Cincinnati's Backward Progress

On open letter to the Mayor and City Council

Dear Mr. Mayor,

On Monday, Council's finance committee is expected to vote on an 11 million dollar allocation to help the 3CDC corporation and park district renovate Washington Park in Over the Rhine and I am troubled by this as well as by other moves made by 3CDC. If I were voting, the vote to allocate funds would be an emphatic "no."

3CDC started with the take over of the building across from the park in 2006. That building will be turned into high end condos overlooking the newly renovated park. The tenants were forced out, but compensated with $70 to help them relocate.

A whole $70. You can buy a metro pass for that amount, but little else. Certainly can't rent a place to live, pay the utilities and feed a family for more than half a week. The arrogance of 3CDC is palpitating, and was apparently done with the approval of the City of Cincinnati.

When corporations like 3CDC decide to do something like the Washington Park makeover, you can bet that it is not with the people in mind. Their move is with the interests of the people who will move into the area once the old, lifelong residents have been moved out.

Why else would 3CDC put forth a plan 3 years later, that eliminates an historic swimming pool and basketball courts, to be replaced by a dog park? Who is looking out for the residents of Over the Rhine? Certainly not the city.

Question: Is a rich man's dog more important than a poor man's kids? Seems so based on this plan.

3CDC operates with an air of impunity that is only matched by the likes of corporations such as Kroger, which offers 4 bus tokens to people who used to shop at their neighborhood Roselawn store until unceremoniously shuttered by the Kroger Company. The bus tokens get them 2 round trips to the Norwood Surrey Square Kroger.

Imagine your mother or some other senior citizen trying to negotiate a bus, even a kneeling one..with $100 in groceries in a rickety cart. Not a pretty picture and going on as we speak.

The silence of the city is deafening when it comes to protecting the people.

Where is the initiative to incorporate all kinds of housing, businesses and people in all neighborhoods to promote diversity and inclusion? Why is it that the poor must always make way for the lifestyles and hobbies of the well off and not necessarily famous except in their own minds.

The job of city government is to speak for those who can't speak for themselves. Yet there has been not even a whisper from the city.

Don't get me wrong, I am in favor of progress and moving forward. However 3CDC moves harken back to the days of gentrification without diversification, the days when Cincinnati was for the well off and white. 3CDC caters to all those people who deserted the city for the suburbs except for when the professional teams play.

Shortly after the condo take over by 3CDC there was an article on the company pointing out it's internal diversity. That may be the case, however it doesn't reflect diversity in it's development plans for the city. And as we all know these days, it's more of a class thing than a racial thing.

The days of a Riverfront Stadium with no banners and signs allowed are over. The days of a city refusing to recognize it's gay, lesbian and transgender population are over. The days of downtown businesses doing inventory during the music festival or Black Family Reunion weekends are over.

Downtown parks without a basketball hoop or a swimming pool sends the wrong message.

3CDC needs to be made to understand this, by you Mr. Mayor.

All of the people voted for you, Mr. Mayor, including me. We expect you to stand up for us. I hear an awful lot about your trips. I am an avid supporter of the street car initiative. I applaud your efforts to end the violence in the neighborhoods.

However, I am concerned about the plans put forth by 3CDC and its blatant disregard of the people who live in the neighborhoods they want to take over.

Making the renovation plans for Washington Park more neighborhood friendly would be a start in the right direction. A finance committe "no" vote would get their attention.

Stranger on My Block

I live in a house that's been owned by my family for 8 decades. We've been associated with this house on this street for so long, that it has become another family member. It is a part of us, like we, the family, are a part of this house and this street.

This house, that I now own, is the first house of my memory. My parents lived here when I was born. I can remember when the street wasn't so wide and the retaining wall across the street, wasn't there, and the public bathrooms at the park shelter were always open. I can remember nights without the unending traffic sounds of I-71, because it did not exist.

I can remember when half my neighbors were Jewish, and Rockdale Temple was located at the top of the hill and a little north on Reading, north of Samuel Ach Junior High. There was a drug store on the corner as well as a butcher shop. Forest Avenue was a couple of blocks over. The Forest movie theater was there. My dad had a part time job as bouncer. We saw movies for free on the weekends.

The bottom of Rockdale was quiet, peaceful, neighborly. Mr Harmon lived there a few doors away. Mr Harmon was known to the world as Chuck Harmon, first Black man to play for the Cincinnati Reds. But to me, he was just Mr. Harmon, my grandfather's friend. I knew everybody up and down the block, Mr. Montgomery and both Mrs Montgomerys, Mr and Mrs Keys, Mrs Johnson, and her daughters next door...their house burned down and was never rebuilt. Mr and Mrs Chandler, after the Keys left. Mr and Mrs Pate on the other side. The Bostons, and Mr Jimmy Woods, Cincinnati's most famous Black golfer. Parts of Avon Field Golf Course are named after Mr. Woods.

This house has always been the center of our family's world. We may leave, but we always came back. It was peaceful, familiar, and comfortable. It was home.

My comfort zone was shattered last night. It was a violation of my space even though I wasn't directly involved. I was directly affected. I felt-feel violated, raped almost. Someone killed a man a few doors down last night. Rolled up on him in a car with no lights, as he was standing outside, leaning on another car, and fired five or six shots into him, leaving his body on the sidewalk, dead.

It was a very big gun...Not the “pop, pop, pop” that everyone talks about...These were big, quick explosions of sound...loud and invasive, ripping through the late evening calm, scaring me and startling my dogs into full throated barks of anger and fear.

The quiet night turned into a death vigil as police shut down the street, people came out of their homes to watch, while others arrived in cars, driving up to find out if they knew the victim.

He was a stranger on my block. He did not live where he died. He died just north of the house where lives a very pleasant young man, a dog owner that I talk to frequently, since we have pet interests in common. It wasn't my neighbor. It was somebody else. Some other mother's son whose blood was spilled this night.

The body lay in view for a long time, while police investigators did their work, counting shots, picking up shell casings by flashlight.

A changing guard of young people, men and women, bathed in the glow of their cell phone lights melted in and out of the darkness, forming yet another outer perimeter, outside police lines and yellow tape, reporting back to those who didn't make the trip....”it's Debo” one of them said as he walked past my house.

This was not my first crime scene, personally or professionally. However it was the first one inside my comfort zone...my home.

It continues to jangle me. Today, my comfort zone looks different. It feels different. Nearly 13 hours later and it's still decorated with crime tape left by careless, uncaring police. They reopened the street, but left the tape hanging, wilted in the rain.

I have talked often of leaving it forever, moving south to be nearer one of my sisters.

Today, sadly I think that dream has become a goal.

It is finally time for me to go.

Cincinnati Justice

Examining recent court rulings in Cincinnati might lead one to believe that letting a dog die in your back yard is infinitely worse than leaving your kid to die strapped in the back seat of your car. I have already talked about the Clermont County vice principal whose daughter was found in the back seat of her Mercedes in the school parking lot. The prosecutor refused to bring charges alleging the death was an accident. He claimed he followed the letter of the law in not seeking a grand jury indictment.

Now comes word about the woman who left the dog in her backyard. It was a pit bull. She didn’t own the dog. It belonged to her brother, and he admitted putting the dog back there. She was jailed because it was her house and was sentenced to two weeks in jail for cruelty to animals. She actually was let go for time already served. The judge claimed she followed the letter of the law in making her decision.

Follow up on both stories shows that Ms Clermont County had been warned about leaving her daughter in the car on at least two other occasions prior to the child’s death, the last happening just a couple of days before the fatal incident. Yet, there was no crime committed.

The pit bull lady apparently got charged more than ten years ago with child endangering..she apparently left her kid alone while she went out drinking. Nothing recent had happened in the pit bull lady’s life...she was a hardworking homeowner these days and her kids are okay. Crime committed.

Similarities....both female, both working women, both with children, both apparently expert multi-taskers at juggling life

Differences....one white, one black....., one upper middle class, school teacher, one, urban, fast food worker......, one with husband who fixes Mercedes, one, no husband talked about..one kid dead, the other, brother’s dog dead.....one jailed and convicted....one not even charged...hmmmmm!

Cincinnati keeps saying it is working hard to erase it’s racist image, but snapshots like these make it damn near impossible. In Cincinnati and Ohio in general, it really is Justice for them and Just us for us.

If both court officers followed the letter of the law, then the laws of Ohio need to be changed. Not only that but enforcement needs to be changed.

When blacks are arrested they are first and foremost drug tested and locked up, until stuff is sorted out. The same goes for poor white people. When non poor whites are arrested they are asked down the station, interviewed and maybe arrested a couple of days, weeks or months later.

No justice....still

No Respect, No Love for Life

Another report from the Justice Department confirms once again that “we” are our own worst enemy. The report deals with the latest increases in crime and basically tells us what we already know...that black people kill black people and white people kill white people.

What is so disheartening about this report is that it claims that most black murder victims..93% in fact, are between the ages of 17 and 29 and male. Conversely, white victims tend to be older, only 37% are between the ages of 17 and 29.

Blacks make up 13% of this country’s population yet account for 49% of all murders and 15% of rapes, assaults and other non fatal violent crimes. The only people who die younger and faster than black youth are native americans.

The experts blame easy access to illegal drugs and guns and generations of young black men locked out of economic opportunity.

As I look at these statistics, I guess my own outlook has changed. Usually I am outraged at this senseless loss. My anger usually pores out on the page. But today is different. I’m, well, maybe I’m tired. Maybe I’m resigned. Maybe I’ve given up trying to reach anyone through my words. Outrage doesn’t work. Nobody listens...not the kids, not the parents, not the community, not the politicians, not the police.

I drive through my neighborhood, a once and future vibrant corner of city life and see the hopelessness on every street corner. Young men in white t-shirts and baggy jeans blatantly displaying their designer boxers shorts above their sagging waistbands disrespecting all who bother to glance their way. They’re out there at all hours, no matter what time I pass by. Girls, young women, standing in the shadows admiring the young men, visibly pregnant, with maybe a baby or two in tow. Anytime of the day, this drama unfolds itself for anyone watching.

While the young men pose on the corner, Avondale, one of the oldest of Cincinnati neighborhoods is being taken away from them. It is being revitalized by whites moving back into the neighborhoods in answer to the gasoline crisis. Real estate is cheap. Older black homeowners who bought from the Jews when Avondale was a Jewish ghetto, are dying out being replaced by younger white speculators with cash to burn and money to invest, spawning a new generation of absentee landlords. Avondale is going green and getting a new coat of paint. It is getting set to sparkle once again like when I was kid, some 50 years ago.

The young men and their absent families are being pushed out. I don’t know where the young men on the corner go when and if they go home. Their neighborhood, the very thing that could save them, is being taken. The sidewalks are being pulled out from under their feet as they claw for existence and survival. Home is the foundation for economic well being. They have none. Their families have none. Even if they have a home, they don’t have the skills to take part in the buildup. No one makes them go to school.

They propagate and perpetuate the cycle, making babies, and baby mommas, with no support or way to get a leg up in society, chewed up almost before they’re spit out.

Soon they will be gone from the corners in Avondale. Police crackdowns and enforcement cameras will push them away from the newly revitalized areas. Out of sight, out of mind. The cycle will resume again somewhere else, if they live.

And maybe that is the answer....dying rather than living...their only way out of a bleak and seemingly endless waking nightmare.