(WBIR - ONEIDA) - A Scott County man's ministry is setting off debate in a Kentucky city.
James Potter runs Cross Ministries, Inc. The goal of his ministry is to design, build and place large crosses to tower over the sides of many roads and highways across the country.
"I started doing little crosses, wooden crosses, and then I decided that wasn't big enough so I started building concrete crosses 20 feet out of the ground. So that wasn't big enough," said Potter.
That led to crosses higher than 100 feet like the one you see off Interstate 75 in Campbell County. His crosses can be seen in nearly 10 states. He wants to put Kentucky on the map.
"I just had a desire in my heart for quite a while, probably four or five years, to put a cross in Somerset," said Potter.
He ran into trouble with city code in Somerset, Ky.
"We have been trying for a year to get a permit, but he told me, the mayor told me, You ain't going to put that in my town. I told him I didn't know this is your town," said Potter.
City officials said his planned 60-foot cross violated building codes. They state that every sign or structure that's 1-foot tall must have a base that's 3-feet wide.
The owner of the property Potter planned to put the cross on also said that no cross will go up now.
"We have to go to federal court. We have been to federal court on I guess about three or four or five of them," said Potter, who has fought to put his crosses up in the past.
The Liberty Counsel is working with Potter on a lawsuit against the city for denying him the opportunity to build. Potter is confident this will help him spread his message to Somerset.
He said he reached out to the city of Knoxville, and he is looking to put two of these crosses up somewhere within the city. He also plans to build two more in Houston, Texas. He works with a company called Cornerstone Engineering of Maryville to create blueprints of the cross designs.
