Black community activists host Jan. 5
debate in wide-open race for County Prosecutor
Six candidates expected to
participate in most even race in sixty years
Voters in Cuyahoga County are about to have a once in a lifetime
opportunity to participate in the open selection of Cuyahoga County prosecutor.
Ever since the legendary — many would say infamous — John T. Corrigan
began the thirty-five year run that ended in 1991 and made him perhaps as
feared locally for the exercise of discretionary powers as FBI director J.
Edgar Hoover was nationally, and for many of the same reasons, voters have been
faced with insiders and incumbents.
This year, five men and one woman, mostly all well-qualified on
paper, are vying in the Democratic Party primary for a place on the November
ballot. It’s a safe bet the March 6 primary winner will be the next county
prosecutor as no Republican filed to run before the deadline.
The Democratic candidates are former Cleveland law director Subodh
Chandra, who has been a federal prosecutor; police officer Stephanie Hall, who
was an assistant county prosecutor before resigning to run; Cleveland city
councilman Kevin Kelley; former North Royalton city prosecutor James J.
McDonnell; former Common Pleas judge Timothy McGinty; and former judge and
Cleveland law director Robert Triozzi.
All seek to succeed the incumbent prosecutor, Bill Mason, who used
his political muscle to win the critical endorsement of the Democratic
Executive Committee in the fight to succeed Stephanie Tubbs Jones after she
resigned to run for Congress in 1998. Once installed as the incumbent, Mason
never faced any opposition with the potential to oust him.
Three candidates — Chandra, Hall, and Triozzi — had confirmed
their participation by the time the sponsoring coalition, headed by The
Imperial Women and The Audacity of H.O.P.E. Foundation, issued its press
release on Tuesday. The Real Deal contacted the other three candidates —
Kelley, McDonnell and McGinty — yesterday, with each confirming their
expectation to participate, although a couple had reservations due either to
scheduling conflicts or concerns about one of the sponsors.
The debate program will start at 5:30pm on Thursday, January 5,
2012. It will be held at the Lil’ Africa Party Center, 6816 Superior Ave.,
symbolically located in the heart of the inner city.
Cleveland Ward 7 councilman T. J. Dow, a former assistant county
prosecutor, will moderate the debate. A community panel including Ward 8
councilman Jeff Johnson, attorney Michael Nelson Sr., Cleveland Jobs With
Justice executive director Debbie Kline, and Art McKoy, will pose questions to
the candidates. One intriguing aspect of the debate is that two of the
panelists — are formerly incarcerated persons.
The public will be invited to ask questions during a 30-minute
period following an hour of questions from the panel.
Sponsoring organizations include Occupy Cleveland, Occupy the Hood, The
Cleveland chapter of the New Black Panther Party, Peace in the Hood, and
Cleveland Urban News.
Contacts
for the event are: Executive Director Frances Caldwell
[Cleveland African-American Museum, 216-421-0929];
Kathy Wray Coleman [Imperial Women
Coalition Leader, 216-932-3114];
and Griot Y-Von [Audacity of H.O.P.E. Foundation, 216-355-3374].
11 comments:
We invite the community to this important debate. Kathy Wray Coleman of Cleveland Urban News. Com http://www.clevelandurbannews.com and The Kathy Wray Coleman Online News Blog.Com http://www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com
It's not so much a concern about a sponsoring group but a concern, we were told, about coming into the Black community for one particular candidate. If they want our votes they will attend the debate.
I stand on my report. What you were told is not necessarily what I gleaned from conversation with several of the candidates.
There is, to be sure, a concern by some candidates that one or more of the sponsors may favor one or more of the candidates. Nonetheless, they intend to participate with an expectation that the moderator and sponsors will be fair.
I bet you $10 that you will not criticize any of the White male prosecutor candidates like former county Tim MGinty whose cases have been overturned for harassing Blacks while taking on are Black women's group for the establishment.
You can print the following response:
"We expect certain people that have no respect for the Black community to find excuses not to come into it and we can expect sellout Black men wannabe journalist to write self serving criticisms leveled against Black female activists while refusing to criticize certain White men that harass us for fighting on issues of public concern for the Black community."
Sell out is a weak word nowadays. What is the different between one who appears to sell out because he/she works across racial lines to promote the idea of change versus the "down for my people" activists who can't convince their community to change? Call yourself black, African American, Nubian, Moor,Muslim, Rastafarian, Buddhist, Christian or whatever, people of color need to stop looking at our differences and look at our common needs and goals.
Candidate Tim McGinty is disliked by his former judicial colleagues in the common pleas court and criminal defense attorneys. He had judicial rulings on appeal overturned for harassing a Cherokee Indian Women, ordering a Black man to prison saying he violated his probation when the probation period was up the appellate court said, and throwing out a lawsuit of a Black person wrongly convicted in Shaker Hts to get endorsements for the county prosecutor's race. He also put former Cleveland NAACP Executive Director Stanley Miller on the Cuyahoga County Grand Jury to indict a Black woman on bogus felony charges that a White neighbor in Cleveland said she witness get beat up and called nigger by police when other grand juries would not indict. And when he was an assistant county prosecutor he sent Michael Green to prison for 13 years for allegedly raping a White woman and he was later released due to DNA sampling and because the woman recanted. And Richard Andrews has the nerve to criticize our Black women's group over McGinty while agreeing not to criticize him because he is White and male. Then he comments here but does not have the guts to put his name to the comment. We do not need anti-Black male journalists promoting racism against the Black community and Black community acttivists. Do your homework and read more at www.clevelandurbannews.com and www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com
@ Anonymous of "sellout is a weak work nowadays": I agree. I take the thrust of your comment as suggesting the effectiveness of black civic leaders as a more critical concern than what we call them. An important notion, and one that we shall comment on more fully in the first part of the New Year.
@ KWC: the absence of logic in many of your assertions is disturbing. I have yet to publish anything critical of your "black women's group". In fact I have publicized its debate initiative. Further, I make criticisms where and when appropriate, and certainly not on the timetable of someone else.
Finally, you appear to be suggesting that I am the author of an anonymous comment on my own blog. An intriguing idea, that, but alas one wholly without merit, and of course, another of the loose spitballs you so freely toss around.
If you cannot be civil here or able to proffer something useful to our readers, then I request that you keep your dyspeptic effusions off this site.
@KWC-Richard did not post that arguement I made. I chose to remain anonymous because it makes no sense who I am. Your thoughts are made up, you are adverse to debate and eager to reflect outward and not honestly assess you and your crew. Black Cleveland was screwed by some whites...and some blacks who allowed it to happen. If you just read the copies of the Urban League reports over the last twenty years, the plagues of black Cleveland remain the same. Cleveland remains a top five poor city every damn year and we argue about the who and not the why.
Well since we are all now on the same page, we will see you guys at the Jan 5, 2012 Cuyahoga County Prosecutor's Candidate's Debate, 6816 Superior Ave in Cleveland at Lil' Africa beginning at 5:30 pm. Healthy debate here at this site, at mine, www.clevelandurbannews.com, and elsewhere is enriching. Happy New Year to all.
I echo that! Happy New Year to you as well, and to all our wonderful readers!
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