WHO YOU’RE WITH MATTERS

Mayor Wilbur continues canine Rabbit Hash tradition: ‘In our elections, anybody can vote’

During the 2020 election, a whopping 22,985 voters came out, setting a Rabbit Hash record and proving just how crucial this dog-eat-dog race was.

Wilbur, the French bulldog, upset the incumbent, Brynneth Pawltrow, a pitbull, in a canine mayoral race that has been going strong for roughly 25 years.

In 1997, it was Boone County’s 200th anniversary. All the local municipalities were asked to do something to honor this milestone. Around the same time, the Rabbit Hash Historical Society was renovating a church and needed money. They decided to combine the two, the anniversary and church renovation, and create a fundraiser for the area.

“We decided that the rules of the election would be that anyone can run and you’d have to pay $1 a vote,” said Bobbi Layne-Kayser, vice president of the Rabbit Hash Historical Society. “And whoever earned the most money got to be mayor of Rabbit Hash. So of course there were locals in the race and then somebody thought that their dog would make a better mayor than anybody on the list.”

After a while, a lot of people thought that their dogs would also make for the best mayoral candidate, and the election took off. Mayoral submissions were being sent in from places as far as Japan, and people were voting from all over the world.

“In our elections, anybody can vote,” said Layne-Kayser. “You don’t have to live down here. Any age can vote, whether you’re two, 10 or 30 or 50, you can vote as many times as you want.”

The first-ever mayor of Rabbit Hash, Goofy, followed by Junior Cochran, a black lab, and then Lucy Lou, who was elected as Rabbit Hash’s first-ever female mayor.

Lucy Lou also had an active presence within the Women’s Shelter, was active in the community and online. During her term, a fire ravaged the Rabbit Hash General Store causing damage that would require $400,000 to repair.

“Since in the past, our mayor elections had been our largest fundraisers, Lucy Lou decided to step down and institute term limits,” Layne-Kayser said.

It was decided that Rabbit Hash mayoral term limits would mirror those of U.S. Presidential limits.

“We think our elections are important because they’re worldwide,” Layne-Kayser said. “We literally get votes from Japan, Denmark, Germany and Australia, and then people from those countries actually come to our town to see who they voted for.”

Bringing people together to support a small county’s tradition is what the mayor’s of Rabbit Hash do best.

Proceeds of HighlandsCovCath to benefit student battling cancer

The Covington Catholic Colonels and Highlands Bluebirds and the host, the Holmes Bulldogs, are all teaming up for Covington Catholic senior Thomas Burns.

Burns is battling Ewing Sarcoma, a rare form of cancer that primarily attacks the bones. The proceeds from the basketball game between Covington Catholic and Highlands will go toward his treatments.

“The Holmes administration has been great,” Covington Catholic Director of Athletics Tony Bacigalupo said. “They knew that when I approached them in terms of anticipated attendance, they jumped right on board. This was simply a decision based upon the support that was shown from the Fort Thomas community and from our own Covington Catholic community. It was nothing to do with basketball. It was everything to do with supporting Thomas.”

Burns is a lacrosse player at CovCath. The CovCath students continually support the teams forming the student section known as the Colonel Crazies.

“It’s about a kid at 17, 18 years old having to deal with cancer treatments, diagnosis of cancer and radiation treatments. It’s an unprecedented situation that we hope in some small way can help him through it,” said Scott Ruthsatz, CovCath head coach. “The social disconnect he’s had with being a normal kid that goes to school, is in class with his buddies, is eating lunch and hanging out afterwards. Those days have been pretty much gone for him this year. This is a way for us to show we haven’t forgotten about him and that we’re praying for him.”

Highlands head coach Kevin Listerman has been on both sides of this rivalry. Listerman played on the 1992 region championship CovCath team and led the Bluebirds to the region and state championship two years ago. The two have combined to win the last five region crowns. CovCath won its second state championship in 2018.

“It’s what Northern Kentucky is known for,” Listerman said. “Even though we compete really hard in a lot of gyms, it’s about treating people the right way and understanding that there are other things bigger than basketball or sports. It’s really neat that we get to participate in this event.”

Wise Guys spotted in Covington

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