

Photo: Kroger location in Covington/RCN file

After watching the first game of the Atlanta Falcons season, it's hard to discern what they do well on defense. The Falcon defensive line appeared extra soft last week as they got nowhere near sacking Drew Brees on the day.

On top of that, Saints running backs consistently had decent running lanes to plow through. If pressed, perhaps one may point to their ability to get to the flats in a hurry, but the Bengals offense should be licking their chops when watching film of their next opponent.

Because of that, one might suspect Cincinnati putting up over 30 points on the day and rolling to a win. This may prove to be the case, but because Atlanta drops their linebackers and safeties on pretty much every play, coupled with the fact the Bengals continue to talk about how important running the ball is to their offense, I could see them settling for decent yards on runs for most of the day with the idea of dominating time of possession and keeping Matt Ryan and company off the field.

It's true that the deep ball was the savior a week ago in Baltimore (and a nicely thrown one at that), but that element of attack is not the strong suit of the Cincinnati offense. They are an offense made of screens and draws and quick outs and crossing patterns. They would rather see yards gained after the catch than a multitude of majestically thrown bombs to the end zone.

If the run game is working the way it should on Sunday, Andy Dalton may end up with modest statistics, but points should still show up on the scoreboard. If they can avoid hurting themselves with turnovers and penalties again, there is no reason they shouldn't march down the field on a regular basis yet again this week. Only this time, they can't settle for field goals on five of their six scoring drives.

Defensively, the Bengals must tackle well in the open field on dump off throws and rely on their depth along the front four to get pressure on their own without blitzing defensive backs or linebackers. This is the formula used successfully for years under Mike Zimmer, and new coordinator Paul Guenther has been in Cincinnati long enough to know his personnel still thrives under these conditions.

The Falcons have a lot of explosiveness and veteran experience in their wide-receiver ranks. Headlining this group is Julio Jones, who is essentially the other great receiver to come out of A.J. Green's draft class. While Green is the graceful technician, Jones is a wild horse at the position, galloping over smaller cornerbacks or roasting safeties with his impressive speed. Jones is deadly on the screen pass because of these characteristics, but his mates are more of the deep-threat variety.

The Falcons are not a grind-it-out variety of an offense they way Cincinnati is. Their run game is average at best as the aged Steven Jackson is only useful between the tackles these days. Get him moving laterally and his effectiveness dries up almost immediately. Complimentary back Antone Smith showed some big-play ability last week when he got the ball in the flats, but the Atlanta run game is not a fearsome one.

Instead, Ryan seeks the gouging play that eats up big yardage all at once. Roddy White still displays the polished skills of a multiple pro-bowler, but he has been firmly rendered second-fiddle to Jones these days. He became a little banged up last week that required him to sit some, and one has to wonder how much he still has in that proverbial gas tank. Harry Douglas and kick-return star Devin Hester complete the veteran core of pass-catchers, but neither are what you might call possession guys and are more known for their speed.

Because of all of this, I would be surprised if the Bengals got too greedy on blitz packages. If Atlanta can only get 10 to 12 yards on successful plays, unlike the five to six the Bengals seem to get regularly on their drives, it doesn't make sense to create a vulnerability on the back end and get beat over the top by loading up the box to stop the run. With a third-string left tackle expected to start this week for the Falcons, Bengals defensive ends should be able to get their hands on Ryan without needing to send other blitzers.

The Falcons can score points, but only in a few select ways. Cincinnati, on the other hand, is far more adaptable with adjusting to the opposing defensive scheme and scoring with a variety of methods by mixing and matching their many weapons against whatever they face. In short, they are a more complete team with better depth and that should prove the difference in getting the win this Sunday.

Bengals 27, Falcons 23

Written by Bryan Burke, Associate Editor

Photo via Cincinnati Bengals Facebook

The Cincinnati Bengals stymied Matt Ryan and the Atlanta Falcons with defensive discipline on Sunday, especially from their cornerbacks.

The Bengal secondary not only covered well, collecting three interceptions on the day, but they also tackled proficiently. This kind of toughness is a luxury for defensive coaches as they can move linebackers and safeties closer to the line of scrimmage without worrying about a receiver getting loose on the outside after a broken tackle.

The Bengals defense was raised by former coordinator Mike Zimmer to be a disciplined unit where each member stays within his personal responsibility and trusts his teammates to do the same. Collectively, they frustrate offenses like the Falcons without showing much glitz and glamor at all. When watching them play, nothing appears dominant but at the same time, the opposition has been able do very little in terms of sustaining long scoring drives.

Yes, the secondary is long in the tooth with four key members in the 30-and-over club. They aren't the fastest or the biggest, they aren't of the shut-down variety of the position, but when a wide-receiver screen is tossed in their direction, they come up and make the play. It sounds simple enough, but because not enough corners can routinely make this kind of play is the reason the quick-hitting pass out to the flats has become such an offensive fad on every level of the game.

Julio Jones looked like a monster on the outside against New Orleans, as he shoved and muscled his way to first downs on a consistent basis against the Saints, but against Cincinnati, he racked up only a modest 88 yards on seven catches, most of those harmless outs for minimal damage.

Another luxury at the position the Bengals enjoy is having two first-round draft picks deep in the ranks behind so many veterans. Perhaps some might view this as wasted top draft picks who contribute primarily on special teams and have yet to earn the check that comes with their high draft status, but the fact remains that these youngsters are essentially apprentices who are eased into the role rather than trial by fire. Also, since the starters are of such vintage quality, these newbies provide insurance for when the bodies of the aged invariably break down.

The NFL is firmly in the greatest passing era of the game's history with records falling each year like the autumn leaves and the need to counter this attack becomes more paramount every season. Cincinnati has invested in the corner position with two recent first-round picks and has resisted casting away any of the veteran presence it has within their corner depth chart. As a result, it has sacrificed drafting many linebackers but have lucked out with terrific undrafted free-agents like Emmanuel Lemur and especially Vontaze Burfict.

In fact, team depth for the Bengals seems to be at an all-time high. Typically when a team loses it's top-three passing targets to injury, a high-profile defensive end and a talented left tackle (not to mention a long-time starting center), production drops off. Yet Cincinnati has showed a variety of attacks as the injuries mount and players become unavailable to them. Can't throw to A.J. Green? Throw to Brandon Tate instead. Lost the Law Firm in the offseason? Pound the rock with rookie Jeremy Hill and second-year dynamo Gio Bernard instead. Tired of seeing Dalton throw every pass? Give Mohamed Sanu a chance to chuck one downfield.

The rich stockpile of talent at just about every position, mixed with arguably even better coordinators than the previous regime has the Bengals organization looking like the model for the league. If teams face the same kind of effort the Falcons got from Bengal corners, Cincinnati should then become one of , if not the number one most difficult place to play in the league.  

-Written by Bryan Burke, associate editor

Photo via the Cincinnati Bengals Facebook page

The Roebling Suspension Bridge between Covington and Cincinnati is one of the ten greatest suspension bridges in America, a new book claims.

Writer, photographer, and bookmaker R. Glenn Alexander has included the Roebling in his new book, America's Greatest Suspension Bridges, a Photographic Essay.

"I got interested in photographing bridges in general several years ago and realized that some of them were architectural works of art in their own right," Alexander said. The author was first attracted to cable-stayed bridges, but found that they were few and far between.

There are plenty of suspension bridges, however; So many in fact that Alexander had to figure out a way to narrow the field.

"As I started looking through Wikipedia, I started to see what the longest bridges were and when they were built," he said. "You can sort of trace the history of the longest suspension bridges built in the United States by looking at ten bridges."

Alexander said that each bridge in his book was the longest when it was built. 

He visited the Roebling Suspension Bridge last year. "I had photographed everything at that time from the Golden Gate to the Ben Franklin and all of those are pretty magnificent, but I was really impressed with the personality of the Roebling Bridge, and also the fact that it was designed by the man who did the Brooklyn Bridge."

"You can sort of really see the evolution of how he went from one to the other."

Alexander is based in Rochester, New York where he not only writes and shoots photos for books, but also produces them through his company pixelPRESERVE. 

His latest includes the Wheeling Suspension Bridge and the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge in addition to the Roebling, which he said he really enjoyed photographing. "It's kind of old but well-maintained and beautiful and stately," he said.

"It's among the ones I like the best when I look at it from my own perspective."

Interested in purchasing the book? Click Here

Written by Michael Monks, editor & publisher of The River City News

Photos provided by Alexander

An interesting chain of events nearly landed a National Basketball Association team in Northern Kentucky.

The year was 1989 and the NBA's Seattle Supersonics were fed up with their facility, then known as the Seattle Center Coliseum. Team owner Barry Ackerman said that he wanted to keep the team in Seattle, but that he needed a new arena. City officials were not all the way on board with such a proposal, so the rumors began about relocating the team.

In the hills of Kentucky, a Lexington developer named Dudley Webb became extremely interested in the prospects of returning pro basketball to the Bluegrass State. Webb identified Northern Kentucky as the desired destination of the Sonics and moved aggressively to get the ball rolling in that direction.

Webb was widely quoted in publications across the county about his efforts to court a team to Cincinnati, possibly basing it in Northern Kentucky.

Cincinnati sports-radio host Andy Furman has been an outspoken advocate for having an NBA team in the area for decades. In the late 1980's, Furman had rallied a group of investors and politicians to seriously examine the possibilities of landing a team.

A preseason exhibition game was held that year at what was then the Coliseum in Cincinnati and local organizers brought in Florida businessman Les Alexander, who was interested in purchasing an NBA team, to tour the facility. It was reported that the Coliseum's owners were open to expanding the facility should an NBA team play there, but Alexander was unimpressed with the arena, and even called it a dump, according to Furman.

Alexander went on to buy the Houston Rockets in 1993.

Meanwhile, representatives from Northern Kentucky University had been in Frankfort trying to secure state funding for a new arena for the school and the region as a whole. That's when Furman caught wind of the arena plans, and began banging the drum about a team in Northern Kentucky. The arena could have been either 10,000 seats to accommodate the school, or 19,000 seats for both the school and a professional basketball team.

“Andy, on his sports talk show, started to muse his opinion that the Coliseum wasn't the right fit for an NBA team, but if Northern Kentucky got this supposed arena funded then maybe an NBA team could play in the new arena in Northern Kentucky,” said Rick Meyers, former Vice President of Communications for NKU.

“It started the impetus, I really believe, to get the Bank of Kentucky Center built,” Furman said.

After the Coliseum had been ruled out, reports of the new arena in Northern Kentucky began to surface, one that could have been shared between NKU and possibly the Supersonics or another NBA team. It came down to a decision by the Kentucky General Assembly which apparently had some political gamesmanship involved in ruling of the arena.

“Of course, Northern Kentucky had the arena in the budget,” said Rick Meyers. “But the Northern Kentucky legislators voted against (the Kentucky Education Reform Act), which was the big educational legislature in that particular session, which force-funded poor school districts at the expense of large school districts and the Northern Kentucky people voted against it. When they did that, the governor and the legislature at the time said, Okay if you're not going to vote for it, we're going to take the arena away from you.”

An arena would not open at Northern Kentucky University until 2007 when the Bank of Kentucky Center began hosting Norse sporting events just before the school transitioned to NCAA Division I athletics.

“They decided to go with a 9,000-seat arena, which they have right now, so that's not any good for an NBA team,” said Furman. “I mean, you have to have at least 17,000, 18,000. So there was talk of expansion if it would have happened, but I'm happy NKU got the arena and it's going to be used solely for NKU.”

Now twenty-five years later, Furman says he is still working on getting the NBA to the Bluegrass State but with a group of organizers in Louisville instead. The group hopes to bring a team there which has the NBA-ready KFC Yum! Center that seats over 22,000.

“The NBA TV contract runs out 2015-16, and it looks like the NBA is going to expand to two more teams. They're talking about Seattle and one other team and I figure that other team may be Louisville,” Furman said.

As for any NBA in Northern Kentucky, there are certainly no plans in the works to build a big enough facility to lure a team to the area any time soon, especially with other cities in the same state in line that are better equipped to handle a pro team. Perhaps in the next 25 years that will have changed, but for now, the Northern Kentucky Supersonics remains in the "what-if" category. 

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Written by Bryan Burke, associate editor

Two men are dead after a boat they were on collided with a barge on the Ohio River late Thursday night.

The barge captain saw the boat cross the barge's path.

"He was looking right out the front watching what was going on. It was a big barge," Cincinnati Fire Chief Lou Arnold told The Cincinnati Enquirer. "The (pleasure boat) just crossed right in front of them and slammed into the barge. We can only assume they didn't see it."

The barge was carrying limestone and was headed north at the time of the collision between the Taylor-Southgate and Purple People Bridges, WKRC reported. The barge has been moved to Covington Landing.

Some media accounts have identified the victims as men in their twenties.

WCPO reported Friday that the victims were locally-based FBI agents in their thirties.

The US Coast Guard and the Kentucky Department of Fish & Wildlife are investigating.

This story will be updated when more information is learned.

-Staff report

The Duke Energy Foundation handed out its latest round of urban revitalization initiative grants and the big winner was Covington.

Of the $280,250 handed out, $111,750 is going to Covington-based projects, or 40% of the total funding.

Among the recipients in Covington: Braxton Brewery, the Schott Grocery Building, the Hellman Lumber Mill Conversion, Pike Star Phase II, and SQUARE1, INc. at bioLOGIC.

Braxton Brewery - $25,000

The 22,000 sq. ft. building that most recently was home to Covington Arts and MKSK Architects will soon be the region's newest brewery.

The 1937 structure was originally built as a grocery store on West Seventh Street. The entire downstairs will be renovated to house the new microbrewery while the upstairs will be the new home of MKSK which will move from the floor below.

"We are thrilled and honored to even be considered for something as remarkable as an urban revitalization grant," said Jake Rouse, one of the co-founders of Braxton. "There's truly a renaissance happening here and it's happening because of programs like this."

Schott Grocery Store Building - $22,500

This long vacant building sits prominently at the corner of Sixth & Main Streets in Mainstrasse Village and was recently purchased by Paul & Emily Weckman, the couple that own the popular Otto's restaurant in the neighborhood.

The building was suffering from serious structural deficiencies prior to the Weckmans' purchase. It has been vacant for seven years and the funds from Duke will assist the Weckmans in architectural and structural engineering services as well as historic tax credit consultation.

The building will be home to an upscale full-service restaurant, Duke Energy's Rhonda Whitaker announced.

"We're really excited to be continuing our efforts in Covington," said Paul Weckman. "We love what's going on with the urban redevelopment in Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky and we couldn't be more thrilled to be a part of it. These small gaps can be hard to fix so this program has proven to be invaluable to us."

The Catalytic Fund also assisted the Weckmans in securing these funds. Sehlhorst called the project, "vital to the continued success and future of Mainstrasse Village".

Pike Star Phase II - $9,250

Pike Star Phase I led to the renovation of the building that now houses UpTech and will soon have newly renovated market rate apartments above.

The building next door, commonly referred to as the Tanino's Building, which was recently acquired, will now also be renovated to include new market rate apartments and a commercial space for Bad Girl Ventures.

Orleans Development and the Center for Great Neighborhoods will collaborate on this project as they did on the first phase.

"When we first started Pike Star phase one several years ago, we didn't know if we would get to this point," said Rachel Hastings of the Center for Great Neighborhoods. She added that a planned phase three will include two additional buildings. The apartments in phase one will go online November 1.

Hellmann Lumber Mill - $35,000

This impressive structure has sat vacant for years at 321 Martin Luther King, Jr. Blvd. The Center for Great Neighborhoods acquired it at auction and will be the organization's first entirely commercial, non-residential development.

It will serve as the creative hub of the Center's creative development efforts in the city's Westside. The site will also include a wood shop for The Carnegie.

"It will be the keystone of our creative place-making initiative," said the Center's Sarah Allan. She called it "a catalyst for MLK" and promised "a really wonderful celebration when it opens".... we will have a really wonderful celebration when it opens.

SQUARE1, Inc. at bioLOGIC - $20,000

Inspired Partners intend to develop the vacant warehouse space at 632 Russell Street, next to bioLOGIC, the life sciences incubator. The new space will house an open workspace to accommodate scientists, entrepreneurs, and creative individuals.

The design will include several closed office and meeting spaces including a conference room on the mezzanine level. Several flexible lab spaces will also tie into the lab facilities at bioLOGIC. The development may become a small retail center for tenant companies that have a completed product to sell.

The focus of the new space will be on health technology companies.

bioLOGIC's Keith Schneider said that two new programs should launch by the end of the year. "The goal is to help people with ideas get into our accelerator and incubator programs," Schneider said.

The revised guidelines for historic preservation practices in Covington were among the winners at the fiftieth annual meeting of the Cincinnati Preservation Association.

Historic preservation officer Beth Johnson accepted the award with Mayor Sherry Carran.

"Covington has a great track record of preservation success with National Register districts, historic tax credit projects and preservation overlay zones. The city’s recently revamped historic preservation guidelines incorporate the latest in scholarship and technology and serve as a model for other cities to follow," the organization said about the new guidelines.

Those new guidelines were presented to the public in June. The city commission offered its approval then.

This newly adopted and updated manual will be useful for homeowners and developers working on historic homes in those areas. "It will give you advice how to do it, provide insight on how it was done in the time when the buildings were constructed and help guide you through the process. Whether you are a homeowner, architect, or developer, this guide will help you," Johnson said at the time.

The process to revise the guidelines included Johnson attending neighborhood association meetings within historic districts to go over the guidelines, explain the changes and get feedback. "The feedback I received was a big part of the process and a lot of it led to some really great additions and modifications in the content." she said.

-Staff report

Photo: Beth Johnson (left) and Mayor Sherry Carran/Jody Robinson

Twenty food trucks in one place on Saturday: The Cincinnati Food Truck Association is hosting its first ever CFTA Food Festival.

It's Saturday, from 4 - 10 p.m. in Cincinnati's Washington Park.

Which trucks can you expect to see? Bistro de Mohr, C'est Cheese, Cuban Pete Sandwiches, East Coast Eatz, Eclectic Comfort Food, Empanadas Aqui, Falafel Mobile, Mobile Cold Stone Creamery, panino., Pizza Tower, Quitefranklyllc, Red Sesame Korean BBQ/Taco, Streetpops, SugarSnap!, Texas Joe: The Legal Mexican, The Chili Hut, Ricco Food Truck, Roll With It Cafe, Waffo, and Wiggy Dip.

There will also be live music by DJ Nate the Great.

Bring a chair or blanket and enjoy a day of food and fun in the awesomely re-envisioned Washington Park.

For more information: CFTA Food Festival

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Two cars crashed on the Roebling Suspension Bridge Tuesday afternoon sending at least one man to the hospital.

The crash happened at around 3:30 and forced the bridge to be shut down in each direction.

Covington Police and Fire responded quickly, transporting at least one man from the scene.

Two trucks arrived at 3:45 to remove the vehicles. The bridge is expected to reopen soon after their removal.

Photos and details by Michael Monks, editor

Hi. I'm Michael Monks, the editor and publisher of The River City News and I don't usually editorialize but I read something today that had me seething and shaking with anger.

I don't want to assume that you, as a resident of Covington or a neighbor or a friend of the city, will feel the same way I did after reading what I read, but I think you might. 

First off, it involves the alleged rape of an underage girl in Covington, something The River City News covered as police were searching for two of the four men accused of being involved.

Secondly, what I read today seems as though it blames all of us who live in Covington for that rape.

It also describes us as, basically, backwards hicks living in the shadow of glamorous Cincinnati and Newport. The spirit of an entire city is encompassed by an act of violence against a teen girl at one house on one block on one night here.

But CityBeat columnist Kathy Y. Wilson in an offensive, inaccurate piece filled with hyperbole and a vague reference to having visited Covington a few times a long while ago, managed to indict all of us as the girl's rapist.

First, take a look at her ridiculous piece at CityBeat, titled They Raped That City, then come back and join us here.

...

OK. Welcome back. You mad, bro?

Look, her telling of the crime isn't even as brutal as the alleged details I've learned about it. These allegations are very serious and if these suspects are guilty (something Wilson assumes throughout her garbage piece), then I hope they are punished appropriately. 

The brutality of a violent crime can illicit an emotional response from people and perhaps that is what happened to Wilson when she went on this ill-advised tirade about a city that she clearly doesn't know a thing about. What exactly does she mean by this line:

The larger point of all this small-focus heinous behavior is that Mason, Conrad, Tyler and Perry didn’t just hold and rape someone’s daughter — though that in itself is bad enough — they have further besmirched the reputation of an already bedraggled, mostly poor and Appalachian burg caught between the shadows of the bright lights illuminating the happy, drinking revelers of Newport — which might very well be the same population crowding along The Banks to Cincinnati’s stadiums — with very few venturing a few blocks south into Covington beyond the bars dotting the near side of the Roebling Suspension bridge.

A community already known for its poverty and rampant drug use because of the state’s zero-tolerance laws punishing but not treating addicts and its less-than-stellar track record of public education and public housing doesn’t need the stench of rapists and a rape videographer added to its long list of ills and woes.

I'm happy for the success of Cincinnati's The Banks (and, for that matter, urban revitalization throughout the city) and even happier for what's happening in our River City neighbor, Newport that we cover frequently and passionately, too. But let's not act like Covington is over here rotting.

Wait, is Kathy Y. Wilson the faceless internet troll behind that God-awful string of Facebook "news" sites. You know the ones, "Covington News", "Cincinnati News", "Boone County News", "Latonia News", etc. No... can't be her. Those are operated by some strange, lonely old man who lives closer to Covington, Georgia than Covington, Kentucky. But the tone is the same, right? The point is to create some image of Covington as a forgotten wasteland surrounded by communities getting it right.

Kathy Y. Wilson

The Facebook "news" troll's motivations are known: He's just a mean old ass. Did you catch his recent racist threads about all the "white people" at Covington events because it's such a racist city?

Maybe he should hire Wilson. Of course, she's busy as the writer-in-residence at the Cincinnati Library. Yeah, that's right. She's actually a reputable writer and even has a book that was published by the company from which The River City News currently leases its office.

So why was she so reckless and lazy in her depiction of Covington? Worse, why did she attach the violent rape of a young girl to a city's socio-economic woes? Look at this crap:

I know Scott Street in Covington; I once had a long-ago friend I used to visit there in a two-family house that looked onto the backside of a grocery store parking lot that looked especially creepy at night.

Her neighbors were never particularly friendly. They always looked wary and suspicious and reminded me, stereotypically, of the weather-worn faces of the mute-mouthed mountain people in Deliverance, one of my favorite movies. Covington is a place that makes a visitor feel like she could turn a corner and be smack dab in the middle of a dirt farm in the middle of nowhere.

I wonder now as I did then: The good people of Covington have more power than they realize to change their reputation, beginning with a house on Scott Street.

Ugh. Seething! Deliverance? Maybe she is that Facebook "news" troll who lives in Georgia. Have you ever actually been to Covington, Kentucky, Kathy? I mean, your publication's annual Best Of... issue consistently nominated Covington Mayor Butch Callery as favorite Northern Kentucky politician as recently as last year even though he left office in 2008 (and is, while an awesome dude, so three mayors ago). 

Look. I know. I am accused of wearing rose-colored glasses and being a cheerleader for Covington and Northern Kentucky. I dispute the first charge about the glasses. The good, the bad, and the ugly (like the rape of a young girl) are reported here. But am I cheerleader? You bet. And I'll never apologize for that. I want this community to succeed because I love it and over the past few years there have been incredible difficulties, on top of the long-standing ones, and there have been brushes with greatness.

We have momentum here. We have attitude. We have... yeah, we have problems. Serious ones. But my goodness, Kathy, you have no idea at all what you're writing about. It's offensive to me, I bet it's offensive to many more, and it should be offensive to the victim. How dare you. Disgusting. Get a clue, and then get on the bus and come visit Covington.

Be careful though. You might turn a corner and run into someone who JUST MIGHT SAY HELLO!

Even if they read your bullshit column.

-Michael Monks

---------------------------------------------------------

And now, The River City News contributor Pat LaFleur offers his letter to the editor at CityBeat in response to Wilson's column:

Dear Ms. Wilson, and the CityBeat editorial board:

What happens when people from out west are faced with tasting Goetta, Cincinnati-style chili, and Grippo's chips for the first time?

"It looks like it was left behind by an animal in the forest," one woman said of goetta. They tasted Glier's, made in Covington.

"It started off good, but then ended badly," one said of Grippo's barbecue chips.

Real estate website Movoto found out and produced this video (with items listed as Ohio foods, but we in Northern Kentucky are quite familiar, too):

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A new documentary about the Roebling Suspension Bridge is on the way -- but could use some help from you.

Filmmaker Cam Miller, whose Our True Blues - a documentary about Covington's foray into major league baseball with the Blue Sox - premiered earlier this year, is the man behind the bridge movie, too.

Miller writes:

During a break in the research phase of my doc Our True Blues: The Story of the Covington Blue Sox, I sat on a bench at the river bank with a cup of coffee, gazing at the steel wire and brick monument. I wondered how such an amazing work of art could have been erected at such an uneasy time in our American history. I thought of how difficult the project must have been for Mr. Roebling. How did they pay for it? Who were the key players and what was their story? What was it like on December 1, 1866 when those first citizens boldly walked across the 1,057 foot span?

I knew there was an interesting story to be told. A story that is important not only for today, but for the future of our river cities. 

The Suspension Bridge between Covington and Cincinnati was designed by John A. Roebling who would later use it as the prototype for his Brooklyn Bridge.

Miller is seeking to raise $1,500 for the project. If you can chip in -- and there are perks for those who do -- visit the IndieGoGo page.

Meanwhile, the Roebling Suspension Bridge is also featured in a new book about the ten greatest suspension bridges in America.

-Staff report

Gateway Community & Technical College has a new transfer agreement with another university in the region, this time reaching its first such agreement with an institution from Ohio. 

In Covington on Friday morning, Dr. Ed Hughes, president & CEO of Gateway, joined Mt. St. Joseph University President Dr. Tony Aretz in signing the agreement.

"We all realize we are one region. The river just happens to run through our region," Hughes said. "It's really the Ohio Ocean and it's this kind of bridging that helps people feel comfortable moving in both directions."

The new articulation agreement enables Gateway students to transfer credits earned at the community college to degree programs at Mt. St. Joe. 

"Mt. St. Joseph University is pleased to formalize our relationship with Gateway to provide students with the opportunity to affordably complete their baccalaureate and graduate degrees with distinguished faculty and excellent learning experiences within the classroom and beyond in the community," Aretz said. 

The agreement provides for collaboration on credit transfer between Gateway and the Mount and involves the design of both "1+3" and 2+2" programs. 

"Students who haven't decided on a major, who wish to complete general education coursework before enrolling at the Mount, or those who may have developmental course neds will benefit from 1+3 agreements," said Maggie Davis, associate vice president of academic support at Mt. St. Joseph. "These will allow students to complete a year of coursework at Gateway before transferring to the Mount to finish a bachelor's degree."

The 2+2 path calls for a student's completion of an associate's degree at Gateway before continuing at the Mount. 

"Gateway is known for its high quality technical education and seamless transfer to Kentucky's public universities," said Mike Rosenberg, Gateway's director of transfer. "This new partnership creates an efficient, economical option for students in Cincinnati's metro area who wish to graduate from a top-ranked liberal arts college. Completing one or two years at Gateway makes finishing at the Mount much more affordable while still providing students a high quality, hands-on learning experience throughout their academic career."

The agreement was signed during a ceremony held at Gateway's new Technology, Innovation, & Enterprise (TIE) Building on Madison Avenue, part of the college's growing urban metro campus in Downtown Covington.

-Michael Monks, editor & publisher

Photo: (From left) Sr. Margaret Stallmeyer (provost) and Dr. Ed Hughes of Gateway and Dr. Tony Aretz & Dr. Joel Thiersten (vice president for academic affairs) of Mt. St Joseph University/RCN