From the 11/26/05 PD:

 

 

Proposal to reduce size of City Council renewed in Cleveland

Saturday, November 26, 2005

Olivera Perkins

Plain Dealer Reporter

 

Reducing the size of Cleveland City Council is an issue that just won't go away.

 

Earlier this year, a group of developers and business leaders failed to gather enough signatures for an August ballot proposal that would have sliced the size of the legislative body in half.

 

Now another group, the recently formed Ohio Citizens League, is pushing a similar issue for the May ballot.

 

...

 

 

To reach this Plain Dealer reporter:

[email protected], 216-999-4868

 

http://www.cleveland.com/news/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/cuyahoga/113299777522720.xml&coll=2

 

like all great ideas i am afraid this one will have no chance! it just makes too much common sense.

The safety forces aren't immune to economic realities and downsizing, and neither should city council be.

This appeared in the 1/18/06 Cleveland Free Times:

 

 

Size Matters: Who really benefits from downsizing Cleveland City Council?

By Charu Gupta

 

THOMAS “CALL ME TONY” GEORGE is a man with political connections. The Westlake resident and millionaire owner of Slam Jams sports bars and Harry Buffalo restaurants has been donating to both Democrat and Republican campaigns since 1998. The walls of his Lakewood office are lined with photographs of himself with the likes of Bill Clinton, Bob Taft, Jesse Jackson and George Voinovich.

 

Today George is the blunt spokesperson for the Ohio Citizens League, which he describes as a bipartisan good-government group with a mission to move the city and region in the right direction. The first step toward that goal will be reducing

 

...

 

http://www.freetimes.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=2985&POSTNUKESID=efe444c5cb6197a90e3799655124ffa0

 

This article is a few days old, but I wanted to close out this topic with the result.  The story also includes info about a similar movement in Maple Hts.  I've removed that, but I've provided the link.  From the 2/15/06 PD:

 

 

City Council downsizing deferred in Cleveland

Maple Hts. cutback likely to be on ballot

Wednesday, February 15, 2006

Leila Atassi and Olivera Perkins

Plain Dealer Reporter

 

Maple Heights voters will likely decide this spring whether to reduce the size of their City Council. But supporters of a more ballyhooed council-reduction effort in Cleveland shelved plans for a May ballot issue.

 

...

 

 

http://www.cleveland.com/news/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/cuyahoga/113999627468420.xml&coll=2

 

I find it ironic that City Council laid off hundreds of safety force workers and offered the wokers that did not get laid off a "slap in the face" contact. I know the CDP got a three year contract of 0%, 0%, and 3%. CFD has been without a contract for a while. Other City divisions were given pathetic contracts and suffered lay offs as well. The same "leaders" (and belive me, I use this term loosely) did not loose one member to a lay off and still got thier 6% annual raise (which they voted this annual raise into city charted so it is 6% every year) along with the other perks. What a bunch of hypocrites. These same people cry the city is broke and can't afford to pay thier workers a resonable raise. They should take a look in the mirror. A City like L.A. has over 1 million residents and less City Council members than Cleveland. Cleveland only has about 480,000 residents. I wish Cleveland City Council would be drastically reduced and recieve the same insulting raises they give to the real workers of the city. It makes my sick to hear my neighborhood fire station may be closing. The police have much less officers. We no longer have leaf pick-up. The bus rides to and from school are less. Security in the schools suck. I can continue on. But those elitist in city hall have not suffered one bit. I'm gonna quit now because I'm getting pissed.

I haven't made up my mind yet on whether reducing the size of council is a good idea or not. But when it was revealed that "businessman" Tony George was a financial backer of the citizens league, I smelled something funny. George never does anything for the stated reasons, and he is never interested in something for the benefit of the public. If he's involved in something political, it's either for the benefit of himself or his friends/business associates.

 

Also, please note some of the various establishments of which he was/is an investor:

 

> Splash reggae club in the Flats... Raided in the mid-1990s by the Jamaican drug task force, which broke up a Cleveland-Jamaica drug ring. The listed owner of the club was attorney Blaise Brucato of Highland Heights, who went to prison. Tony George admitted to a fellow reporter that he was investor.

 

> Kaos nightclub in the Flats... Site of numerous fights and gang activity in recent months. Site of the killing of a 16-year-old boy who was a customer of the club. Tony George admitted to a Plain Dealer reporter he was an investor of Kaos.

 

> Krobar nightclub in North Olmsted... For the past several months, police have made dozens of arrests (as many as that in a single night at times) of underage drinkers and others using drugs, both in the club and in the parking lot. City officials are trying to revoke the club's liquor license. Tony George admitted he was an investor in Krobar, along with an informant friend of mine who communicated that information to me for an article I'm researching. The listed owner of the Krobar club is a young man with the last name of Hammons. His father is Dave Hammons Sr. who was arrested for his involvement in organized crime-run drug and gambling operations. The informant served two stints in federal prison (bank fraud and assault) as an earner for the Cleveland mob, specifically to Alfred "Allie" Calabrese who died in federal prison in 1999. He also ran investment scams on Wall Street for the Gambino crime family of NYC.

 

Now, does all of that smell a tad "off" to you?

Even if George's motices aren't pure, I still think I'm in favor of a reduction in size in the # of council members.  Given the drop in population Cleveland has suffered over the years, it seems reasonable.  If they're not going to shrink, they should at least make some of the council members elected at-large.  That would help prevent some of the parochialism we see now.    As a comparison, DC has 13 members (8 ward, 5 at-large incl city council president), Boston also has 13 (9 ward, 4 at-large), Cincy 9, all at-large, Pittsburgh has 9 (all ward), Seattle has 9 (all at-large).  All of these cities are reasonably similar in size to Cleveland (Washington, Boston, Seattle a bit bigger, Cincy, P'Burgh a bit smaller).  Even Philly only has 17 city council members (10 ward and 7 at-large) even though is has 1.5 million people.  (Wikipedia is a good thing...)

 

Based off of that it would seem that other cities seem to get by with fewer council members.  It's not at all clear to me why Cleveland's needs are so different as to warrant so many more council members.