Newcomers to the city are surprised to find an older downtown with architecture from the 1950s. Visitors find insurance offices, a pizza parlor, antique shops, a framing gallery, drug store and other healthy businesses. To small-business owners, the spotless downtown represents the old Mason that is surrounded by vinyl split-levels and ranches, and every kind of modern house imaginable.

There's no mall. No office tower. No glitter. Yet there's little disagreement on where upscale Mason is headed in the next decade: to success. ''Mason still has the feel of a small town,'' said City Manager Scot Lahrmer. ''But with the level of services the city provides, and the corporate citizens we have, Mason is no longer viewed as a small town.

These days, Mason is viewed by many as a quintessential suburbia. Since city officials started encouraging industry to come to the city in the early 1980s, the city has attracted Mitsubishi Electric Manufacturing and Cincinnati Electronics, among others. Soon, developers followed them, leaving a trail of vinyl and particleboard.

Despite the influx of new residents, Mason has managed to avoid many of the problems that growth usually brings to cities' infrastructure. City leaders have continued to hire police officers and other city workers over time. To accommodate the growth, the city has also invested $20 million in the past four years to bring its utilities up to standard and beyond.

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