CPT • Change is Coming to Ohio's iconic 11th Congressional District — Part III

Cuyahoga Politics Today 

Fudge departure must be wake up call for 11^th District’s Black Civic Leaders — Part III

By R. T. Andrews

The gale force entry of former state senator Nina Turner into the developing race to succeed Cleveland area Congresswoman Marcia Fudge, pending her confirmation as the next Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, knocked our plans for this column momentarily askew. 

Having discussed here in Part I and here in Part II the District's proud origins and history, and its importance to Cleveland’s black community, we had planned to advocate for a new process whereby we might begin more effectively to cultivate the generation of new black political leadership. 

Turner’s reemergence on the local scene, taken together with the initiative Justin Bibb is showing in the race to replace Frank Jackson next year, might seem to suggest a reinvigorated local political scene. But Black Cleveland needs a long term strategy if it is ever to realize its potential as an agentic community or capitalize on its status as the city’s largest ethnic group. 

If we can do that, we would not only address our seemingly intractable problems of poverty and despair, we would galvanize a sorely needed larger civic vision that for once was truly inclusive, not just so in our typical top down pro forma way. 

A smart community has a system for developing and nurturing talent.

John O. Holly, founder and president of The Future Outlook League

So, while Rep. Fudge is still our Congresswoman, we should consider that a smart community has a system for developing and nurturing talent. Let us realize that the mid-twentieth century ecology that produced our community’s greatest political talent — the Stokes Brothers — is not the environment we inhabit today. Carl and Louis Stokes, separately and collectively, were a once in a lifetime occurrence, products of a compact hothouse black community where they could attach themselves to a John Holly, perhaps black Cleveland’s greatest civic leader, and imbibe his sense of community service and spirit. 

Black Cleveland needs a long term strategy if it is ever to realize its potential as an agentic community and capitalize on its status as the city’s largest ethnic group. 

Carl and Lou came of age at a time when avenues for black excellence were tightly constricted. Many avenues of career and professional development were unavailable. Black people were unwelcome in every professional association. Black real estate agents could not participate in multiple listing services and could not even call themselves realtors, forcing them to invent the term “realtists”. You couldn’t find a black professional anywhere from downtown east until you neared 55^th and Woodland Ave.

How did we overcome? We got organized, informally and formally. John Holly formed The Future Outlook League, which quickly became 10,000 strong, forcing employers large and small to open their hiring gates.

Informally, civic leaders convened Operation Alert, a regular conclave of community leaders who shared information, plotted how to capitalize on vulnerable points in the area’s apartheid regime, and discussed how to navigate both opportunities and crises, whether sudden or foreseeable. 

The eventual 1960s breakthrough was communal, collective, cultural, and simultaneously national, global, and local. 

Regrettably, once black people began to find status and success in positions of public service, i.e. as elected officials, the definition and pecking order of community leaders and spokespeople began to shift, often with unfavorable results. Sometimes we placed impossible demands upon some of these officials. More often we asked too little of them and failed to hold them accountable. And most fatally, we failed to recognize the extent to which they in fact often answer to interests outside the community that are inimical to our own.

How can we change a system where too many of our elected officials do not work for us, do not respect us, do not love us enough to care for our welfare?

In much of the black community, the quality of our elected officials is left to chance. We do not identify, train, nurture and develop our political leaders. They self-select, more often than not becoming beholden to those who finance their campaigns.

There has to be a better way.

To find it, we spoke over the past month with a number of folks from all walks of life about the black community might develop a more effective politics. The brightest among them were quick to decouple the issue from any particular office or imminent election.  The frustration and despair that sometimes peeked through our questioning gave way before long to hope as we realized the enormous talent that already resides within our community. 

In the midst of our discussions, cleveland.com published a column that purported to identify some leading candidates to succeed Fudge. With a couple of exceptions, the list was tired, perhaps reflecting a veteran reporter’s old paradigm and his obvious disconnect from the black community of the present and future. It seemed almost an attempt to select a leader for us.

This is what happens when by our inaction we leave the field to others. 

In the next and final installment of this series, appearing this Sunday, we will explore how we might become, as a friend of mine is wont to say, “active participants of our own deliverance”.

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CPT • Turner candidacy upsets local political apple cart

Cuyahoga Politics Today 

Candidate’s return home will raise District’s profile, heighten the stakes 

By R.T. Andrews 

Nina Turner announcing from her home in Cleveland's Lee-Harvard neighborhood that she will be
running for Ohio's 11th Congressional District seat if Rep. Marcia Fudge vacates the office upon her
confirmation as US Secretary of Housing and Urban Development. [Screenshot by R. T. Andrews]

She hasn’t won an election for anything in over a decade, and the last time her name appeared on a ballot was in 2014, when her candidacy for Secretary of State was part of a statewide ticket that cratered from top to bottom, but if you watched the rollout of former state senator Nina Turner’s declaration of candidacy for a Congressional seat that is not yet vacant, you know that star power has come to Cleveland and its 11th District.

Turner left town in 2015 in bold and shocking fashion when she very publicly shifted her allegiance from Hillary Clinton, the presumptive favorite for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination, to the insurgent Bernie Sanders, because his campaign more closely aligned with her principles. 

If I say many of her fans felt betrayed and effectively burned her political jersey in effigy, then you know what’s coming next. Turner took her native political talents to the national stage where she performed under the brightest lights, the harshest scrutiny, and against the toughest competition. She performed in leading roles and was regularly center stage in the high stakes production of two national political campaigns. In between, she headed a dynamic national political organization for several years and spent frequent time as a commentator on national television networks. 

Long story short, Turner left town on a mission, learned what it takes to compete at the highest level, sharpened her skills, developed a team of loyalists, and in the process built a national fan base. 

Yesterday, flanked virtually by a carefully selected array of former legislative colleagues, current public officials, and Hollywood star power in Danny Glover, Turner announced from her home in Cleveland’s Lee-Harvard community, that she was running to succeed Congresswoman Marcia Fudge, who will vacate the seat if confirmed as Secretary of Housing and Urban Development for the incoming Biden administration. The event was impeccably scripted, the production values were tight, the presentations were succinct, coordinated, and on point, and the candidate was at her most radiant, composed, and centered. (She obviously understands the suburban voters she will need to win over to broaden her base.)

Clearly, like another prominent prodigal Northeast Ohioan, Turner has returned better equipped to pursue the brass ring. 

By law, Gov. Mike DeWine would set dates for special primary and general elections if Fudge resigns. The winner of the special general election would serve until December 31, 2022. 

Turner, 53, joins county councilwoman Shontel Brown, 45, and former state senator and ex-Cleveland city councilman Jeff Johnson, 62, as announced candidates to succeed Fudge. The field will undoubtedly expand when and if a vacancy in fact occurs. 

Make no mistake: Turner’s candidacy, while anticipated, irreversibly changes the dynamics of the race in many ways. 

First and foremost, Turner’s presence assures the race will be about policies and ideas. Atypical of most local politicians of any stripe, the Turner brand is associated with big policies and big ideas. She will force discussion of critical issues like healthcare, public education, affordable housing, food insecurity, living wage, income inequality and public transportation in any candidate forums. The candidates who have not prepared themselves adequately to debate these issues will likely find themselves exposed, if not overwhelmed. 

Notwithstanding Turner’s presence in the race, she is by no means a shoo in. Her presumptive status as front runner in an incomplete field will have no value when the votes are tallied. 

Indeed, Turner herself may become an issue. A passionate person who inspires many, she also incites fierce opposition on both personal and policy matters. Some suburban white women may never forgive Turner for her perceived abandonment of gender solidarity when she left the Clinton plantation for Sanders. Businesspeople who applauded Turner’s courage as a solitary African American advocate for county reorganization in 2009 will be appalled by the prospect of an unapologetic leftist representing the District. And Cleveland’s staid black political establishment, a low expectations bunch, are unlikely to appreciate Turner’s disruptive force. 

So, assuming that Fudge leaves office in the next 45 days or so, expect the following: 

· The race to succeed her will draw the most national attention to a local political contest since Carl Stokes was elected mayor in 1967. It’s already begun.

· Anti-Turner forces will coalesce around an ABT candidate. (Anybody But Turner) 

· Many disengaged eastside Cleveland voters, who once comprised the District's heart, will find their concerns center stage. 

· A spirited special Congressional contest will impact next year’s mayoral race in Cleveland, possibly accelerating a wholesale changing of the guard.

And in a wild off the cuff prediction: do not be surprised if northeast Ohio’s original prodigal child, who now reigns in Los Angeles, but whose childhood home is part of the District’s crazy Akron tail, and who has become widely respected for his willingness to speak out politically from his platform of fame and fortune, finds a candidate to endorse in the race.

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