Zack Reed enters mayor's race from home plate; Hough council candidates use batboys to toss infield dirt at one another
I’m a little more than
halfway through a marvelous book focused on a distinct group of Cleveland neighborhoods.
I thought it was going to be about the Lee-Seville area on the city’s southeast
side but it’s turned out to be so much richer, deeper and broader than I had
anticipated. Look for my review in a couple of weeks.
Even those familiar with
our city’s history are likely to seldom reflect that the confinement of black
Clevelanders almost exclusively to the Central/Cedar neighborhood for about the
first 150 years of Cleveland’s founding in 1796 has done much to shape our
city. There were of course a few pioneers and outliers scattered here and there,
but their presence and experience simply confirms the human condition; they
were the exceptions that proved the rule.
Sheer population pressures
after World War II forced expansion of the black community into the Hough,
Glenville, Mt. Pleasant and Lee-Harvard neighborhoods at an accelerated pace.
Learning about the histories of these communities can inform our understanding
of the people who live there now, even if the denizens of those neighborhoods
are unaware of the dynamics that foretold their arrival.
The neighborhood lens
shapes and guides our local politics in many ways; the effects can be healthy
or toxic. This is likely to be especially true in the next few years: almost
every one of the city’s 17 wards and the mayor’s seat will likely see very
competitive races this year. Next year will be a 2018 statewide election that
will set the stage for what has become a hyper-contentious and almost criminal
redistricting process following the latest decennial census results.
This backdrop had us looking
with fresh eyes as we boarded the #14 bus from West Third and Frankfurt just
off Public Square along a route initially as circuitous as the Cuyahoga River.
We eventually sliced through Tri-C’s Metro campus and straightened out going
eastbound on Woodland Ave. Soon we reached the intersection of 55th
and Woodland Ave., once the undeniable cultural and commercial heart of
Cleveland’s black community. (One might ask if the “heart of Cleveland’s black
community” still exists, and if so, where, and if not, why, and whether any of
the answers represent progress.)
MT. PLEASANT
Eventually the bus got us
onto the long stretch of Kinsman Road, still the undeniable main artery of the
euphoniously named Mt. Pleasant neighborhood. Much of the street has a weary
feel to it, as do lots of the other once vibrant thoroughfares that electrified
mid-century Cleveland, carrying factory workers, students and shoppers all over
town. For a long time Mt. Pleasant was one of the city’s model neighborhoods,
full of Hungarian and Italian descendants, Jews, and blacks up from Alabama and
Georgia.
I didn’t know it but when I
got to the Murtis Taylor Services Center — a longstanding community anchor at
137th and Kinsman — I would soon be listening to Warrensville
Heights mayor Brad Sellers reminisce about growing up on the tail end of that
era. “The Mt. Pleasant I know is vibrant”, he would recall. “It is rich in
tradition. It is rich in people.”
Even as he moves through
the neighborhood today, Sellers continued, he does not see decay. “We [Ward 2 councilman Zack Reed and I] see a
world of potential ready to be unleashed.”
Does the “heart of Cleveland’s black community” still exist? If so, where is it? If not, what happened to it? Is that progress?
Sellers was at Murtis
Taylor to introduce Reed at the official launch of Reed’s entry into
Cleveland’s 2017 mayoral race. Nodding at the oddity of his intrusion into another
city’s politics, Sellers forthrightly observed, “Blood is thicker than water”.
He and Reed are brothers. Though the legal status may actually be
half-brothers, neither used that term and the warmth between them was clearly
genuine.
The themes of home and
family were clearly prevalent as Reed told the assembly that he was running for
mayor and what he wanted to accomplish. Indeed, that sense of home and
neighborhood was why he chose the Murtis Taylor venue for his announcement.
Outside the comforts of Mt.
Pleasant, Reed may be best known for his three D.U.I. convictions, and he was
not far into his relatively short speech before he addressed that issue. He
acknowledged and apologized for the hurt, pain and embarrassment he had caused
the community, his family and the city, and he averred that a period of
self-reflection and treatment at the Cleveland Clinic had helped him get
straight.
Reed talked about the
city’s “depressed wards” — a phrase he used more than once — and talked about
rebuilding neighborhoods. Key to accomplishing that, and anything else, Reed
said, was public safety. He proposed adding 400 police officers trained in community
policing. Reed also talked about job creation and youth services.
Reed said a couple of times
that “this election is not about Frank Jackson” but about new leadership and
new ideas. But he did take direct at the mayor when he referenced how one man
without consultation or public discussion, “closed Public Square”.
HOUGH
Our political watch
yesterday actually began at the County Board of Elections where a challenge to
Basheer Jones as a lawful candidate for the Ward 7 was being heard. The
challenge was filed by supporters of the incumbent, T. J. Dow, who won a second
term by defeating Jones in November 2013. Dow won that election by fewer than
600 votes, a closer margin than one might expect, given that Jones was running
for the first time. Jones had the endorsement of Congresswoman Marcia Fudge in
that first campaign, and some observers were expecting an even closer race this
year, even before Mansfield Frazier joined the already crowded field last week
[see here
and here].
Jones pulled his petitions
to run on December 28, 2016 and filed them on March 7. Each time he listed his
residential address as 6400 Whittier Ave. The Dow camp submitted documents
indicating that the lienholder took title to that property last October and
subsequently filed eviction papers against the occupants, including Jones’
surrogate father, Timothy Roberts. Heart-tugging tales were offered by the
candidate’s side regarding how the house was lost [divorce, delay, miscommunication,
“religious marriage”, etc.] all of which were irrelevant. A successful
challenge hinged solely on proving by clear and convincing evidence that Jones
did not consider the Whittier address his home and that had no intention to
return there for domiciliary purposes.
When the challengers could
offer no proof in this regard, the elections board voted 3-0 to dismiss the
challenge. At least one board member was troubled by the fact that Jones
obtained a new driver’s license after the challenge was filed. His
new license shows the Whittier address; the old one, Jones admitted, bore the
South Euclid address where Jones’ three children now live with their mother,
from whom Jones is estranged.
Jones will need to update
his license once again. He was scheduled to move today, along with his
surrogate family, to a new home on East 74 Street near Superior, in the wake of
the eviction proceedings.
Dow supporters had only a little
time to gloat over how their lightweight maneuver vexed and embarrassed Jones.
As we were leaving the Board meeting, we learned that only the day before,
Clark Nelson of Lexington Ave. in Ward 7, had filed a challenge to Dow’s
candidacy, “protesting the validity of his address and accusing Mr. Dow of
voter fraud … and election falsification.”
The eagle-eyed Mr. Nelson
noted — or was perhaps advised — that Mr. Dow’s Decker Ave. voting address differs
from the address on a May 2014 traffic ticket issued to the councilman in
Shaker Hts. The ticket hit the news when after news reports there was an active
warrant out for the councilman for his failure to appear at a court hearing. He
had apparently been cited “for improper use of earphones” while driving in that
fair city.
We called Mr. Nelson to
inquire as to his preference in this councilmanic [manic council?] contest but were
unable to reach him by publication time.
LEE-HARVARD
Word on the street is that
former Ward 1 councilman Joe Jones is circulating petitions to reclaim his old
seat from incumbent Terrell Pruitt. Jones would be another strong candidate in
the race that also includes Kimberly F. Brown, who has had Pruitt in her sights
ever since he defeated her in 2013.
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