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B1 Your Community Press newspaper serving Blue Ash, Montgomery, Sycamore Township, Symmes Township E-mail: nesuburban@communitypress.com We d n e s d a y, J u l y 2 9 , 2 0 0 9
Symmes Township road foreman Chip Brinkman
Volume 46 Number 23 © 2009 The Community Press ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Share your vacation photos
Whether you’re headed to the beach or the mountains this summer, we want to publish your vacation photos. To get started, go to Cincinnati.com/Share and follow the steps there to send your photos to us. Be sure to identify everyone in the photo and what community they live in. Photos will appear on your community page and may even make it into your local paper, so start sharing today!
Weight a minute ...
It had all started weeks earlier when 23 people joined at Madeira Health Care Fitness Center with the common goal of losing weight. This was a tight race by some serious competitors. Notably, there were two married couples, Lydia and Geoff Hirsh of Symmes Township and Peggy and Jay Linne of Madeira, and previous participant, Kathy Hyatt, who challenged to the end. SEE LIFE, B1
In the money
Ursuline Academy’s Class of 2009 raked in a total of more than $15.5 million worth of scholarships when members graduated last spring. Some 89 percent of the school’s 129 graduating seniors won scholarships. SEE SCHOOLS, A6
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Sycamore offers lunch break District meal prices unchanged for 2009-2010 By Jeanne Houck
jhouck@communitypress.com
Meal prices in all seven Sycamore Community Schools will not increase by even a penny when classes resume in late August. The Sycamore Board of Education voted to charge the same prices for the 2009-2010 school year that were charged during the 2008-2009 school year: “We are fortunate that we are able to hold the line on our meal prices in these tough economic times,” said Erika Daggett, chief information officer for the schools. “Our child nutrition services manager and department are to be commended for being able to recommend no price increase for next year.” Sycamore Community Schools Child Nutrition Services is a selfsupporting district department funded by money students and staff pay for meals and by federal reimbursement from the National School Lunch and Breakfast Programs. No state or local taxes are used for food, equipment, supplies and salaries, Daggett said. Child Nutrition Services operates out of kitchens in all of the district’s schools. In addition to serving meals to students - including making lunch during the school year for more than 5,000 students daily districtwide – Child Nutrition Services caters district-sponsored events. Daggett said the department has instituted a point-of-sale system in which students can pur-
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Prices for meals and milk in the Sycamore Community Schools will be the same during the upcoming school year as they were last year. chase food by entering their student identification number into a personal identification number pad, which immediately and confidentially alerts the cafeteria cashier of the child’s food allergies, eligibility for federally-funded, reduced-price meals and the student’s account balance. “Parents can also add funds to their child’s meal account electronically via our Web site, thus eliminating any concerns associated with students handling paper money and eliminating the possibility of losing a check,” Daggett said.
Holding the line
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A Blue Ash Elementary School student enters her student identification number into a personal identification number pad to pay for lunch in the cafeteria. All Sycamore Community schools now have the same point-of-sale system in their cafeterias.
Sycamore schools meals prices for the 2009-2010 school year: • Breakfast – $1.25 • Reduced-price breakfast – 30 cents • Elementary school lunch – $2.50 • Secondary school lunches – $3 • Special secondary school lunches – $3.50 • All reduced-price lunches – 40 cents • Milk – 50 cents
Arrest solves at least eight Blue Ash cases By Jeanne Houck jhouck@communitypress.com
Eight Blue Ash residents have identified their property among what police say are stolen good found in the apartment of an accused burglar. A Hamilton County grand jury recently indicted the accused man – Jason Ward, 26, of Northside – on one count of burglary and four counts of receiving stolen property. Prosecutors said the charges relate to crimes in Blue Ash and Madeira. Although Ward is scheduled for a jury trial Sept. 15 in Common Pleas Court, the investigation of him continues. “There were 28 cases solved so far as a result of the arrest of Jason Ward,” Blue Ash police Capt. Jim Schaffer said. “Eight of the 28 were solved in Blue Ash alone. “The other 20 were from Madeira, Sycamore Township,
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Blue Ash police arrested Jason Ward for breaking into people’s cars. Among the items they confiscated from him were 19 cell phones, 47 iPods, 12 cameras, two laptops, five Gameboys, knives, flashlights, calculators, jewelry, CDs and backpacks. Symmes Township, Montgomery, Miami Township in Clermont County and Loveland,” he said. Schaffer said about a dozen more people are arranging to see whether property found in Ward’s home when he was arrested July 2
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belongs to them. Police said they found cell phones, watches, iPods, Game Boys, cameras, computers, knives, flashlights, calculators, jewelry and CDs in Ward’s apartment. “As you can see, this is still an ongoing investigation,” Schaffer said. Ward is being held on a $20,000 bond in the Hamilton County Justice Center in downtown Cincinnati. He was arrested at his home following a spate of crimes between June 21 and July 2, during which time police said Ward stole pickup trucks in Madeira and Sycamore Township and was scared away from a Blue Ash home after the homeowner found him scrounging around in a car in her garage. Ward ran off with coins from the Blue Ash home on Muirwoods Court June 21, police said.
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Police said officers who tried to track down Ward with a police dog found a Ford Ward pickup truck nearby that had been reported stolen in Madeira. The truck held items belonging to Ward, whose fingerprints were found at the Blue Ash home, police said. Police said that on June 25, Madeira police officers responding to a reported theft in progress from a vehicle at Kaywood Drive and Rollymeade Avenue saw a Ford pickup truck pull into the Camargo Canyon subdivision. The truck driver pulled into a driveway and fled on foot. Madeira police determined the man was Ward and that the pickup truck had been stolen in Sycamore Township June 24, police said.
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