Cody Mathews - Personal Page/ Hillsboro City Council Member

08/23/2026

🍽️ what’s better than eating local in Hillsboro on a beautiful Saturday evening? Not a lot!

08/18/2026

I had to miss the last council meeting due to a prior commitment. It bothers me to miss a meeting. I don’t foresee missing any more.

Disclaimer: I do not speak on behalf of the city of Hillsboro. All opinions and summaries are my own, based on publicly available information.

That being said, a rundown of some recent business, old and new.

At the council meeting before last, council had a first reading for increasing residential building permit fees. The second reading occurred at this meeting. I’m still looking into the numbers. How much cost the state has passed on to us, how much we’re spending, on what, etc. The measure will move to a third reading next month where it will be voted on.

A second reading was heard on the social media policy for the city page. It was sent to committee to clear up some language in the original ordinance and remove some language that was a bit restrictive on elected officials. That being said, I feel much better about the policy and how it allows the city to operate the page as an outlet for information and citizens to ask on-topic questions, while preventing comments that would be off-topic, spam, malware, discriminatory on the basis of categories listed in the civil rights act, derogatory or perverse, obscene, threats to any person, solicitations. It will move to a third reading and vote next meeting.

The big topic of the evening was sewer rates. To try and make it as simple as possible, the city’s sewer infrastructure is old, deteriorating, and allowing too much storm water into the sewer system. It’s causing backups, wash-outs, and overflows that put the city in violation of the EPA and negatively impact citizens. The question isn’t whether this project needs done: it is known that it needs done. The question is the best method to pay for it. I have been working on the issue quite a bit. I’ve had many discussions with the auditor, safety service director, sewer plant superintendent, and officials from OWDA (who gives us loans for projects like these), and other members of council. It’s a multi-million dollar project ($15-20 million, about $4 million per phase), one that many local governments are having to do to update their outdated sewer infrastructure. Council has been told the city is pursuing as much grant money as possible to pay for the project, but grants are never a certainty. The question is, is it possible to use a combination of grants and long-term loans to finance the project? Grants obviously reduce the cost the city must pay from its revenues. Long-term loans might allow the city to gradually and incrementally increase sewer rates over a much longer term (several decades) than currently proposed so as to minimize the impact on citizens. I’ve been encouraged by my discussions with members of council of their commitment to do the same. These discussions are ongoing, and hopefully will lead the city to a solid balance to get the project done. Part of these discussions should be a thorough review of the sewer budget and expenditures as well. While I was unable to attend the meeting, I have spent quite a bit of time outside of the meeting researching and gathering information.

07/31/2026

A few days before July 4th, I was presented with a unique opportunity. David Pepper, candidate for Lt Governor on the same ticket as Amy Acton, was going to be stopping at The Porch for a Q&A with voters in Hillsboro. He was kind enough to give me 5 minutes, and wanted to know, as a member of city council, how their campaign could best serve voters in Hillsboro and Highland County. I gave an answer I know a lot of you spend time worrying about: Data Centers. How they drive up energy prices. How they cause concerns on water usage and environmental standards. How rural voters feel as if they’re falling under a type of serfdom for the lifestyle of others. I said the campaign would be wise to call for a moratorium.

I spent quite a bit of time that evening talking to Nathan Shapiro, a campaign staffer for Pepper, about lots of topics, but mostly the same as communicated to David about data centers.

Less than a month later, I received a text from Nathan about a new policy announcement from the Acton campaign: A conditional moratorium on data center building.

I appreciate getting the opportunity to talk to the campaign about what rural voters in Hillsboro want. I’m happy to talk to anyone about it, regardless of party. Credit to the Acton team for giving me the time.

07/24/2026

A little “how the budget works” discussion. I think it helps voters to understand that there isn’t just a big pot of money where revenue flows in and expenditures flow out. There are rules the city must follow established in law.

(Note: summary and opinions my own. I speak only for myself and do not speak on behalf of the city.)

Best to think of “the budget” as several different, separate budgets that must stay separate and and have different revenue sources.

The general fund pays for police, administration, mayor, council, finance/auditor, law director, economic development, code enforcement, general building maintenance, etc. The revenue primarily comes from city income tax, a small portion of property taxes, building and permit fees, court fines and fees, local government fund distributed by the state.

The water and sewer fund is separate, typically called “enterprise funds”. It is funded by utility fees (like water and sewer bills), late fees, connections fees, etc. The general fund and the water/sewer fund are separate. In fact, if money is lent to water and sewer from the general fund, that money must be repaid within a year. Expenses from this are any maintenance or upgrades to the water or sewer system, water treatment chemicals, employees, pumps, wastewater treatment plant, storm water infrastructure, etc. EPA compliance is also paid for from this fund. Again, it is funded solely by user fees for the utilities it provides.

The street fund is also separate. It exists under a category called “restricted funds”. Its revenues come from different sources as well.

I had a chart generated (and double-checked by a former auditor) to display the budget structure. I’m sharing it with this post.

07/22/2026

July council meeting review.

(Note: all thoughts and summaries are my own and I do not speak for the city of Hillsboro.)

1. Council voted to officially authorize the purchase of 200 acres of land that abuts the back of Liberty Park and the Northview Drive neighborhood. The purpose is a road through that would connect the park to 138, and create another route of traffic that would reduce the bottleneck of traffic on that stretch of 62 North. If you’ve driven through Hillsboro, you know from Wendy’s to McDonald’s can get pretty congested. This road should help with that. The land would also be open for new housing development.

2. Social Media policy proposal: the administration proposed a social media policy that would govern the city page, city employee comments and interactions with regards to the city, and guidelines for public officials. Many are common sense and good proposals. Some were vague and need more clarity. One of the main issues is inappropriate and derogatory comments on the city’s main page. Think in terms of unproductive comments with nasty stuff you wouldn’t want your children seeing. This policy would provide the ability to deal with those comments. This part is very common in most local governments. The concerns I had were some of the guidelines for public officials. Several of us on council were concerned that vagueness might lead to limitations of elected officials in our communications with the public via social media (such as these updates). Therefore, council asked for the discussions of the policy to be placed in committee for review and changes. It was placed in the Civil Service and Employee Relations Committee where it will undergo discussion and likely changes before coming back before council.

3. We were given a presentation by Waterworth, a firm that helps local governments navigate their infrastructure projects that are related to water and waste management as well as funding. The presentation was really well done. The project of replacing our sewer infrastructure is long overdue, extensive, but necessary. I’m going to make a separate post about it because of the detail and explanations involved. That being said, in order to fix our streets and get them paved really nice and expect them to hold up long term, the drainage infrastructure beneath them must be updated. It should have been done 50 years ago.

4. Imagine Hillsboro update.

This was prior to the council meeting. Council received an update on the “Imagine Hillsboro” plan. If you’re unfamiliar, this is the roadmap vision for the city of Hillsboro. It provides guidelines for budget requests, needs, and updates to the city in terms of streets, sidewalks, parks, attracting new business, infrastructure, etc.

Planning Commission Chair Rob Holt gave us an update on Phase 1, which has now been completed. I want to thank him for taking the time to provide the update. When looking at the goals the committee had heading into phase 1, vs the outcome, it’s clear that most of the goals were achieved and the city is ahead of schedule on phase 2. I want to commend the administration and planning commission on their efforts and success in phase 1. Imagine Hillsboro provides a great roadmap for upgrading the city while maintaining small town charm.

5. Holiday Lights Drive Thru Display.

The official website is up. I’ve shared it here in a previous post. It is really well done! I’m super impressed and excited that the city is doing this for the community and region.

I think that’s all for now.

07/16/2026

Christmas (news) in July! Check out the details of the Holiday Drive-Thru Light Display! And share!

07/15/2026

Check out the Highland County 250 video! Very cool showcasing of Hillsboro, Highland County, and our history!

Celebrating 250 Years of America in Highland County, OhioJoin us ...

07/04/2026

07/04/2026

Great night @ Booming in the Boro. Despite our differences at times, this is a great country and system of government. Our beautiful display of fireworks every year makes me proud to be an American, and proud this year to get to represent you all. Happy 4th, Hillsboro.

*And thank you Ray Charles, who owns the rights to this music, to which I do not 😎*

07/02/2026

Make sure you get out and enjoy this year’s Festival of the Bells! If you see me out and about in line at every food vendor, no you didn’t 😎

🔔 2026 Festival of the Bells Schedule 🔔

From the Baby Parade and Pet Parade to live music, games, the parade, and fireworks, there’s something for everyone!

Save this post, share it with your friends and family, and join us Downtown Hillsboro as we celebrate “Bells Through the Ages” this Fourth of July weekend. 🇺🇸

See you at the festival!