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HAMILTON — A Liberty Twp. native and former Cincinnati Junior Rowing Club coach is coming home to stir up competitive rowing on the Great Miami River.

The city's Vision Commission hired Frances Kern Mennone last week to serve as a consultant for a not-for-profit organization called "Great Miami Rowing Center," which will be a base for competitive rowing at the high school, collegiate and masters levels.

Since last year, members of Hamilton's Vision Commission — with local residents, including the Miami Conservancy District, which has oversight of activities along the river — have explored making the river a premier regatta location.

Mennone attended Lakota schools before graduating from Ursuline Academy and Xavier University. Mennone was head coach and program director for a junior team — LPJ Chicago — in Chicago.

In 2002, the team was awarded a grant from Illinois to develop a boathouse on the river — the first boathouse built in Chicago in more than 100 years and the only floating boathouse on the Chicago River.

Timothy MacDonald, a Vision Commission member, said Mennone's first goals are to establish a rowing center, hire a coach and acquire boats. Another goal: establish a boathouse on the river and begin a program for 40 local high school students — from Badin, Fairfield, Hamilton, Lakota East and West, Middletown and Talawanda students — by April.

Mennone, who also served as a coach and manager for the U.S. Junior National Rowing Team development and selection camps, said she is excited about returning to the area.

"It's high time that Hamilton

starts using its asset in the Great Miami River," she said. "There is a huge park facility that runs right through the center of downtown that has gone sparsely unused, and so we're very excited about helping Hamilton figure out ways in which they can get people down to the river."

The commission's goal is to have a board of directors established by the end of January 2007, and a temporary rowing center running by April in time to hold an event or two in the summer or fall, MacDonald said.

Contact this reporter at (513) 820-2190 or dewilson@coxohio.com.