Brian, I've seen you in action raising public awareness about issues like taxation without representation for the MedCon, and holding all accountable on that project today - you have pissed off the wrong powerful people and I am not at all surprised they have plans to do you in.

If CSU is planning this it is a Cleveland Foundation plan and you need to attack there - send your people to Playhouse Square each Monday!

Disrupt IT

http://realneo.us/content/councilman-santiago-ward-14-poster-child-council-reduction

Norm,

I have respect for the Consultants.  They've been doing reapportionment work for along time.  I do not envy their work because the business of reapportionment is a dirty one when done in a vacuum as opposed to more progressive governmental jurisdictions that use such things as non-partisan commissions or community processes for public involvment.  Although they are working on behalf of all 21 Councilmembers, clearly, as in any other political body, direction in terms of the process and communications must come from the body's leadership.

Triad is City Council's primary contractor responsible for the word of redistricting/redrawing new Ward boundaries.  Triad in turn hired CSU (CSU is the subcontractor) to conduct the actual population estimate work that was competed at the end of January.  CSU's Dr. Mark Salling and his team at the Northern Ohio Data & information Service are highly regarded and the information available on their site is excellent.

Regards,

Brian.

  Brian has also pissed off the Diocese, so connect the dots there, too.  http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2009/02/plans_for_church_closings_by_d.h...

Cummins, Polensek, Keane, Zone and Reed could topple Sweeney and his despicable crew, by mobilizing those angry Catholics and others affected by the Diocese's attempt to make commercial real estate killings off these congregations in the city.  Cimperman handed over St. Andrews for thirty pieces of silver.  Whatever happens to Brian Cummins--he can at least go down knowing he did not betray his people.

 Brian, maybe this is a blessing in disguise. Should the worst happen and they redistrict you out, I sincerely hope you will run against Santiago. I don't know you well, but your recommendations are good. You seem to be honest. You discourse above the 4th grade level.

I will work my fingers to the bone to help you get elected Ward 14 councilperson.

South Hills neighborhood is slated to be represented by Brancatelli ?  That alone should mobilize a lot of home owners to storm City Hall.   

The redistricting is a blatant attempt to destroy neighborhoods that have begun to mobilize some political clout.  The redistricting would effectively disable Brooklyn Centre and Old Brooklyn residents to what end?

This is simply a lowdown dirty shame - Brian, you have been a leader in the realm of stimulating citizen engagement and valuing citizen input.  If there were a truly logical reason for your ward to be skewered (for lack of a better term) in this fashion, please  help me understand it.  While other councilpeople supposedly had their remarks prepared for them, you did your own research, have epitomized hard work, and have worked to set a great example for other councilpeople to follow.  As mentioned before I really valued your comments at the redistricting forum - and aside from the few councilpeople that cared enough to attend - Kudos Zach Reed, and a little-boo for Joe Cimperman - I've liked you and the good you stand for, but where were you?).  I don't mean to be overly critical - but here is a forum, designed to value attendee input - and dealing with a major restructuring that impacts all of Council and all of us - and a minority of Council shows?   This may be just part of the endemic apathy that cannot be the example set by our leaders.  I can only imagine the 'internal' politics dealt with in council meetings themselves - but its one team, right?  Or at least it should be - for the good of the Whole of Cleveland.   So again, perhaps facilitated forums helping to gain perspective for the Council as a Whole - perhaps even a Council Retreat in idyllic, natural surroundings - might help achieve a greater measure of council unity and shared vision for those that public servants are meant to serve - to find the right blend of value for their ward-constituencies and the Cleveland constituency as a whole.  That faciliation should function on multiple system levels and raise awareness of participants to these many levels to achieve better functional and collaborative outcomes.  

We talked in forums at Applewood that day about natural boundaries, inclusiveness of all ward-representatives facilitated by technology - and encouraging participation, buy-in, and shared vision via additional platforms.

However, the problem remains in reaching that those still tech-averse or simply lacking ubiquitous access to online media.  The digital divide is still very, very real for many of our disadvantaged, such as those in ward's like Kevin Conwell's #9, for example.  I suppose there are many issues to consider to achieve true and equitable representation and action from our citizenry - part of it stems from a 'learned apathy and inertia' cultivated by frustrations amongst the citizenry with the levels of local leadership as a whole - perhaps not due to the efforts of the well-intended - but rather due to unfortunate levels of divisiveness and resentment within Council.  Its been far too long that focus by Councilpeople has been primarily on the needs of their individual wards - and that's all well and good as a primary focal point - what Ward stewardship is about on a primary level.  Yet if there could only be an awareness of another level of system simultaneously-  that greater level in the interest of the common good and well being of all our city's people - we could have outcomes that would be so much richer - rather than the historical fifedoms reminiscent of feudal times.

Hang in there Brian, many here will support you, I feel -  but fundamentally - I personally will - to the end.

Cimperman was at a safety meeting at the Old Stone Church that was scheduled by downtown leaders on the same day and time of the Applewood meeting. It was regrding the East 12 shootings. He had his hands full that night. He gets a free pass.

The question should be where was Sweeney? He sent his mouthpeice Kevin Kelley to the dog and pony show.

Brian,

As you know, I'm a great admirer of your service to the community. I will be contacting your office Monday. You tell me how I can help.

See Deb Zeleny's post at Save our Land

http://tinyurl.com/anr7vx 

  Yeah...this is Positively Cleveland!!!

What are the underlying implications of this article and why would our "leaders" want this story to run in the NYT magazine on the same day, that the Cleveland Film Festival also paid for an expensive promotional insert (my guess would be that they didn't give it a thought...just spend millions to advertise the city, and, at the same time, undermine it all with one cover story.  Afterall, who can resist a photo-op cover story and any coverage...any coverage at all?)???

Oh, sure, Brancatelli looks good in a trenchcoat and can mug like a gumshoe for the camera, but what has he done to really stop the mess in Slavic Village, one of the neighborhoods benefitting from special NPI Strategic Investement Iniative funds???  And what are the implications of the Rokakis/Frangos land bank's wholesale demo strategy solution for all the unfortunate neighborhoods, say, like Brooklyn Centre, located outside the SII areas?  Are we SOL?
 

Brian,

Since you were the most enthusiastic Council advocate of redistricting to even fewer wards during the Charter Review hearings (fifteen at most), and you didn't campaign against Issue 39 when it was on the ballot in November -- and passed by a 60-40 margin -- I assume that your anger is not about having the wards redrawn to bigger boundaries.  Because you support Council reduction, right?

So do you have some alternative plan by which Dykes could draw "fair" ward lines for nineteen (or seventeen) wards that

a) keeps 100% of Brooklyn Centre in one ward, and in which

b) you get to keep more of your current voters without moving, and

c) some other historic neighborhood(s) don't get split between wards, and

d) every ward gets roughly 23,000 residents?

Seems like now would be the time to roll it out.

Who are you shilling for Bill?  Do you think that the redrawn districts make sense?  Take Brian Cummins out of it. 

You really feel it makes sense to redraw Brancatelli's ward to include South Hills?  If so, I see now why you were chosen to serve on the charter commission, which by the way, was a total joke.

Bill:  Don't understand the snideness of your remarks regarding Cummins.

There is plenty to be critical and dismissive about the present City Council, its leadership and its record. 

Council  reduction was likely on someone's agenda given Cleveland's population losses so one could hardly blame one member. I'd also suggest the population figure the consultants have come up with won't hold up come the 2010 Census when we see truer figures on the city's population decline.

Laura, I can read a map and count.  So when my Councilman makes himself a poster child for something I think is a bad idea, and then it happens and the results are exactly the bad thing that I was afraid of, and then he acts like it's all somebody else's fault, I find that kind of irritating.

Who am I shilling for? Look in the mirror, neighbor.

Roldo, I didn't say one Councilman made it happen, but Brian sure as hell enabled it.  Now he's got what he wanted.  So now the problem is not the thing he said he wanted (and got) but the "transparency" of the process. 

Okay, I'm for transparency.  Let's have the PD find that map and print it, instead of just giving a megaphone to one Councilman. And let's hear what my Councilman would advocate instead of what's on that map. 

Is that too snide for you? Sorry.

Oh, and Laura, I can't comment on the whole plan because I haven't seen it -- only what Brian says about a small part of it.  I'm probably going to think it's full of awful ideas because the whole reduction enterprise is stupid, and doing it without data in 2009 is criminally irresponsible.  But it's what 60% of the city voted for.  I blogged against it and voted against it. How about you?

As for Brancatelli and South Hills, I don't think it's a great idea in general, but I predict that once the neighbors there get to know Tony they're going to think they died and went tro Heaven.

Bill: I didn't say anything, I don't think, about one or any number of Council members causing or pushing reduction. At this point I guess the number of Council member doesn't really mean much but the quality of Council/Mayor does. I find the Sweeney/Westbrook/Jackson leadership lacking and the issue to be more relevant to address.

  Bill, let's just admit that the idea of installing Brancatelli in South Hills is the SOS operating in  Cleveland...and someone's idea of shoring up his support among "white" voters.  GCP/NPI/SII group thinks that it will take Cleveland another twenty years to catch up with the rest of the country and vote based on content of character...I think that your shadow partner will find out sooner than later that we as are not as STUPID as they want to corral us.

(And, I am not shilling for Brian here...you, as well as everyone else, know that I have had my major differences with his policies, especially as it relates to demolitions.  Full disclosure--I voted for Brian Cummins, because I voted against Emily Lipovan.  Who did you vote for?).

The biggest fraud about this process is the tight time-frame now - must have redistrict plan by end of March or our esteemed mayor gives us all an April Fool's present on the FIRST.

BULLSHIT. Who wrote this legislation, planned the process, and set the timeframe...?!?!

If there is one thing certain it is that it does not matter one cent whether this is decided on March 31, April Fool Day, or my birthday, as the benefits are minor, the costs huge, and the harm of doing this wrong immeasurable.

We have done too many stupid public works in Cleveland, for the wrong reasons, driven by the wrong people, for too damn long, and this cycle of bullying and corruption must stop.

If there is not a good solution that has been reached through good public processes by March 31st, then more time must be spent addressing the issue.

Mayor Jackson has no business in these affairs, and has plenty else to worry about on Fool's Day.

Brian, you should raise this reasonable concern immediately - anyone trying to slam this down our throats is an enemy - anyone agreeing we need to spend the right amount of time on the right processes has potential to serve society well.

Disrupt IT

My reaction to this “re-districting”  is  that the process is broken and dirty.

 I need to  hear only ONE thing – that the publicly paid for population records are “private at this time” - to come to my conclusion .   The only  reason that the public records are being kept “private” (but obviously public to those favored few who have access to them and have come up with the present plans)  is to gain illegitimate leverage in the process.

 Clearly, the census methods and results are of vital importance NOW – not when the study and redistricting is substantially complete -  in determining  whether the re-districting process is equitable – or a pre-loaded fait-accompli. 

 Bill, I think your questions to Brian are good and fair.       But Brian couldn’t even answer your questions yet.     Both you and Brian know the West side well and could make good suggestions for redistricting,  but without the CSU figures neither of you can make informed boundary suggestions.

 I believe the redistricting goal in Cleveland is to drive out Cleveland City Councilors who speak with an independent voice – leaving Cleveland with brain/morally dead actors like Mr. Sweeney,  and the many other mute and malleable ward Councilors from mute wards.  

 Viva la Shrinking City!

Norm,

No, I don't get paid to plan anything in Cleveland unless you count trying to figure out how to build and support neighborhood technology initiatives, which as you know has been my work for over a decade.

Yes, I have lots of "relationships" with various interested parties.  Including Brian, who nominated me for the Charter Review Commission, and with whom I have shared all of these disagreements for over a year.

No, I don't have a "plan" for ward lines in 2009.  My position is, and has been:  Council reduction is a distraction from real issues.  But if it's going to happen, it shouldn't happen until 2013 when there will be actual Census data to base it on.  And  then it should be done in public, with lots of lead time, with a prior public discussion of what city neighborhoods are "real" (organic, not planning or CDC artifacts) and with an eye to keeping them politically intact, and it should be accompanies by a reorganization of administrative departments to align the wards with coherent planning districts.  All of which I argued for in the Charter Review Commission and wrote about in my blog, and much of which the Commission actually recommended to Council.

I think Council should put Triad's map on the table yesterday, and let everybody in the city have at it.  But that won't change the fact that redistricting in 2009 will be 100% driven by politics rather than data or principles.  Because there is no data, and "principles" have nothing to do with anyone's reaction to this mess, including (I'm afraid) Brian's and the PD's.

But that what 60% of my fellow citizens voted for in November.  Unfortunately, you get what you pay for.

  Vote here http://www.ohiodailyblog.com/

A little logic is in order here, the vote on council reduction did not determine the redistricting boundaries....only reduction by the numbers. 

 or I would have gone for the lying meglomaniac...

hard choice to make, I'll tell ya.

 
The Scene article sums it up. http://www.clevescene.com/stories/15/71/cuts-like-a-knife

Your comment is awaiting moderation . You will never see this at REALNEO...so please add to this string of opinions on the near westside redistricting.

- the process of eliminating or lessening extremes, in order to ensure normality (yummmmm.... norMALity)

- to preside over or act as chairman of (so what... no chairWOman)

- to become less violent, severe, or intense (what the hell did you write, Laura???)

and my FAVorite:

Bill, Roldo, Laura…

A plan? I do have some ideas of how we could minimize the gerrymandering of wards.

The proposed ward 12, which would include Slavic Village, part of Old Brooklyn, South Hills, Skylane/Starlight, etc…; and, the proposed ward 13, which would include the near eastside, Downtown, Ohio City, Tremont, Brooklyn Centre and part of Old Brooklyn, are both configured to serve political interests contrary to mine and the citizens of the present Ward 15.

Gerrymandering is a disenfranchisement of voters as it makes it harder for the stakeholders to build a broad consensus. I envision more compact wards drawn to preserve contiguous neighborhoods… think squares, ovals, rectangles instead of the sprawling and irregular wards 12 and 13 that were proposed to me on Thursday.

What are the numbers and methods?

Thursday was the first time that I was informed of the boundaries for the new ward.

On Friday, I requested the detailed population numbers after being declined twice in the last two weeks. That evening, between my meeting with the consultants and the night’s civic meeting, and after being made aware of the gerrymandering, I confirmed the Public Record’s law and our entitlement to this information.

Three weeks ago, I met with a three of my colleagues and the consultants and discussed what population shifts we would consider. There was a mention of eastern wards moving westward at that time, but there was no mention about the amount of population that would have to be made up on the westside.  I don't know if the consultants knew the number at the time, nor if the information was withheld for political reasons.

In the discussion there was no indication of any specific population numbers or geographic area that would have indicated to me the loss of 3/4th of the ward and a splitting-up of Old Brooklyn and Brooklyn Centre into 4 different wards.

We can not formulate a detailed solution without detailed population data or knowledge of other new ward boundaries.

Two questions that I asked the consultants on Thursday were: 1) If there are 4 to 6 wards on the east and near westside that are below the average new ward population (22,400) could those wards absorb sufficient population (4,000 – 6,000 combined) to avoid having Ward 12 push southwest into Old Brooklyn? And, 2) Could some of the boundaries be shifted slightly without significantly impacting those areas in terms of cohesion, minorities? etc… I received no response and a refusal to provide specific population numbers.

I was told by the consultants that since Ohio City had been split-up in the past, Old Brooklyn and Brooklyn Centre was the selected area to be significantly impacted this time around.

I was told – “tell your people to focus on ways that the new 2013 boundaries can be drawn to rectify what we are doing today”.

I was also told that after the 2010 census and when the ward boundaries are redrawn again in 2011 in advance of the 2013 elections, and based on the projected population loss, two wards will be lost from the eastside.

Yes, I pushed for deeper reform in terms of fewer wards (based on an analysis of peer cities – academic and possibly not practical) but most importantly, I recommended at-large seat(s) to try to create some focus on city-wide issues by City Council.

I actually voted NO when it came to placing the redistricting on the ballot. I disagreed that the redistricting should be done for two elections in a row - but I agreed with a minority of councilors who wanted to delay the reform until 2013 - after the 2010 federal census was complete.

I did all of this while at the same time I was trying to get information out to the public for discourse and discussion – for better public process.

Finally, in terms of public process and inclusion, I’ve recommended the creation of Neighborhood Development, Planning and Service Districts, which Bill Callahan led in the drafting for the Charter Review Commission. The Commission recommended this as a companion piece to the re-districting proposal.  This should begin post-haste after this year’s fall elections.

In fact, the Cleveland Neighborhood Development Corporation is currently contracting with someone to learn and apply what was recently done in Pittsburgh in terms of merging and defining service areas or specialty services so that we can begin to look at creating efficiencies in our CDC sector. Recall that Councilman Kelley and I worked together to do this in 2006. This is combined with my 9-year effort to highlight the importance of civic associations.

I appreciate the constructive criticism. There has not been enough thoughtful debate. The culture and power structures in our city and within the wards and neighborhoods can inhibit this. There are as clear benefits to our governance structure as there are disadvantages, but leaving the status quo unchallenged and not bringing forth new ideas or promoting discourse will doom us to failure. The status quo encompasses a pettiness and an abuse of power – gerrymandering, and fear or lack of respect, if not contempt for public process.

REF:

2008 Charter Review Commission’s policy recommendation to create Neighborhood Development, Planning and Service Districts

  Representation should be districted based on recognized neighborhoods.  In some cases, a number of neighborhoods may be consolidated into one ward.

Wikipedia describes the following Cleveland neighorhoods--

Brooklyn Centre • Buckeye-Shaker • Central • Clark-Fulton • Corlett • Cudell • Detroit-Shoreway • Downtown • Edgewater • Euclid-Green • Goodrich-Kirtland Park • Fairfax • Forest Hills • Glenville • Hough • Industrial Valley • Jefferson • Kamm's Corners • Kinsman • Lee-Miles • Mt. Pleasant • North Broadway • North Collinwood • Ohio City • Old Brooklyn • Puritas-Longmead • Riverside • South Broadway • South Collinwood • St. Clair-Superior • Stockyards • Tremont • Union-Miles Park • University • West Boulevard • Woodland Hills

(This list notably is missing Slavic Village (why?) and probably other neighborhoods, but it is a start)

Surely, the numbers can be massaged to keep neighborhoods intact.  If not, then, I recommend following Tim Ferris' advice to Cleveland residents not happy with the redistricting boundaries--We secede from Cleveland.

 * And a little history here for the Rocky River-based Triad Group's effort to create a "Hispanic" ward...the Wilson Plan didn't work in Europe and it's not going to work in Cleveland...

"We can't build a ward that has a majority of Hispanics," said Dykes, of Triad Research Group. "But we try to come as close to having as many Hispanics as we can without having ward boundaries that look like an octopus. That's why Brian finds himself in that ward."

Norm, the bells of St. Barbara's tolled this morning.  I think the congregation is making a more concerted effort to be heard in the community. Most of the attendees are suburbanites, who come back to their home neighborhood.  Obviously, houses of worship provide community in Cleveland and, as the churches/mosques/synagogues/temples move further outside the boundaries of the city proper, so goes community, which is truly a sad irony.* 

I have always had a hard time with religion, despite a great love for ecclesiastic architecture...I suppose it makes sense that I gravitated towards a library career, because I believe libraries can define open access communities and serve as community anchors.  The other obvious anchors in our neighborhoods--our schools and our rec centers.  The Schools as Neighborhood Resources (SNR) program needs to be more widely advertised and expanded.  I would also add stores--as much as folks want to condemn some retail..ALDIs and Dave's are urban anchors...but, when they approach Wal-mart size, they destroy a neighborhood.

These are just a few suggestions.  It's not all the gloom and doom portrayed in today's New York Times article.  We can pick up the pieces, but we need real leaders willing to take on the greed and corruption in the city and in our region.  Build from the center out, not from the outside-in. Start by using the tools available like receivership and point-of-sale inspections to take back houses and GIVE them to families.

*Imagine if congregations/assemblies just required their parishes to walk to service....Also, the Cleveland Museum of Art's temporary migration of the VIVA program to locations such as St. Stanislaus needs to be made permanent.

I agree, there are many types of anchors found in healthy neighborhoods... places for meeting, worship, learning, shopping, working, relaxing... what are the layers of infrastructure, services and attractions core to liveable, sustainable neighborhoods and where do we find concentrations of such anchors in Northeast Ohio?

They would not be found in Pepper Pike, at all, ever. They would be found in Old Brooklyn, I suspect.

Let's get working on the right planning maps for the future of this region - if our colleges and universities and government can't do it, we'll have to use public information from the Internet and libraries and citizen activism and ground-work to get the job done.

We need to inventory and rate our neighborhood assets - start with your own neighborhood... what matters most to you?

Disrupt IT

Who the hell are these people anyway?  Norm says:

I believe we need to know EVERYTHING about EVERYONE at TRIAD, including EVERY CLIENT RELATIONSHIP for the past 10 years. 

I wonder how many people with Triad gave Martin Sweeney money? Or the Council Leadership Fund? Why is Colleen Gilson keep giving campaign checks to Cimperman and Sweeney if not others too?

 Hello Henry,    Link in a source showing those Gilson campaign contributions, could you please.   Here is a link to a Crains Profile of Ms. Gilson, who was the ex director of TWDC.

  I didn't know there even was a   Cleveland Neighborhood Development Coalition, serving “as the collective voice of community development corporations in Cleveland”.  So the Cleveland CDC's comprise a "parallel", un-elected government in Cleveland.   Funded by the Federal gov, the Cleveland Foundation, and other entities.

 Parallel to the mute City Council. Negating the need for bonafide public participation. 

Viva la Shrinking City!

Brian, thanks for your response.

I should disclose that Brian called me this morning and we had a long talk, which I appreciate. We agreed to disagree (somewhat) about the role he played in the Charter Review discussion of Council reduction.  However, here are two things we agree about:

1) All parties to the redistricting discussion, including Council leadership and Bob Dykes, claim to agree on the principle that ward redistricting should strive to keep  genuine neighborhoods intact, i.e. within the same ward.  Splitting Brooklyn Centre down the middle of 25th Street would be a blatant violation of that "principle", apparently for pure gerrymandering reasons, and it should not be allowed to happen.

2) Whatever maps and population "data" Triad has given Council at this point, it's inexcusable, counterproductive and dumb for Council leadership to try to keep them under wraps --  three and a half weeks away from the frigging approval deadline. 

Based on my knowledge and experience with Triad and CSU, I have no reason to doubt their integrity and quality of their work.  I posted information to this affect early on in this entry.

My focus is informing people and gaining support in ensuring the population data details are released and available for review and then reducing the damage that the current proposal does to the neighbohoods that I represent. 

I regret that I made comments on Friday related to the impacts that this may have on me personally.  I am an elected official  and my job is to represent the interests of my constiguency.

The facts are that Council Leadership represented their intentions to draw boundaries from the outside-in and to strive to keep neighborhoods whole.  The proposal put forth that I saw and how it impacts the current Ward 15 neighborhoods contradicts their stated goals and process.

Some may want to pursue other issues but I do not want to be drawn into discussing what is assumed to be the politics behind this.

The people and the neighborhoods must be placed first.

That should reflect our discussions here.

There is no way you can divorce politics from redistricting. Or redistricting from politics. It is politics.

Bob Dykes certainly has the competency to do what he does. However, Bob Dykes knows for whom he works - Council leadership. You cannot divorce what he does  from those who employ him - and have for years.

Roldo, I agree and can't stop anyone from discussing the political issues on this open forum -- the gerrymandering by definition is political.

I just think the larger questions of the roles of the region's universities, foundations, GCP, related political contributions etc... are not as relevant in the immediate term as what actions need to be taken to ensure the proposed ward boundaries are changed.

Wards in other parts of the city can be effected, outreach and other forms of communication are needed. Equally important to issues of politics and power, is what power is being suppressed or inhibited. What are some of the root causes of why our city, county and regional government entities have such an aversion to fair and thorough public engagement processes and healthy discourse.

Issues pertaining to race, continued segregation, cross-cultural ignorance, allocation of funding, old and outdated political protocols, government and non-profit inefficiencies, lack of (independently-minded) leadership development, the setting and following of priorities, all need attention.

Today’s corporate media is quick to marginalize the story to the most banal, salacious, and controversial points.

We need to drive constructive discussions that can result in actions and outcomes. Theoretical or speculative discussions can take up our valuable time and attention. It’s hard enough to keep focused in the storm of dysfunctionality called Cleveland politics.

We need to concentrate on our most immediate problems facing our city, our people, our children and socio-economic malaise.  A similar tone was set in Tom Bier's piece in today's PD Forum pages - Saving cleveland's Core.

See the attachment added to this post for an approximation of the proposed 2010 Ward 15 re-apportionment.

Brian do you have a proposed map on how ward 14 and ward 13 split going north up West 25th. I think people would like to see how that breaks out to get a better picture. We may me able to get some people from ward 14 and ward 13 involved.

Henry

 
How much are we paying the Rocky River "experts" to draw up these maps? Natural boundaries like a RIVER, deep valleys and creeks obviously have no influence on the boundary lines...

I have a mental picture of a bunch of Rocky River High School kids, smoking weed and divvying up a map...okay, the irish people go here, the spanish-speaking people go here...the dark-skinned people go here...the party animals go here...and the tax-abated city community development people go here...

"you just move in the artists and the gays"

Cleveland Councilman Brian Cummins wants an alternative to carving up his ward in redistricting
Posted by Henry J. Gomez/Plain Dealer Reporter March 09, 2009
http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2009/03/redistricting_worries_clevelan.html

EDITORIAL
As Cleveland draws new ward lines, it should let the public in on the process - editorial
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
http://www.cleveland.com/editorials/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/opinion/1236673945178760.xml&coll=2

UrbanOhio - Re: Cleveland City Council
Other sites - internet communities the issue is being tracked and discussed on include:
http://www.urbanohio.com/forum2/index.php/topic,16011.60.html

UrbanOhio - Re: Cleveland: Old Brooklyn
http://www.urbanohio.com/forum2/index.php/topic,13801.210.html

Here is some of the first confirmations of the proposed reapportionment populations totals for the current Ward 15 area.  Additional information will be forthcoming as I have a meeting with the consultants tomorrow.

Meet with Council President Martin Sweeney--

Wednesday evening @ 7 P.M.

Ward 20 Republican Club meeting @ The Slovenian Home W130th & McGowan.

Regardless of your political affiliation, please attend as the ward redistricting is supposed to be explained by Mr.Sweeney.
 

 laura - do you thnk it matters that its on April Fool's Day???

  I would say call before actually heading out....Mizz Debra you are too sharp for NEO :)  Give my love to the chickens.

Reggie (the baby chick - born 3/3/09) had his/her first day out with the bIg girls today... Ooh the drama!!!!

I had to spend most of my afternoon sitting on the back porch steps with a spray bottle (water) to break up the hen fights (and my camera, of course.... and a Great Lakes, of course). Finally, I spotted hawks cruising by over and over and I shooshied the mama and baby back into their house.

How much more exciting does life get?

By now, we all know that Jackson is making a bid for four more years.  The question I have is whether the FBI will catch up with the developer-controlled machinations in the Building and Housing department before Clevelanders reelect Jackson.  It goes beyond a few folks taking money on the side.  The buildings that were demolished serve some greater "development" plan, albeit, not the plan, that I, as a resident, would endorse.
 

The Plain Dealer needs to look into the prioritization of demolitions in Cleveland.  Are vacant building demos fast-tracked to assist development plans?  If so, does the developer pay the City of Cleveland back for the service of clearing a property?  It's your money, folks.

My understanding of what goes on can only focus on the west side of Cleveland, because it is where I live.  Can anyone relate their experiences with demolitions that have taken place in other Cleveland neighborhoods--and, especially, in East Cleveland? 

As part of the campaign strategy, I know that Collinwood is still being promised its rec center and that there are promises being made to not redraw the boundaries of Polensek's ward, when the next round of four additional council seats are whittled away.  What happens to Sweeney?  Will his constituents vote him in, AGAIN?  Which council folks will survive the elections?  Are we headed on the path of Detroit?

I am fed up--while I have generally been grateful for the few measly city services reinstated by Frank Jackson--recycling, Saturday hours at the rec centers--I have been appalled that he has allowed the CDCs and the newly created, Greater Cleveland Partnership/Plain Dealer/Clinic/County Treasurer-controlled Land Revitalization Corp to assume greater power to slice and dice and bulldoze, and that his Sweeney puppet council has not put any visible monies into street and infrastructure repairs (only Detroit-Shoreway, but I have not taken the time to analyze that money pot).  Also, Jackson has done nothing to stop the heinous, business-as-usual abuse of funds by the Cleveland Metropolitan School District administrators, especially as it pertains to the buildings program.

I am sad to see no viable alternative to the Cleveland and Cuyahoga County machine.  Will someone, ANYONE, please give me a choice?! 

Afterall, you don't have to live in Cleveland to work here!

  If you can--it's not easy--plow through the previous posts.  Redistricting is all about redistribution of HUD funding to keep the shadow work of the CDCs afloat in NEO. 

Don't believe for a minute that Anthony Brancatelli is good for Ward 15...now gerrymandered to Ward 12.  I submitted my complaint to the Elections Commission (for what it is worth)...Brancatelli's poverty dollars from Slavic Village can now fuel the completely useless Old Brooklyn Development Corporation with the extra bodies provided by the residents of South Hills.  They know it and they ran his recent "RE-elect" propaganda in the Old Brooklyn News.  And so it goes...

The probable cause hearing is scheduled for Thursday, September 17 at 9:00 a.m. at the Office of the Ohio Elections Commission in Columbus.  If you would like to contest the campaign language used by Anthony Brancatelli to mislead residents in the South Hills neighborhood of Cleveland, please call Commission Secretary Betty Springer at 614-466-3205.