Posts Tagged police
MIA Mayor Jackson Fails to Give Community Confidence
Posted by Roldo Bartimole in Media, People, Politicians on November 6, 2009
November 6, 2009… As if the Cleveland police don’t have enough on their hands. Now they have another missing person: Mayor Frank Jackson.
Where is Frank Jackson?
I’ve covered a lot of mayors going back to Ralph Locher. I don’t know one of them that would not have had a strong public presence in a situation as the one where 11 women have been murdered. And where so much evidence points to an embarrassing lack of policy, execution and service from the city and its bureaucracy.
I don’t know any of the Mayors for more than 40 years who would not be very visible, trying to guide the city, calm the city and give it some assurance of action. I don’t know any of them who wouldn’t be consoling the residents, trying to reassure them in every way, every day that the Mayor has concerned for them, for what has happened and for a just resolution.
This Mayor is absent without leave. He can’t hide behind, “What is, is.”
It won’t fly. Not this time.
The city’s police department has been seen as embarrassingly inept or worse, seriously unconcerned. This is his police department. They represent him.
The absence of the mayor is unforgivable.
It is symbolic of the criticism of Mayor Jackson that should have made it necessary and expected that he would have a viable rival in the just concluded election. He didn’t. He was allowed to waltz into another term. Why? Because it is clear that the corporate leadership wanted it that way.
That says something about the plight of the city. As much, unfortunately, as Imperial Avenue.
That the news media are not pressing Jackson reveals another aspect of Cleveland’s problem.
The headline on the front page of the New York Times today says, “After Gruesome Find, Anger at Cleveland Police.” It is a three-column front-page story on a day when news is dominated by a dozen or more killed at a U. S. Army Post.
The Times story continues for four more columns of 16 inches depth with three photos. That’s a big story for the New York Times.
Mayor Jackson’s name does not appear once!
It’s distasteful to even say, but does the Mayor even really care?
Jackson in a statement as part of an update on Nov. 4 on the city’s web site said, “There is still a lot of work that needs to be done and a lot of unanswered questions that need to be addressed. Until the family of victims get the closure they seek and ultimately the justice they deserve, this case will continue to be our focus. My thought, prayers and deepest condolences go out to the Carmichael family, friends and relatives.”
A day later in another press release (all of them less than a full page) Mayor Jackson said, “As we continue to make progress with the identification, I want to assure the families of the missing that until they all get the closure they seek and ultimately the justice they deserve, this case will continue to be our focus. On behalf of the City of Cleveland, I offer my deepest condolences to the family, friends and relatives of the victims.”
That’s all there is.
That seems like canned PR that just doesn’t match the needs of the community at this time.
Just as pathetic in my mind was the gathering of ministers and the advice that the community should pray. Pray? Hell, the community out to be damned angry and expressing it.
There’s no leadership at the top. And there’s no leadership at the bottom.
What happens when that occurs? Usually, unpleasant action fills that vacuum.
But I think Cleveland is too dead even for that.
11 Murdered in Cleveland… Finally Noticed
Posted by Roldo Bartimole in Media, People on November 4, 2009
November 4, 2009… The biggest story this day after the election isn’t approval of County government reform or approval of a monopoly casino for a billionaire.
No. The biggest story is about the numerous murdered bodies found in the middle a city neighborhood. In fact, not far from famous Shaker Square in the new 4th ward.
That it could happen with little notice says so much more about Cleveland, its priorities and what it cares about than any election issue. Residents count little in this world.
The question is how does this happen? Why did it happen? Why did it happen so easily? Why did it escape notice so easily? For so long?
Where were the police? Where were health officials? Social workers? Community development personnel? Community activists?
Let’s build a new convention center. Let’s build a new casino. Can we build any new stadiums? Theaters? Fancy restaurants?
Anyone can see reform and casinos don’t answer what really ails Cleveland. You can’t hide it behind glitz or change for the sake of change.
Poverty and its relatives are eating away at the very life of the city. Giving recognition to this is step one.
But we are being sold shoddy goods instead.
The Plain Dealer won big yesterday. The newspaper – surely looking for relevance – piggybacked on a vile corruption scourge in County government to change its form. Not its nature.
Where does this constitute a change in the nature of our government? I don’t believe it does. It may be a hope that it will.
Chalk up another victory for the Pee Dee in the vote for a casino.
The Pee Dee strongly backed both issues. Even the news columns were used to push the platform.
The newspaper got on a train that was already speeding. However, the paper did use all its power – which is still substantial – to promote passage of both issues.
Take a bow, Ms. Goldberg.
Corruption and joblessness were the twin engines prompting voters to vote for Issue 3 and Issue 6.
Rotting dead bodies, however, tell a more frightening, real picture of our situation.
What to do about it raises even more problems.
With the residency law killed by the all-Republican Ohio Supreme Court soon there will be even fewer police living in the city they patrol. The distance between the police and community can’t be helped by the distance between where the police live and where their eyes and ears are needed.
Some thought had better be given to hiring neighborhood people, not as police, but as monitors – eyes and ears – in the neighborhoods. There needs to be intelligence on the ground, methods of gathering information so that whether someone is a drug addict, a prostitute or an upstanding citizen, he or she is guarded as humanly as possible.
That isn’t happening now. Cleveland can’t survive as a thriving downtown and nothing more.
Let’s see if the Pee Dee can wrestle with this one. Honestly. Without pretensions. And not for circulation.