Beavercreek City Council took up 18 ordinances Monday night, Nov. 9, that would appropriate property interests along Shakertown Road for the city’s long-planned widening project, according to the council agenda reporting by the Dayton Report. Each ordinance was listed for a second reading as an emergency measure, which lets it take effect immediately instead of after the usual 30-day wait.
The project itself is well defined on the City of Beavercreek’s official project page: about 0.65 miles of Shakertown Road (County Road 71), from Carthage Drive to Southern Belle Boulevard, widened from two lanes to three, with sidewalks on both sides and drainage upgrades including curb, gutter and storm sewers. The city is running the project with the Ohio Department of Transportation.
The money explains the urgency. The project is estimated at about $3.2 million, with roughly 75 percent — about $2.4 million — coming from ODOT and the remaining 25 percent, about $800,000, covered by city street levy dollars, according to the city’s project page. City staff told council that property petitions need to be filed by the end of the year to protect the grant funding, the Dayton Report reported from the council agenda and the Oct. 26 meeting.
For the property owners involved, the city says the takes are limited. Legal counsel told council there are no permanent takes in the Shakertown ordinances — they cover temporary easements for grading or storm sewer work — and owners remain entitled to compensation, according to the Dayton Report’s agenda reporting. At the Oct. 26 meeting, City Engineer Nick Smith said 12 of the 32 affected properties had been settled and three more had verbal agreements, the Dayton Report reported.
One parcel has already dropped out of the process: Ordinance 26-25, covering 3170 Shakertown Road, was settled and removed from the agenda, according to the Dayton Report. The same Nov. 9 agenda also carried the first steps of a second widening — four right-of-way resolutions for the Kemp Road Widening Project — and a public hearing on a proposed Wawa station on Indian Ripple Road.
Appropriation is the legal process a city uses to acquire property for public use when a purchase cannot be negotiated, with the owner entitled to compensation. The emergency readings, city legal counsel said, give the city time to file the court petitions and keep the project on schedule, according to the Dayton Report.
What happens next: bidding, utility relocation and construction are slated to begin in March 2027, the city engineer told council, and the city’s project page puts construction from spring 2027 through fall 2028. Property filings due by the end of this year are the next deadline on the calendar.