Cincy Magazine February/March 2020

LOCAL IMPACT OF ONLINE CANCEL CULTURE NAKED KARATE GIRLS CELEBRATE 11 YEARS LEADING LAWYERS JOHN BOEHNER ON THE POT INDUSTRY

SPRING ARTS PREVIEW

2020

The Tristate’s Most Influential People

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Contents

The Magazine for Business Professionals

Fe b r u a r y/M a rc h 2020

The Tristate’s Most Influential People PAGE 36

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Publisher’s View

BY ERIC HARMON

Midwestern Traveler

Contributors Web Exclusives Inside Cincy

POWER 100

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A Paradox of Opportunity

Inside the World’s Only Cardboard Boat Museum and behind the numbers of FC Cincinnati.

Scene

CINCY LIVE

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Bringing the Wow

Tennessee’s cities are great weekend getaways for families looking to stay busy.

BY CORINNE MINARD

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11 years after forming, Cincinnati band Naked Karate Girls keeps the party going. BY DAVID LYMAN

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Spring Arts Preview

Cincinnati arts organizations ring in spring by keeping busy, plus calendar. BY CORINNE MINARD

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Dining: Brunch

Marianne Lewis, UC Lindner College of Business’ new dean, sees ways to build on the school’s legacy while enhancing what it already does. BY DAVID HOLTHAUS Our guide to brunch in the Tristate lets you know when and where to enjoy this weekend meal. BY KEVIN MICHELL

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Power 100

Who are the most powerful people in the Tristate in 2020?

BY DAVID HOLTHAUS

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Business

community

44 History & Leadership

62 Swing Hard

Live Well

81 Finding Better Methods

Leadership Cincinnati’s innovative ideas, like St. Vincent de Paul’s Charitable Pharmacy, have led to tangible results. BY DAN HURLEY

Local providers offer patients with chronic and acute pain effective treatments that avoid heavy medication and opiates.

BY KEVIN MICHELL

View 46 Another Cincinnati TIFs plunder the

tax levies approved by voters.

BY DON MOONEY

Problem of Piling On 48 The Two local examples of callout culture provide contrast and teachable moments.

BY KEVIN MICHELL

50 But he’s not smoking it… yet.

This is John Boehner on Pot

Mike Venerable and CincyTech are on a mission to make the region an innovation destination. BY LIZ ENGEL

83 A Wholistic Take

64 Leading Lawyers

BY PETER BRONSON

& Vets 52 Pets Pet owners are seeking better medical care and advanced diagnostics for their pets.

BY ERIC SPANGLER

Homes Healthier 54 Making People Working Cooperatively’s Whole Home division provides an array of services to address mobility and health issues.

BY KEVIN MICHELL

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An Adaptable Education

Our 16th annual list of the best lawyers in the Tristate, as voted by their peers. BY THE EDITORS

74 The Newport Syndicate still Just Having Fun

providing happiness after 25 years. BY ERIC SPANGLER

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Till the Cows Come Home

Alliance Integrative Medicine looks at the whole person when it comes to managing pain.

BY CORINNE MINARD

Modern Retirement 84 AChristian Village Communities

updates its facilities with three new projects. BY CORINNE MINRD

to Wealth 85 Guide Management

Union Institute’s online courses and educational tracks are tailored toward helping working adults advance their careers.

BY KEVIN MICHELL

Schools: DePaul Cristo 58 Best Rey High School DPCR is providing microgrants to help its alumni graduate from college. BY CORINNE MINARD

Blue Grass Stockyards Regional Marketplace is a place to eat, shop and learn. BY ERIC SPANGLER

in Business 77 Best Calendar & Directory

Experts provide advice for 2020. BY GINNY MCCABE

88 Love Cincy

Cincy (ISSN-1934-8746) published in February/March; April/ May; June/July; August/September; October; November; December/January for a total of seven issues by Cincy, 30 Garfield Place, Cincinnati, OH 45202. Periodicals postage paid at Cincinnati, Ohio, and at additional mailing offices. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Cincy, 30 Garfield Place, Suite 440, Cincinnati, OH 45202. w w w.

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Publisher’s View

Where Have All the Pencils Gone?

D

riving into work the other day, I realized t hat I forgot my trusty pencil at home. At the start of each week I usually spend my morning going through the goals of the previous week and thinking about those coming up with t he help of my handy notebook. I have gotten into the habit of using the time-aged pencil to do this. I erase the bullets that have been accomplished. Check—goal achieved. I then write out those I seek to get done in the coming week. Checking off those to-dos and the eradication of what’s been done has become my favorite part of the work week.

There’s some important background information for those to-dos, though— almost everything that falls into the goal completed group is actually performed by others in the company. In fact, I tell most of my staff to not actually give me any “real” work. If you do, well then you have been warned. As such I have great respect for those who get things done.

I also consider those who are a part of our annual Power 100 list to be doers. This list has been a mainstay for the magazine for over a decade, and gives our editorial team a great boost every year as they spend time developing it. The list, like anyone’s weekly to-dos, changes every year and it’s our mission to see that it best reflects those we see making the most impact and wielding true power in our region.

Getting rid of politicians from the group is relatively easy because of the nature of their profession—when they fall out of favor with the electorate they go. Tougher

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to clarify are those running companies of their own. Many are private entities that are successful in their own right, but assessing what they do, or the choices they make, within the community is a lot harder to guage.

You cannot buy your way on this list, so in a way the choices we make are purely subjective. By limiting this list to 100 we also know we’re missing people who deserve to be on it. If this is the case, please do let me know. I would encourage you to shoot me an email at eharmon@cincymagazine.com, or call my direct line at 513-297-6205. Much of this list is generated by this kind of feedback.

If you like what you see here, we encourage you to come and network with this powerful group Feb. 20 at the Backstage Event Center for the Power 100 Reception.

The program’s nonprofit beneficiary is Cincinnati Works, and we couldn’t be happier to give this impactful organization the exposure it deserves.

In an attempt to bring this column full circle, let’s go back to the pencil. To replace my treasured pencil while driving into work, I stopped at multiple gas stations to see if they sold any. No luck.

You could have assumed as much—that pencils would not be found there—but I figured I’d try anyway. I’m sure my staff would tell me that I should have gone to a pharmacy or grocery store, but that would be too much work.

Locally, veteran and family owned Editor & Publisher Eric Harmon Managing Editor Corinne Minard Associate Editors Kevin Michell, Eric Spangler Contributing Writers Peter Bronson, Liz Engel, Bill Ferguson Jr., David Holthaus, Dan Hurley, David Lyman, Ginny McCabe, Don Mooney Editorial Intern Menna Elarman Creative Director Guy Kelly Art Director Katy Rucker Digital Content Coordinator Danielle Cain Photographer Joe Simon Associate Publisher Rick Seeney Custom Sales Manager Brad Hoicowitz Advertising Director Abbey Cummins Sales Representatives Jon Castonguay, Kristine Granata, Donna Sobczak Operations & Finance Manager Tammie Collins Advertising & Circulation Manager Laura Federle Advertising Coordinator Katelynn Webb Audience Development Nakya Grisby Events Director Stephanie Simon Events Coordinator Amanda Watt Production Manager Keith Ohmer Work-Study Students Aixa Velazquez, Comar Watson Cincy on the web: www.cincymagazine.com Cincy Co. LLC Cincinnati Club Building 30 Garfield Place, Suite 440 Cincinnati, OH 45202 Contact Cincy: information@cincymagazine.com or call (513) 421-2533.

Go to www.cincymagazine.com to get your complimentary subscription to Cincy.

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CWSP-0131 Cincy Ad-Jan 20.qxp_Layout 1 12/17/19 8:23 AM Page 1

Corporate Work Study + Education = A GREATER Cincinnati

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Contributors

Cincy Magazine contributing editor Peter Bronson is an author, editor, publisher and owner of Chilidog Press LLC. He is a former reporter, columnist and editor at The Cincinnati Enquirer, The Tucson Citizen and other newspapers in Arizona and Michigan.

Liz Engel is a business writer, runner and once-upon-a-time volleyballer who found her way back to the Queen City following stints in North Carolina and Tennessee. She’s spent more than a decade covering topics like health care, transit and entrepreneurship.

Dan Hurley is a local historian and the president of Applied History Associates, which works with museums and historical societies throughout the Eastern U.S.

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Bill Ferguson Jr. is a writer/editor/communications consultant who has spent 40-plus years as an editor and reporter for six newspapers, beginning at age 14 as a sports reporter for his hometown daily.

Don Mooney is a Cincinnati attorney, a past member of the Cincinnati Planning Commission and active in local politics.

David Holthaus is an awardwinning journalist with more than 20 years experience in Greater Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky covering business, public affairs and writing commentary.

Ginny McCabe is a bestselling author, an award-winning journalist, media professional, speaker and teacher. Her work may be seen in publications like Journal-News and Reuters. She has spent decades covering topics like news, business, real estate and entertainment.

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Digital Exclusives TOP 5 ONLINE STORIES 1 Best Doctors 2019

by The Editors 2 Best of the West 2019

by The Editors 3 Staying Safe at Home

by Deborah Rutledge 4 6 Questions with Christy Samad of 3CDC

by Eric Spangler 5 From Floor to Wall

by Liz Engel

TOP TWEET

DIALOGUE Clermont Chamber @Clermont Chamber We’re so proud to see so many #ClermontChamber members as finalists for @CincyMagazine Best of the East 2020! Get your early bird tickets today and save!

Christian Vlg Mason @ MCV_OH We’re proud to win Best Retirement Community in @CincyMagazine’s Best of the North competition for the 7th straight year! http://bit.ly/352EKzF #RetirementPlanning Hamilton Co. Developmental Disabilities Services @ HamiltonDDS Congratulations to @GoodwillCinci Board Member and Volunteer Service Guild President Sue Burreson for being named a @CincyMagazine Charitable All-Star!

LIVE

Jeffrey Layne Blevins @JeffBlevinsPhD What can you do at @uofcincy @UC_ArtSci @JournalismUC? Here is what Keely Brown is doing! @ONAatUC @UC_ONA @NewsRecord_UC @CincyMagazine

Our exciting events will help get you through the long winter. Check out Cincy.Live to find out what’s on the calendar!

Cincy Magazine @CincyMagazine Replying to @JeffBlevinsPhD @uofcincy and 5 others We thoroughly enjoyed having Keely Brown complete an editorial internship with Cincy Magazine! Here is one of the fantastic articles she wrote for us: http://bit.ly/33tjgvl We look forward to seeing what Keely does next!

Want to be featured in our Instagram stories?

Follow us at @cincymagazine and use our hashtag #LoveCincy! Show us what makes you love this city! w w w.

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InsideCincy

One of a Kind

World’s Only Cardboard Boat Museum housed along the river in New Richmond

By Eric Spangler

T

ommy Lemon’s buddies in New Richmond had an inkling he was crazy. That’s because he once told them they should start a museum to display the best cardboard boats that race down the Ohio River during New Richmond’s RiverDays event every August.

This was while Lemon and his brother Ed Lemon, Tim Young and Kenny Smith were building a new cardboard boat in Tommy’s garage designed to look like Batman’s boat.

The idea might have had something to do with the fact that Tommy already had about six or seven cardboard boats that had raced in previous years hanging in his garage. And there was something about Tommy’s wife.

“I would go in to the garage—[the boats] are hanging every where—or my wife would pull in …” His voice started to trail off. He didn’t want to get into the details about that. Husbands understand.

Anyway, Smith told the group he knew someone who had a building that formerly housed a garage in town that had been abandoned for 10 years, since the 1997 flood. “I said, ‘Let’s go look at it,’” Tommy says. The back door was falling in, windows were broken and it was filled with junk.

Tommy says that he immediately knew the location would work. That’s when Smith

The museum in New Richmond 8

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A cardboard replica of the Island Queen in the World’s Only Cardboard Boat Museum knew. “He looked at me and he said, ‘You are crazy!’”

Since that day in 2007 the World’s Only Cardboard Boat Museum—yes, that is the actual name of the museum—has been housed at 311 Front St. in New Richmond displaying some of the craziest, zaniest and most ingenious cardboard boats ever created for New Richmond’s annual Cardboard Boat Regatta.

There are now almost 40 full or partial cardboard boats on the floor, walls and ceiling of the former Pure Oil gas station, featuring replicas of the Delta Queen and Island Queen steamboats, a guitar, a Viking ship, a dragster, an ambulance, a school bus, a Coast Guard cutter and a hydroplane named Miss Mudweiser.

Originally allowed to use the building at no charge, the owner soon required the museum to pay rent. One of the museum’s volunteers, Ray Perszyk, quickly went around and secured sponsorships to allow the museum to remain open, says Tommy. Unfortunately, he says, Perszyk died last year.

The museum is open Tuesdays between 4-7 p.m. and Saturdays and Sundays from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday hours during the winter, however, are iffy, says Tommy.

Admission is free.

Those who visit are asked to sign a book. The museum has had visitors from around the world. Maps with pins mark the visitors’ home states and countries.

A post on the back deck has directional signs to some of those cities, states and countries.

Museum volunteers conduct a fundraiser each September to raise money for a nonprofit organization, Tommy says.

Volunteers have raised about $14,000 the last three years for the Disabled American Veterans, he says. “This is something that we’re really proud of.” The Paddling for a Cause fundraisers consist of a 16-mile canoe and kayak paddle, he says.

Tommy participates in the event by paddling down the river in his favorite mode of transportation. “I always take my cardboard boat.” His buddies would expect nothing less. n

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By the Numbers

FC Cincinnati Kicking Off Fifth Season

As FC Cincinnati prepares for its fifth season—and second as a Major League Soccer franchise—the team also will begin its final season at University of Cincinnati’s Nippert Stadium. FC Cincinnati will move to its new home, a soccer-only stadium in the West End, beginning next season.

(Research by Bill Ferguson Jr.)

27,336 34 7

Average home-game attendance during 2019 season at University of Cincinnati’s Nippert Stadium, third highest in Major League Soccer behind Atlanta (52,510) and Seattle (40,247)

Most goals scored in 2019 by an FC Cincinnati player (midfielder Allan Cruz)

17 matches at home and Games in 17 2020 season away

1,965,008

31

Goals scored by FC Cincinnati in 2019, lowest in the league (and tied with Vancouver with lowest number of shots at 359)

Amount, in dollars, of guaranteed salary of highest paid FC Cincinnati player, forward Fanendo Adi, in 2019

SOURCES: FC CINCINNATI, MAJOR LEAGUE SOCCER, MAJOR LEAGUE SOCCER PLAYERS ASSOCIATION WEBSITES

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Matthew 25’s Hunger 5K

Matthew 25: Ministries hosted its annual Hunger 5K Nov. 9 at its Kenwood facility.

The race raises funds for the nonprofit’s mission of helping the poorest of the poor and disaster victims in Greater Cincinnati, throughout the U.S. and around the world. The race also kicks off the Hunger 5K Food Drive.

1 Participants could run or walk the 5K. 2 After the race, participants were invited to the after party, which included a chocolate fountain. 3 Participants and supporters joined together after the race to celebrate at the post-race party. 4 The 2019 race participants started the race with a bang.

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St. Rita School for the Deaf Dream Makers Scholarship Benefit On Nov. 23, more than 230 people gathered to honor Dan and Connie Vonderhaar at St. Rita School for the Deaf’s 44th annual Dream Makers Scholarship Benefit. The Vonderhaars have been advocates for St. Rita for over 46 years. They’ve served on the Board of Trustees, volunteered at events and worked on numerous committees.

Music and entertainment for the event were provided by Kevin Siefker DJ Services and the Quartet of the North. The St. Rita signing choir, ASL Rockers, received a standing ovation for its performance to the songs “All Star” and “Go Light Your World.” Over $90,000 was raised to go towards student scholarships.

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1 Honorees Dan and Connie Vonderhaar and their family 2 Sam Stephens, Marlee Stephens, Scott Fulton, Kelli Fulton, John Rizek, Brittany Rizek, Katie Lavelle and Kevin Lavelle 3 Mary Liz Finn, Bridget Thompson and Tina Meder 4 Deana Schneider, Steve Schneider, Tim Halloway and Mike Jorgensen 5 Rachel Schutte, Kitty Stroud and Kasey Kreusch 6 St. Rita’s Signing Choir, the ASL Rockers 7 St. Rita President Angela Frith presenting the Dream Makers award to Dan and Connie Vonderhaar

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Scene Buckeye Trail Ribboncutting Ceremony On Sept. 28, The Nature Conservatory and Buckeye Trail Association officially opened the new 16-mile section of the Buckeye Trail in the Edge of Appalachia Preserve. The new trail is part of the 4,600mile North Country National Scenic Trail, which connects New York to North Dakota.

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PHOTOS BY DAVID IKE

1 Chris Loudenslager, park superintendent with the National Park Service, cuts the ribbon opening the new section of the Buckeye Trail, which is now certified as the newest section of the 4,600-mile North Country National Scenic Trail.

2 Bill Stanley, state director of The Nature Conservancy in Ohio, leads a group on a hike along the new section of trail.

3 Hikers, naturalists and dignitaries exploring the newly opened trail.

2020 Lady in Red

CincyLive is the home of all Cincy and NKY Magazine events, as well as our partners. From food and community events to professional and nonprofit ones, all can be found on CincyLive.

Are you a nonprofit looking for a no-upfront cost promotion for an upcoming event?

Contact: Eric Harmon, President & Publisher eharmon@cincymagazine.com • 513-297-6205

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Feb. 7, 6-9pm - National Wear Red Day! Tri-County Macy’s

Power 100 Reception February 20, 5:30PM - 8:00PM

The Backstage Event Center

MURDER MYSTERY DINNER February 15, 6:00 - 8:00pm

Newport Syndicate

Best Workplaces in Northern Kentucky Celebration!

February 27, 5:30 - 8:00pm The Metropolitian Club

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Art Academy of Cincinnati’s Beaux Arts Ball To celebrate the success of its 150th anniversary, the Art Academy of Cincinnati’s (AAC) Alumni Association revived its popular Beaux Arts Ball. The costume gala is known for its unique and sometimes wild designs. This year’s event, chaired by Rich and Renita Homan, was themed the Future Now Beaux Arts Ball. Guests enjoyed palm readers, space-age belly dancers, a collaborative sensory art installation and the first edition of Between Two Paintings featuring Joe Girandola, Art Academy president, and Mel Chin, world-renowned artist.

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1 Alex Tellez, Tom Schiff and Jeanine Steele 2 Gary Gaff ney and Jared Miskell 3 Paige Williams, Jil Baker and Jimmy Baker 4 Joe Girandola and Mel Chin

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Scene Bethany Theological Seminary 25th Anniversary Celebration Bet hany Theolog ical Seminar y celebrated 25 years in Richmond, Indiana, with festivities the weekend of Sept. 2729. Guests were welcomed to an open house and a recital by Mari Lunde, concertmistress of the Richmond Symphony Orchesta. A ribbon cutting by the Wayne County Chamber of Commerce recognized major renovations to the Bethany Center.

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1 Bethany president Jeff Carter, left, visits with Richmond mayor Dave Snow.

2 Guests join Bethany employees and trustees in the newly renovated building. 3 Members of the Wayne County COC join President Jeff Carter and board chair Lynn Myers in the ribbon cutting.

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KELLER, BARRETT & HIGGINS

February 20, 2020 The Backstage Event Center 625 Walnut St, Cincinnati, OH 45202

5:30pm - 8pm

- Ellen Keller -

-Tina Barett -

Divorce, Custody, Trusts, Wills, Special Needs, & Real Estate

A special cocktail event featuring networking with some of the Tristate’s most influential leaders. This annual event celebrates the release of Cincy Magazine’s list of the 100 most influential business, political, and community leaders in the Tristate. The event will feature the Power 100 decision makers throughout the Tristate, select sponsors and friends of Cincy Magazine.

Brought to you by:

Keller, Barrett & Higgins, LLC 6914 Miami Avenue Madeira, Ohio 45243 513-351-6058 • kbesq.com

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Non-Profit Beneficiary:

Visit Cincy.Live for you complimentary ticket and more information!

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The Christian Village at Mt. Healthy Guardian Center for Memory Support Ribbon Cutting

STEVE ZIEGELMEYER

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For over 50 years, The Christian Village at Mt. Healthy (CVMH) has served the Mt. Healthy and greater Cincinnati community with award-winning senior living options and health care. On Nov. 21, CVMH held a ribbon-cutting celebration for its new Guardian Center for Memory Support. The Guardian Center features 17 private suites with an elegantly appointed dining area and common spaces.

1 Nora Wiley, Lizz Stephens, Greta Smith, Mark Oaks, Shawn McMullen, Larr y Monroe, Harry Snyder, Vickie Brashear, Bob Slade, Lisa Cecil and Brian Kershner 2 Victor Kolb, Kent Geer, Brian Kershner, Larry Monroe, Nora Wiley, Mike Keifl ing and Katerina Barrat

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LIVE!

NAKED KARATE GIRLS

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SPRING ARTS PREVIEW

page 20

A&E CALENDAR

page 21

TRAVEL: TENNESSEE

page 27

DINING: BRUNCH

page 31

JOHN KLARE JR.

Cincinnati band Naked Karate Girls has been performing in the Tristate for 11 years.

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BRINGING THE 11 YEARS AFTER FORMING, CINCINNATI BAND NAKED KARATE GIRLS KEEPS THE PARTY GOING

By David Lyman

“J

ust wow,” burbled a woman who identified herself as Lisa W. on the wedding-related website The Knot.

She was oohing and aahing about the Cincinnati-based band, Naked Karate Girls. And like the dozens of other people who offered online testimonials for the 11-year-old cover group, she couldn’t say enough good about them.

Admittedly, you have to take online reviews with a grain of salt. But I scrolled through nearly 100 of these reviews and there was just one that dipped below a fivestar rating. And even that one—a four-star review—pronounced Naked Karate Girls an “Overall great band!”

I asked friends about them, too. Young friends. Old ones. Married ones. Single ones. Even a couple of terminally jaded friends. I couldn’t come up with a single person who had anything bad to say about the group.

But then, Naked Karate Girls is not your run-of-the-mill band.

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WOW

original members. “Music is just one slice of our pie.”

Mind you, music is an incredibly important slice of that pie. Scan their playlist and you’ll see it’s a top-40 journey through the 1960-1990s with a smattering of country music tossed in. It’s familiar music. And fun.

But that still doesn’t sound like enough to add up to a 4.99-star rating.

To fully grasp their appeal, you have to go back to the beginning. That name, for instance.

They don’t play naked. Nor do they practice karate. And they’re not girls. (For the record, though, a couple of them admit to taking a few karate classes.)

The name, it turns out, is a complete fabrication. But it’s a well thought out fabrication. When the band was formed in 2008, the members searched out the top 10 Googled words. Among them were “karate” and “girls” and “naked.”

“So we took those words, switched them around and got the name,” says King. “We thought it was fun and catchy.”

There was a problem, though. Initially, church festivals—one of their mainstays—

were hesitant to book a band with such a provocative name. But then, one particularly eager festival organizer asked if they would be willing to refer to themselves by their initials—NKG. “We agreed,” says King, “and we sold all their beer on a Thursday night. After that, all the churches wanted us. “ It’s true that an ability to sell lots of beer will warm the hearts of promoters. But still, that doesn’t explain NKG’s extraordinary popularity with audiences, a popularity that sees them performing upwards of 200 gigs a year, from Key West to West Side Cincinnati, from Branson, Missouri, to dozens of weddings and corporate gatherings.

The key is showmanship. And charisma.

And a boundless energy that fi nds them dancing and teasing and treating every audience member like an old friend. They invite people onstage and occasionally clamber down into the crowd themselves.

They know the ever-so-fi ne line between poking fun at someone and mocking them.

And they never cross it.

Sometimes they put on wigs. Or funny hats. And they dress for the occasion.

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At Hilton Head, they look like they just returned from the beach. At Put-in-Bay, they’re fashionably scruff y. But at wedding and corporate gigs, they channel the best of old-school rock bands and they wear suits. Of course, they may turn out to be splashy red suits with polka dots and swirling patterns all over them. But they look sharp as hell.

Most important, every moment of an NKG show is goodhearted. And generous.

You inherently understand that they have just one purpose—to entertain.

Th is is no accident. NKG was not one of those garage bands that stumbled into success. That was the goal when they started.

All four founding members had played in numerous Cincinnati-area bands for decades. They were long past the point where they were content with day jobs supporting the occasional gigs. They wanted to create a band that could provide them steady, full-time employment.

So they approached the founding of NKG as one would the creation of a small business. And they were determined to make it a smart business devoted not just to entertaining audiences, but also

to helping their clients make their events more entertaining. (Hint: When was the last time you heard members of a pop band call the people who hire them “clients?”)

“One thing we always keep in mind is that when we are hired, it’s all about the client’s day, not our day,” says drummer Glenn Kukla. “We’re there to make them look like the hero. Ninety percent of the work we do is not onstage. We can be the master of ceremonies. We can organize integrated DJ music. We can execute any special programming that a client envisions. We’re like an event planning partner.”

They study audiences, paying careful attention to what songs work and, just as important, which ones don’t. And then they develop playlists accordingly.

“We want songs that bridge all generations,” says Kukla. It has proven to be a highly successful approach. So successful, in fact, that they found themselves having to turn down numerous gigs back in 2016.

So they did what many businesses before them have done—they cloned themselves.

Over the years, enough musicians had cycled in and out of the band that NKG

had a pool of former members they could call on in an emergency.

So in t imes of ex t reme demand— typically the summer months and again in December—they cobble together a second NKG. Same music. Same costumes.

Same shtick. There are always two of the original members performing with the group. But other than that, you’d be hard-pressed to tell the “new” group from the original.

None of this comes cheap, of course.

Depending on what options you select, an NKG evening can set you back anywhere from $3,000 to $6,000. But with the average American wedding topping $30,000 (according to Brides Magazine), spending a few grand on such a surefire entertainment centerpiece seems like a steal. Besides, if all those rave reviews can be believed, NKG provides many ancillary services you might otherwise pay more for.

“We’re not just a band—we’re an entertainment package,” says Kukla. “And though it may seem like a rudimentary thing, we go on on time. For us, getting up onstage and performing the music is the reward.” ■

JOHN KLARE JR.

Naked Karate Girls has played weddings, festivals, special events and more throughout the Tristate for the past 11 years.

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Spring Arts Preview

Spring into the Marco Borggreve

Arts Cincinnati arts organizations ring in spring by keeping busy

Pavel Haas Quartet

By Corinne Minard

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e may still be fighting cold weather as we enter spring in the Greater Cincinnati region, but the Tristate’s arts organizations are in full swing. New art exhibits, classical music and riveting theater can be found throughout the months of February and March. Read on for a taste of this spring’s arts opportunities.

Music The Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra and Cincinnati Pops have filled the coming months with plenty of music. The Pops start February with its final performances of Orchestral Spectacular: Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue (Jan. 31- Feb. 2). Pianist Marcus Roberts joins the Pops to play Gershwin’s seminal classic, but attendees will also hear show-stoppers like “Porgy and Bess,” “Cuban Overture” and “American in Paris.”

The following week the CSO is joined by mezzo-soprano Isabel Leonard and pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet for Play of Light: Ravel’s L’Enfant (Feb. 7-8). The show will be brought to life with projected animations on and around the orchestra that were created in collaboration with the University of Cincinnati’s CollegeConservatory of Music.

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most legendar y concerts. Beethoven Akademie 1808 (Feb. 29-March 1) is a sixhour event with a two-hour dinner break as an intermission. The symphony will be covering eight of Beethoven’s works with the help of several guest artists, including singers and a pianist.

In March, the CSO will celebrate Mozart and Shostakovich. For Manny and Mozart (March 27-28), the symphony will be joined by Emanuel Ax, a Grammywinning classical pianist.

Memorial Hall will also be playing host to several classical performances over the coming months. Chamber Music Cincinnati is bringing both Pavel Haas Quartet (March 12) and Murray Perahia (March 17) to the hall.

And for those who enjoy opera, soprano Nicole Cabell (March 27) is performing a solo show, something she rarely does.

Theater The region’s many theater companies are also staying busy this spring, with each group hosting multiple shows.

A highlight includes Playhouse in the Park’s AmericUS (Feb. 1-March 8). Performed by Universes, a multi-cultural performance ensemble, the show will fuse theater, dance, hip-hop, jazz and more for a show that looks at contemporary America.

But there’s plenty more. The Cincin-

nati Shakespeare Company brings some levity to the season with its performance of Pride & Prejudice (Feb. 28-March 28), Broadway’s Les Misérables (Feb. 11-23) will make a stop at the Aronoff and the Cincinnati Ballet will perform the classic tale of Swan Lake (Feb. 13-16).

Art Many art exhibits will also be calling the Tristate home this spring.

At the Weston Art Gallery, visitors will be able to see “Pop Supernatural” (Feb. 7-April 5). The exhibit contains three interconnected bodies of work, but the highlight will surely be the enormous carved wooden PEZ dispensers that people will be able to see in the lower galleries. “ Women Brea k i ng Bou nda r ies” (through April 12) only has another month at the Cincinnati Art Museum, so art fans should head over to the museum before it leaves. The exhibit features the work of women artists from around the world in many mediums, and featured artists include Georgia O’Keeffe, Lorna Simpson and Chiyo Mitsuhisa.

The Taft Museum of Art brings in one last exhibit before the end of March to celebrate its home. “Built to Last: The Taft Historic House at 200” (March 27-July 19) will tell the story of its historic house and features a scale model of the house. n

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SUNDAY

MONDAY

FEBRUARY TUESDAY

WEDNESDAY

THURSDAY

FRIDAY

SATURDAY 1 [2/1-3/8] Head to Playhouse in the Park to see AmericUS, which fuses theater, poetry, jazz and more.

2 [Through 2/2] Pianist Marcus Roberts joins the Pops for Orchestral Spectacular: Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue.

3

4

5

6

7 [2/7] UC’s CCM Wind Symphony presents Maslanka 4, which includes an original piece by a CCM alum.

8 [2/8] The Cincinnati Boychoir celebrates song with its show Canten Senores!

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13

14

15

ARTHUR COHEN, MILDRED RUIZ-SAPP, LAWRENCE TURNER

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[2/13] The Earls of Leicester perform the classic bluegrass of Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs at Memorial Hall.

18 [2/18] Join the Cincinnati Pops for An Evening with Ledisi, an American R&B and jazz artist.

19 [2/19] Husband and wife duo Drew and Ellie Holcomb will play together and separately at Memorial Hall.

23 [2/20-23] CCM presents its take on Handel’s romantic comedy opera Partenope.

25 [2/25] CPI New Voices brings audiences a stage reading of a new play with a performance of Angels.

26 27 [2/26] Singer-songwriter Janis Ian will play songs from her decades-spanning career at Memorial Hall.

TONY ARR ASMITH

16 17 [Through 2/16] Playhouse in the Park presents Buddy: The Buddy Holly Story.

24 [2/21-3/1] NKU’s School of the Arts presents the comedic play HMS Pinafore.

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21 [2/21] The Fab Four: The Ultimate Tribute takes over the Taft Theatre stage.

28 [Through 2/28] “ALIGNED – The Art of Design” features the works of DAAP students and faculty at 1628 Ltd.

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[Through 2/15] The Cincinnati Shakespeare Company tells the story of Lyndon B. Johnson in All the Way.

MIKKI SCHAFFNER

10

LLOYD BAGGS

9 [2/8-9] Delve deep into the cheese and charcuterie world during the Big Cheese Festival at Jungle Jim’s.

22 [2/22] Celebrate 50 years of Pink Floyd during The Pink Floyd Laser Spectacular at Memorial Hall.

29 [2/29] Multiple Elvis impersonators join together for the Elvis Tribute Artist Spectacular at the Aronoff.

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A&E Calendar Play of Light: Ravel’s L’Enfant The Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra is joined by mezzo-soprano Isabel Leonard for Play of Light: Ravel’s L’Enfant at Music Hall Feb. 7-8. These special shows feature a fully staged production of L’Enfant with animated projections to bring everything to life. Feb. 7-8.

8 p.m. $14-$107. Music Hall, 1241 Elm St., Over-theRhine. 513-381-3300, cincinnatisymphony.org.

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Desitny of Desire Playhouse in the Park pays homage to Latin American soap operas with Destiny of Desire. The play starts when two girls are switched at birth, but the drama really starts when they find each other 18 years late. Feb. 29-March 28. Times vary. $30-$88.

Playhouse in the Park, 962 Mt. Adams Circle, Cincinnati. 513-421-3888, cincyplay.com.

TONY ARR ASMITH

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SUNDAY

MONDAY 2

TUESDAY

WEDNESDAY

THURSDAY

FRIDAY

SATURDAY

5 [3/5-8] The classic novel comes to life as a musical when CCM performs The Secret Garden.

6 [3/6] Gospel singer CeCe Winans joins the CSO for a celebration of black music during Classical Roots 2020.

7 [3/7] The comedy group The Capitol Steps mocks both sides of the aisle during its political sketch show.

11 [3/11] South African male choral group Ladysmith Black Mambazo stops

by Memorial Hall.

12 [3/12] The Pavel Haas Quartet comes to Memorial Hall for the night.

13 [3/13] Guitarist Tommy Emmanuel brings his unique playing style to the Taft Theatre.

14 [3/14] Travel the world without leaving the region during the NKY International Festival.

17 [3/17] Pianist Murray Perahia promises a night of classical compositions at Memorial Hall.

18 [3/18] Funk band Lucky Chops brings its fun and brassy energy to the Taft Theatre.

19

20 [3/20] Singer-songwriter, rapper and bassist Meshell Ndegeocello plays Memorial Hall.

21 [3/21-4/26] Playhouse in the Park’s Actually addresses gender, race and consent through a story of two college students.

25

27 [3/27] Opera singer Nicole Cabell performs a rare solo concert at Memorial Hall.

28 [3/28] ABBAFAB: The Premier Abba Experience stops by the Aronoff for the night.

3

4

RENEE SILVERMAN

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MARCH

8

9

10 [3/10] The Ariel Quartet will play the works of three Hungarian composers during a show at CCM.

15 [3/15] The Cincinnati Youth Choir will sing songs from around the world during Celebrating Our Stories.

16

22 [3/22] Aoife O’Donovan will play bluegrass, folk and more during her show at Memorial Hall.

23

24

29 [3/29] Political comedian Bill Maher visits Cincinnati again for a show at the Taft Theatre.

30 [3/30] Journalist Denise Kiernan will address the changing roles of women since the 1870s as part of the Women’s Club lecture series.

31 [3/31] Colin Hay will play songs from his more than 20-year career during a show at the Taft.

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[3/4] English singersongwriter Dave Mason brings songs from his solo career and more to Memorial Hall.

[3/19] The Official Blues Brothers Revue stops by Memorial Hall.

26 [3/26] Head to the Taft Theatre to hear the blues music of Tab Benoit.

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A&E Calendar

Penguin Days Enjoy discounted admission and lots of cute penguins during Penguin Days at the Cincinnati Zoo. E ach weekend until March 13, penguins will parade throughout the zoo. Guests also will be able to view special enrichment activities with many of the animals. Through March 13.

10 a.m.-5 p.m. Prices vary. Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden, 3400 Vine St., Cincinnati. cincinnatizoo.org.

CAREER PLUS PROGRAM St. Rita School for the Deaf

The Career Plus Program is a 2 year program for students who have chosen to defer their diploma for focused vocational training that prepares students for competitive employment and independent living.

The program consists of classroom work and on the job training.

Thank you to our 2019 – 2020 Community Partners!

• Animal Friends Humane Society • BMC Sprindale • Cincinnati Museum Center • Expressions by Elizabeth

• Fitton Center for Creative Arts • Krohn Conservatory • The Healing Center

Working alongside students and staff from the Career Plus program has been beneficial to myself as a supervisor, my team as coworkers and our organization as we work to create better experiences for all of our community members. Our student intern connected well with our staff and happily worked on a wide variety of projects with us while learning and growing their own skills. This St. Rita’s program is a huge asset to helping blend opportunities for students and businesses seamlessly together in an inclusive world.” Amanda Dotson, Fitton Center for Creative Arts

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A&E Calendar Jimmy Webb

Sasa Tk alcan

Jimmy Webb, a prolific songwriter who is known for hits like “Worst That Could Happen” and “The Highway Man,” stops by Memorial Hall for the evening on March 21. During this performance he’ll be focusing on the 100-plus songs he created with Glen Campbell. March 21. 8 p.m. $28-$45.

Memorial Hall, 1225 Elm St., Over-theRhine. 513-977-8838, memorialhallotr.com.

MAYA Coming March 14

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Midwestern Traveler

Staying Busy in Tennessee THE STATE’S CITIES ARE GREAT WEEKEND GETAWAYS FOR FAMILIES LOOKING TO STAY BUSY

By Corinne Minard

F

or those looking for a quick trip away Tennessee may be the perfect place to start. Just a couple hours away from Ohio, the state is home to many cities that are packed with a variety of things to do. From outdoor adventures and unique festivals to live music and immersive history exhibits all of these can be found in the following Tennessee cities.

With its location on the Cumberland River, Clarksville provides many opportunities for outdoor recreation.

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Midwestern Traveler

Photo by Justin Fee

Knoxville According to Kristen Combs, director of communications and social strategies for Visit Knoxville, visitors are often surprised by how much there is to do without leaving the downtown area.

“I think a lot of people … don’t really have this conception of what Knoxville is so they are surprised by what we do have,” she says. “We’re a type of place where you come to your hotel, you valet or you park your car and you’re not going to see it for the rest of the weekend.”

Combs recommends travelers start with a visit to the Sunsphere, Knoxville’s answer to Seattle’s Space Needle. Built for the 1982 World’s Fair, the Sunsphere offers a 360-degree view of Knoxville. “I always recommend people to do that because you really kind of get your bearings and get a good feel for the destination,” she adds.

One of the first sites you’ll notice is a large forested area on the south side. Called the Urban Wilderness, the 1,000-acre site provides outdoor recreation lovers with 50 miles of hiking trails, lakes and quarries in which to kayak and paddleboard, a doubleblack diamond mountain bike trail, rock climbing opportunities and more within the city of Knoxville itself.

“It’s like 3 miles from the heart of downtown. You’re not having to drive half an hour, 45 minutes, and beyond to really get some outdoor adventure. You can go do that and come back downtown for lunch,” says Combs.

When families need a break from the outdoors, they can have find some indoor respite in Knoxville’s many museums. The Knoxville Museum of Art is a free museum 28

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that celebrates the art and artists of east Tennessee. The East Tennessee History Center delves into the history of the region, from the Cherokee to the 1982 World’s Fair.

And Zoo Knoxville is home to dozens of animals, including red pandas.

In addition to its regular attractions, visitors to Knoxville can also enjoy many different festivals and events throughout the summer and spring, such as the Mardi Growl Dog Parade, the Chalk Walk and Bike, Boat, Brew and Bark. One of the most family-friendly festivals that Knoxville hosts, the Children’s Festival of Reading, will be conducted May 16 in World’s Fair Park this year.

“There will be arts and crafts, all kinds of different story telling, games and all sorts of fun stuff,” says Combs.

Franklin Nashville is known for country music, but just 15 miles south of the city is Franklin, a city that also embraces country music.

“If Nashville is the big full arena with electric guitars, Franklin is kind of the acoustic version,” says Matthew Maxey, associate director of public relations for the Williamson County Convention and Visitors Bureau.

Walking down Franklin’s historic Main Street visitors can expect to find at least 30 places playing live music, from restaurants and performance venues to street performers and even dress shops.

“It really is you’ll be walking down the street and the spice shop might have a guitarist outside of it or buskers on the street that are just a few years away from being on your radio,” says Maxey.

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: The abandoned quarries in Knoxville’s Urban Wilderness are great for paddleboarding; Zoo Knoxville is home to many animals including tigers; and the Knoxville Museum of Art celebrates the art and artists of east Tennessee.

Many country music stars like to escape the nonstop action of Nashville for the slower pace of Franklin, so it’s not uncommon to see big-name acts perform at the 300-seat Franklin Theatre. For example, on April 14, country fans will be able to see Sara Evans, Cherie Oakley and JP Williams perform together in an intimate show that’s raising funds for Franklin’s Holy Trinity Montessori.

“You’ll get Jason Isbell or Vince Gill playing on that stage that usually you have to go to a much larger venue [to see] and it’s just a really cool thing seeing them that up close,” says Maxey.

Even those who aren’t country music fans will find Franklin full of charm. Franklin’s Main Street is 16 whole blocks of local and one-of-a-kind shops and restaurants.

“You walk down Main Street and it really is like walking into a Norman Rockwell painting or the cities that Hallmark movies try to create—it’s the real life version of that. You don’t see people looking down at

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PHOTO FROM VISIT FR ANKLIN PHOTO FROM VISIT FR ANKLIN

their phones. They’re just heads up enjoying it,” says Maxey.

Noteworthy stops on Main Street include Holly Williams’ White’s Mercantile shop, Scarlet Scales Antiques and restaurants like Red Pony.

For those interested in history, Maxey recommends visiting historic sites related to the Battle of Franklin, one of only a few Civil War battles that was fought in a downtown area instead of a large battlefield.

“We’ve got 300-plus acres of battlefield just outside the downtown square, three house museums on it that people can dive into history in as little as three hours or spend three days,” says Maxey. “Plus many of the buildings in downtown that were witness to the war still have markers. You can go deep into the battle if people want.”

ABOVE: Each year, Franklin commerorates the Battle of Franklin with an Illlumination Ceremony on the battlefield.

LEFT: Live music can be found throughout Franklin, including the restaurant Gray’s On Main.

CLARKSVILLE Clarksville and Montgomery County are also worthy vacation spots for those who love history. Michelle Dickerson, director of media and marketing for Visit Clarksville, points to the area’s Fort Defiance Civil War Park (which features a well-preserved earthworks fort) and the Historic Collinsville Pioneer Settlement (home to 16 authentically period structures on 40 acres).

“It very much chronicles history from Native American times through before, during and after the Civil War,” she says.

History can also be found in nearby Dunbar Cave State Park. Recently reopened to public cave tours, the caves are home to 14th century Mississippian art. Cave tours take visitors through about three-quarters of a mile of the cave, which includes a chance to see the cave art. Dickerson recommends booking a cave tour in advance as they are often full.

But Clarksville isn’t all history. As home to Austin Peay State University and the 101st Airborne Division, the city has a dynamic and young population that has

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Photo by Lucas Ryan Chambers

Midwestern Traveler

ABOVE: Visitors touring Dunbar Cave.

RIGHT: Clarksville’s Cumberland RiverWalk follows the meandering Cumberland River.

Photo by Lucas Ryan Chambers

allowed it to host expansive arts and food scenes alongside historic sites.

“Troops retire from the military at 40 and they’ve lived all around the world, so they bring a lot of those ideas for coffee shops and craft breweries and restaurants serving authentic Korean barbecue or what have you here in Clarksville,” says Dickerson. “We definitely have traditional Southern catfish, barbecue, that sort of thing, but we also have a lot of the whole

Asian realm and Italian and German and French and all that, which is really surprising to people. And it’s surprising that it’s all an affordable price point.”

No matter your interest, Dickerson recommends that you include Clarksville’s Cumberland RiverWalk in your trip.

“Downtown borders the river so the RiverWalk connects up to downtown. You’ll find locally run businesses, restaurants, breweries, a performing arts theater and

the state’s second largest general history museum,” she says. The RiverWalk offers visitors a great opportunity to take some historic architecture, grab a bite to eat and even enjoy a free concert during the summer.

“We’ve really got a little bit of a lot of things. I think the one thing I hear the most is how pretty the place is with the river right downtown and the parks, the architecture and the history downtown,” says Dickerson. n

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Dining

Brunch Time

OUR GUIDE TO BRUNCH IN THE TRISTATE LETS YOU KNOW WHEN AND WHERE TO ENJOY THIS WEEKEND MEAL

Brunch in Cincinnati is more popular than ever and it shows with the amount of restaurants that offer Saturday and Sunday specials. There’s something for everyone, whether you favor old-school diner breakfast dishes and atmospheres or gourmet versions of familiar meals accentuated by creative bloody marys and mimosas.

Downtown and Over-the-Rhine have a deserved reputation as the city’s paradise for gourmands, but don’t overlook the vegetarian-friendly eateries of Northside, the new offerings clustered in Blue Ash or the boutique restaurants sprinkled from Walnut Hills to Oakley. No matter where you are or what you’re looking for, you’ll fi nd your next favorite brunch destination among our listings that follow.

—Kevin Michell

SATURDAY ONLY: Blue Jay Restaurant 8 A.M.-3 P.M. 4154 HAMILTON AVE., NORTHSIDE Classic diner breakfast at an old-school price Bonbonerie 8 A.M.-5:30 P.M. 2030 MADISON ROAD, O’BRYONVILLE BONBONERIE.COM Café and bakery serving specialty French toast all day Court Street Lobster Bar 11 A.M.-2 P.M. 28 W. COURT ST., DOWNTOWN COURTSTREETLOBSTERBAR.COM Seafood-influenced brunch with a bottomless brunch deal

SUNDAY ONLY: Basil’s On Market 10 A.M.-2 P.M. 5650 TYLERSVILLE ROAD, MASON BASILSONMARKET.COM New Cincinnati location from the Troy-based restaurant offers a Sunday brunch buffet BrewRiver Creole Kitchen 10 A.M.-2 P.M. 4632 EASTERN AVE., LINWOOD BREWRIVERCREOLEKITCHEN.COM New Orleans-inspired twist on brunch, including eggs Sardou

Social OTR

The Comet 11 A.M.-2 P.M. 4579 HAMILTON AVE., NORTHSIDE COMETBAR.COM An eclectic, rotating, chef-driven brunch menu with ample vegetarian options

Mazunte 11 A.M-9 P.M. 5207 MADISON ROAD, MADISONVILLE MAZUNTETACOS.COM Sundays are Dia de los Huevos, with huevos rancheros and more served all day

CWC The Restaurant 9 A.M.-2 P.M. 1517 SPRINGFIELD PIKE, WYOMING CWCTHERESTAURANT.COM Recognizable favorites, plus doughnut sandwiches and homemade sweets

Muse 10 A.M.-3 P.M. 1000 DELTA AVE., MT. LOOKOUT MUSEMTLOOKOUT.COM Familiar brunch dishes done with a focus on healthy and local ingredients

Grand Finale 10:30 A.M.-2:30 P.M. 3 E. SHARON ROAD, GLENDALE GRANDFINALE.INFO Brunch buffet with blueberry pancakes made to order

Nick & Tom’s Restaurant & Bar 11 A.M.-2 P.M. 5774 BRIDGETOWN ROAD, BRIDGETOWN NORTH NICKANDTOMS.COM Specializing in waffles, including its fried chicken waffle

Incline Public House 10 A.M.-2 P.M. 2601 W. EIGHTH ST., PRICE HILL INCLINEPUBLICHOUSE.COM Large brunch menu with fun bloody marys and mimosas Matt the Miller’s Tavern 10 A.M.-2:30 P.M. 5901 E. GALBRAITH ROAD, KENWOOD; 9558 CIVIC CENTRE BLVD., WEST CHESTER MTMTAVERN.COM Breakfast sandwiches, healthy bowls and waffles are offered by this growing chain

Parker’s Blue Ash Tavern 10 A.M.-2 P.M. 4200 COOPER ROAD, BLUE ASH PARKERSBLUEASH.COM The city’s best brunch buffet includes a complimentary mimosa, bloody mary or screwdriver

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Dining Red Feather 11 A.M.-3 P.M. 3200 MADISON ROAD, OAKLEY REDFEATHERKITCHEN.COM Specializing in a wide range of egg dishes and a buildyour-own bloody mary bar

Goose & Elder 10 A.M.-3 P.M. 1800 RACE ST., OVER-THE-RHINE GOOSEANDELDER.COM New eatery from Jose Salazar combines brunch sandwiches and salads with French toast and omelets

Senate 10 A.M.-3 P.M. 1100 SUMMIT PLACE, BLUE ASH SENATEBLUEASH.COM Gourmet breakfast favorites, including an excellent eggs Benedict

Half Day Café SA 7 A.M.-2 P.M., SU 8 A.M.-2 P.M. 1 WYOMING AVE., WYOMING; 8825 WILKENS BLVD., MASON HALFDAYCAFE.ORG Neighborhood breakfast favorite with a second location in Mason

SATURDAY AND SUNDAY: Branch 10 A.M.-2 P.M. 1535 MADISON ROAD, EAST WALNUT HILLS EATATBRANCH.COM Refined twist on brunch favorites with unique cocktail offerings The Brown Dog Café 10 A.M.-3 P.M. 1000 SUMMIT PLACE, BLUE ASH BROWNDOGCAFE.COM Varied menu including poutine, unique eggs Benedict, bottomless mimosas and more

First Watch 7 A.M.-2:30 P.M. DOWNTOWN CINCINNATI: 104 E. SEVENTH ST. HYDE PARK: 2692 MADISON ROAD CRESTVIEW HILLS: 2762 TOWN CENTER BLVD. ANDERSON: 7625 BEECHMONT AVE. HARRISON GREEN: 5655 HARRISON AVE. KENWOOD: 8118 MONTGOMERY ROAD NORTHGATE MALL: 9721 COLERAIN AVE. FLORENCE SQUARE: 7727 MALL ROAD PRINCETON PLAZA: 80 W. KEMPER ROAD HARPERS STATION: 11301 MONTGOMERY ROAD UNION CENTRE: 9233 FLOER DRIVE LIBERTY: 6876 CINCINNATI-DAYTON ROAD FIRSTWATCH.COM Sit-down chain specializing in breakfast with a large menu at its 12 Tristate locations

Hangover Easy 8 A.M.-4 P.M. 13 W. CHARLTON ST., CLIFTON HANGOVEREASY.COM Campus-adjacent spot does a modern spin on traditional diner breakfast with large portions Louvino OTR 10 A.M.-2 P.M. 1142 MAIN ST., OVER-THE-RHINE LOUVINO.COM Refined yet relaxed brunch experience featuring dishes with a touch of southern flair

Come

Brunch with us Fresh seafood, chef-carved meats, made-to-order omelettes and housemade waffles complement our bountiful buffet of sweet & savory selections Join us on Sundays from 10:00 a.m. until 2:00 p.m.

For reservations, call 513-891-8300

420 0 CO OPE R ROA D • C I NC I N NAT I, OH IO 45242 PA R K E R S B L U E A S H . C O M

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MOTR 10 A.M.-2 P.M. 1345 MAIN ST., OVER-THE-RHINE MOTRPUB.COM This music venue and bar opens up weekend mornings to dish out its breakfast casserole and other favorites

Sleepy Bee 8 A.M.-3 P.M. LOCATIONS IN OAKLEY, BLUE ASH AND DOWNTOWN SLEEPYBEECAFE.COM Quickly growing restaurant offers healthy and vegetarian options alongside breakfast standards

The National Exemplar 7 A.M.-2:30 P.M. 6880 WOOSTER PIKE, MARIEMONT NATIONALEXEMPLAR.COM Longtime Cincinnati breakfast favorite with a great blend of hearty and healthy options

Social OTR SA 9 A.M.-2 P.M.; SU 10 A.M-3 P.M. 1819 ELM ST., OVER-THE-RHINE SOCIALOTR.COM One of OTR’s best-kept secrets offers a unique brunch menu and inventive cocktails to match

Poked Yolk 7 A.M.-3 P.M. 2235 BAUER ROAD, BATAVIA POKEDYOLK.COM Omelets and traditional breakfast dishes complimented by biscuits, avocado toast and more

Sugar n’ Spice 7 A.M.-3 P.M. 4381 READING ROAD, PADDOCK HILLS EATSUGARNSPICE.COM Colorful breakfast joint has been serving for over 75 years and will soon add an Over-the-Rhine location

Poochie’s Place 6 A.M.-2 P.M. 1375 W. OHIO PIKE, AMELIA FACEBOOK.COM/POOCHIESPLACE Local favorite among East Siders opens bright and early to dish out pancakes, biscuits and platters

Taste of Belgium HOURS VARY BY LOCATION MULTIPLE LOCATIONS IN CLIFTON, HYDE PARK AND DOWNTOWN AUTHENTICWAFFLE.COM Waffle specialists offer brunch all day, including biscuits and gravy and goetta

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Tucker’s Restaurant SA 8 A.M.-3 P.M.; SU 8 A.M.-2 P.M. 1637 VINE ST., OVER-THE-RHINE FACEBOOK.COM/TUCKERSRESTAURANTOTR Venerable OTR breakfast joint in operation since 1946

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A Paradox MARIANNE LEWIS, UC LINDNER COLLEGE OF BUSINESS’ NEW

of Opportunity

DEAN, SEES WAYS TO BUILD ON THE SCHOOL’S LEGACY WHILE ENHANCING WHAT IT ALREADY DOES

By David Holthaus

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T

he new leader of Cincinnati’s leading business college is a self-described academic brat who grew up on the

coasts but calls the Midwest her home.

If that sounds like a paradox, it’s one that Marianne Lewis is comfortable with.

That’s because Lewis, named in March as the dean of the University of Cincinnati’s Carl H. Lindner College of Business, is a recognized expert in a rather arcane field of business study known as organizational paradoxes.

It’s an area of research that draws on deep philosophical topics, but in the Cliff Notes version it is about learning to function effectively among the competing demands and tensions that pervade our lives, our workplaces and our institutions.

That research will be useful for Lewis as she lays out a vision and direction for the 113-year-old college that she sees as playing a central role in the success of the region’s businesses and in the future of its students.

“It’s about making sure we develop top talent for corporations and helping students figure out who they want to be,” she says. “What their skills and capabilities can be and how to make the most of their time on campus.”

Those demands would be pressing enough, but Lewis lists others, demands she sees as providing “opportunities”: solving problems through faculty and student research, creating new modes of learning, creating lifelong learning opportunities for alumni and being a resource for sectors of the community to come around together.

Lewis is returning to Cincinnati after four years in London as dean and professor of management at Cass Business School, part of City, University of London, considered a top-50 global business school.

She grew up in the rarefied air of Harvard and Stanford, the daughter of an educator at those elite institutions. “My rebellion was I came to the Midwest for college and I never left,” she says.

“I wanted to fi nd my own space,” she says. “When I got here, I felt I found my people.”

She completed a bachelor’s in business administration at Tusculum College in Greeneville, Tennessee, in 1989, an MBA in management from Indiana University in 1991 and a Ph.D. in management from the University of Kentucky in 1997.

Lewis joined UC and the Lindner College of Business in 1997 as an assistant professor of management. From 2002 to 2006 she served as associate dean for innovation and program development. In that role, she says, “I had this wonderful job of figuring out how do we do more of what we do well.”

One of the programs she spearheaded was the Lindner Fast Track project, designed for freshmen to collaborate in teams of 20 and work with a Cincinnati corporation on a real-world problem right off the bat in their fi rst year of college.

“It’s a wonderful way of connecting what we do in the business school with the business community,” she says.

In 2007, Lewis became director of UC’s Kolodzik Business Scholars, an honors program, and in 2009, she was named associate dean for undergraduate programs.

In 2014, she was off to Cardiff University in Wales for a year as a Fulbright Scholar, and, in 2015, she was appointed dean of Cass Business School in London.

After four years there, it was time for a homecoming of sorts.

She’s found a home in Villa Hills, not so far from where she raised her three children, now grown, in Fort Thomas. “They’re spread out, but they’re happy to have me back in Cincinnati and back in our home base,” she says.

She loved London, but is happy to be back.

“The difference between a London and a Cincinnati is huge,” she says. “Cincinnati is large enough to have a vibrant diverse ecosystem of large corporations, startups, private businesses, but it’s small enough that it actually feels like a community.

“There’s as much collaboration as there is competition,” she says. And there’s power in that paradox.

“People realize what they take for granted when they come back,” she says.

Returning to Cincinnati from London, she says, ”I learned more about the power of community.”

Over there, the school claimed alumni from 160 countries. Here, alumni are more geographically concentrated, which presents an opportunity for the new dean.

“I have a real opportunity to build us into a strong alumni community that helps

and supports the city, the school and, most importantly, our students.”

UC provost Kristi Nelson called Lewis “a transformational and collaborative leader whose passion and innovative spirit will position the college for decades of highimpact research, teaching and experiential learning.”

Lewis is the first woman to lead the business college, an honorific she says brings yet another opportunity, and also a responsibility.

“I’m passionate about women in leadership,” she says. “Now I have a responsibility to not only leverage that passion but make sure we are supporting our alumni and students and community and developing fantastic, diverse leaders.

“Inclusive excellence has always been a passion of mine,” she says.

Her focus on inclusion received a huge vote of support recently with a major gift from UC business school alum Richard Thornburgh and his wife, Cornelia. More than $4 million of that $9 million gift announced in December has been directed to scholarship funds that support African American, Hispanic, Latino and Native American students enrolled in the business college.

Lewis arrived to lead the business college just a few months before it opened its 225,000-square-foot state-of-the-art building this fall. The $120 million project was one of the most ambitious construction projects undertaken by the university.

“It’s a game-changing facility,” she says.

“It is so student focused and interactive.”

She plans to make use of the facility and its technology to create new paths of business learning that are better adapted to people’s lives. “I think we can personalize learning further by helping individuals get the business learning they need, when they need it and how they need it,” she says.

That means greater opportunities for online learning, certificate programs and professional development for executives already in the business world.

“Let’s take the offerings we have now that are all degree-oriented and be creative about how we break that up into smaller pieces to provide the flexibility people need today,” she says.

Lewis, fittingly, offers up a paradox to describe how she’ll lead. “You need to live for the moment and in today, and for the long term and having vision,” she says.

A paradox, yes, but one fi lled with opportunities. ■ w w w.

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By

David

Holthaus

&

Th e

Ed i t o r s

From business leaders to politicians, those in power know that it is work to get to the top and a struggle to stay there.

Challenges from opponents can present themselves at any time and there’s always the next test, the next task, the next obstacle. Cincy’s 16th annual Power 100 list recognizes those people who hold and use the most clout to benefit the region. = New to the Top Ten = New to this year’s list

1

John Cranley mayor, City of Cincinnati

With John Cranley entering the penultimate year of his second term as Cincinnati’s mayor, speculation is certain to intensify about his political future. If he does seek a higher office, he’ll certainly tout the redevelopment of The Banks, downtown and Over-theRhine, developments that he has called “the Cincinnati miracle.”

Cranley has also presided over a rise in population in the city after years of population declines and stagnation. In the year ahead, he is expected to continue championing the community’s anti-poverty efforts, including his Hand-Up Initiative and the Cincinnati Poverty Collaborative.

3John Barrett

president, chairman & CEO,

Western & Southern Financial Group

In addition to leading Western & Southern, Barrett continues to be very active in downtown development and in the broader business and nonprofit communities. A new hotel proposed

by Western & Southern, The Lytle Park Hotel, is scheduled to open this year. Barrett is also spearheading a $105 million fundraising campaign to help the University of Cincinnati’s Barrett Cancer Center and other members of the Cincinnati Cancer Consortium pursue National Cancer Institute designation for cancer research excellence. His company reported record profit last year while an acquisition pushed its assets owned over the $50 billion mark for the first time.

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2Bob Castellini

principal owner & CEO,

Cincinnati Reds; chairman, Castellini Co.

Since 2006, a group of people led by Bob Castellini has controlled one of Cincinnati’s icons, the Cincinnati Reds. After a disappointing season in 2019, Castellini and the Reds had an active off-season, acquiring the club’s first Japanese-born player and shelling out big payroll for free agents. Castellini’s influence extends far beyond the Reds, as he has been instrumental in the development of The Banks and the broader Cincinnati riverfront. He chairs the Joint Banks Steering Committee and is on the board of the Cincinnati Center City Development Committee (3CDC).

4 Carl Lindner III

majority owner, FC Cincinnati;

co-president & Co-CEO, American

Financial Group

Carl Lindner III is the co-CEO of one of Cincinnati’s largest companies, $7 billion financial services giant American Financial Group. But these days, he is best known for bringing professional soccer to Cincinnati. In just a few years, FC Cincinnati has earned an invitation to join the big leagues and a new home for the team is rising in the West End, a stadium funded predominantly by Lindner and the other club owners. Over the last year, Lindner has attracted new investors to the team, including former eBay CEO Meg Whitman.

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5Tom Williams

president & CEO, North American

Properties Inc.; co-principal owner & vice chairman, Cincinnati Reds

For the last 25 years, Tom Williams has led North American Properties, a national real estate company that has developed millions of square feet of commercial space and thousands of residential units in 15 states and 67 cities. In the year ahead, the company is expected to transform a signature local commercial property, Newport on the Levee. Beyond his own business, Williams is vice chairman and one of the principal owners of the Cincinnati Reds and serves on several boards that exert influence over development in the region, including JobsOhio.

7Denise Driehaus

president, Hamilton County Board

of Commissioners

Democrats are firmly in control of the Hamilton County Board of Commissioners, and Denise Driehaus wields considerable power in that body, which holds the county’s purse strings. Driehaus holds a long-time interest in inclusive economic development, and serves as a board member of the OKI Regional Council of Governments, REDI Cincinnati and the Hamilton County Landbank. She has been a leader in pushing for a coordinated response to the region’s drug epidemic and will be a key participant in continued development of The Banks as well as negotiations with City Hall over the Metropolitan Sewer District.

9Neville Pinto

president, University of Cincinnati

The University of Cincinnati celebrated its bicentennial in 2019 and university president Neville Pinto used the milestone to highlight a new strategic direction for the university called Next Lives Here. His vision encompasses three areas: improving academics through new curricula and faculty and staff investments; expanding the university’s impact in the community through its health resources, stronger links to Cincinnati Public Schools and community partnerships; and focusing on innovation through its 1819 Innovation Hub, a reimagined co-op program and an emphasis on inclusion and diversity.

6Mike Brown

president & principal owner,

Cincinnati Bengals

The Cincinnati Bengals may have just endured one of the worst seasons in franchise history but team owner Mike Brown’s clout in the region hasn’t lessened.

Witness the Bengals’ role in stalling the development of a music venue on the riverfront until a new location could be found to replace the loss of tailgating spots. But the clock is ticking on the 2026 expiration agreement of the team’s stadium lease and as it draws nearer, the sway of Brown, his family and his team should become apparent.

8Joe Deters

Hamilton County prosecutor

The Hamilton County prosecutor is, arguably, the most powerful office in local politics, controlling law and order in the county with the help of more than 100 attorneys. Joe Deters is the county’s longestserving prosecutor, first elected in 1992 and serving until 1999, when he entered state politics. In 2004, he returned and was subsequently re-elected in 2008, 2012 and 2016. After some speculation, Deters has announced he is running for re-election again in 2020. Deters has helped streamline litigation in death penalty cases, helped create the statewide DNA database and successfully argued for laws permitting certain violent juveniles to be incarcerated until age 21.

10

Nancy Grayson president, Horizon Community

Funds of Northern Kentucky

A relative newcomer on the region’s philanthropic scene, the Horizon Community Funds was established in 2017 as a vehicle to pool resources, increase giving among Northern Kentucky residents and corporations and build resources to improve the community’s quality of life. Nancy Grayson is its first president and is responsible for carrying out the vision and strategic direction of the organization. The organization gained nearly $20 million in assets under management by the end of 2018—in just a year and a half since its launch in August 2017.

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Jocile Ehrlich Better Business Bureau, president & CEO Scott D. Farmer Cintas Corp,. chairman & CEO

Those who didn’t make the top 10 are still important players in town. Below are the remaining 90,

Tim Fogarty West Chester Holdings, CEO; CRBC, co-chair

sorted by organization type. = New to this year’s list

B u siness

Leigh Fox Cincinnati Bell Inc., president & CEO S. Kay Geiger PNC Bank, Greater Cincinnati and

Stuart Aitken

Northern Kentucky, president

84.51, CEO Charles H. Gerhardt III Neil Bortz

Government Strategies Group, president & founder

Towne Properties, co-founder & chairman George T. Glover Katie Brown Blackburn

Taft/Focused Capitol Solutions, managing director

Cincinnati Bengals, executive vice president Christopher S. Habel William P. Butler

Frost Brown Todd, member-in-charge Cincinnati

Corporex Cos., chairman & founder Gary Heiman Julie Calvert

Standard Textile Co., Inc.,

Cincinnati USA Convention & Visitors,

president & CEO

president & CEO Stephen Hightower Greg D. Carmichael

Hightowers Petroleum Co.,

Fifth Third Bancorp, chairman,

president & CEO

president & CEO David L. Joyce Phil Castellini

GE Aviation, president & CEO

Cincinnati Reds, president & chief operating officer Eric Kearney Brent Cooper

Greater Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky African-

Northern Kentucky Chamber of Commerce,

American Chamber of Commerce, president & CEO

president & CEO Stephen G. Leeper

38

Alfonso Cornejo

Cincinnati Center City Development Corp. (3CDC),

Hispanic Chamber Cincinnati USA, president

president & CEO

Bill Cunningham

Steve Martenet

WLW Radio talk show host

Anthem Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Ohio, president

W. Stuart Dornette

Candace McGraw

Taft Stettinius & Hollister, partner; Cincinnati Zoo &

Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky

Botanical Garden, board chair

International Airport, CEO

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James J. McGraw Jr.

Becky Wilber

Keating Muething & Klekamp, corporate partner;

Union Centre Boulevard Merchant Association,

KMK Consulting, CEO

president; CTI Restaurants, owner

Rodney McMullen

James M. Zimmerman

Kroger Co., chairman & CEO

Taft Stettinius & Hollister, Cincinnati partner-in-charge

Jill P. Meyer Cincinnati USA Regional Chamber, president & CEO

ED U C AT I O N

Molly North

The Rev. Michael J. Graham

Al. Neyer Inc., president & CEO; Cincinnati USA

Xavier University, president

Regional Chamber, chair Laura Mitchell Mike Prescott

Cincinnati Public Schools, superintendent

U.S. Bank, Cincinnati region, president Monica J. Posey Maribeth S. Rahe

Cincinnati State Technical & Community College,

Fort Washington Investment Advisors,

president

president & CEO Harry Snyder Carl Satterwhite

Great Oaks Career Campuses, president & CEO

RCF Group, president & owner Ashish Vaidya J. Michael Schlotman

Northern Kentucky University, president

Kenton County Airport Board, chairman Larry Sheakley Sheakley Group, CEO

government & politics Steve Chabot

Jamie Smith

U.S. Representative, Ohio’s 1st District

Cincinnati Business Courier, publisher Warren Davidson Amy B. Spiller

U.S. Representative, Ohio’s 8th District

Duke Energy Ohio and Kentucky, president Patrick Duhaney David S. Taylor

City of Cincinnati, city manager

Procter & Gamble Co., chairman, president & CEO Eliot Isaac Eddie Tyner

City of Cincinnati, police chief

USA Today Network, Gannett Midwest, regional president & vice president of sales (Enquirer Media)

Kris Knochelmann Kenton County, judge executive

Matthew D. Van Sant Clermont County Chamber of Commerce, president &

Thomas Massie

CEO

U.S. Representative, Kentucky’s 4th District

Mike Venerable

Gwen McFarlin

CincyTech, CEO

Hamilton County Democratic Party, chair

George H. Vincent

Gary Moore

Dinsmore & Shohl, managing partner & chairman

Boone County, judge executive

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g o v ernm ent & p o l i t i cs (continued)

Michael Fisher Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center,

Jim Neil

president & CEO

Hamilton County, sheriff Most Rev. Roger J. Foys Greg Pence

Diocese of Covington, bishop

U.S. Representative, Indiana’s 6th District Ellen M. Katz Steve Pendery

Greater Cincinnati Foundation, president & CEO

Campbell County, judge executive Dr. Richard P. Lofgren Mark R. Policinski

UC Health, president & CEO

Ohio-Kentucky-Indiana Regional Council of Governments, CEO

Timothy J. Maloney Carol Ann and Ralph V. Haile, Jr./U.S. Bank Foundation,

Rob Portman

president & CEO

United States Senator, from Ohio Thane Maynard Todd Portune

Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden, director

former Hamilton County commissioner The Rev. Wendell Mettey T.C. Rogers

Matthew: 25 Ministries, founder

Butler County, Board of Commissioners; OKI Regional Council of Goverments, past president

John Pepper Procter & Gamble Co., retired chairman & CEO

Joshua A. Smith City of Hamilton, city manager

Barbara C. Perez YWCA of Greater Cincinnati, president & CEO

Chris Smitherman Cincinnati City Council, vice mayor

Jorge Perez YMCA of Greater Cincinnati, president & CEO

Alex Triantafilou Hamilton County Republican Party, chairman

Elizabeth Pierce Cincinnati Museum Center, president & CEO

Brad Wenstrup U.S. Representative, Ohio’s 2nd District

Arturo Polizzi The Christ Hospital, president & CEO

NONPROFITS

40

Archdiocese of Cincinnati, archbishop

Laura N. Brunner

John M. Starcher

The Port, president & CEO

Bon Secours Mercy Health, president & CEO

Mark C. Clement

Neil F. Tilow

TriHealth, president & CEO

Talbert House, president & CEO

Garren Colvin

Brian Tome

St. Elizabeth Healthcare, president & CEO

Crossroads Church, senior pastor

Harry & Linda Fath

Dick Weiland

Philanthropists

Philanthropist

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Most Rev. Dennis M. Schnurr

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PEOPLE TO WATCH They may not be on this year’s Power 100, but here are some people to keep an eye on in the coming year.

David J. Adams

Innovation District, is designed to be a place

Chris Seelbach

CHIEF INNOVATION OFFICER,

where entrepreneurship can be accelerated

CITY COUNCIL MEMBER

UC OFFICE OF INNOVATION

through the collaboration of the university, big companies and startups.

Scott Altman PRESIDENT & CEO, CINCINNATI BALLET

Lauren Hannan Shafer CEO, ARTWORKS

Greg Landsman

Named as CEO of ArtWorks in October, Lauren

CITY COUNCIL MEMBER

Hannan Shafer takes over the day-to-day manage-

John Brannen

ment of the organization from founder Tamara Har-

Marianne Lewis

kavy. ArtWorks has changed the visual landscape

John Brannen was named the

DEAN & PROFESSOR OF MANAGEMENT, UC’S CARL

in Greater Cincinnati and has contributed to the

27th head coach in University of

H. LINDNER COLLEGE OF BUSINESS

education of hundreds of youth. Pairing student

UC BASKETBALL COACH

Cincinnati men’s basketball history in

apprentices with professional artists, ArtWorks

April. In selecting Brannen, UC picked another

Gary Z. Lindgren

has created and executed dozens of large, color-

hometown boy (he’s a native of Alexandria, Ky.,

PRESIDENT, CINCINNATI BUSINESS COMMITTEE

ful murals throughout Cincinnati and beyond. As

an alumnus of Newport Central Catholic High

CEO, Shafer plans to expand ArtWorks’ capacity

School and the former head coach of Northern

Doug Loftus

Kentucky University) to replace Mick Cronin. As

MARKET LEADER, JPMORGAN CHASE

to enable more youth apprentices to get involved.

Steve Shifman

head coach of the UC basketball program, he’ll be courting big donors, speaking to community

Rob McDonald

organizations, fi lling a renovated Shoemaker

PARTNER, TAFT STETTINUS & HOLLISTER; CO-

Center and under pressure to advance in the

MANAGER, VINE ST. VENTURES

President & CEO, MICHELMAN; BOARD CHAIR, UNITED WAY OF GREATER CINCINNATI

NCAA postseason tournament.

Donald L. Dixon

Steve Shifman was named board chair

Dan Meyer, CEO

of the United Way of Greater Cincinnati in June after

NEHEMIAH MANUFACTURING

a tumultuous period in which the previous board

PRESIDENT, BUTLER COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS

Tamaya Dennard

chair and the agency’s CEO both departed amidst

Ed Rigaud

controversy. Shifman and the agency’s executive

PRESIDENT, REAL ESTATE ENTERPRISES FOR

leadership will be expected to right the ship of the

AFRICAN AMERICA LEADERS LLC

region’s leading funder of social service agencies,

COUNCIL PRESIDENT PRO TEM, CINCINNATI CITY COUNCIL

an agency that has committed to the long-term goal

Beth Robinson

of reducing the area’s high rate of childhood poverty.

PRESIDENT & CEO, UPTOWN

Luke Fickell UC FOOTBALL COACH

CONSORTIUM INC.

Meg Whitman

Beth Robinson leads the Uptown

MANAGING OWNER, FC CINCINNATI

Consortium’s ef forts to revitalize

Fernando Figueroa

Uptown Cincinnati, a job hub of the city that

Verna Williams

PRESIDENT & CEO, GATEWAY COMMUNITY

includes major employers like University of

DEAN, UC COLLEGE OF LAW

& TECHNICAL COLLEGE

Cincinnati, Cincinnati Children’s Hospital

In March, the University of Cincinnati made a historic

Medical Center, UC Health, TriHealth, and

appointment to lead one of its highest-profile col-

Jason Heikenfeld

the Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Garden.

leges, the College of Law. Verna Williams is the first

VICE PRESIDENT FOR OPERATIONS,

The Uptown Consortium has assembled and

African American to lead the college, the fourth oldest

UC OFFICE OF INNOVATION

owns dozens of acres in the Uptown area, and

continuously operating law school in the country.

As vice president of operations at University of

is working to create the Uptown Innovation

Williams has served in the College of Law for

Cincinnati’s Offi ce of Innovation and its 1819

Corridor along Martin Luther King Drive, an

nearly two decades, joining in 2001 as an as-

Innovation Hub, Jason Heikenfeld will be a

avenue that was opened for major develop-

sistant professor. She was named professor in

leader of the university’s efforts to commer-

ment with the completion of the Interstate 71

2006 and served as the Judge Joseph P. Kinneary

cialize new ideas. The Hub, part of the Uptown

interchange there.

Professor of Law from 2013 to 2017. w w w.

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Pamper Yourself.

Eat Well. Enjoy Life.

Bring an epicurean adventure into your home with The At Home Chef.

Leave all the cooking and cleaning to us!

@chefken

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Community HISTORY & LEADERSHIP page 44

ANOTHER VIEW page 46

CANCEL CULTURE page 48

BOEHNER ON POT page 50

PETS & VETS page 52

PEOPLE WORKING COOPERATIVELY page 54

UNION INSTITUE page 56

DEPAUL CRISTO REY page 58

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History & Leadership

By Dan Hurley

Leading Cincinnati Leadership Cincinnati’s innovative ideas, like St. Vincent de Paul’s Charitable Pharmacy, have led to tangible results

F

or decades Leadership Cincinnati has served as an incubator for innovative civic ideas. Each year classes formed project teams to identify and address community needs. Most of those efforts failed to produce enduring results.

Though frustrating on one level, that record echoes the experience in many startup incubators that embrace the maxim “fail faster and move on.”

Some Leadership Cincinnati projects, however, gained traction, including Crayons to Computers, the Power Pack program operated by the Freestore Foodbank, Red Bike and Cincinnati Preschool Promise.

But none has delivered more substantial and innovative results than the Charitable Pharmacy.

In 2003 Liz Carter, the former executive director of St. Vincent de Paul, suggested Class 27 work with SVDP to create a charitable pharmacy, a sort of “food pantry for medicine.” This type of organization existed in other states, including Kentucky, but was illegal under Ohio consumer safety laws. Working with the Ohio Pharmacy Board and lobbying the Ohio legislature to change the law consumed most of the project team’s efforts during their year in Leadership Cincinnati.

Ron Christian, an attorney with Taft Stettinius & Hollister and chair of the project team, remembers that until team members immersed themselves in the issue they “did not appreciate that people who are on multiple prescription medicines face hundreds of dollars in copays every month and have to make decisions about whether 44

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In November 2019 a 2,800-square-foot Charitable Pharmacy opened on the first floor of the new Don and Phyllis Neyer Outreach Center of St. Vincent de Paul on Bank Street in the West End. to have prescriptions filled or take their medicines every day as prescribed.”

By graduation Ron and the other seven members of the team were committed to the vision and stuck together to drive the completion of the lobbying effort, develop an initial business plan, incorporate and form an advisory board under the auspices of SVDP. The charitable pharmacy began operation in 2006 in cramped quarters in the West End headquarters of SVDP. SVDP hired Mike Espel, a registered pharmacist with 32 years experience with the Cincinnati Health Department, to lead the effort.

Over the last 14 years, Mike and his growing staff have filled over 500,000 free prescriptions with a retail value of $65 million.

When the pharmacy started, the hope was to develop contacts with physician offices to donate the drug samples they received. Although that remains a source of 4% of the medicines the pharmacy receives, today 59% come from pharmaceutical wholesalers who take a tax write off for donating medicines that have only a year left on their expiration dates. The rest of what is needed is purchased with dona-

tions, grants, $150,000 per year generated by the Indigent Care Levy and $100,000 from a Block Grant received by Hamilton County.

When the project team started work, they presumed that most patients would come from the low-income neighborhoods of the city of Cincinnati. In fact, only 50% of those seeking help come from the city. The other 50% live in the suburbs of Hamilton, Butler, Clermont and Warren counties.

Mike Espel is proud of the number of prescriptions filled and individuals served, but insists the truly innovative character of the initiative is that it has become one of the few “outcomes based” pharmacies in the country. This means the relationship between the pharmacy and its clients is not transactional—it is not simply about efficiently filling prescriptions—but personal.

Before any prescription is filled, the social workers and pharmacists at the Charitable Pharmacy develop a comprehensive care plan for each patient in conjunction with their primary care doctor.

Even more importantly, the pharmacy now supervises over 70 pharmacy students a year from the University of Cincinnati,

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Ohio Northern University, Butler University and even Creighton University in Omaha for an Advanced Practice Rotation in their fi nal year of training. Th is skilled volunteer cadre allows the Charitable Pharmacy to reach out on a daily basis to make sure that patients are taking their medicines as prescribed (a remarkable 81 adherence rate). The Charitable Pharmacy can document a 49 reduction in patient re-hospitalization, a 40 reduction in costly ER visits and significant reductions of diabetes and smoking use.

The Charitable Pharmacy’s “outcomes based” approach may not entice CVS or Walgreens to change their approach, but Espel hopes that the results will attract the attention of health insurance companies interested in innovative models to improve outcomes and contain runaway costs.

The Charitable Pharmacy expanded in 2016 to a second location in the new SVDP Western Hills Th rift Store. Last November the original pharmacy moved to an expanded, 2,800-square-foot modern space in the new Don and Phyllis Neyer Outreach Center across the street from the original location. Th is year the Charitable Pharmacy trustees and SVDP are planning to

Mike Espel is pharmacy director for St. Vincent de Paul’s Charitable Pharmacy. increase the number of days the Western Hills pharmacy is open and are looking for a third location, probably in the Milford Th rift Store, to serve the eastern suburbs.

No member of the original Leadership Cincinnati project team imagined in 2003 the remarkable number of people who would be served, much less the emergence

of an innovative outcome based approach to wellness or the role they would play in sensitizing young pharmacists to the needs of the poor, but that’s what makes entrepreneurism in the civic space so exciting. ■ Dan Hurley is the president of Applied History Associates.

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Another View

By Don Mooney

Council-Approved Piracy Cincinnati TIFs plunder the tax levies approved by voters

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City of Cincinnati

H

as piracy broken out at Cincinnati City Hall?

It sure seemed so if you watched City Council create Tax Increment Financing (TIF) in 15 more city neighborhoods at the end of 2019.

What’s a TIF? Local politicians know that voters just hate tax increases for generic governmental purposes. So they load up the ballot each election year with designated levies that warm-hearted voters just can’t resist. Cincinnati taxpayers have approved real estate tax levies for all sorts of tear-jerking causes: child, family and senior services, indigent health care, developmental disabilities, libraries, schools and more. A TIF allows the city to exploit all that voter generosity by skimming tax dollars from those benevolent levies and use the “booty” for a variety of projects voters never approved.

As explained by Deputy City Solicitor Luke Blocher at a recent council hearing, a TIF designation allows the city to “capture” any increase in real estate taxes paid on property in a TIF district. That captured revenue can be spent as City Council decides.

That sounds like piracy, not democracy.

What does that mean if you live in a TIF District? You generously voted to raise your real estate taxes to pay for schools, or children services. When County Auditor Dusty Rhodes decides that the value of your house increased, your tax bill increases. But the increase in taxes doesn’t go to schools, or children’s services as you voted. It goes to a development slush fund that council controls. It might get used to build a parking garage, or to subsidize a developer who just happens to have donated campaign cash to a few council members and/or the mayor.

Example: TIF funds captured from Overthe-Rhine property owners will be used

The TIF districts proposed by City Council in 2019 by the city to help subsidize that brand new professional soccer stadium in the West End. TIFs are used to subsidize stand-alone developments, too. Example: the Queen City Square on Fourth Street. The auditor values the building at more than $234 million. But it pays tax levies to indigent health care or family services on only about $11 million of that value. So instead of paying $284,170 annually for children’s services, it pays just about $7,000. Instead of going to the levies that voters approved, about $8 million is collected annually by the city under a TIF arrangement, used to help subsidize the developers.

In total there were already 44 Cincinnati TIF districts and projects at the end of 2019. The city was in a frantic rush at the end of 2019 to create 15 more TIF districts, hustling to be one step ahead of the auditor’s scheduled 2020 reappraisal.

This proposed plunder from voterapproved levies was challenged by the Cincinnati Federation of Teachers and a variety of citizens, community and civic

groups. But city council plowed forward, extending their TIF piracy to those 15 new districts.

During the debate, much lip service was devoted to the noble purpose of constructing affordable housing. But parking garages and office buildings have gotten the lion’s share of TIF funding in recent years, not affordable housing.

Meanwhile, council keeps on approving tax abatements for high priced condos and McMansions.

Here’s an idea: Stop plundering from levies that have earned voters’ support.

If council believes more money should be spent on neighborhood development and/or affordable housing, then man (or woman) up. Ask voters to approve your own real estate or payroll tax levy to create a neighborhood development and/or housing fund. Honesty, not piracy, is always the best policy, even at Cincinnati City Hall. n Don Mooney is an attorney, a past member of the Cincinnati Planning Commission and is active in local politics.

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The Problem of

Piling On Contrasting two local

examples of call-out culture and the social media firestorms they created in their wake

By Kevin Michell

C

ancel and call-out culture is a hotbutton topic that has engulfed our society and online interactions.

Canceling refers to calling out a person or entity through social media to bring attention to perceived injustice, inappropriate behavior or prejudice and then utilizing digital platforms to spread the message to encourage a boycott of the offending party. But while this mechanism has been positively used by victims of harassment, abuse and discrimination to call out the actions of more powerful people, like prominent businesspeople and celebrities, the discourse surrounding cancel and callout culture has ballooned into a national debate about its merits and problems.

Early national examples revolved around sexual harassment and the #MeToo movement, such as when former senator Al Franken was accused of forcibly kissing Leeann Tweeden on a 2006 USO tour, which Tweeden made public in a 2017 blog post, eventually resulting in his resignation. But as call-out culture has evolved into a way for anyone indirectly affected by perceived offensive conduct to cast attention on a person or entity’s actions—like in the cases of actor Roseanne Barr for her 48

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vocal political stances seen as offensive and director James Gunn for making graphically explicit tweets seen as tasteless—discourse about call-out culture has shifted to whether it encourages impulsive reactions in people and a mob mentality that does more harm than good.

Cincinnati has witnessed a few highly visible instances of call-out culture in the last two years and two in particular stand out for the contrast in public reaction.

On Oct. 7, 2018, Evelyn Reid shared a video on her Facebook account of Terry’s Turf Club owner Terry Carter saying a sexually explicit and derogatory remark to her.

The incident occurred after Reid, who had been working a shift at the restaurant, was fired by Terry Carter. The 3-minute-long video includes Reid asking for an explanation of why she had been fired and, after some back and forth about whether he had to provide a reason for firing her, Terry Carter telling Reid, “Keep your legs open.”

Public response—particularly on Facebook—was generally supportive of both Reid’s action and, when Carter sold the business in December, the outcome. On the whole, perception seemed to be that Reid was right to capture and publicize

Carter’s inappropriate actions. Business plummeted at Terry’s Turf Club and the restaurant’s online reviews became more negative in its wake.

On Oct. 27, 2019, Cincinnati City Council member Chris Seelbach used his social media platforms to share and amplify a Facebook post by TriHealth nurse Cindy Carter, of no relation to Terry Carter.

Cindy Carter’s post to her own Facebook profile contained explicit, homophobic and transphobic remarks about the gay and transgender communities. Fellow TriHealth employee Sabrina Sells posted to TriHealth’s Facebook page on Oct. 25 expressing her concern about Carter’s views. The post reached Seelbach after he was tagged in a separate Facebook post’s comments. He then shared to his personal Facebook profile Cindy Carter’s post and expressed his discomfort with potentially using TriHealth’s services in light of her views. In his Twitter post on the same, Seelbach added that he would not use TriHealth’s services until Cindy Carter was fired and included the hashtag #BoycottTriHealth.

Seelbach’s call-out inspired a lot of passionate responses on all sides of the issue

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and quickly ballooned into a media story that didn’t just encompass potentially discriminatory biases among health care practitioners but also Seelbach’s role in amplifying the story and whether his large audience and platform made his post inappropriate.

“I know I have a platform and so the story kind of has blown up. And lots of people have reacted and I’ve heard a lot of feedback on social media,” Seelbach said in an Oct. 28 video to his personal Facebook profile, before stating that he talked to TriHealth that day, found the organization was placing Cindy Carter on administrative leave and that he thought TriHealth was doing the right thing. He later said in the video that he thought TriHealth’s response on the evening of 27th was inadequate before the company acted more strongly the following day.

While both instances are examples of a person calling attention to offensive behavior and the offending parties both experienced a comeuppance, public opinion differed vastly on the appropriateness of Reid and Seelbach’s call-outs. On the latter, much of the backlash toward Seelbach centered on whether it was right for him to call attention to Cindy Carter’s social media post as a prominent and visible holder of political office in the city. Some other negative reactions revolved around whether Cindy Carter’s speech protections were being violated despite the explicit and anti-LGTBQ opinions she shared.

The Seelbach case is particularly trenchant to the current debate on cancel culture. The focus of conversation shifted from the alleged offensive actions to the people involved and the differing opinions shared by everyone on social media about their roles as victim and offender.

Jeffrey Blevins is the head of the journalism department at the University of Cincinnati and has spent recent years both studying and teaching the relationship between social media and modern communication in society.

“For me, one of the things that really stands out in contrasting these two cases is to look at where the power resides in these relationships,” Blevins says. “You take Terry’s Turf Club where you have a waitress who is being fired and is being sexually harassed in the process—she doesn’t have really any power in that situation. Her social media post was the one platform she had to push back with, to balance out that unfairness, to call attention to what was going on.

“But the case with TriHealth and Seelbach is very different in the sense that it’s like, yes, you have a nurse who posted some very unsavory things but Seelbach already has a position of power. Seelbach didn’t necessarily have to rely on social media for this.”

Blevins cites another headline-grabbing example that touched Cincinnati in the last two years—the video of Covington Catholic student Nicholas Sandmann and Nathan Phillips standing face-to-face at the Lincoln Memorial in January 2019. Reaction to that video was swift and, though additional information lent context over the next few days to the circumstances surrounding that video, many people sharing their opinions stayed entrenched in their viewpoint.

“Once people got on their team in that case, it was rare for anyone to want to backtrack,” Blevins points out, adding that the most damaging aspect of call-out culture often isn’t the instigating social media post, it’s the pile-on that occurs across digital discourse that follows. Social media encourages quickly firing off an emotional reaction to news, circumstances or other people’s opinions. Particularly in instances that touch on politics, the resulting conversation often devolves into social media rock-throwing among people reacting and not directly involved with an occurrence of discrimination or harassment. Such is why the dialogue surrounding Seelbach’s amplification of Cindy Carter’s post may have prompted backlash from many people, stemming from a perfect storm of his political stature, indirect involvement and social media visibility even though Seelbach justifiably felt personally aggrieved by a nurse belonging to a prominent health care organization sharing views that could conflict with her duty to treat all patients with the care they require.

“I could see doing the same thing myself,” Blevins says. “He reacted to something that he was rightfully outraged about.”

Indeed, this implies a need for greater discussion not about the merits of specific parties involved in a single instance of call-out culture but one that examines the differences between punching up—in the sense of a less prominent person calling out the actions of a more visible one—and punching down when a public figure uses the same platforms to cast attention on things they find wrong or inappropriate.

And the continuing prevalence of social

“You look at the engagement that we all have with social media these days and it kind of touches every part of our lives. But it really is like a literacy and it has to be more than just a high school class or a college class.”

— Jeffrey Blevins, UC Journalism Department

media call-outs may also require a more introspective approach to how society talks about the action and the resultant fallout.

“We tend to not have these conversations proactively; we tend to have them reactively where something like this happens and it’s a postmortem exercise,” Blevins says.

For all the anger and unrest felt by opposing viewpoints in instances of call-out culture, Blevins does see these moments as important case studies society can use to educate itself about social media interaction and the need for acknowledging misinterpretation and misunderstandings coming from limitations of context.

“You look at the engagement that we all have with social media these days and it kind of touches every part of our lives.

But it really is like a literacy and it has to be more than just a high school class or a college class. Media literacy is something that we should be thinking about should be in our education system.”

Perhaps, then, the major problem with cancel and call-out culture isn’t with the act of calling people and their actions out, it’s with how we deal with the piling on—both in support of or opposition to the parties involved—made so easy by the omnipresence of social media, that inevitably takes place afterward. n w w w.

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This is John Boehner

ON POT

BUT HE’S NOT SMOKING IT… YET

By Peter Bronson

T

hree things that hippies never imagined they would live to see in their wildest LSD-peyote-hashish hallucinations that have happened in recent years: - Pot is now legal for medical use in 33 states and for recreational use in 11 states— yet somehow revenues are as underwhelming as a bong of seeds and stems.

- Willie Nelson announced that he has stopped smoking pot.

- And one of the biggest supporters for legalized cannabis is a conservative Cincinnati Republican, former Speaker of the U.S. House John Boehner.

It’s unlikely that pot sales slumped because Willie quit toking. But now we at least know how Boehner got high on pot.

And it was not by smoking it.

“Nope, I’ve never used the product. But that doesn’t mean I won’t,” he says. “My older friends in Florida swear by it.”

When he was approached in 2018 to join the board of one of the biggest companies in the cannabis industry, Acreage Holdings, he says his first reaction was, “I wasn’t going to do that.”

But after a closer look, he changed his mind. “I watched as state after state legalized medical marijuana, so I knew something was going on out there. People’s opinions were clearly changing.

“After I got out of office [in 2015], I began to talk to seniors who were using CBD oil and cannabis to relieve this or that issue.

Then one day I ran into a group of veterans who were very frustrated that the Veterans Administration was prescribing opioids when what they wanted was cannabis, a much better option,” he says.

“The most striking example to me was this Navy Seal I met, who served for 21 years and had 12 concussions. He had a wife and four kids, and the VA wanted him to take more opioids. He told me, ‘I can’t do that and still be a good father and husband.’

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John Boehner After living for 10 years with horrible headaches, he found relief with cannabis.”

Boehner is now a board member for Acreage Holdings, which has licenses to grow legal marijuana in 20 states, including Ohio. And he is chairman of the National Cannabis Roundtable, a group of 15 top companies that operates in 23 states, working to change federal laws that block banking access for the cannabis industry.

Boehner’s family owned a bar in Cincinnati where he worked as a kid. His Happy Hour choice is still a cigarette and a glass of cabernet. But his sudden conversion to legalized pot made headlines.

“Some people were shocked,” he says.

“Some were critical. But I would say that 99 of the people I run into every day, someone brings this up and thanks me for speaking up.”

An associate says he is not paid by Acreage Holdings. He says, “There is some money involved, but that had little to do with my decision. The money is not an issue at all. When I went to Congress I sold my business and invested that. My retirement is more than secure.”

It has been reported by Financial Times and others that Boehner stands to make as much as $20 million if Acreage Holdings is

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sold to Canada’s Canopy Growth—but the sale requires federal legalization in the U.S., where marijuana is a Schedule 1 narcotic under federal law, in the same class with LSD and heroin. For now, that looks as unlikely as Snoop Dog for president.

Boehner takes no position on state and local laws, such as Cincinnati’s legalization without any age limit, or a possible vote to legalize recreational use in Ohio next November. Like most Americans, he thinks “it’s just totally bizarre” that it’s now OK to light a joint on Fountain Square, but lighting a cigarette is social leprosy.

He names three reasons for legalization: Help veterans, fight the opioid epidemic and encourage more research. “All we have to go on is 4,000 years of anecdotal evidence.”

He says some studies show that legal pot reduces opioid abuse, and believes legalization is inevitable. “Polls show 93of Americans believe medical marijuana ought to be legal, and 65 say recreational use should be legal.”

But there is other research and anecdotal evidence that raises doubts.

The Wall Street Journal reported that sales in California last year were barely more than a third of the annual $1 billion predicted. Investor analyst Motley Fool says the cannabis industry lost $35 billion last year, and losses are likely to continue through 2021.

“The market turned south,” Boehner says, “because it’s say ing, ‘W hen is someone going to make money here?’

The industry is busy reinvesting earnings and expanding the business.” As more sales outlets open, “Real revenue growth could be soon, which is what the market wants to see.”

But claims that legal pot eliminates smuggling and cartels could be a bust.

Thanks to taxes and regulations, buyers pay up to 75 more for legal pot, which keeps black-market sales thriving.

And there are serious crime and health concerns. Former New York Times reporter Alex Berenson, author of Tell Your Children: The Truth About Marijuana, Mental Illness and Violence, says legal pot is a big mistake, and he blames his own business—the media—for failing to tell the truth.

In op-eds for the Wall Street Journal, Berenson wrote about how legalization increases crime, aggravates mental illness and suicide among teens and causes increased psychosis-triggered violence.

“That is a failure of journalism to be skeptical,” Berenson says. “After 50 years of Big Tobacco lies, and two decades into a terrible opioid epidemic where we know prescription drug companies lied, I don’t know where we got the idea that people who sell us addictive intoxicating substances will tell us the truth.”

The typical attitude he says, is that “only someone who is not cool would be against it. It’s sold as if there’s no way to lose. The cannabis crowd has vastly overstated medical benefits, and those claims are not challenged. They vastly understate risks, and reporters have not challenged that.”

For every claim about benefits, there is a sad story about damage to memory, motivation and mental health, especially for young users whose access to pot expands under legalization. For every claim that marijuana reduces opioid use, there are addicts who say their training-wheels drug was pot.

If recreational use makes the ballot next November and loses again, Ohio could be the swing state that turns back the tide, Berenson says. And Boehner’s endorsement of legal pot is a big deal. “He’s not a liberal, not a Democrat, so obviously he’s going to help people accept it, and that is powerful.”

Boehner believes the scales may be tipped by aging boomers who turn to legal pot.

“When friends of mine hear that someone’s getting relief, they go get their medical marijuana card, go to a store and talk to the clerks,” he says. “It’s just a matter of time before it’s legal for recreational use all across the country.”

Berenson says there would be a nationwide backlash if police, teachers and parents knew the damage it is doing. “But if the media won’t tell the truth or do the work to fi nd it out, they won’t know,” he says. “I try not to get too upset about it, but we are doing something terrible.”

They agree on one thing: We need more research, not more magic-mushroom promises. “If it’s not providing the benefits I thought, or causing all these other problems, I’d step away from it,” Boehner says. “Th is is where research is critical.” ■

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Pets and Vets

A Growing Demand

PET OWNERS ARE SEEKING BETTER MEDICAL CARE, ADVANCED DIAGNOSTICS FOR THEIR PETS

Today’s pet owners expect their animal companions to be treated like family when they go to the vet.

By Eric Spangler

O

ne of only a couple facilities in the Greater Cincinnati area to offer 24-hour emergency veterinary care, MedVet is also is one of the leading specialty health care facilities for pets, says Dr. Jenny Wells, medical director.

“We are a 24/7, 365-day-a-year practice as far as our emergency clinic goes and then the specialties group are available on a full-time basis as needed,” she says.

MedVet, a veterinarian-led and -owned business with 24 locations throughout the country, has been in Cincinnati since 2010, says Wells.

Located at 3964 Red Bank Road in Fairfax, MedVet offers specialty services by referral in 14 different specialties, including the area’s only board-certified anesthesiologists, radiation oncologist and radiologists, she says.

MedVet Cincinnati’s Cancer Center is also home to an integrated team of oncology experts providing surgical, medical and radiation treatment options, says Wells. The facility is equipped with the most advanced diagnostic and treatment 52

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technologies available to dog and cats, including CT scanner, linear accelerator and the only animal-dedicated MRI in the region.

“I think as pets become a bigger part of our lives and our families people are expecting the same kind of care that they get for themselves for their pets and we’re here to deliver that,” she says.

Because there is such a high demand for veterinary specialists MedVet, which also offers internships and residency programs to veterinarians to further their knowledge and qualify them for board certification in a specific specialty, is continually seeking to recruit the best doctors, says Wells.

“All the specialties are growing at a rapid rate and we’re doing our best to keep up with the demand,” she says. “People have higher demands, higher wants for their pets. They want those advanced diagnostics so they can give their pets the best life possible.”

That’s especially true for the millennial population of pet owners, says Cidney

Fitzpatrick, MedVet regional marketing partner. “We’re seeing less and less millennials have children and they’re investing in their livelihood and their pets,” she says.

Although no referrals are needed to bring a pet in for emergency care, MedVet works in partnership with general practitioners for specialty care needs, says Fitzpatrick. “Let’s say you take your cat to the vet and they’re listening with their stethoscope and they hear like a murmur,” she says. “They may refer you to a cardiologist which would be used to help detect where is the murmur coming from.”

In fact, MedVet employs Dr. Kathy Wright, one of the leading veterinary cardiologists in the country. “Dr. Kathy Wright does cardiac ablation and she’s the only person in the country to do that,” Fitzpatrick says.

Regardless of whether a pet is being seen for emergency or specialty health care they will never be alone at MedVet, says Wells. “We have 24-hour nursing, 24-hour doctor care,” she says. “There is always someone here.” ■

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Making Homes People Working Cooperatively’s Whole Home division provides an array of services to address mobility and health issues.

By Kevin Michell

P

Healthier

eople Work ing Cooperatively (PWC), a nonprofit service organization that started in a Covington, Kentucky, garage 45 years ago, does a lot for homeowners with tight budgets or disability concerns from its current headquarters in Bond Hill. But PWC and its Whole Home division also offer quality home remodeling and services to everyone in the area.

“When you think of PWC, you think of granted services,” says Nina Creech, vice president of operations for PWC’s Whole Home division and its Innovation Center.

“But we’ve also received a lot of requests for services for people who can pay. As a result of that we created Whole Home.”

The three overarching services the organization provides clients are helping people with emergency services, remodeling homes into a space that people will love and keeping people healthy and safe in their homes.

W hen someone returns home with diminished mobility as the result of an operation or change in health, people often find barriers to living comfortably and safely within their own home that they didn’t initially realize. That can entail worsened vision from aging or difficulty climbing stairs after a knee replacement.

Whole Home can do permanent alterations to accommodate lasting mobility issues or temporary fixes that can be rented and returned after recovery. The latter also works for a healthy homeowner who might have an older parent visiting or convalescing in their home.

Services like installing a grab bar for a shower or toilet often can be implemented within 48 hours of the request, says Creech.

Better still, the product lines PWC has access to are not just utilitarian—they’re aesthetically appealing.

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“We have products that don’t look like they’re for medical purposes,” says Creech.

“We firmly believe that we can help you make your home look beautiful and if we do it right, you’ll never need to change it.”

Maintaining a healthy home goes beyond accessibility as the result of injury or age, too. Whole Home’s assessments look for air quality issues caused by paint, carpeting and ventilation systems. That has been an offering of PWC’s for some time but has become a major service in light of its partnership with Cincinnati Children’s Hospital that connects the organization with families who have a child with asthma.

All of this points to People Working Cooperatively and its Whole Home division’s versatility—the organization can respond to emergent home health and safety needs but just as effectively take care of remodeling and beautifying someone’s home while assessing for fall prevention, air quality concerns, lighting improvements and more.

Creech points out that any homeowner considering updating or remodeling their living space should consider PWC as their contractor.

“The health and safety of what we do is built into [remodeling work] and I don’t think [people] will find that from another contractor or provider,” she says. “We’re thinking about the long-term and we’re more involved in how you are using your space.”

At another PWC facility—the Innovation Center—the nonprofit holds classes on various topics, ranging from aging in place and fall prevention to sensory issues and childhood safety, the latter two of which will be major focuses in 2020.

“Part of the model of the Innovation Center is that we partner with other experts in defining best practices,” Creech explains.

“We conduct research and we collaborate

with people from multiple disciplines that offer classes and workshops for people to live their best life.”

For example, the Stepping on Fall Prevention series is a seven-week set of classes for people age 60 and older concerned about falling in their home or preventing someone else in their household from falling. Part of the class involves an in-home assessment of trouble areas and Whole Home also grants some useful items to attendees of these classes.

These classes can be incredibly helpful and enlightening for people who may not think they would need them. As Creech points out, there’s always a possibility that people who have spent the last 10, 20 or 30 years in the same home don’t realizing the trouble areas that may arise with diminished mobility, worsening vision or just not being diligent about maintaining healthy air quality.

The winter edition of Stepping on, a Fall Prevention Workshop will start at the Innovation Center Feb. 18, with two different time slots—one from 10 a.m.-noon and another from 2-4 p.m.

Another seven-week class will begin in mid-April after Stepping on, a Fall Prevention Workshop concludes.

The Innovation Center is open to the entire community and all different types of homeowners because the information in these courses can be relevant to everyone, especially as the prevalence of multiple generations living under one roof increases in the future.

“As your life changes, your home needs to change as well,” Creech says.

The PWC Whole Home division’s home consultations and remodeling services for anyone can be arranged by contacting the organization at 513-482-5100 or by visiting its website at wholehome.org. n

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Example of a bathroom remodel done by PWC’s Whole Home division

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An Adaptable Education Union Institute’s online courses and educational tracks are tailored toward helping working adults advance their careers

By Kevin Michell

T

he number of adult learners in the college ranks has been on the rise for some time. In fact, adults reenrolled in school after their early 20s and other nontraditional students make up the majority of students pursuing a degree in the United States. A Forbes article from July 2018 found the growing trend of people going back to school later in adulthood encompassed many different motivations, including staying competitive in a career field, shifting to a new career track, gaining a higher degree or finishing off one that they hadn’t completed earlier in life.

Those adults and their goals for going back to school are exactly the type of student for whom Union Institute & University—with one of its four main campuses located at 440 E. McMillan St.—is ideal.

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More than 90% of Union’s classes take place online, including all of its bachelor’s degree courses, and has provided adult higher education since 1964.

Shanda Gore, vice president for Institutional Innovation and Economic Development at Union, says that a large portion of its student body is made up of students who have some amount of credits from another college but are returning after life changes or work caused them to leave before getting their bachelor’s degree.

“We cater to that student, we’re very generous with transfer credit,” Gore says.

Union employs student success coaches who help prospective and entering students as a single point of contact for their questions and needs. These aides outline what a degree from Union will cost, help make the course load fit within the student’s availability, find financial assistance opportunities and handle transferring credits over to Union. In addition to any previous college credits earned, Union can also apply work experience and even a company’s internal employee education toward credits.

Union Institute & University caters to adult learners, particularly those balanc-

TOP: Union Institute & University’s 2019 commencement ceremony ABOVE: Union Institute & University’s Cincinnati location at 440 E. McMillan St.

ing the pursuit of a degree or certificate with continued employment, through offering most classes online as well as tutoring and career counseling. The university’s philosophy centers on reducing the difficulty of going back to college, which often only increases as a prospective student gets older.

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Gore knows well what the barriers are for people who want to continue their education, particularly while balancing an active career, a family and everything else life can throw at someone.

“I was that person years ago trying to get my doctorate,” she says. “I stayed away from all programs that required me to sit in a classroom three days a week. I just couldn’t do it.”

Union’s concentration on online coursework helps keep tuition costs down—tailoring the experience for adults who want to get their degree online means no need for residence halls, athletic programs and many of the other trappings of a traditional college campus. That also means the university’s focus above all else is on the quality of the education being offered and developing leadership in adults looking to take the next step in their careers.

Union Institute & University is regionally accredited by The Higher Learning Commission, with specialized tracks individually recognized by national organizations, such as the Bachelor of Science in Social Work accredited by the Council on Social Work Education and the Master of Arts in Clinical Mental Health Counseling accredited by the National Board of Certified Counselors.

The school offers a wide array of degree levels and tracks. Bachelor’s degree programs encompass majors in fields such as education, health care, business and civil service, within which are unique offerings like Emergency Services Management and Maternal Child Health that focuses on lactation, the latter of which is the only program of its kind in the country.

Beyond the bachelor’s offerings, Union also has a robust selection of master’s programs—including clinical health counseling and health care leadership—doctorates in education and the humanities and professional certificate programs.

“If one of your goals is meeting challenges and learning new things [and] you’ve got a goal to do this—you want to stay competitive or you’re looking for that second chapter career move—we’re talking about opportunities that we afford and we recognize your experience,” says Gore.

Gore also points out that the professors teaching at Union make the coursework even more powerful, not only through teaching effectively online but utilizing the experience that adult students bring from their careers into classes to tailor the

Shanda Gore, vice president of Institutional Innovation and Economic Development at Union Institute & University

curriculum. That and the success of many Union alumni show why the university is adept at forming the next generation of leadership across many fields, she says.

Class terms are 16 weeks with two eightweek sessions—which can help students fit courses within limited availability and pursue their degree at their desired pace—and the next term starts on March 2. Union’s student success coaches are well-trained to get prospective students enrolled easily and quickly.

“We say don’t wait until the last minute to register,” Gore says, “but if you can

register at least a week before [the start of the next class term] and have us work with you—again, life might be happening—we can get you registered.”

Online college courses have come a long way in the last decade and Union Institute & University is doing a lot to ensure it remains at the forefront of conveniently offering competitive and valuable higher education, guided by its mission to engage, enlighten and empower.

“Those three words are powerful in themselves, but that’s what we’re trying to do for our students,” says Gore. n w w w.

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Best Schools

Filling in the Gaps DePaul Cristo Rey High School is providing microgrants to help its alumni graduate from college

By Corinne Minard

D

ePaul Cristo Rey High School, a Catholic high school for students who can’t afford other private schools, is on a mission. “Our mission is solely to get kids into college and then to give them whatever support we’re able to,” says Sister Jeanne Bessette, school president.

The school may be most known in the Tristate for its corporate work-study program, in which students work five days a month in professional offices throughout the region to gain real work experience,

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DPCR alum Deanna Wilson at her graduation from Mount St. Joseph University

but its Graduate Success program is what is setting the school apart. DPCR follows its students after they graduate, providing them with advice or a sympathetic ear when needed. But what is truly different about the program, even from the other 37 schools in the Cristo Rey Network, is that it is providing microgrants to former students to help them complete their education.

It all started when Bessette heard from students who graduated from the high school but were considering dropping out of college because of unexpected fees they couldn’t afford to cover.

“One of our first college-going students was dropping out during first semester at college and, when we probed it a little bit with the student, it was because of a $50 fee they didn’t know they had,” says Bessette. “You can have all the planning in the world but if you literally pull out your pocket and it’s empty, no plan in the world is going to help.”

DePaul Cristo Rey boasts a 60% college enrollment rate for its graduates (higher than the 40% national average and 34% average for low-income students), but Bessette and the school knew that to truly fulfill their mission they would need to continue to support students through college.

Larisa Wright, director of graduate success for DPCR, assists alumni in mul-

tiple ways. She makes campus visits to first-year students, calls students several times a semester to keep in touch, sets up individualized appointments for when students do run into problems and assists students in applying for microgrants when there is a need.

“I can say we are a trailblazer in the fact that we really put our money where our mouth is and support our students financially because, for first-gen students and low-income students, one of the No. 1 reasons that they don’t succeed in college or complete is financial insecurity,” says Wright.

Wright says that with the microgrants, DPCR has been able to help students buy bus passes, cover part of a student’s tuition when it’s not fully covered by scholarship, purchase a dining plan and even buy Microsoft Word so they could do their homework. The microgrants vary in size, but average around $1,000.

“One of the young ladies, literally her first year she was going to have to come home because her mom just couldn’t pay what I think was a $1,000 bill [for her books] and her mom couldn’t afford it. So we were able to step in and help pay that. And she has over 3.0, now she’s in her junior year and so she’s doing well,” says Wright.

Deanna Wilson, who graduated from DPCR in 2015, says that the microgrants were “crucial” for her to be able to earn

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Larisa Wright, DPCR director of academic success , at Gannon University in Pennsylvania with 2017 DPCR graduate Amanda Drew her degree. She received microgrants to help cover gaps in her tuition at Mount St. Joseph University.

“At the time my mom was retired and we were going to be tight on money, so I really didn’t know how we were going to pay for school,” says Wilson. With the assistance of the microgrants, she was able to earn her bachelor’s degree in Health and Wellness and is now a certified community health worker for Health Care Access Now. These microgrants have made a huge difference for Wilson and other alumni.

While nationally only 11% of low-income students are expected to graduate from college within 6 years, 41% of Cristo Rey alumni nationally do the same.

But as more students graduate from DPCR, the need continues to grow. In 2018, when DPCR had three classes of students in college, the school gave out $25,000 in

microgrants. Last year, with four classes of students in college, the school distributed $68,000.

“That’s money that’s not going into this high school. We’re writing checks to or making credit card payments directly to colleges and universities to help these kids stay in school,” says Bessette.

While DPCR has been able to provide this to students thanks to the generosity of several donors, Bessette says they would like to create a more sustainable way to assist students. DPCR is gearing up to launch its Graduate Success campaign, which looks to raise $6 million for the Graduate Success Fund. With this fund secured, DPCR will be able to assist students without having to regularly ask donors for assistance.

“We don’t mind asking and there are people that are happy to do that, but to

have money that we can actually plan on, that becomes more and more scalable as the school grows and as we have more students in college,” says Bessette.

With the endowment, the school will be able to help more students complete college, particularly the ones who are only being held back become of finances.

“Our priority is to get money into the hands of kids who are persisting,” she says.

“We have kids, they’ve never dropped out for a semester even though life has gotten really miserably hard for a few of them, and those are the kids that if we can keep them in and keep them on that path toward attaining a degree, we’re going to do it.”

If people are interested in donating, Bessette recommends they visit the school’s website (depaulcristorey.org) or contact the school’s vice president of advancement, Sparkle Worley, at 513-861-0600. n w w w.

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Ultimate Workshop

TAX, Succession, and Estate mistakes made by Business Owners and how to avoid them Presented By: NKY Chamber of Commerce

William E. Hesch, Esq., CPA, PFS • Amy E. Pennekamp, Esq.

Tuesday, February 12, 2020, 8:00 am – 11:30 am Northern Kentucky Chamber of Commerce 300 Buttermilk Pike, Suite 330 Ft. Mitchell, KY 41017

Register at www.nkychamber.com/events Members: $30, Non Members: $45

Benefits of Attending the Workshop: • Identify action steps for your business which become your 2020 road map for success!

• Protect the value of your business and its long-term success.

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• Get answers to your CPA and legal questions. Forward your questions to Bill prior to the workshop!

• All attendees receive a one-hour complimentary follow-up consultation with Bill.

8:00 am • Session 1: Top 10 Tax Planning Mistakes • Choice of Entity-Sole Proprietor, S or C Corporation • Maximize retirement plan deductions • Maximize your tax deductions • Avoid IRS audit problems

9:15 am • Session 2: Top 10 Succession Planning Mistakes • How to Plan for: *Death, *Disability, *Retirement • Secrets For a Successful Business Succession Plan • Planning for disability of owner

10:30 am • Session 3: Top 10 Estate Planning Mistakes • How to use a Trust and buy-sell agreement in estate plan • How to protect family and value of business if owner dies or becomes disabled

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Business

MIKE VENERABLE

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LEADING LAWYERS

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NEWPORT SYNDICATE page 74

Cincy

BLUE GRASS STOCKYARDS

LEADING LAWYERS

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BEST IN BUSINESS CALENDAR AND DIRECTORY

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2020

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Swing Hard Mike Venerable and CincyTech are on a mission to make the region an innovation destination

By Liz Engel

I

t’s been a busy 12 months at CincyTech.

But sit down for a chat with Mike Venerable, CEO of the regional seed fund investor, and that certainly seems par for the course.

Over the last year, CincyTech has moved into new digs at the 1819 Innovation Hub, near the University of Cincinnati; it added its 82nd portfolio company, and counting; and, while team members declined to comment, per an SEC filing, the group in the midst of raising its fifth, and largest, fund to date. Or, as some like to say, business as usual.

There’s been a lot of talk lately—and national press—about Cincinnati’s booming startup scene. Fledgling businesses here have access to accelerators, incubators and angel investors, sure. But what Venerable and team are doing is different than anybody else. CincyTech provides and organizes early seed-stage investment—in other words, the first money in, a high risk, high reward proposition—and it’s continually betting big at home. Eighty of the 82 62

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investments CincyTech has made, it’s made in Cincinnati (the other two are also Ohio based, just up Interstate 71 in Columbus).

“We want our founders to swing hard,” Venerable says. “This is not for everybody.

In fact, it’s actually for the very few.”

It almost wasn’t his path, either, or at least it wasn’t early on. Venerable, a firstgeneration college grad from Hamilton, left home with an ambitious plan to join the National Security Agency. At that time, The Puzzle Palace, a novel by Washington reporter James Bamford, was a popular read. Venerable was fascinated by it—it was the first time anyone had detailed the organization’s inner workings. The NSA only hired mathematicians and computer scientists, he says, and military veterans— so he joined the Army.

He spent two years in South Korea as a linguist. He returned to D.C., got a job and “accidentally” got involved in software development. He landed with Oracle, which, at the time, was in hyper growth mode—it was the early ‘90s—but left less than a year

later with a co-worker to co-found Talus, a big data company in the terabyte age. In 1998, Talus sold to California-based Sagent, a pre-IPO software company.

“I had never thought about selling the company,” he says. “I was surprised. But we were young, and the company was less than five years years old. Back then, there wasn’t all this infrastructure around startups. There weren’t accelerators or anything like that. There was stuff going on in the Valley, in California. That was sort of an odd experience in Virginia.”

Venerable stayed until 2000 and took a job in New York before taking some time off a few years later to spend with his family.

Looking for a change of pace, he moved back to Cincinnati in 2005. He and his wife thought it would be a great place to raise their young children, close to family and in a region with big-city amenities but a small-town feel. The plan, he says, was to start another company. But in the process, he met Bob Coy, then CincyTech’s president and CEO. The rest is history.

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Venerable joined the team as managing director in 2006. He stepped in as CEO, when Coy stepped down, in 2017. The job, he says, “was a cure for the disease.”

“It was a way to be a founder vicariously,” he says. “It’s not really what I expected to do. But after about three or four years of doing it, I told my wife, I feel like this is what I should be doing. It’s really highly addictive. It’s fulfilling. It’s about as intellectually stimulating as anything could be—when you’re baked into these companies, you become really passionate about what happens to them and focused and committed.”

That commitment has paid off in a big way, at least for the community. It’s one of the largest and most active seed funds in the Midwest. While CincyTech has invested $60 million into its regional portfolio companies, it says co-investment tops $900 million.

Its bread and butter are bioscience, health care, digital health and software, and, at press time, CincyTech had 36 active companies in its portfolio, including Enable Injections, IncludeHealth, Lisnr and Losant, an Internet of Things platform. Overall, it’s invested in 82 with 12 exits, meaning the companies were either acquired or went public (literally its biggest, Mason’s Assurex Health, a genetic testing company, garnered $307 million in 2016). Its portfolio companies employ about 1,200 people in the region with an average annual salary topping $84,000.

Still, the region needs more capital— much like the rest of the Midwest. That’s another popular theme. But, today, at least, “the city feels entirely differently,”

Venerable says. “There are signs of progress and success.

“You’d be on Third Street, and it felt like living in a black and white movie.

There were tumbleweeds blowing down the street. We just didn’t have as much going on, and I don’t think people were as organized. Today people are much more comfortable being in a startup, or working for a growth company. And we have an investor class now, a large part of which is locally [based], that is committed to these kind of growth opportunities, and that’s the most important thing.”

As for its headquarters at the 1819 Innovation Hub, CincyTech is settled in by now.

It seemed to chase that opportunity much like it does new business ideas—CincyTech

left downtown, for example, for Over-theRhine’s Union Hall in 2015 before opening its office here in February 2019. There’s plenty of energy inside, given that companies like Procter & Gamble and Kroger maintain corporate innovation spaces just steps away. And visions of bigger things to come, in more ways than one.

“When we were [downtown], I could see over into Kentucky. When they built the Banks, I couldn’t see it anymore. We moved to OTR, and there was nowhere to eat. Then lunch got too expensive. We like to be where we can imagine what it will look like in five years, and then it grows into that experience,” Venerable says. “We just felt like this is going to be the next place to pop.” n

It’s fulfilling. It’s about as intellectually stimulating as anything could be—when you’re baked into these companies, you become really passionate about what happens to them and focused and committed.

—Mike Venerable

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Cincy

LEADING LAWYERS

2020

If you have to hire a lawyer, you want to make sure you have a good one when you do. For 16 years, registered lawyers in Southwest Ohio, Northern Kentucky and Southeast Indiana have been invited

by Cincy to submit ballots nominating the best among their colleagues. Results are fact-checked and approved by an advisory board. Self-nominated lawyers are not included. Votes from lawyers in the same firm carry less weight. Two awardees are profiled below and this year’s 296 Leading Lawyers are listed alphabetically by specialty.

– The Editors

Marty Dunn has been with Dinsmore for the last 12 years, the latest chapter in the native Cincinnatian’s career journey in his home city.

“I didn’t want to just practice law in a large city,” Dunn says. “I wanted to have my practice and my community service and everything else intertwined.”

Dinsmore has grown into a nationwide firm during Dunn’s tenure—which has seen him join the firm’s board of directors and executive committee, make partner and chair Dinsmore’s diversity committee—but Cincinnati’s growth has kept him busy on the local level.

Dunn is on the Freestore Foodbank board—in addition to the boards of the Cincinnati Museum Center and the Greater Cincinnati Minority Counsel Program—and spends his time and energy working to eradicate hunger and poverty in the city. Through it all, Dunn provides an example for the next generation of lawyers and black leaders in Cincinnati.

“I’ve stood on the shoulders of some great people,” Dunn says. “I care about our community and I try to do my part to make it better.”

—Kevin Michell

Martiné “Marty” Dunn Corporate Dinsmore

Anyone who is connected to real estate—be it developers, landlords or contractors— should know a good real estate lawyer, saw Monica L. Gearding, a lawyer with Taft Stettinius & Hollister.

“Oftentimes, for new clients, we get called after they’ve signed a contract, which, actually, if we could get there from the get-go, I think it would be more efficient and more economical and could make things run smoother if we get started early on,” she says. She says that she’s seen first-time clients become stressed over parts of the process that seem scary but that having a lawyer in place early could assuage.

Gearding, who has been in practice since 1998, enjoys using her knowledge to get things done. What can seem uninteresting and intimidating to others is what she loves to do.

“I think real estate law is perceived as not as interesting as some other areas, but actually I love it because I can look out and say, ‘I’ve worked on that project and I’ve worked on that project.’ I can see it, it’s very tangible,” she says.

– Corinne Minard

Monica L. Gearding Real Estate Taft Stettinius & Hollister [ Alphabetical by Specialty ] Antitrust & Trade Regulation

James A. Dressman III DBL Law

Kevin E. Irwin Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL

W.B. (Bill) Markovits Markovits, Stock & DeMarco, LLC

Lynn M. Schulte Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Stephen D. Lerner Squire Patton Boggs, LLP

Bankruptcy

Kim Martin Lewis Dinsmore & Shohl LLP

Mark L. Silbersack Dinsmore & Shohl LLP Antitrust Law & Appellate Litigation Matthew C. Blickensderfer Frost Brown Todd LLC

Philomena Saldanha Ashdown Strauss & Troy LPA Richard Boydston Bingham Greenebaum Doll LLP

Douglas L. Lutz Frost Brown Todd LLC Robert G. Sanker Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL

Banking

J. Michael Debbeler Graydon Head & Ritchey LLP

Reuel D. Ash Ulmer & Berne LLP

Eric Goering Law Office of Goering & Goering

Randall S. Jackson Jr. Wood Herron & Evans LLP

Anthony J. Bickel Dinsmore & Shohl LLP

Timothy J. Hurley Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

David E. Jefferies Wood Herron & Evans LLP

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Biotech

Joseph P. Thomas Ulmer & Berne LLP Business Kevin Feazell Cors & Bassett LLC W. Ashley Hess BakerHostetler Business & Emerging Companies Patrick Nesbitt Patrick Nesbitt, Attorney Business Litigation Kent Britt Vorys, Sater, Seymour & Pease LLP

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James E. Burke Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL

Paul Raymond Boggs III Wallace Boggs

Eric K. Combs Dinsmore & Shohl LLP

Beth A. Bryan Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Colleen M. Devanney Vorys, Sater, Seymour & Pease LLP

David T. Bules Calfee, Halter & Griswold LLP

Renee S. Filiatraut AK Steel Corp.

Erin M. Campbell Helmer Martins Rice & Popham

Louis F. Gilligan Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL

Deepak K. Desai Donnellon, Donnellon & Miller

Mark T. Hayden Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Michael D. Eagen Dinsmore & Shohl LLP

Robert P. Johnson Thompson Hine LLP

Alphonse A. Gerhardstein Gerhardstein & Branch

Commercial

Corporate

Scott A. Kane Squire Patton Boggs, LLP

Brian D. Goldwasser Rendigs, Fry, Kiely & Dennis LLP

Daniel E. Fausz Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Andrew R. Berger Katz Teller

Nathaniel Lampley Jr. Vorys, Sater, Seymour & Pease LLP

James D. Houston Strauss & Troy LPA

Adam M. Vernick Dinsmore & Shohl LLP

David DeVita Stagnaro, Saba & Patterson

Joseph E. Lehnert Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL

David P. Kamp Dinsmore & Shohl LLP

Commercial & Contract

Peter A. Draugelis Dinsmore & Shohl LLP

Jacob D. Mahle Vorys, Sater, Seymour & Pease LLP

J. Robert Linneman Santen & Hughes

Deborah P. Majoras Proctor & Gamble

Jesse R. Lipcius Ulmer & Berne LLP

William N. Minor Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL

Jeffrey C. Mando Adams, Stepner, Woltermann & Dusing PLLC

Beth Schneider Naylor Frost Brown Todd LLC Peter O’Shea Katz Teller

Christopher Markus DBL Law

Civil Litigation, Malpractice, Product Liability

Louis K. Ebling Thompson Hine LLP

Copyright & Trademark

Brian E. Hurley Schroeder, Maundrell, Barbiere & Powers

Kenneth B. Germain Wood Herron & Evans LLP

Class Action/ Product Liability

Lori E. Krafte Wood Herron & Evans LLP

Tiffany Reece Clark The David J. Joseph Company

Margaret A. Lawson Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Frank C. Woodside III Dinsmore & Shohl LLP

Michael A. Marrero Ulmer & Berne LLP

Michael J. Suffern Ulmer & Berne LLP

R. Guy Taft Strauss & Troy LPA

Charles C. Bissinger Jr. Vorys, Sater, Seymour & Pease LLP

Martine “Marty” R. Dunn Dinsmore & Shohl LLP

Jeffrey S. Schloemer Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP Commercial Finance

Neil Ganulin Frost Brown Todd LLC

Hani R. Kallas Vorys, Sater, Seymour & Pease LLP

Brian C. Judkins Chemed Corporation

Commercial Litigation

Michael J. Moeddel Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL

Steven C. Coffaro Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL Commercial, Securities

Peter A. Solimine Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Robert A. Pitcairn Jr. Katz Teller

Matthew S. Parrish FisherBroyles, LLP

Susan B. Zaunbrecher Fifth Third Bancorp

Michael L. Scheier Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL

Communications & Media

Corporate & Bankruptcy

Stephen E. Gillen Wood Herron & Evans LLP

Louis F. Solimine Thompson Hine LLP Corporate & Business Litigation

Christina M. Sprecher Frost Brown Todd LLC

Donald L. Stepner Adams, Stepner, Woltermann & Dusing PLLC

Computer, Internet & E-Commerce Alan J. Hartman Ulmer & Berne LLP

Breck Weigel GE Aviation

Sanna-Rae Taylor Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Richard S. Wayne Strauss & Troy LPA

Computer, Internet & E-Commerce, Construction

Corporate Finance

Mark A. Vander Laan Dinsmore & Shohl LLP

Civil Litigation, Business Litigation

Steven W. Weeks Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Victor A. Walton Jr. Vorys, Sater, Seymour & Pease LLP

Jamie M. Ramsey Calfee, Halter & Griswold LLP

John J. Reister Millikin & Fitton Law Firm Eric W. Richardson Vorys, Sater, Seymour & Pease LLP Russell S. Sayre Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP Phillip Smith GE Aviation

Paul B. Martins Helmer, Martins, Rice & Popham LPA

Joseph W. Shea III SheaHartmann LLP

Tracey A. Puthoff Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Construction

Corporate Finance, Real Estate

Business, General

Civil Litigation, Employment

Joseph A. Cleves Jr. Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Edward D. Diller Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Stephen S. Holmes Cors & Bassett LLC

Robert W. Hojnoski Reminger, Co. LPA

D. Scott Gurney Frost Brown Todd LLC

Corporate Law

Jonathan D. Sams Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Civil Litigation, False Claims Act

Heather Hawkins Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Michael T. Sutton Sutton Law

James B. Helmer Helmer, Martins, Rice & Popham LPA

Mark H. Klusmeier Mark H. Klusmeier Attorney

George H. Vincent Dinsmore & Shohl LLP

Civil Litigation, General Practice

Leonard A. Weakley Jr. Jedson Engineering

Civil Litigation

Todd V. McMurtry Hemmer DeFrank Wessels, PLLC

Mark G. Arnzen Arnzen, Storm & Turner PSC

Jeffrey L. Rohr Graydon Head & Ritchey LLP Corporate Lending, Real Estate Stephen M. Griffith Jr. Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Copyright

Corporate, Tax & Wealth Planning

Karen K. Gaunt Dinsmore & Shohl LLP

Ben F. Wells Dinsmore & Shohl LLP

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Cincy LEADING LAWYERS 2020 Corporate/Securities Bridget C. Hoffman FHLB Cincinnati Corporation Stephen Ewald Medpace, Inc. Patrick D. Hayes Calfee, Halter & Griswold LLP

Jonathan N. Fox Lyons & Lyons

Matthew L. Darpel Darpel Elder Law Services

Caroline M. DiMauro Jackson Lewis PC

Charles M. Rittgers Rittgers & Rittgers

Gregory S. French Law Office of Gregory S. French

Jamie Goetz-Anderson Jackson Lewis PC

Criminal Defense

Janet E. Pecquet Law Offices of Burke & Pecquet, LLC.

David G. Holcombe BakerHostetler

Elder Law, Estate Planning

August T. Janszen Janszen Law Firm

Perry Leslie Ancona Perry L. Ancona Co. LPA

Lev K. Martyniuk Porter Wright Morris & Arthur

Martin S. Pinales Pinales Stachler Young Burrell & Crouse Co LPA

Ralph J. Conrad Conrad Law Office Emerging Companies

Samantha A. Koeninger Rittgers Graydon Head & Ritchey LLP

Maggie A. Muething Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Peter Rosenwald Peter Rosenwald Attorney at Law

George D. Molinsky Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Julie Pugh Graydon Head & Ritchey LLP

Corporation, Commercial

Criminal Law

Employment & Labor

John A. Mongelluzzo Calfee, Halter & Griswold LLP

R. Scott Croswell III Croswell & Adams Co. LPA

David J. Willbrand Thompson Hine LLP

Corporation/Partnership

Robert S. Fischer Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Tom Bosse The Law Offices of Thomas W. Bosse, PLLC Calvin D. Buford Dinsmore & Shohl LLP

DUI

Emerging Companies/ Venture Capital

Steven R. Adams The Law Offices of Steven R. Adams, LLC

Robert W. McDonald Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP Employment

Robert H. Lyons Lyons & Lyons

Mark J. Jahnke Katz Teller

Mark J. Chumley Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL

Joseph B. Suhre IV Suhre & Associates LLC

Criminal Kathleen M. Brinkman Porter Wright Morris & Arthur

James M. Zimmerman Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Elder Law

Jennifer W. Colvin Calfee, Halter & Griswold LLP

Jennifer Anstaett Wood & Lamping LLP

Curtis Cornett Cors & Bassett LLC

David T. Croall Porter Wright Morris & Arthur Randolph H. Freking Freking Myers & Reul, LLC Michael S. Glassman Dinsmore & Shohl LLP Mark D. Guilfoyle DBL Law Michael W. Hawkins Dinsmore & Shohl LLP Marc Mezibov Mezibov Butler Charles M. Roesch Dinsmore & Shohl LLP C.J. Schmidt III Wood & Lamping LLP

Phyllis G. Bossin

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hyllis Bossin is a nationally recognized family law attorney. She is known as a skilled negotiator and litigator, handling high-asset cases, which often involve complex business valuations and complicated tax and estate issues. She is also a trained mediator and arbitrator as well as trained in collaborative law. Phyllis is a Diplomate in the American College of Family Trial Lawyers and a Fellow of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers. She has been recognized as a Leading Lawyer for the past 9 years and has been listed in Best Lawyers of America for over thirty years. Her firm continues to be recognized by U.S. News and World Report as a Leading Law Firm. She is certified by the OSBA as a Family Law Relations Specialist. Phyllis has been named as a Super Lawyer in Ohio since its inception in 2004 and, in 2020, she has received the distinction of being named one of the “Top 5” lawyers in Cincinnati in addition to being listed among Ohio’s Top 100 lawyers, Ohio’s Top 50 Women Lawyers, Cincinnati’s Top 25 Women Lawyers, and recognized in her field of Family Law.

Phyllis G. Bossin & Associates, A legal Professional Association 201 E. Fifth St., Suite 1910 Cincinnati, OH 45202 513-421-4420 bossinlaw.com

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Employment Law & Estate Planning

Family Law, Divorce

Eric G. Bruestle Roetzel & Andress LPA Employment, Civil Litigation Robert W. Maxwell II Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL Environmental Robert A. Bilott Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP William D. Hayes Frost Brown Todd LLC

Laura Thudium Beth Silverman & Associates Stephanie A. Dietz Dietz & Overmann PLLC

John C. Greiner Graydon Head & Ritchey LLP

Family/Domestic Relations

First Amendment, Intellectual Property

Gregory L. Adams Croswell & Adams Co. LPA

Barbara J. Howard Barbara J. Howard Co. LPA

Family

Wijdan Jreisat Katz Teller

Elizabeth Murray Murray Law LLC Zachary D. Smith ZDS Law

George Zamary Zamary Law Firm

Shawn Evans Wood & Lamping LLP

Michael A. Laing Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Sallee M. Fry Santen & Hughes

First Amendment Christopher P. Finney Finney Law Firm

Phyllis G. Bossin Phyllis G. Bossin & Associates LPA

Randal S. Bloch Wagner & Bloch

General Practice Michael B. Ganson Michael B. Ganson Law Offices

Family, Divorce

ERISA

Kathleen W. Adams Lyons & Lyons

Finance & Bankruptcy Michael J. O’Grady Frost Brown Todd LLC

Governmental, Real Estate Donald L. Warner III Calfee, Halter & Griswold LLP

H. Louis Sirkin Santen & Hughes

Governmental/Public Finance

General Business Law

Bradley N. Ruwe Dinsmore & Shohl LLP

Trista Portales Goldberg Goldberg Evans LLC

General Litigation

Timothy B. Theissen Strauss & Troy LPA

Governmental, Employment Anthony Springer US Attorney’s Office

First Amendment/Criminal Law

Charles M. Meyer Santen & Hughes

Jeffrey M. Rollman Rollman, Handorf & Conyers, LLC

Charlie Luken Calfee, Halter & Griswold LLP

Monica L. Dias Frost Brown Todd LLC

Mary Ellen Malas Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL

Adrienne J. Roach Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL

Governmental

Health Care Adam D. Colvin Squire Patton Boggs, LLP

Paige L. Ellerman Mount St. Joseph University

William M. Freedman Dinsmore & Shohl LLP

Daniel E. Izenson Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL

Thomas W. Kahle BakerHostetler

Theresa L. Nelson Strauss & Troy LPA

William A. Posey

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ated by Ohio Super Lawyers to the Top 5 Attorneys in Cincinnati list in 2020, Bill Posey is a nationally known and respected trial attorney representing both plaintiffs and defendants in high value, significant litigation. He has represented injury victims and their families throughout Ohio and Kentucky and has represented businesses in product liability, other tort defense cases, and commercial disputes in more than 35 states.

Bill has been named to Ohio Super Lawyers since 2005 in the area of Personal Injury: Plaintiff. He has been recognized by The Best Lawyers in America® since 2011 as both a plaintiff and defense lawyer. Bill has also been selected as a member of the Multi-Million Dollar Advocates Forum®, and a Fellow of the Litigation Counsel of America.

Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL One East Fourth Street, Suite 1400 Cincinnati, OH 45202 513.579.6535 kmklaw.com

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Practice Areas Civil Litigation Personal Injury Wrongful Death, Malpractice Product Liability Tort Defense

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Cincy LEADING LAWYERS 2020 Susanne Cetrulo Cetrulo, Mowery & Hicks

Health Life Sciences Mark A. McAndrew Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Intellectual Property Mark R. Hull Calfee, Halter & Griswold LLP

Immigration Neil Fleischer Fleischer Law Firm LLC

Gregory F. Ahrens Wood Herron & Evans LLP

Antonia Mitroussia Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Intellectual Property Litigation

Christopher T. Musillo Musillo Unkenholt

John F. Bennett Ulmer & Berne LLP

Immigration & Naturalization

Mark J. Stepaniak Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP Litigation

Carl J. Stitch Jr. White, Getgey & Meyer Co., LPA

Jack B. Harrison Cors & Bassett LLC

Medical Malpractice John D. Holschuh Jr. Santen & Hughes

Kyle E. Hern University of Cincinnati

Mergers

Julia B. Meister Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Michael J. Zavatsky Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Paul Allaer Thompson Hine LLP

Litigation, Construction Law

Insurance

Toshio Nakao Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Shannah J. Morris GE Aviation

Michael R. Oestreicher Thompson Hine LLP

Malpractice

Brian S. Sullivan Dinsmore & Shohl LLP

Mediation/Arbitration

Daniel J. Donnellon Sebaly, Shillito & Dyer

International

Pamela Morgan Hodge Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL

Jospeh T. Mordino Faulkner & Tepe LLP

Lynne Longtin CT Law

Paul J. Linden Wood Herron & Evans LLP

Richard I. Fleischer Fleischer Law Firm LLC

Steven R. Jaeger Jaeger Firm

Labor, Employment

Melvin A. Bedree Vorys, Sater, Seymour & Pease LLP D. Brock Denton Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL James C. Kennedy Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL Mergers & Acquisitions B. Scott Boster Ulmer & Berne LLP

Labor & Employment Law

Roger N. Braden Braden-Humfleet Law, PLC

Thomas A. Sweeney Adams, Stepner, Woltermann & Dusing

Gregory Parker Rogers Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

William A. Posey Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL

Insurance Litigation

Daniel E. Burke Graydon Head & Ritchey LLP

Mediation

Michael A. Hirschfeld Graydon Head & Ritchey LLP

Grant S. Cowan Cowan ADR

Edward E. Steiner Squire Patton Boggs, LLP

Robert Cetrulo Cetrulo, Mowery & Hicks

Frank D. Chaiken Thompson Hine LLP

2020 Cincy Magazine LEADING LAWYER PROFILES Kathleen W. Adams

STEVEN R. ADAMS

gregory f. ahrens

Kathleen W. Adams provides personalized legal guidance for individuals and families in transition, and handles all aspects of domestic relations and elder law, including pre-marital agreements, divorce, adoption, child custody/support proceedings, paternity actions, grandparent’s rights, retirement, wills, estate planning, and probate. Ms. Adams is licensed to practice law in both Ohio and Florida, and part of her practice involves advising clients who are transitioning into retirement that spans both of those states.

Steven R. Adams has practiced law for 25 years, and has been in the private practice since 2000. He focuses his practice to DUI and criminal defense. He has been deemed an expert witness in field testing and breath testing in Ohio. He has litigated cases all the way to the Ohio Supreme Court and won.

He is listed in Best Lawyers in America. He is rated as AV-preeminent by the Martindale-Hubbell Lawyer Peer Review. He has been named an Ohio Super Lawyers for eight consecutive years and recently named in the top 100 Lawyers in Ohio by Super Lawyers magazine. Steven is also a member of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and the National College of DUI Defense. He frequently speaks as a guest lecturer/speaker at legal conferences regarding DUI defense. The Law Office of Steven R. Adams is included in the Best Law Firms in America. He also co-authored a book, Ohio OVI Defense; The Law and Practice and Kentucky DUI; The Law and Practice and Authored: Practice Law Like an Ironman: Unbeatable Checklists for Any Lawyer Creating and Building a Solo Or Small Firm

Gregory F. Ahrens is in his 33rd year of practicing intellectual property law and is registered to practice before the United States Patent and Trademark Office. His expertise is concentrated on intellectual property litigation, although he oversees others in all phases of the firm’s intellectual property practice, particularly in the chemical arts. In his litigation practice, Gregory has handled scores of cases, many through jury trials and appeals, in numerous federal courts across the country, including the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, as well as in various state courts in Ohio. Greg is currently a member of the Executive Committee of Wood Herron & Evans, which manage the firm’s operations.

The Law Offices of Steven R. Adams, LLC 8 W. Ninth St. Cincinnati, OH 45202 (513) 659-4442 notguiltyadams.com

Wood herron & evans LLP 2700 Carew Tower, 441 Vine Street Cincinnati, OH 45202 (513) 241-2324 gahrens@whe-law.com

Practice Areas DUI and Criminal Defense Family Law

Practice area Intellectual Property

Lyons & Lyons Attorneys at Law 8310 Princeton-Glendale Road West Chester, OH 45069 (513) 777-2222 kadams@lyonsandlyonslaw.com Practice Area Domestic Relations Estate Planning Elder Law Business Law Civil Litigation 68

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David A. Zimmerman Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Kevin G. Rooney Dorton & Willis

Mergers, Bankruptcy Andrew Simon Calfee, Halter & Griswold LLP

Real Estate

Tax

Patent, Copyright

Monica Gearding Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Henry G. Alexander Graydon Head & Ritchey LLP

Steven J. Goldstein Frost Brown Todd LLC

Stephen R. Hunt Aronoff, Rosen & Hunt LPA

Jennifer M. Gatherwright Gatherwright Freeman & Associates

Scott P. Kadish Ulmer & Berne LLP

Sonya S. Jindal Tork Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Stephen M. King Thompson Hine LLP

Howard S. Levy Voorhees & Levy LLC

Monica Donath Kohnen Graydon Head & Ritchey LLP

Patrick J. Mitchell Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Tamara Miano Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

J. Shane Starkey Thompson Hine LLP

Thomas M. Tepe Jr. Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL

Trust

Mergers, Commercial

Personal injury

Michael B. Hurley Calfee, Halter & Griswold LLP

Justin Lee Lawrence Lawrence & Associates

Nonprofit/Tax Exempt

Blake R. Maislin Law Offices of Blake R. Maislin, LLC

Ronald C. Christian Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP Patent

Personal Injury & Business Litigation

W. Scott Gaines Wood Herron & Evans LLP

T. Lawrence Hicks Cetrulo, Mowery & Hicks

Vance V. VanDrake III Ulmer & Berne LLP Patent & Intellectual Property Glenn D. Bellamy Wood Herron & Evans LLP David H. Brinkman Wood Herron & Evans LLP David M. Lafkas Eureka Ranch!

J. Dwight Poffenberger Jr. Wood Herron & Evans LLP

Privately owned Business David W. Burleigh Buechner Haffer Meyers & Koenig Co., LPA

Real Estate, Zoning

Mary L. Rust Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

Sean S. Suder Calfee, Halter & Griswold LLP

James A. Singler Singler Law

Probate, Estate Planning

Retirement

Trust & Estate Planning

Mark S. Reckman Wood & Lamping LLP

Diane Schneiderman Episcopal Retirement Homes

William J. Baechtold Graydon Head & Ritchey LLP

Securities

Kenneth P. Coyne Graf Coyne

Product Liability, Personal Injury Peter L. Ney Rendigs, Fry, Kiely & Dennis LLP

Arthur F. McMahon III Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP Sports

William R. Graf Graf Coyne

W. Stuart Dornette Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP

William E. Hesch William E. Hesch Law Firm

GLENN BELLAMY

Paul R. Boggs III

DAVID H. BRINKMAN

Glenn Bellamy is a Partner with Wood Herron & Evans LLP. Glenn has 30 years of intellectual property litigation, patent and trademark prosecution, and U.S. Customs enforcement experience. He counsels clients on strategic plans for IP protection of everything from video games to firearms and has litigated cases in federal courts and before the International Trade Commission. Glenn has a B.S. in Nuclear Medicine Technology, from the University of Cincinnati, 1984 and J.D. from the University of Cincinnati College of Law, 1987.

Mr. Boggs, a lifelong resident of Northern Kentucky, is in his 37th year of private practice and is licensed in both Kentucky and Ohio. He is also admitted to practice before the United States District Courts for the Eastern and Western Districts of Kentucky and the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals. He is a member of the Northern Kentucky Bar Association and the Kentucky Bar Association. While his firm is a general practice firm, Mr. Boggs concentrates his practice in all facets of business representation, commercial/business litigation, employment law, workers’ compensation and estate/ succession planning. He regularly is invited to speak to groups about various business, employment and estate planning issues. He and his wife are residents of Florence, Kentucky, and are members of Seven Hills Church.

Mr. Boggs is actively involved in the Northern Kentucky Chamber of Commerce and Business Networking International and regularly volunteers with local charitable organizations including “Whiz Kids”, an after-school program teaching children to read. Leisure activities include skiing, golf, reading, hiking and mountain biking.

David H. Brinkman is a partner with Wood Herron & Evans LLP and is involved in all phases of the firm’s intellectual property practice. Admitted to the Ohio Bar in 1994, Mr. Brinkman is registered to practice before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and his expertise is concentrated in the areas of electronic, mechanical and electrical technologies. He has been selected for inclusion in Best Lawyers in America.

Wood Herron & Evans LLP 2700 Carew Tower, 441 Vine Street Cincinnati, OH 45202 (513) 241-2324 gbellamy@whe-law.com

Wallace Boggs PllC 300 Buttermilk Pike, Suite 100 Ft. Mitchell, KY 41017 859-647-9100 wallaceboggs.com

Practice Area Intellectual Property Law

Practice area Business, Business Litigation, Workers’ Compensation, Employment Law

Wood Herron & Evans LLP 2700 Carew Tower, 441 Vine Street Cincinnati, OH 45202 (513) 241-2324 dbrinkman@whe-law.com Practice Area Patent & Intellectual Property Law

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Cincy LEADING LAWYERS 2020 Daniel J. Hoffheimer Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP Kara H. Lyons Lyons & Lyons Trust, Business, General Susan E. Wheatley Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP Wealth Planning & Tax Law William F. Russo Katz Teller White Collar Crime J Jeanne Cors Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP Ralph W. Kohnen Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP Chad Ziepfel Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP Workers’ Compensation

Deepak K. Desai

Daniel J. Donnellon

Integrity, trust and collaboration are the hallmarks of Mr. Desai’s practice. He represents public entity clients such as Sycamore Township where he serves as the Law Director, and private businesses assisting them with contracts, compliance, and personnel matters. He joined Donnellon Donnellon & Miller in 2018 because of the firm’s emphasis on representing municipalities and townships, as well as locally-owned businesses. As a greater Cincinnati native, Mr. Desai is connected with the community and has served as the commissioner for the local cub scout pack, as well as a coach for youth baseball and basketball.

Mr. Donnellon has devoted the entirety of his years in practice to trial work, concentrating on business and civil injunctions. He is the author of Injunctions and Restraining Orders in Ohio (Anderson 1992), and frequently teaches on the subject for the Ohio Common Pleas Court Judges Association. Mr. Donnellon has litigated actions for injunctions and other relief in matters involving trademarks, trade dress, trade secret copyright, and other business-related issues, and he has tried complex business and product liability actions. He returned to the University of Cincinnati College of Law as an adjunct professor, teaching Advanced Trial Practice and coaching the competitive mock trial teams.

In 2013, Prof. Donnellon recieved the Alumni Award for Teaching Excellence. He is an active member of the Federal Bar Association having served as Chapter President.

He has been recognized in Best Lawyers in America, Ohio and Kentucky Super Lawyers, Benchmark, and Cincy Magazine’s Top 100 Lawyers in the Tri-State area. He joined Sebaly Shillito + Dyer in 2017 and actively enjoys taking business litigation matters on contingent fee or other value-added bases.

Donnellon Donnellon & Miller 9079 Montgomery Road Cincinnati, Ohio 45242 (513) 891-7087 dkd@donnellonlaw.com

Brian C. Thomas Graydon Head & Ritchey LLP Zoning Thomas W. Breidenstein Stites & Harbison PLLC

Sebaly, Shillito + Dyer, a legal Professional association 9100 West Chester Towne Centre Dr, Ste. 210 West Chester, OH 45069 513-644-8125 ssdlaw.com

Practice Area Municipal Employment Real Estate Business

Timothy M. Burke Manley Burke

See full list online at cincymagazine.com

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JONATHAN FOX

W. Scott GaineS

Jennifer Gatherwright

Jonathan Fox graduated from the University of Cincinnati College of Law in 1988 (J.D.). Prior to law school, he was a trooper with the Ohio State Highway Patrol and a police officer for the City of Monroe. Mr. Fox was an assistant prosecutor for Franklin Municipal Court, a Butler County assistant prosecuting attorney, and an assistant law director/prosecuting attorney for the City of Hamilton. He has been an acting judge in all three Butler County Area Courts for the past 10 years. Currently, Mr. Fox serves as magistrate in Trenton Mayor’s Court. Mr. Fox’s primary areas of practice include Traffic/Criminal, with a concentration on DUI defense, Criminal Defense, Juvenile, and Personal Injury.

W. Scott Gaines is an associate at Wood Herron & Evans, and holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in electrical engineering.

Scott’s practice focuses primarily on the preparation and prosecution of patent applications for electronic devices and circuits, digital and analog communication systems, semiconductor devices and processing, and software-implemented inventions. He also has more than 12 years of practical engineering experience, mainly in wireless communications and radio frequency electronics, with particular experience involving cellular telecommunication networks, aerospace electronics, and defense electronics.

Jennifer has twenty years of experience providing entrepreneurs and small to middle-market companies with outside general counsel services. She regularly assists clients with finance transactions, new entity start-ups, purchases and sales of existing businesses, restructurings, and corporate governance.

Through her tax practice, Jennifer assists clients from all walks of life with a wide range of tax problems, such as audits, collection matters including offers in compromise, tax liens and levies, and criminal tax investigations and prosecutions. Jennifer has achieved national recognition for her experience in the field of tax controversy.

Lyons & Lyons Attorneys at Law 8310 Princeton-Glendale Road West Chester, OH 45069 (513) 777-2222 or (513) 844-8888 jfox@lyonsandlyonslaw.com

Wood Herron & evans LLP 2700 Carew Tower, 441 Vine Street Cincinnati, OH 45202 (513) 241-2324 sgaines@whe-law.com

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Practice area Intellectual Property Law

Practice Area Business Planning and Transactions Tax Audits, Collection, and Litigation Criminal Tax Representation

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Gatherwright Freeman & Associates, P.S.C. 541 Buttermilk Pike, Suite 103 Crescent Springs, Kentucky, 41017 (859) 578-3000 jennifer@gfalegal.com

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Kenneth Germain

STEPHEN E. GILLEN

WILLIAM E. HESCH

Germain has more than 45 years of varied experience in the trademark/ unfair competition field.

He focuses his practice on trademark counseling, consulting and litigation.

He is often retained as an expert witness working on cases involving some of the nation’s largest companies in high-stakes, cutting-edge cases. He is also available for Early Neutral Evaluation. In addition to his involvement at WHE, he recently taught Intellectual Property/Trademark courses at the NKU Chase School of Law and at the University of Dayton Law School’s Program in Law and Technology. Germain has a J.D. from New York University School of Law, 1969, and an A.B., magna cum laude, from Rutgers College, 1966.

Prior to entering private practice in 1994, Stephen Gillen served as house counsel for an education publishing company. He has written and spoken nationally on various publishing and copyright topics. Steve’s practice emphasizes publishing and entertainment transactions and disputes, Internet issues, advertising law, computer law, copyrights, technology transfer, trade secrets and related matters. His clients include publishers, authors, artists, photographers, videographers, independent producers, Internet service providers, multimedia developers and software programmers. Mr. Gillen has a B.S.B.A from Miami University, 1975, and a J.D. from the Salmon P. Chase College of Law, 1980.

William E. Hesch founded his law firm and CPA firm in 1993, with an emphasis in estate and tax planning.

As one of the few attorneys in the Cincinnati area who is also a CPA and Personal Financial Specialist, Mr. Hesch provides creative, practical solutions to complex legal, tax and retirement planning for business owners and individuals. His videos at www.heschlaw.com identify the Top 10 Mistakes Business Owners make in Tax, Succession and Estate Planning.

Wood herron & evans LLP 2700 Carew Tower, 441 Vine St. Cincinnati, OH 45202 (513) 241-2324 kgermain@whe-law.com

Wood Herron & Evans LLP 2700 Carew Tower, 441 Vine St. Cincinnati, OH 45202 (513) 241-2324 sgillen@whe-law.com

Practice area Trademark Law

Practice Area Copyright & Intellectual Property Law

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William E. Hesch Law Firm, LLC 3047 Madison Road, Suite 205 Cincinnati, OH 45209 (513) 731-6601 www.heschlaw.com Practice Areas Purchase/Sale of Business Interests Estate Planning and Administration Succession Planning & Business Law Tax Planning for Business Owners Retirement Planning for Baby Boomers Elder Law Medicaid Planning

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BarBara J. Howard

RANDALL S. JACKSON, JR.

DAVID E. JEFFERIES

Barbara J. Howard and her law firm provide services in all areas of family law, serving clients in the Greater Cincinnati area, including Hamilton, Clermont and Warren counties.

A highly skilled litigator and negotiator, Howard, who is a past president of the Ohio State Bar Association and the Cincinnati Bar Association, is trained as a collaborative law practitioner and is a member of the Cincinnati Academy of Collaborative Professionals. She is Immediate Past Chair of the Board of Trustees of Xavier University and a member of the Board of Trustees of the Volunteer Lawyers for the Poor.

Randy Jackson is a partner with Wood Herron & Evans LLP and is in the firm’s Chemical/Materials Sciences and Biotech Practice Groups. While involved in all phases of intellectual property representation, Randy’s expertise is heavily concentrated in the chemical and biotechnology areas. He was admitted to the Ohio Bar in 1998, the Kentucky Bar in 1999, and is registered to practice before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. He also is admitted before the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals, and the U.S. District Court.

David E. Jefferies is a partner with Wood Herron & Evans LLP and is involved in all phases of the firm’s intellectual property practice. Admitted to the Ohio Bar in 1998 and the U.S. District Court, Southern District of Ohio in 1999, Mr. Jefferies is also registered to practice before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. He joined Wood Herron & Evans in 1998 and his expertise is concentrated in patent prosecution and infringement evaluation in the areas of biology, biotech, pharmaceuticals and biomedical devices.

Wood Herron & Evans LLP 2700 Carew Tower, 441 Vine Street Cincinnati, OH 45202 (513) 241-2324 rjackson@whe-law.com

Wood Herron & Evans LLP 2700 Carew Tower, 441 Vine Street Cincinnati, OH 45202 (513) 241-2324 djefferies@whe-law.com

Practice Areas Chemical & Biotech Patent Law

Practice Areas Biotech & Pharmaceutical Patent Law

Barbara J. Howard Co., L.P.a.

120 E. Fourth St., Suite 960 Cincinnati, OH 45202 (513) 421-7300 barbarajhoward.com Practice area Family Law

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LORI KRAFTE

PAUL LINDEN

Kara H. Lyons

Lori Krafte is a Partner with Wood Herron & Evans LLP. Lori counsels clients in all areas of advertising and media law, privacy, trademarks, copyrights, and domain name disputes and other internet law matters.

Krafte has been selected for inclusion in Best Lawyers in America in the fields of advertising law, trademarks, copyrights, and IP litigation; and she has been named to Ohio Super Lawyers for a number of years, including as one of the top 25 women lawyers in Cincinnati four times, and one of the top 50 women lawyers in Ohio in 2010. She is also a Certified Information Privacy Professional (CIPP/US). Krafte has a J.D. from the University of Cincinnati College of Law, 1998, a Doctor of Philosophy from The Claremont Graduate School, 1989, and a B.A. from Indiana University, 1977.

Paul Linden is a partner and registered patent attorney with Wood Herron & Evans LLP. During his more than 10 years in practice, Paul has developed expertise in three primary areas of intellectual property law: federal court litigation at both the trial and appellate levels involving patents, trademarks and trade secrets; contested proceedings at the United States Patent and Trademark Office involving patents and trademarks; and preparing legal opinions regarding a range of intellectual property issues, such as patentability and freedom to operate. Paul currently serves as co-chair of the Cincinnati Bar Association’s Intellectual Property Litigation Committee, where he presents annually on recent development in intellectual property law. He is also an adjunct professor at the University of Cincinnati College of Law where he teaches a course on intellectual property practice.

After graduating Summa Cum Laude from Chase College of Law in 2015, Kara H. Lyons, following her late grandfather’s and father’s footsteps, joined the family firm of Lyons & Lyons as a third-generation attorney. With a primary focus on wills, trusts, estate planning and probate law, Ms. Lyons has made it her mission to simplify the traditionally overly complicated estate planning process by creating personalized plans based upon each client’s individual needs.

Wood Herron & Evans LLP 2700 Carew Tower, 441 Vine Street Cincinnati, OH 45202 (513) 241-2324 lkrafte@whe-law.com

Wood Herron & Evans LLP 2700 Carew Tower, 441 Vine Street Cincinnati, OH 45202 (513) 241-2324 plinden@whe-law.com

Practice Area Media & Intellectual Property Law

Practice Areas Intellectual property practice

Lyons & Lyons attorneys at Law 8310 Princeton Glendale Road West Chester, Ohio 45069 513-777-222 klyons@lyonsandlyonslaw.com Practice areas Trust & Estate Planning Probate Business Law

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RobeRt H. Lyons

TODD V. MCMURTRY

JULIA B. MEISTER

Robert H. Lyons has been successfully defending the rights of those charged with DUI in Southwest Ohio for more than 35 years.

He has established a reputation of providing an aggressive defense, leaving no stone unturned, while obtaining the best possible outcome for his clients. With vast experience in DUI, Mr. Lyons is very active in teaching DUI defense to other attorneys and has been an instructor at Chase College of Law and Miami University. Mr. Lyons is also the former chairman of the Ohio State Bar Association Traffic Law Committee.

Todd V. McMurtry has extensive experience in both personal and business litigation matters.

He has handled and tried cases throughout Ohio and Kentucky. Super Lawyers recently recognized Todd as 2019 Top 50 Kentucky Super Lawyer. Martindale Hubbelll has rated him as AV Preeminent. Todd combines his business litigation and mediation training to help business owners resolve conflicts. Todd has written extensively on the topics of business divorce and is available for consultation with individuals or fellow attorneys. Todd also represents individuals damaged by legal malpractice. Todd has been married for 32 years to Dr. Maria C. Garriga. Together, they have three adult children.

Julia is an experienced, respected litigator who has prevailed in jury and bench trials and arbitrations as well as administrative proceedings on behalf of individual, corporate, health care, and fiduciary clients. She has been received as an expert and appointed counsel by courts. Julia is an elected fellow of the selective American College of Trust and Estate Counsel and is recognized in several categories by Best Lawyers in America and Ohio Super Lawyers. She frequently is invited to speak to groups of attorneys and judicial personnel and has chaired drafting committees to submit new legislation for the state of Ohio. She serves as a trustee at the Cincinnati Opera and Cincinnati Legal Aid Society and has been appointed to several committees at the Cincinnati Bar Association, which honored her with its Warrington Community Service award. She serves on the Taft Ethics committee and as a mentor for junior lawyers through the Ohio Supreme Court. Julia is a graduate of Leadership Cincinnati Class 41. She is passionate about the arts in greater Cincinnati, Girls on the Run, and assisting and protecting older adults as a volunteer guardian and advocate.

Hemmer DeFrank Wessels, PLLC 250 Grandview Drive, Suite 500 Fort Mitchell, KY 41017 859-344-1188 tmcmurtry@hemmerlaw.com

Lyons & Lyons Attorneys at Law 8310 Princeton-Glendale Road West Chester, OH 45069 (513) 777-2222 rlyons@lyonsandlyonslaw.com

Practice Areas Legal Malpractice, Business Divorce, Business Litigation, Mediation

Practice Areas DUI/OvI Defense Traffic/Criminal Personal Injury Estate Planning

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PARTNER, TAFT STETTINIUS & HOLLISTER CINCINNATI OFFICE 425 Walnut Street #1800 Cincinnati, OH 45202-3957 513 357-9330 Meister@taftlaw.com Practice Areas General Litigation, Estate, Trust & Fiduciary Litigation, and Health Care

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AntoniA MitroussiA

Elizabeth R. Murray

Matthew S. ParriSh

Antonia Mitroussia’s Immigration practice focuses on counseling domestic and multi-national employers on foreign recruitment strategies and immigration compliance, including how to best manage their foreign labor force, transfer employees from abroad, and hire new foreign professionals in the U.S. She represents clients on complex employment-based and related family-based immigration transactions through multiple federal adjudicative stages including the U.S. Department of State, and the U.S. Departments of Labor and Homeland Security. Ms. Mitroussia is a member of the American Immigration Lawyers Association and serves on the International Advisory Council of the University of Cincinnati College of Law where she also lectures on Immigration law to the LLM class. She has served as past Secretary of the Board of Directors of the European-American Chamber of Commerce, Greater Cincinnati Chapter, and as chair of the International Law Committee of the Cincinnati Bar Association. She attended the University of Athens, Greece, and received her B.A. and M.A. degrees from the University of Cincinnati and her J.D. degree from the University of Cincinnati College of Law.

Elizabeth Murray concentrates her practice in the area of Domestic Relations, which includes divorce, dissolution, prenuptial agreements, adoptions, custody issues, post decree matters, child and spousal support, visitation and collaborative law.

Beth is a highly respected guardian ad litem representing the interest of children in divorce situations. Beth serves as a parenting coordinator who focuses on helping parents navigate their parenting issues and communications. Beth is also a certified mediator.

Matthew S. Parrish is a partner in the Cincinnati office of FisherBroyles, LLP. His practice focuses primarily on helping clients find ways to finance, capitalize, buy and sell their businesses. Matt serves as an adviser to publicly traded and privately held clients ranging from global financial service companies to middle market and early-stage high-growth companies that operate primarily in the manufacturing, consumer products, technology and entertainment industries. In 2020, Matt was selected for inclusion in Best Lawyers in America for Securities and Capital Markets Law.

Beth is the immediate past chairperson of the Cincinnati Academy of Collaborative Professionals which is a group that strives to make the process of ending a marriage less stressful. Through Collaborative Law, the parties are able to control the situation, craft agreements that meet their needs, and create a healthy environment for their children.

taft stettinius & Hollister LLP 425 Walnut St., Suite 1800 Cincinnati, OH 45202 (513) 357-9665 mitroussia@taftlaw.com

Murray Law, LLC Centennial Plaza III 895 Central Avenue, Suite 310 Cincinnati, OH 45202 513-619-6060 513-651-6981

Practice Area Immigration

Practice Area Family Law

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J. DWIGHT POFFENBERGER, JR.

Zachary D. Smith

George J. Zamary

Dwight Poffenberger is a partner with Wood Herron & Evans LLP and is involved in all phases of the firm’s intellectual property practice. Admitted to the Ohio Bar in 1994, Mr. Poffenberger is also registered to practice before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. He joined Wood Herron & Evans in 1995, following prior experience at the USPTO where he was a patent examiner. He received a degree in mechanical engineering from the University of Michigan in 1987 and his Juris Doctor degree from the George Mason University School of Law in 1993.

Before starting Zachary D. Smith, LLC, I practiced as a public defender in the Commonwealth of Kentucky and later with an established small firm in downtown Cincinnati.

I became a public defender because I craved action. I wanted to gain experience counseling clients and develop my courtroom skills. When I transitioned into private practice I added civil litigation to my repertoire, gravitating toward and eventually focusing my practice on Family Law in Ohio and Kentucky.

George Zamary started the Zamary Law Firm in 2016 with the intent of providing high quality, personalized legal services while building long-term relationships with clients. Mr. Zamary practices in the areas business law, litigation, estate planning, construction and employment law. Due to the Zamary Law Firm’s smaller size, it is able to act quickly and innovatively to client’s issues. Our goal is to become an integral part of our client’s business or an advocate for matters of a more personal nature. We combine common sense approach to achieve practical results.

Wood Herron & Evans LLP 2700 Carew Tower, 441 Vine Street Cincinnati, OH 45202 (513) 241-2324 dpoffenberger@whe-law.com Practice Area Intellectual Property

I am a trained Family Law Mediator, previously served as co-president of the Cincinnati Academy of Collaborative Professionals, and litigate my fair share of cases. I enjoy Family Law because it allows me to use all the tools in my toolbox. I believe a client is best served when you engage in complex problem solving, generate creative outcomes, and are ready to lean on the nuances and technical aspects of the law to prevail in Court. I understand every family is different, and every family requires different tools be deployed. Whether they know it or not, my parents greatly informed my approach to the practice of Family Law.

centennial Plaza iii 895 Central Avenue, Suite 305 Cincinnati, OH 45202 513-275-1164 zdslaw.com Practice areas Divorce/Dissolution Collaborative Law Mediation Division of Property Business Valuation

Child Support Child Custody/Visitation Prenuptial Agreements Domestic Violence

Zamary Law Firm, LLC 455 Delta Avenue, Suite 204 Cincinnati, Ohio 45226 gzamary@zamarylaw.com Practice Area Business Litigation Construction Employment Estate Planning

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Just Having Fun The Newport Syndicate still providing happiness after 25 years

By Eric Spangle

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he Newport Syndicate will celebrate its 25th year of providing event space and a banquet hall for weddings, corporate events, social events and fundraisers this year with an event in the fall, says Sharon Forton, managing partner.

While details of the event have yet to be worked out, Forton says she expects it will be some sort of big celebration involving fundraising. “We opened Oct. 5, [1995], so in the fall we’ll definitely be doing some sort of big celebration,” she says.

The Newport Syndicate was the city of Newport’s first “golden business,” Forton says. “We were here before Newport on the Levee,” she says.

The Newport Syndicate is the perfect place for wedding ceremonies, receptions, reunions and social events, Forton says.

The wedding business is The Syndicate’s No. 1 market, she says.

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“The wedding business has been our biggest business from the beginning,” says Forton. “People still want a good wedding, they still want to have fun, they still want to have good service, good food,” she says.

“I mean, we’re easy to work with.”

The Syndicate is perfect for wedding ceremonies and receptions because both can be conducted in the same facility, Forton says. A wide choice of spaces is available so couples can have an intimate ceremony in the Flamingo Room or a big ceremony in the same space as the reception.

The facility offers the perfect recipe for wedding receptions, Forton says. Packages include food, a four-hour bar package, cake cutting and plating, fine china and glassware, room setup and cleanup, linens, chair covers, late-night weddings (until 2 a.m.), late-night food and an event planner at every step in the process.

Reception menus can fit anyone’s budget and tastes with several different buffet options including appetizers, carving boards, side dishes and entrees, says Forton. Sitdown dinners with entrée options such as chicken Marsala, salmon with herb butter, prime rib, filet mignon, vegetarian lasagna

The Newport Syndicate hosted Best of NKY in 2019.

and stuffed portabella mushrooms are also available for receptions.

Great food has always been the cornerstone of The Syndicate’s business, says Forton. “We started it with that fine dining flair that we’ve never lost,” she says.

“We get more compliments on our food than anything else we do when it comes to banquets. So that part I think is what’s sustained us all these years. That attention to good food.”

Right behind the wedding business is hosting fundraisers, Forton says. That’s because The Syndicate has such a large space to handle big groups, she says. “We can have a silent auction and have room for everything they need to make a lot of money.”

Some of the largest names in fundraising have conducted their events at The Syndicate, including the Arthritis Foundation, the Northern Kentucky Homeless and Housing Coalition, the American Cancer Society, the Alzheimer’s Association and Dance With Your Heart.

“We’ve probably done a fundraiser with most of the large fundraisers in the city in the past 25 years,” she says. To help them

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Christopher Michael Images

Over its 25 years in business, the Newport Syndicate has hosted many events, including weddings. make money the facility offers special fundraiser pricing for the nonprofit groups, she says.

“The chances with making a lot of money here at The Syndicate are good because the product is good, the people leave happy, the space is good, the food is good,” says Forton. “All that helps the fundraisers to make money.”

The Syndicate is also a popular space for corporate events such as holiday parties, business meetings, business celebrations,

award ceremonies, corporate luncheons, team building and retirement parties.

The Syndicate is a popular venue for corporate events because the facility offers privacy and the option of a large space or smaller rooms for companies to use, Forton says.

The Syndicate is also a popular venue for social events like proms, sorority or fraternity formals, bar mitzvahs, bat mitzvahs, reunions or family parties, she says. The facility has seven party rooms

that can accommodate any size event, including two of the largest dance floors in the Tristate, Forton says.

The Syndicate also has the only dueling piano bar, Gangsters, in the Tristate area.

“We run it every Saturday night and it’s great for all ages [21 and up],” says Forton.

“What’s so cool about it is it runs the gamut from 21-year-olds to 75-year-olds,” she says.

Gangsters is the youngster of The Syndicate’s business. It started over 10 years ago, which is unusual for a piano bar to last so long, says Forton. “It’s just weathered a lot of things and it’s consistent in what we offer and that’s the secret to staying in business so long,” she says.

Part of its longevity can be credited to the entertainment value it offers, says Forton.

“It has a fun menu and it’s entertaining,” she says. “People come to Gangsters and then they end up staying like two or three more hours.”

Gangsters is a great place for a bachelorette party or birthday party, she says. “It’s like one of the spots you can put on your to-do list where you know if you come in you’re going to have fun.”

And having fun is really what has sustained The Syndicate’s business model for the past 25 years. “People just want to have fun,” says Forton. “We’re always at people’s happiest day.” n

The Newport Syndicate has also hosted business events, such at the NKY Business Hall of Fame. w w w.

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Till the Cows Come Home Blue Grass Stockyards Regional Marketplace is a place to eat, shop and learn

By Eric Spangler

J

ust a short drive down Interstate 75 in Lexington, Kentucky, is a place where visitors can eat, shop and learn until the cows come home—literally.

It’s called Blue Grass Stockyards Regional Marketplace and it features a restaurant called Hayden’s Stockyard Eatery, a meat shop called the Local Connection, a farm and outdoor wear store called R.T. Outfitters, a farrier supply shop called Breeder’s Farrier Supply and a gift shop that features Kentucky-branded products called Bluegrass Mercantile, says Jamie Crites, event coordinator for Blue Grass Stockyards.

It’s all part of the vision the nine owners of Blue Grass Stockyards had for their new building that was rebuilt in Lexington just over two years after the original building was destroyed by a fire, she says.

Although Blue Grass Stockyards continues to sell livestock at the new facility, the Blue Grass Stockyards Regional Marketplace space—a community-minded dining, retail and education space—is designed to draw tourists, says Crites.

For hungry visitors Hayden’s Stockyard Eatery, owned and operated by Lexington’s DaRae & Friends, is the top draw, offering fresh, seasonal ingredients and a comfortable atmosphere for a traditional Southern dining experience, she says.

The restaurant and the Local Connection meat shop try to source most of their products from local farmers, including beef, pork, bacon and produce, Crites says.

“We offer that education where consumers can come out here and learn about the facility and learn about the farm-to-table aspect,” says Crites.

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TOP: Blue Grass Stockyards’ Lexington location is at 375 Lisle Industrial Ave. ABOVE: Visitors can learn more about cattle in Blue Grass Stockyards’ classroom.

The educational aspect of the Blue Grass Stockyards Regional Marketplace is accomplished through a classroom called The Yards, Crites says. “Our owners, besides wanting to have a place for [agriculture] commerce, it was really important to them to have some place that can educate consumers,” she says.

“That’s because at the end of the day the product we’re selling is beef and so how can the business educate people on the cattle and beef industry?” Crites says. It’s an experiential education as visitors walk through the classroom and look at photos and read the descriptions. There’s also a window that overlooks the area where livestock are sold, she says.

“Since we’ve opened we’ve had over 20,000 visitors through that classroom,”

says Crites. The business also offers school field trips and partners with the Kentucky Cattleman’s Foundation and the Kentucky Beef Council, which has a certified agricultural teacher on its staff to teach lessons, she says.

In addition to the stores in the Regional Marketplace, Blue Grass Stockyards also has event spaces and 17 other agriculturalrelated businesses to accommodate the needs of the farmers who sell their livestock at the facility, says Crites.

“Our owners wanted to have a place that our farmers could come and kind of do one-stop shopping,” she says. “A lot of times farmers don’t have the time to get off the farm so when they do make a trip into town they wanted it to be a place where they could do some of their other business.” n

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Business Calendar

February 2020 Economic Update: Manufacturing & Distribution Cincinnati USA Regional Chamber

Feb. 4

Fifth Third Bank and VonLehman CPA & Advisory Firm lead this exploration of economic trends and projections for the year ahead in manufacturing and distribution. Business owners, CFOs, COOs, controllers and anyone else involved in the fields of manufacturing and distribution are encouraged to attend.

7:30-9:30 a.m. Free with registration. New Riff Distilling, 24 Distillery Way, Newport, Ky. cincinnatichamber.com.

Blue Ash Business Association Membership Drive Blue Ash Business Association

Feb. 6

Network and learn more about the Blue Ash Business Association and its members at this Thursday evening event. Two Blue Ash Business Association members, Fretboard Brewing and Flavor Catering and Bar Service, will provide refreshments. 4:306:30 p.m. Free. Daventry at Summit Park, 9993 Plainfield Road, Blue Ash. babusiness.org.

Clermont Chamber Annual Meeting and SBDC Awards Luncheon Clermont Chamber of Commerce

Feb. 14

Clermont County celebrates the economic accomplishments of the last year and looks ahead to the rest of the year at this lunch event. At the same time, the Clermont Small Business Development Center hands out six awards recognizing the best of the county’s businesses and organizations. 11:30 a.m.-1:30 p.m. $60 members, $75 non-members. Holiday Inn & Suites Cincinnati East, 4501 Eastgate Blvd., Cincinnati. clermontchamber.com.

Power 100 Cincy Magazine

Feb. 20

A special cocktail event featuring networking with some of the Tristate’s most influential leaders. This annual event celebrates the release of Cincy Magazine’s list of the 100 most influential business, political and

community leaders in the Tristate. The event will also include complimentary drinks and appetizers. 5:30-7:30 p.m. Free, donations to nonprofit partners encouraged. Backstage Event Center, 625 Walnut St., Cincinnati. cincy.live.

Cincinnati Chamber Annual Dinner 2020 Cincinnati USA Regional Chamber

Feb. 27

This annual dinner is a celebration of leadership where the Great Living Cincinnatian Award is presented for the 53rd year. The 2020 honorees are Uma Kotagal of Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, Don Neyer of Al Neyer Inc., O’dell Montero Owens, board member of U.S. Bank and the Cincinnati Firefighter Association, and Harry Santen of the University of Cincinnati Law School. 5-8:30 p.m. $175. Duke Energy Convention Center, 525 Elm St., Cincinnati. cincinnatichamber.com.

March 2020 Cincinnati Women in Leadership Symposium Women in Leadership Symposium

March 3

The Cincinnati edition of the National Women’s Council’s marquee event will focus on the theme of “Creating a League of Your Own: Women in Action.” Speakers include Bonita Brown, vice president and chief strategy officer of Northern Kentucky University, and Martha Sarra, vice president and chief ethics and compliance officer for Kroger. 8:30 a.m.-noon. $149. The Health Collaborative, 615 Elsinore Place #500, Cincinnati. wilsymposium.com.

Dan Beard Council Good Scout Luncheon Boy Scouts of America

March 18

Business and community leaders come together at this annual event to honor the recipient of the Good Scout Award, given to a business or individual who has made a lasting impact on the Greater Cincinnati community over the years. Don’t miss out on one of the largest fundraising and networking events to happen in the city each year. 11:30 a.m.-1 p.m. $250. Duke Energy Convention Center, 525 Elm St., Cincinnati. danbeard.org/gsal.

O’dell Owens 29th Annual Sustainability and EHS Symposium Manufacturers’ Education Council

March 24-25

Maintaining compliance with environmental, health and safety regulations is a growing concern for businesses of all types. Join local, regional and national organizations at one of the largest sustainability and EHS conferences in the country to learn how to adhere to regulatory guidelines while also lowering costs and gaining a competitive edge. Tu 7:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m., W 7 a.m.-2 p.m. $495 for both days, $275-$385 for single day tickets. Sharonville Convention Center, 11355 Chester Road, Sharonville. mecseminars.com.

Business Impact Awards 2020 Northern Kentucky Chamber of Commerce

March 25

Presented by Huntington Bank, this celebration of businesses large and small recognizes those that are bringing innovation, creativity, leadership and strong business practices to Northern Kentucky.

Awards will be given out to the best small, medium and large businesses as well as nonprofits, startups and others. 4-6 p.m. $35-$40. The Learning Center at Northern Kentucky Convention Center, 1 W. Rivercenter Blvd., Covington, Ky. nkychamber.com.

Don’t see your event?

Visit cincymagazine.com to add it to our online calendar for free.

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Best in Business Directory

T

hose who run or manage businesses know that sometimes you need some help. As the Tristate’s magazine for business professionals, we are in a unique position that enables us to meet and interact with some of the best business service providers in the region. This list gives you a taste of the region’s best business services, and serves as a resource for those looking for assistance. Make sure to visit CincyMagazine.com to see exclusive online Best in Business content.

Chambers/Economic development African American Chamber of Greater Cincinnati & Northern Kentucky 513-751-9900 african-americanchamber.com Blue Ash Business Association babusiness.org The Chamber of Commerce Serving Middletown, Monroe & Trenton 513-422-4551 thechamberofcommerce.org Cincinnati USA Regional Chamber 513-579-3100 cincinnatichamber.com

Accounting GBQ 513-871-3033 gbq.com

Clermont Chamber of Commerce 513-576-5000 clermontchamber.com

VonLehman 800-887-0437 vlcpa.com Air Travel

Clermont Department of Economic Development 513-732-7825 clermontcountyohio.biz

CVG 859-767-3151 cvgairport.com

Hispanic Chamber Cincinnati USA 513-979-6999 hispanicchambercincinnati.com

Audio Visual

Lebanon Chamber of Commerce 513-932-1100 lebanonchamber.org

ITA Audio Visual Solutions 800-899-8877 ita.com

Mason Deerfield Chamber 513-336-0125 madechamber.org

SpotOn Productions 513-779-4223 spoton.productions BAnking

Milford Miami Township Chamber 513-831-2411 milfordmiamitownship.com

Commerce Bank 800-453-2265 commercebank.com

Northern Kentucky Chamber of Commerce 859-578-8800 nkychamber.com

Commonwealth Bank 859-746-9000 cbandt.com

West Chester Liberty Chamber Alliance 513-777-3600 thechamberalliance.com

BUsiness Law

Western Economic Council westerneconomiccouncil.com

William E. Hesch Law Firm 513-731-6601 heschlaw.com Business Resources Cincinnati Better Business Bureau 513-421-3015 bbb.org/cincinnati/

PNC Financial Advisors/W Mgmt.

513-651-8714 pnc.com Western & Southern 866-832-7719 westernsouthern.com Health Superior Dental 937-438-0283 superiordental.com IT Services CMIT Solutions 800-399-2648 cmitsolutions.com Law firms Calfee, Halter & Griswold LLP 513-693-4880 calfee.com Lyons & Lyons 513-777-2222 lyonsandlyonslaw.com Taft Stettinius & Hollister 513-381-2838 taftlaw.com Wood Herron & Evans 513-241-2324 whe-law.com Professional development Gateway Community & Technical College 859-441-4500 gateway.kctcs.edu Great Oaks Campuses 513-771-8840 greatoaks.com The Haile/US Bank College of Business at Northern Kentucky University 859-572-5165 nku.edu/academics/cob

Construction

Indiana Wesleyan University 866-468-6498 indwes.edu

EGC Construction 859-442-6500 egcconst.com

Union Institute & University 800-861-6400 myunion.edu

Financial Management Charles Schwab Fort Mitchell 859-308-1425 schwab.com/fortmitchell

Interested in having your company included? Please contact Publisher Eric Harmon at publisher@cincymagazine.com or 513-297-6205.

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PAIN MANAGEMENT page 81

ALLIANCE INTEGRATIVE MEDICINE page 83

CHRISTIAN VILLAGE COMMUNITIES page 84

WEALTH MANAGEMENT page 85

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e Transforming the Meeting Experience

36 East Fourth St., Cincinnati, OH 45202

Seamlessly blending classic opulence and comtemporary elegance, The RenaissanceÂŽ Cincinnati Downtown Hotel features breathtaking 40-ft. domed ceilings, setting an unforgettable stage for your next social or corporate event. To start planning, call 513.333.0000 or visit RenCincinnatiWedding.com

Cincy Live Well: Pain Management

Finding Better Methods Local providers offer patients with chronic and acute pain effective treatments that avoid heavy medication and opiates

By Kevin Michell

M

anaging pain is a wide concentration in health care, encompassing everything from taking care of lingering pain after injury or surgery to mitigating chronic issues that stay with a person throughout their life. This is complicated by the personal nature of pain—it can be very subjective between people’s different sensitivity to it and willingness to be open with physicians about the pain they’re experiencing.

And, for some people, chronic pain can be a constant aspect of their lives that doesn’t feel like it can ever be improved.

But one Mercy Health patient recently had a new treatment that changed her entire life.

Ava Strole had been dealing with scoliosis her whole life, as she was diagnosed at 6 years old. She had been treated many times in many different ways and, in her mid-50s, was referred to Dr. Aarti Singla, a Mercy Health physician specializing in physical medicine, rehabilitation and pain management.

“When she was young, she was wearing a back brace and suffered from chronic pain from a pretty young age,” says. “She went through three back surgeries but continued to have quite a bit of pain despite the surgeries.”

Strole’s surgeries were often quite invasive, including implanting rods in her spine to try to help her stability. But her treatments weren’t very effective at improving her quality of life and required a lot of medication to help her get through each day.

“She used to go to a different pain management doctor where they used what she called ‘a cocktail of drugs,’” recalls

Singla. “She would go there every month and continue to not get better. The surgeon who last did her back surgery sent her to me and we worked to basically take her off pain medications and improve her overall functional status.”

Mercy Health went with a therapeutic route to reduce the need for Strole to take opiates while also improving her daily wellness.

“After some interventional options we proceeded with spinal cord stimulation, which is what eventually helped her quite a bit,” Singla says. That method involves using an implantable device that uses electrical stimulation on the spine to mitigate pain by blocking pain signals to the brain from nerves in the spine. The device is placed under the skin in a patient’s lower back and functions like a pacemaker by occasionally sending a low electrical current to spinal nerves.

Singla arranged for Strole to get the spinal cord stimulator temporarily inserted for a weeklong trial to see how well it helped to reduce her constant pain.

“She did really well with the trial,” explains Singla. “She was actually able to go and lift her grandkids and spend time with them, where before she was in a recliner all the time. She used to sleep every night in the recliner, and she was actually able to get rid of that because she had such significant pain relief with the trial.”

After the success of the trial, Strole had a permanent device implanted after the trial device was removed. After decades of chronic pain and taking medications that didn’t help to alleviate it, the spinal cord stimulation worked wonders for her.

For the first time in a long time, she could walk around a farmer’s market, lay flat on a bed and be active with her family. After a two-month recovery period from the final surgery, Strole was pain-free, no longer having to take opiates and off almost all her medications.

She’s back to living her normal life instead of having to be in doctor’s offices all the time and constantly bogged down by pain, Singla says. Strole comes back in

Dr. Aarti Singla with Mercy Health

for check-ups and provides Singla with updates every three to six months.

Spinal cord stimulation is becoming less of a fallback option for chronic back pain in health care and is being recommended more frequently for patients whom therapy, surgery and medication isn’t working. As a more preferred option, it can really improve a chronic pain sufferer’s life, just like it did with Strole, Singla explains.

“It used to be used a lot later in the treatment algorithm,” she says, “but it’s being used earlier because it has great results and people continue to do well with it.”

Prioritizing pain management methods that don’t require a patient to take opioids is a prominent topic in the field and resulting in other options being used earlier in treatment. The opioid crisis, for which southwest Ohio has had an unfortunate front-row seat, has not only changed how health care providers go about treating pain, but also how patients request treatment. Many people coming to doctors for help with their pain are aware of the dangers of opioids and request options up front that don’t involve taking them.

Another form of pain treatment that has gained in popularity is the array of regenerative therapies that stimulate the body’s own healing ability in localized areas to renew muscles, ligaments, tendons and w w w.

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Cincy Live Well: Pain Management

other areas. Platelet-rich plasma (PRP) injections are a common form of this, utilizing the clotting abilities of platelets to heal and renew damaged areas.

“Usually your body does it very well for places that have great blood supply, like

if you have a cut or skin injury it’s easy for your body to heal that area,” explains Singla. “But areas like tendons, joints and discs in the back, they don’t have great blood supply so the body can’t heal it the way you do if you had a lesion or cut on your skin.”

PRP injections can be useful for both addressing pain resulting from injuries such as torn muscles and ligaments or with issues like bursitis and tendinitis that can either be acute or chronic. The process involves drawing less than two ounces of a patient’s blood, separating the plasma and platelets from the red and white blood cells using a centrifuge and then directly injecting the concentrated plasma into the affected area.

This constructive and regenerative method encourages better and quicker

healing after acute injury than physical therapy and rest, and can actually make muscles, tendons and ligaments heal stronger than they were before injury. It tends to work effectively for people of most ages up to 70.

Methods like this can be enhanced with other therapies that manage a patient’s pain and help them recover strength after injury or a long time of inactivity resulting from chronic pain. Aquatic therapies continue to be a popular choice as it puts less stress on a person’s body while providing enough resistance to rebuild strength.

Importantly, health care providers like Mercy Health prioritize medication management to help patients dealing with pain to get treatment while avoiding opioid medications when possible. Chronic pain doesn’t have to require a lifetime of medication and the potential dangers of dependency that come with it as treatments like spinal cord stimulation and PRP injections continue to demonstrate their efficacy for all types of pain management patients. n

Join us at the 15th Anniversary Go Red for Women Experience on Thursday, April 30, 2020.

2020 Go Red for Women Executive Leadership Team Standing (L-R): Vera Hall, Carolyn Micheli, Julie Holt, Cathy Lindemann, Caitlin Clipp, Shellie Creson, Delores Hargrove-Young Seated (L-R): Craig Young, Deborah Hayes (Campaign Chair) Not pictured:Philecia Avery, Beverly Grant, Kevin Jones, Pam Webb

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A WHOLISTIC TAKE Members of the Alliance Integrative Medicine team: from left: Dr. Elizabeth Woolford, Dr. Teresa Esterle, Dr. Steve Amoils, Dr. Sandi Amoils and Dr. Katie Peeden

ALLIANCE INTEGRATIVE MEDICINE LOOKS AT THE WHOLE PERSON WHEN IT COMES TO MANAGING PAIN

By Corinne Minard

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lliance Integrative Medicine, located at 6400 E. Galbraith Road in Kenwood, often sees patients come in looking for help with their chronic pain.

Dr. Steve Amoils, director of AIM, says that while most people consider there to only be two types of pain—pain that can be handled with over-the-counter medications and pain that requires narcotics or surgery—there is actually a large gray area in the middle.

“There’s so many therapies that are wonderful for pain that don’t involve pills, that are generally safe,” he says.

As an integrative medicine facility, AIM is set up to assist patients with many different types of pain in a variety of ways. AIM treats patients with musculoskeletal pain, fibromyalgia, arthritis, irritable bowel syndrome, endometriosis, headaches and even cancer-related pain using a team approach. AIM’s team of doctors, chiropractors, energy healers, Rolfers, massage therapists and a dietician work together to create a wholistic plan for decreasing someone’s pain.

One example is AIM’s ACE treatment.

“A stands for acupuncture, C for chiro, E for energy, and it has a lot of really good benefits when you do it all together,” says Dr. Teresa Esterle, associate medical director of AIM’s fellowship program.

For AIM, it’s all about creating a personalized medical plan that addresses an individual’s needs as well as the unique causes that have triggered the pain.

“We don’t just look at a symptom. For us, to really have an impact, we want to fi nd out the root cause of the problem,” says Esterle.

When a patient comes in for their first appointment, they spend more than an hour

completing a health assessment that looks at everything from biometrics to mental health. Once a possible issue is identified, AIM works from multiple angles to fi x the problem. With joint pain, for example, AIM may provide patients with massage therapy and acupuncture to help relieve the pain. Then, to fi x what is causing the pain, a patient may see a Rolfer to realign their body’s structure or the dietician to cut down on food that may be causing inflammation.

“So often people come in and see their pain as just spontaneously starting when in fact they’ve been on a slow slide down and there’s been a single tipping point, a straw on the camel’s back sort of speak, that pushes them into a pain syndrome.

Getting someone out of that pain syndrome implies not only changing their pain but also changing the slide that they’ve been on and re-focusing them on a trajectory toward health and wellness,” says Amoils.

Amoils adds that once AIM has been able to help with a patient’s pain, many are ready for the next step of becoming healthier people, too.

“We often say come for pain, stay for wellness,” says Amoils. ■

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A Modern Retirement

CHRISTIAN VILLAGE COMMUNITIES UPDATES ITS FACILITIES WITH THREE NEW PROJECTS

By Corinne Minard

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arry Monroe, president and CEO of Christian Village Communities, which operates both The Christian Village at Mt. Healthy and The Christian Village at Mason, has always been proud of his company’s culture. But as more and more retirement facilities have sprung up in the region, Monroe decided it was time to bring more modern touches to the organization that was founded in 1960.

“Usually facilities attract and culture keeps. Unless we are competitive, unless we have facilities that are attractive, that are modern, in some cases cutting edge, then it will impair our ability to attract prospects,” he says.

The organization has moved further in this direction thanks to the help of three new projects.

The first is the recently completed Guardian Center for Memory Support at The Christian Village at Mt. Healthy. The new center is a secured floor dedicated to assisted living memory support.

“We provided specialized memory care at Mt. Healthy for years but it’s a 50-plus year facility,” says Monroe, “We took a look our facility and we took a look at what we had to offer and felt that we needed to make an investment to modernize that area.”

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Christian Village Communities invested $1.7 million in updating the floor.

The center is now a modern space with private baths, full showers in each room and common spaces like a living room, dining room and kitchen, enabling the staff to provide the same quality of care in a more modern space.

Christian Village Communities is also updating residences at The Christian Village at Mason. The organization is starting to convert its independent living homes, which were originally built in the ‘80s, into larger and more modern manor homes.

“These are homes that are close to 2,600 or 3,000 square feet with two-car garages, two full baths, half bath, very spacious open living areas and modern fi nishes,” says Monroe.

The organization is in the process of fi nishing its second home and has identified a third, but Monroe says they have already seen increased interest in the Mason community thanks to the manor home concept.

The last project is Christian Village Communities’ biggest. The organization is in the midst of a $2.85 million campaign to build a new auditorium and chapel at the Mason community. Called the Stone Worship Center and Auditorium, the center

A rendering of the Stone Worship Center and Auditorium at The Christian Village at Mason will increase the community’s meeting space capacity from 99 to 400.

“We’re very limited for space when we want to get all the residents together for activities. It’s not uncommon for us to have to have concerts on several consecutive nights in order to get everyone in that wants to attend,” says Monroe.

Service attendance is also very high, with the community recently adding a third service on Sundays to meet the demand of its residents.

“We felt that if we had a larger auditorium, we could reach so many more people and it would be wonderful for us to continue to grow that chapel service,” says Monroe.

With these three projects, Monroe says the organization will be able to retain its culture while becoming more attractive to prospective residents.

“I believe that these investments are necessary in order to keep us attractive to prospects and to help us grow and continue to be successful in the future,” he says. ■

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Guide to Wealth Management

Getting Ready for the Future We spoke to financial experts Jason Katz and John VanWeelden, who shared tips and advice for 2020

By Ginny McCabe

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s we start a new year and begin a decade, investors often reflect on their financial future. Factors like the economy, the election and the stock market are a few of the issues that often first come to mind when we think about investing, but other aspects like spending, saving, establishing goals, the ability to earn or connecting with a trusted financial advisor are key when it comes to building wealth.

One goal might be purchasing a new car.

Other goals might include buying a home, saving for a child’s education or retirement.

However, it can be critical to balance one’s current lifestyle expenses with future needs. Investors need to consider all the different factors that will come into play.

With each new year there are always questions about the financial landscape and when it comes to investments and financial planning experts say one of the biggest questions they get asked is “Will I have enough?” Another common concern they hear is “I don’t want to lose what I’ve worked so hard to build.”

Another thing that investors frequently overlook is inflation. Regardless of the various concerns, qualified help from a financial planner or adviser can help individuals and families balance their lifestyles, needs and goals so they can best allocate dollars and ensure a bright financial future.

Looking to the year ahead, industry experts expect some growth and generally there’s a positive outlook. Returns have been strong the last few years, although, some still fear a recession. Long-term, many also advise that economic volatility is a fact of life. A financial plan can protect and help to build one’s wealth.

We talked to Jason Katz, wealth adviser and principal of Bartlett Wealth

Management (bartlett1898.com) and John VanWeelden, founder and principal of VanWeelden Financial Group (vanweeldengroup.com) in a Q&A to find out some tips and advice for the Guide to Wealth Management in 2020.

Here’s some of the advice Jason Katz has to share: Q: What guidance would you offer about coming up with a financial plan and setting goals?

Katz: You are 42% more likely to achieve your goals if you simply write them down.

A comprehensive financial plan not only documents your goals, but also lays out the pathway to achieve those goals. We believe that a comprehensive financial plan is essential to a wealth management service. The financial plan is customized to each person and it should inform the way that your investments are managed.

Q: What are some of the factors that are most important when it comes to financial success?

Jason Katz like economic growth abroad and trade issues do affect companies and portfolios.

Partnering with a wealth adviser who understands the global economy and can build a financial plan and investment program that aligns with your goals and risk tolerance is key.

A: Financial success requires good habits, a goals-oriented mindset and intentionality. Putting together a plan that details your goals and a pathway to achieving those goals is the most intentional thing you can do to create financial success.

Most people, left to their own devices, will not achieve success because our society is built around consumption and not saving.

Another huge factor in people who achieve financial success is having a trusted adviser who is not only knowledgeable and competent, but also holds you accountable.

Q: What are some of the biggest questions people have about investing?

Q: How do you see the overall economic landscape in the U.S.? How are things like the economy and trade issues impacting investors?

Q: What tips or advice would you offer to investors?

A: The U.S. economy is still growing, albeit at a very modest rate, and is outpacing many of its foreign counterparts. However, we live in a global economy, so things

A: People ask us a lot about how the election will affect the stock market and their portfolios. We also get asked a lot about the intricate rules around taxation and the most tax efficient ways to invest and achieve goals. No one has a crystal ball that will tell us what the future holds in the markets, but there are advisers who understand rules and strategies to help people achieve their goals.

A: My tip for investors would be to seek out the most credible news sources and only focus on the facts that are presented, as opposed to the many opinions and sensationalistic headlines that are blasted out each day. We try to block out any other w w w.

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Guide to Wealth Management lenses by which news is communicated and focus on the data that can help us make good financial decisions.

what they think they know. We find the best investors are those who are willing to learn. We love to teach.

Q: When it comes to managing wealth, what are some of the mistakes people make?

Q: What tips or advice would you offer to investors?

A: One of the biggest mistakes people make when managing their wealth is making emotional decisions in their portfolio. This could look like selling out of the market when it drops a lot or even changing their strategy drastically based on a headline or news story. These “behavioral penalties” are real and can lead to sub-par results.

Q: What is your strategy or approach when it comes to advising clients about their own financial picture and wealth management?

A: Our approach is to sit down with the client with a blank piece of paper and actively listening to their situation, goals, dreams and fears. We work to understand them as individuals first, and then we craft a financial plan to capture and address all of these things. We present this financial plan to them each year, adjusting for life’s changes and we let this plan inform the management of their investments. Each financial planning client has two advisers: a Certified Financial Planner adviser and an investment-focused adviser. These two advisors work together to execute on the strategies we present in the financial plan and the investments in the portfolio.

We don’t work solely with the individual client, but take a look at the family unit as a whole. We want to understand all family members and how we can assist each in a unique way.

John VanWeelden offers these important key tips: Q: What are some of the factors that are most important when it comes to financial success?

VanWeelden: I’m pretty old fashioned when it comes to the keys to financial success. I believe they are: Live well within your means (cashflow is king); Minimize debt (debt is overhead); Invest tax efficiently for tomorrow versus today (It’s why we love Roths versus traditional, 86

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John VanWeelden tax-deferred plans) and Focus on managing volatility versus maximizing return (the math here is real).

Q: How do you see the overall economic landscape in the U.S.? How are things like the economy and trade issues impacting investors?

A: The U.S. economy and investment markets, generally speaking, are on a roll.

However, that can change in a moment’s notice. Economic volatility is a fact of life.

It always has been and always will be. So rather than try to predict it, we believe the most prudent investment strategies are those that presume volatility will occur and are designed to mitigate it when it does.

Q: What lifestyle factors should investors consider when they are trying to build wealth?

A: Managing expenses, debt and taxes are always critical. However, I think lifestyle factors are even more of a factor when transitioning into retirement—the wealth preservation and distribution phase of life.

The challenge becomes how to maintain one’s lifestyle, or even improve upon it, without neglecting prudent tax, health care, survivorship and estate planning.

Q: What are some of the biggest questions people have about investing?

A: Most people don’t know what they don’t know. So for us, there are two types of investors; those who are willing to learn and those who tend to believe and rely on

A: As important as traditional asset allocation and diversification are, we believe they are not sufficient in-and-of themselves— especially when transitioning into the retirement years. Markets have become too volatile and unpredictable. Witness the fact that the broad U.S. equity market has twice lost over 50% of its value in the past two decades alone. This can be disastrous to long-term investment success. You may eventually recover from such losses if you are young and still aggressively saving, but not if you’ve entered your retirement years. So make sure you have additional loss mitigation strategies in place to help protect your principle from unnecessary volatility.

Q: Are there any new federal laws in 2020 or beyond that will impact investors?

A: One big change that’s likely coming soon is the elimination of the stretch IRA, which currently allows beneficiaries of Traditional IRAs to stretch the payments out over their lifetimes. The other biggest factor is the possible phase out in 2025 of many of the recent changes to the tax code.

Even if that doesn’t occur in 2025, we’re not likely to see such favorable tax laws down the road. It just isn’t sustainable. We’re working hard with all our clients to take advantage of the current tax environment before it goes away.

Q: How frequently should a client/investor review their portfolio mix?

A: On a strategic level, I would not reevaluate asset allocation and diversification more frequently than annually.

Otherwise, you run the risk of “chasing markets/returns,” which is a sure way to fail. If working with an adviser, that should be an integral part of your annual review.

From a tactical perspective, your investment manager, (which should be directed by, but not the same as, your financial adviser), should be evaluating your mix constantly. n

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Fort Washington Investment Advisors, Inc. fortwashington.com What changes does the new SECURE Act make for 529 plans or 401(k) accounts?

The new law allows for younger investors to use distributions from 529 plans to repay student debt (up to $10,000) and a provision that allows 401(k) participants to take out $5,000 from a 401(k) to help with costs related to a child’s birth or adoption. The law also eases the way for annuities to be included in 401(k) plans, which will allow for additional resources for plan sponsors seeking to provide retirement income options.

Cincy Wealth Management Guide Ask the Expert Q&A Author: Joshua M. Sillies, CFP® Title: Wealth Planner Company: Fort Washington Investment Advisors, Inc.

What are the highlights of the SECURE Act recently passed by Congress and signed into law by the president?

There are several highlights of the new law to keep in mind as you plan for retirement.

One big change is that for almost all non-spousal beneficiaries, it eliminates the right to stretch required minimum distributions over their lifetimes. Instead, they will have to take all RMDs within 10 years. The SECURE Act also increases the age at which individuals must begin taking RMDs to age 72, but this only applies to those who did not attain age 70½ by the end of 2019.

I have heard that the new SECURE Act changes the “stretch IRA.” Can you explain how?

The SECURE Act calls for the elimination of the “stretch IRA” for almost all non-spousal beneficiaries. With inherited IRAs, instead of being able to stretch required minimum distributions (RMDs) out over the life of a beneficiary, many will have to take all RMDs of the inherited retirement account within 10 years. This can push higher RMDs into the prime working years – and highest tax years – of a beneficiary’s life.

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See all that Cincy has to offer in the Arts, Business and Culture.

Visit cincymagazine.com for a FREE subscription to Cincy Magazine

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Love Cincy

Colin Peterman Photographer

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YOUR SUCCESS IS OUR BENCHMARK

Roger Lanham, CFA Co-Chief Investment Officer

Kate Brown, CFP® Senior Wealth Planner

John F. Barrett Chairman, President & CEO, Western & Southern Financial Group

Maribeth Rahe President & CEO

Gerry Ulland, FSA Managing Director, Private Client Group

Brendan White, CFA Co-Chief Investment Officer

Providing tailored service that exceeds your expectations is our goal at Fort Washington Investment Advisors, Inc. As the largest money manager in the region¹ and a member of Western & Southern Financial Group, we work hard to do what’s right for our clients and the community. A constant pursuit of success for you and your loved ones serves as the guide for our personalized planning approach.

How can we help? contactus@fortwashington.com / fortwashington.com / 513.361.7929

1 Cincinnati Business Courier Book of Lists 2019-2020 — ranked by locally managed assets as of June 2019.

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Calfee is honored to have eleven attorneys named 2020 Cincy Leading Lawyers n David T. Bules – Litigation n Jennifer W. Colvin – Labor and Employment n Patrick D. Hayes – Corporate and Capital Markets n Mark R. Hull – Intellectual Property n Michael B. Hurley – Corporate and Capital Markets n Charlie Luken – Government Relations n John A. Mongelluzzo – Corporate and Capital Markets n Jamie M. Ramsey – Litigation n Andrew M. Simon – Corporate and Capital Markets n Sean S. Suder – Real Estate, Zoning n Donald L. Warner, III – Zoning, Public Finance Calfee, Halter & Griswold LLP is a full-service, corporate law firm with attorneys located in Cincinnati, Cleveland and Columbus, Ohio, Indianapolis, New York and Washington, D.C. As a founding member of Lex Mundi, Calfee offers national and international representation through a network of independent law firms with 21,000 attorneys in more than 100 countries.

Call us today to discuss how our team of attorneys can help you and your business succeed.

John A. Mongelluzzo, Partner-in-Charge, Cincinnati CALFEE.COM | 513.693.4880 | INFO@CALFEE.COM

©2020 Calfee, Halter & Griswold LLP. All Rights Reserved. 2800 First Financial Center, 255 East Fifth Street, Cincinnati, OH 45202. ADVERTISING MATERIAL.

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