Greater Cincinnati DEMS

GCDems Tuesday noon Lives On 💥 - https://mailchi.mp/c8d261d25d9e/reorganizinggcdems-newsletter-20203804

G. C. Dems Newsletter 🇺🇸 - https://mailchi.mp/b66c8d217ce7/g-c-dems-newsletter

Newsletter GCD 🎈🇺🇸 - https://mailchi.mp/5ec03354f995/newsletter-gcd

GCD Newsletter 8/2/22 VOTE TODAY 🇺🇸 -

GCD Newsletter 8/2/22 VOTE TODAY 🇺🇸 One of the less-frequent, still-salient critiques of depolarization (“depol”) work I’ve heard, is that it’s uninspiring; that there’s little in it to stir the soul to greatness, to awaken the passion and energy that fuels all worthy politics. It’s a fair critique, if you suppose the task...

Noon TODAY ❗️❗️GCD Meeting - https://mailchi.mp/4a60e225c5e4/noon-today-gcd-meeting

NEWSLETTER for 7/12/22 -

NEWSLETTER for 7/12/22 Zak with Americans for Prosperity: Ohio is #2 in the nation for opioid deaths and our rehabilitation through incarceration policy has failed. Please follow the link to encourage your legislator to vote"Yes"on Senate Bill 3 this week and stop treating first-time possession offenses as a life sentenc...

Newsletter 7/5/22 🎒Planning Meeting - https://mailchi.mp/fc9506c209c6/newsletter-62122-jessica-miranda-20174036

Newsletter 6/21/22 Jessica Miranda 🔫 - https://mailchi.mp/7d59ac4ef06d/newsletter-62122-jessica-miranda

Cancelled for 6/14/22 🥵 - https://mailchi.mp/39b81c1b30a3/cancelled-for-61422

NEWSLETTER 6/7/22 Deb Leonard, MSD 🦓 - https://mailchi.mp/c06a4c038261/newsletter-6722-deb-leonard-msd

Newsletter 5/24/22 ~ Meet Brigid Kelly, running for County Commission. - https://mailchi.mp/023a725ff0e7/newsletter-52422-meet-brigid-kelly

Newsletter 5/24/22 ~ Meryl Neman of Ohio Progressive Action - https://mailchi.mp/8c9232df3d4e/newsletter-52422-meryl-neman-of-ohio-progressive-action

Newsletter for 5/17/22 🇺🇸 - https://mailchi.mp/dd79c567f484/newsletter-for-51722 Our weekly Tuesday forum needs your support.

NEWSLETTER 5/10/22 🎈 - https://mailchi.mp/f1125332120a/newsletter-51022 Amy Bottomley of the Freedom Center will present on 5/11/22.

NEWSLETTER 4/13/22 🎈 - https://mailchi.mp/520da99feae8/newsletter-41322 Presentes will be judge candidates Lebers, Flottman, and Rikell Howard Smith.

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Newsletter 4/4/22 👀 - https://mailchi.mp/9160cda76a22/newsletter-4422Read about our weekly zoom meeting, candidates we interview etc. etc.

NEWSLETTER 29/22 🇺🇸 - https://mailchi.mp/763efcc07f4e/newsletter-2922

Newsletter 3/22/22: JUDGES ❗️❗️ - https://mailchi.mp/09902ef11576/newsletter-32222-judges

Greater Cincinnati Democrats – Tim Ryan for US Senate (Portman’s seat)
Date: Mar 15, 2022 11:40 AM Eastern Time (US and Canada)
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Newsletter 3/15/22 TIM RYAN for Senate 🇺🇸 - https://mailchi.mp/6058fd3daa98/newsletter-31522-tim-ryan-for-senate

Greater Cincinnati Democrats – Matt Caffrey – SWING LEFT
Date: Mar 8, 2022 11:35 AM Eastern Time (US and Canada)
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NEWSLETTER 3/1/22 - https://mailchi.mp/880dc975129d/newsletter-3122

Morgan Harper for US Senate - https://mailchi.mp/757f19f394ee/morgan-harper-for-us-senate

Julie Sellers, left, and Michelle Dillingham gave an excellent presentation on Cincinnati Public Schools!

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Greater Cincinnati Democrats present Julie Sellers and Michelle Dillingham talking about Cincinnati Public Schools.
Date: Feb 1, 2022 11:27 AM Eastern Time (US and Canada)
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Zamira Saidi is an Afghan graduate student who shared her extensive experience with her many years in Afghanistan.

GCD January 25, 2022 Zamira Saidi, Afghan graduate student. Telling her story

Ms. Saidi, a native Afghan and current Law student at Univ. of Cincinnati gave a fine presentation and power point describing a brief history of Afghanistan, its resources, culture, exports, food, geography, and explanation of current and past women's rights, or lack thereof, the impact of the Taliban in her lifetime, from 2000 to 2021. She also addressed the question of why Afghan has been at war for at least the last 30 years.

Afghanistan is a landlocked mountainous country located at the crossroads of Central and South Asia. It is surrounded by USSR, Iran, Pakistan and China. Afghan exports many natural resources: minerals, gems, jewelry, dried fruits, metals and basic fuels. There are 16 districts, each with its own dialect, customs & costumes.The Taliban originated in and was encouraged in Pakistan, where it still maintains a stronghold. It has always been a fundamentalist, strict Muslim terrorist organization fighting to gain Afghan independence and Shea law..

Zamira was born in Kabul but as a young child she and her family moved to a small village. Her father returned to Kabul for his employment. She is the eldest of two daughters but always felt she should have been a boy because of the privileges and freedom boys have always had in her country. In her village, however, she was allowed to play outside and was in the first class of a girl's elementary school opened in 2012, after the Taliban were defeated. (She showed a slide of how women dressed in public in 1990– 2000, 2000-2010, 2010–2020, and now again totally covered after long dresses but women's faces open and young girls without head coverings before the Taliban were again in charge.) She knew the village was different than in the city, as sometimes she traveled with her father, a government employee, to other villages and cities. She always noted the differences in each different place, that boys went to school everywhere, and a family with boys had higher status. Years later her family expanded to include two brothers. Zamira described herself as perpetually angry because she was a girl, but she was smart and studied hard, and was always full of questions which was unusual for girls in her school. It was difficult in the village, too, because her father worked & lived in Kabul.

Zamira attended Kabul University and Law school and was particularly interested in women's issues, education equality, and property law. She practiced law in Kabul and helped organize the Afghan Women's Association, and used her earnings to found AWEESO, Afghan Women's Education and Empowerment Service Organization, an NGO. This effort was quite successful, providing many well attended seminars and workshops to large audiences to promote legal change to discriminatory laws. This organization is currently closed by the Taliban following the U.S. Withdrawal and she is no longer there to support it.

Zamira applied for and received a scholarship to attend Brunel University in London, where she obtained a Master's degree in International Property Law.. While there her family moved to Germany to escape the Taliban as her father had worked for the U.S. Army. While in London, she then obtained a Fulbright to attend Univ. of Cincinnati Law school, where she will graduate in International Law in May 2022.

Q: Can she visit Afghanistan? No.
Q:Are there many Afghan families in Cincinnati area? Yes, approximately 40 families and more expected. Catholic Social Charities is the official refugee organization locally. They try to help but housing is a particular problem. The families need help. Zamira feels other Ohio cities do a better job helping refugee families settle.
Q: How does she support herself now? She is on a Fulbright, and UC covers her books and tuition. She has had an internship here in Cincinnati with a local Judge magistrate.
Q: Can she communicate directly with friends, relatives or former colleagues in Afghanistan? A little. Pseudo names requires access to an unidentified source to hide identity. Direct communication would put the person contacted in Afghanistan at risk of capture or imprisonment.
Q: How can Zamira be contacted?

A great volunteer activity!

Your cloud recording is now available. An excellent presentation by Brennan Grayson and Magna Orlander of the CIWC, the Cincinnati Interfaith Workers Center.

Topic: Virtual Democrats Tuesday Noon
Date: Jan 4, 2022 11:27 AM Eastern Time (US and Canada)

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Our cloud recording is now available, great words to really fine songs!
Topic: Virtual Democrats hosting fabulous members of the Queen City Balladeers. These folks are helping us celebrate the holidays with special words with great songs!
Date: Dec 28, 2021 11:34 AM Eastern Time (US and Canada)
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Topic: Virtual Democrats Cardinal Land Eonvervancy.
Date: Dec 14, 2021 11:33 AM Eastern Time (US and Canada)

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NEWSLETTER December 7: Dinsmore Homestead: Cathy Collopy
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Greater Cincinnati Democrats via gmail.mcsv.net
Dec 4, 2021

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Alberta announcements
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Alberta wrap up and next week


NEXT WEEK: Dinsmore Homestead,, Cathy Collopy , Collections Coordinator

LAST WEEK: Howard Willkinson : post-election analysis
Summary of Howard Wilkinson’s commentary of the recent elections
Editorial Comment: Given the great value of Howard’s analysis, I have again edited the full transcript. As noted earlier, the transcript is dyslexic: it cannot distinguish won/one, on/in/and, two/two, hit/ship, etc. It offered “after pro ball” for Aftab Pureval. Since few of us speak all the time in complete sentences, I have omitted filler words “I mean,” “you know,” “Yeah,” and words repeated for emphasis, etc. For the few occasions where it left me puzzled, I resorted to [?]
Moderator: Thank you for coming, and you can sort of share with us what happened in the election and maybe give us a forecast about what's going to happen in city hall.
Howard: Well, obviously a lot happened on that election and there's also a lot happening, post election. In terms of the legislature and the drawing of new state legislative and congressional district seats we’re right, kind of a ground zero here, Hamilton County on that
But let me talk first about the mayoral race and city council race and Cincinnati. I wrote a column right after the election for wvxu.org, which is where you can find most of my stuff. And it said that Aftab Pureval actually won two elections: he won the mayor's race by a very large margin, surprisingly large 66%--almost two to one over David Mann. I don't think anybody was predicting quite that big of a victory. But that was a pretty substantial mandate, so that's victory number one for Aftab, and he will be the mayor on January 4. The second election he won that same day was a city council race, because he got extraordinarily lucky, because it was such a low turnout election, 24.2%, in the city that eight of the nine endorsed Democratic candidates were elected to city council. I'm not telling you anything you don't know, but that's that is pretty remarkable. And it tells me that it was very difficult for voters in the first because there were 35 candidates on the ballot. That's just ridiculous. No wonder people couldn't sort it out. So, clearly, people who consider themselves democrats and vote democratic went to the polls, took the sample ballot at the polling place, or the mail or got it stuck in their door, and took them to the polls and voted, up and down, because it was, it was easier than trying to sort out. You had a whole bunch of other Democrats, people who are Democrats, running for Council, Michelle Dillingham and a whole raft of them who did not have party endorsements, so they didn't get the kind of attention that those endorsed candidates did. So people went in and they voted straight down the ticket. So that gave him eight democrats on Cincinnati City Council. One Republican, Liz Keating, squeaked by. She didn't lose because, number one, she's a good candidate, she had a lot of resources. She has a name that's well known, particularly to older voters in Cincinnati. Her grandfather was a great friend of mine. When I was at the Enquirer, when he was publisher, even though I was union president, we got along famously. He was a wonderful man. But she's got a lot of Bill in her, and she did something that was really smart. She went out and she understood that a Republican running for city council in the city of Cincinnati can't win with just Republican votes; there aren't enough. They're just simply aren't enough of them: it's under 10%. If you look at the voter rolls in the city of Cincinnati, who identify themselves as Republicans by drawing a republican ballot in some primaries. So you're not going to win that way. So you’ve got to reach out to Democrats you’ve got toreach out to independents. In her case, she had to reach out to African American voters to pull in people who ordinarily would not vote for a Republican. And she was very smart about doing that: she ran a whole bunch of ads on black radio stations featuring two people--Charlie Winburn, former Republican council member, and Blake Hillary, former Democratic mayor and council member. They were kind of cornball ads, but they were effective: it's like a conversation between the two of them: say all you know why we never agreed on anything, but we agree on this, Liz Keating will make a great member of the Cincinnati City Council. And she was not only doing that on the radio stations, she was doing that on social media--on Facebook and Twitter. And she just flooded the social media with ads. A lot of them--most of them. in fact, featuring her with Hillary. So she was going after that black vote and she got it. And she managed to get elected. The other thing I admire about her campaign was the day after the election. She said that she followed her grandfather's old rule when he was running for office--that the day after the election, you go out and you take down every yard sign no matter where it is. And she did that, and other people didn't. So she was the only Republican who managed to get elected: so you've got eight Democrats, only one Republican who is probably going to be fairly easy to work with in terms of legislation. She's not going to agree with everything, but is not going to be hostile about whatever she disagrees about. That's like a dream come true--as a new Democratic mayor, to have eight Democrats. And if you can't get your agenda past with eight democrats on city council, then you might as well just give it up. And then he did another smart thing: he named JanMichele Lemon Kearney his Vice-Mayor. And I wrote about this last week--I wrote a column about Jan-Michele, and how she is going to be a powerful person on this council, because she's been there. She was appointed in March of 2021, when Tamaya Denard had to leave under very bad circumstances, she took over that seat, and she ran with it. She made herself: she was already well known within the city, particularly in the black community, but she raised her stature. And she was a logical choice for Aftab as vice mayor, because she can function for him as sort of a majority whip--like you have in Congress or in the state legislature, so she can count the votes, she can get everybody on line with the agenda. As long as she's on board with the agenda. But she's has enough political power, in and of itself, that she can cajole colleagues into maybe compromising on some of those plans. And it will be kind of a joint effort legislating. Where then she goes out, because he's there [i.e., potential rivals for mayor?]. They're going to be six new council members, six out of them who have never been there before. They're brand new, and they're going to be looking for direction; a nd one of the persons--the person they're going to be looking to for direction from on council I think is Jan Michelle and Greg Landsman to a certain extent because Landsman has been there for some time. So that was really smart, to choose her. Also, and I raised my column. And some people's, Oh god, you're saying, Well, I do. She also a potential rival, after for a while, because she was a time [?] Now, she's never even suggested that she would run against him. But I think she would be first in line, when he leaves, whether it's after one term or two terms, but she'd be first line from there. There's a theory in politic: you keep potential rivals close to you; you keep your friends close, that you keep your rivals even close. And that was the basis of Doris Kearns Goodwin’s book Team of Rivals about Abe Lincoln, because that's what Abraham Lincoln did. He took three men who ran against him for the Republican nomination and despised him for getting the nomination and winning and brought them into his cabinet. And that was extraordinary. At the time, but I think we'll see a little bit of that in Aftab now with this relationship with Jan-Michele, and how Jan -Michele can help him advance his agenda with this new council, because these people really are rookies. They don't know that much about the process; and they've not been there. So they're going to look for direction, people who have been there, and that's Jan Michelle and Landsman. Now, you know after I've got something there. He's never been in City Hall. And he's sort of like Mark Mallory in that sense, because Mark was never in City Hall: he was in the state legislature in the Ohio house. He got elected, basically as an outsider who was going to come in and clear up the chaos and wasn't part of any of this. But I do know. And by the way, if anybody has any questions or any comments or anything like that, do not hesitate to jump in. Because If you let me go on, I’ll keep going.
Questioner:I have a question about the transition team. Okay, what your thoughts are on that.
Howard: Well, that's a unique thing too I don't recall. I've been around City Hall since 1982. I don't recall any other incoming mayor, even in the in this era of stronger mayors, who actually had a formal transition. And I think it was pretty smart because of the people that he chose, he chose. Mark Mallory, who was sort of his mentor--Mallory endorsing very early in the process and was very instrumental in talking after—saying, hey you can do this because I've had some doubts whether or not he was ready for this. And Mark’s saying now you can do this, I did it, you can. Then you have Stephanie Jones, who is a brilliant lawyer and the daughter of late judge in the family of judges. But she's a vice presidential candidate. And she knows how the process works, and she knows how the city works. This is her hometown. And she can speak: she obviously represents the African American community well. And she and her father are two of the most respected people around. And then you had the former Children's Hospital president, Michael Fisher. And I think a lot of business people in the city looked at it and kind of said ,well I don't know about this guy. Michael Fisher is the kind of person who can sell that to the business community. They listened to him, their respectful of him. So I thought, really I thought that was like a stroke of genius to actually have a real transition to somebody that you could talk to. When Cranley came in, the only two people they really talked to a lot were Tom and Charlie Lukon. That was where he got his most of his advice. And that's fine: those are two smart guys, but Aftab had to have was to broaden that out: he’s trying to reach other people. He's trying to reach other people. And that can only rebound in his benefit. In the long run, because they're not going to be just advising him up until the time he’s sworn in. They’ll be advising him in the years to come.
Questioner: How are the people we're talking about-- the new council is sort of a change, and their conduct and maybe manners. Do you see that actually happening or do you see the power issues coming up between these people?
Howard: Those who are actually elected seem to get along very well--every last one of them every last one of them: we talked to all of them. So, no, no, we don't want any more of this backbiting and infighting. They didn't want things like that used to be--Smitherman and seven we're at each other's throats, every man. I don't think you're going to see that. If you're going to see a more collegial city council, it doesn't mean they're going to agree on everything. That'd be ridiculous. But they're not going to be grandstanding, and people who are trying to, because you look at them: I don't think most of them have any real ambitions, beyond City Council, possibly Mayor someday or whatever; but for the most part I think they're doing this for the right reasons. And I think it will be a better atmosphere. And so the council should be a lot of that going back to Jan Michelle. She can kind of orchestrate if disagreements come up, somebody's got to be the arbiter; and she can be the one who sits them down and says, okay, you work this out: let's find a common ground,and let's just get things done, instead of just fighting and arguing about the law, because that's been the problem.
Questioner: My question is about that. From my perspective, when I looked at places where the new council lives, it seems to me that there's more working class representation, more and more of the council members are from neighborhoods that typically don't have a council member. Is that true or is that just my perspective?
Howard: No, I think it's true to a certain extent. They've always been kind of concentrated over here—I’m sitting in Clifton right now--Cliftonville one of the places I park now. Look at what you've got--somebody like Jeff Cramerding. He's a Westwood guy been very active west side and politics and development issues over the years. You've got people who are from other places. It's a more representative group I think than we've had in most years. We've had people in the past when Todd Portune [called the shots?]. We're not just all concentrated on the east side of the city. But it's tough for the west side to get around and back a candidate as they did in the case of Cramerding; but Cramerding also had a lot of support in these East Side neighborhoods because he's worked everywhere. He's worked on charter campaigns; he's worked on democratic campaigns. He knows everybody in politics city wide. But he is a Westsider.
Questioner: And one other thing that’s mysterious maybe you can help me understand it is Meeka Owens: I didn't find her background very impressive. She is unknown, and yet she came in fourth.
Howard: here's the thing about Meeka: I've known her for some time. She wasn't known widely to the public. She was very widely known in political circles. She's been very active in campaigns. She had a lot of ties to Aftab’s people. And then, if you add that to the slate card and endorsement factor--the sample ballot factor. People were just going in and voting for whatever names they saw on that sample ballot and Meeka was one of them, and Scotty Johnson was one, Jeffries was one on down the list. It could have been anybody. But I think the voters were looking at [the sample ballot]/ It was so confused--35 candidates! Who could possibly? We had profiles on our website of every last one of them with positions on issues. And people were looking at it, but it was just so hard to sort out.
Questioner: One of the things that I found very confusing was these unknown candidates getting the endorsement. What's your insight into that?
Howard: It was my fear. There were a lot of them who got the endorsement because they were on board-- the transit valid issue. People who were not did not get the endorsement. T was a lot of inside politics. I think Cranley had a large role to play--behind the Scenes of who was going to get an endorsement who was not. And it ended up to be pretty much a slate the people who are friendly to John Cranley. Some also had ties to people like Mark Mallory. Scotty Johnson got elected, and Scotty Johnson used a police officer, and he used to be Mark Mallory's body guard when Mark was mayor. He needed a bodyguard, and Scotty was with him everywhere he went in public, even to lunch. And he had obviously Mark’s support. So there were a lot of internal politics in the democratic nominating process .
Questioner: I had my questions about it and I frankly could not get any sensible answers. Out of the leaders of that endorsement process, which were basically Ann Sessler, and Crystal Brian [?]. So I have I haven't any follow up on that dirt. What can we-- I found it very disturbing. And I would like to have someone with some inside knowledge about this, or at least some political understanding what can we do to make this process more transparent next time? How can we engage the right people to make sure that doesn't happen again?
Howard: Well, it's obviously an internal Democratic Party matter. These rules are put together by the Central Committee. I don't know how many of you are precinct executives by I suspect a number of you are. And if you are, then you have to get involved and at that level. When they start making the rules for the signs [?] because they in this case--the rules-- they were like moving the goalposts and the football kept changing. And I think if there were a strong central committee presence…So no, we got to be fair to everybody we got to listen to every candidate. We’ve got to be fair to everybody; we’ve got to listen to every candidate. Some Democratic candidates who were legitimate people, not just some guy off the street, who couldn't even get an interview. Anybody who's connected with a CFT (Cincinnati Federation of Teachers) was out. They had no chance whatsoever. And that wasn't fair. And that cost Michelle Dillingham election to the city council. She ended up 10th again. But if she had been on it, if she had been on that ballot on that sample ballot. I can guarantee, she would be on city council now.
Questioner: What does the Federation of Teachers have to do it?
Howard: because of their position on the transit levy
Questioner: When it comes down to stuff like that, can you repeat that I missed that their position on what on the transit levy the metro.
Howard: It gets down to those petty things that used to be current politics for a very long time and Democrats didn't mind fighting with each other over it. But at the end of the day, they would put it aside and say, Okay, well, the most important thing is we want. But now they're getting into this almost republican-like ideological purity, that if you oppose something that the majority favors, then you're out, you're done, you're finished.
Questioner: And I heard I heard a similar sort of discussion about not taking the charter endorsing people.
Howard: That's right. And then, that this might be cutting off their nose in spite of their face. Well, it was to certain extent. What's the harm in taking a charter committee endorsement? Liz Keating did, and she's going to be on Council. But in a different election that might have had more impact. When you have these 35 candidates running madcap around the city, trying to attract attention to themselves, and if you have a low turnout and a sign to follow--and the sign was the sample ballot... There was only one of their endorsed candidates who didn't make it. He was probably the weakest of all. Absolutely. Yeah, by far, and people were discerning enough. I think Democratic voters were discerning enough to say, hey, these are not this guy.And so he fell off the map. And then the other thing they did, and you might have noticed this with charter--they had people like Jim Tarbell and Kevin Flynn, why obviously have been on Council, that are well known names, and they didn't come anywhere close to it. And to me what happened there were two things. You got a whole new generation of voters who are coming on, who really don't care about their resume. And they don't even know who Jim Tarbell is except a big four story painting on the side of a building and override and Jim and Flynn really didn't work, didn't do much campaigning. You never saw them; you never heard from them. They just waited for the voters to come to that question.
Questioner: Well, this is a little bit off the subject of what we're now talking about. But these counselors--some of them, you wonder what will they be doing, what kind of jobs, will they have. Iwonder if you would remind us. When was it that we gave up district candidates where each area of the city would elect your own counciler. And to me that is a wonderful idea. I don't know the history of it here. I remember being very mad when we had these terrible landslides in our neighborhood--mudslides destroyed even a home, and we couldn't get any attention about it. It took forever. And we don't have anybody who tells you that we do.
Howard: that horse left the barn in 1925 when the charter was adopted, and we went to a council manager form of government. We have had people like to the council at large ever since. Now there have been several attempts to go to a combined district at large system, but they've all failed. And the reasons they fail is that who draws the disctricts, what is dropped, who makes up the business? And nobody can ever agree of that. Combined district at large system makes sense. But you'd have to have a real fair process in place to draw the maps. Otherwise one party would just roll over the other, or individuals could just roll over others.
I don't see it happening anytime soon. But there is a group out there, made up of Democrats, charter rights, and Republicans who are still beating the drum for combined district at large system, and even some expanding Council.
Questioner: Well, Howard, I so appreciate your coming when I hear you're coming, I just get so excited I wish you visit us more often. I'm going to try to figure out how to get your column.
Howard: Very easy, wvxu.org.
Questioner: I have a bad attitude about the dems and how they pick people because I'm a Brian Gary and Michelle Dillingham fan back with that so wrong. Even if they would just endorse 15 or something, give people more, you know chance to win I just hate that I'm glad you address that. Thank you.
Howars: You know what the problem with endorsing more than nine? There are political party, and they want to maintain control. They did this several years ago; they endorsed, and people looked at it and said, “So what are we supposed to do?” Because you can't vote for that. You vote for 10 your ballot gets thrown out. So, they are going to maintain this. The party does what they want to do. They're never going to endorse more than nine candidates for city council. But I think, as I said earlier, if the next time around they construct a process for going through interviews and endorsements that is more fair to everybody, then maybe you'll see a slate of nine candidates that's a little more diverse in terms of their opinions on issues.
Questioner: I have another question about the charter, what's the point of it at this point?
Howard: I don't, know. We've got to be governed by something other than state law. This is a charter, the committee or whatever they are that endorsed candidates. Well they always get mad at me because I call them a political party. If you endorse candidates for election, and in my definition that's a political party--walks like a duck quacks like a duck.
Questioner: What's their purpose?
Howard: Well, they had high hopes for this election because of all the problems of corruption at City Hall--the three council members guided off by the feds, another one indicted by the state. And they came around, and they said look we were the people who in the 1920s ended the corrupt rule of the political bosses, and put a charter with a council manager form of government in place, and they were pointing to themselves. saying we did it once, and now we can do it again. And that's why they built a slate of candidates. But the problem was only one of those candidates was kind of liked, and that one wasn't really a charter person--she was a Republican,.Liz Keating. All the rest of them failed. So now they're at a crossroads. I think they've got to figure out okay what is we're supposed to be doing here. People aren't listening to us, at a time when there was severe problems with corruption in City Hall, and voters weren't listening to us. And then what is our purpose? So I think that's something that they have to work out. And they better do it. But I've said that over the years; I've written many many stories, many columns, about the demise of charter. But it's still here.
Questioner: I have a question and if you're concerned at all that there are no guardrails to sort of help the Council or city administration about their agenda since there's only maybe one opposing voice.
Howard: Well that could be a concern. But that's what the voters wanted. They wanted a majority of Democrats on city council and they got it. And, and two years from now, if they don't feel like that that group has fulfilled its promises, or done anything significant. We can throw them out.
Questioner: I just wanted to make an observation from the actual voting day because I was at a place where I our voting place had both the city and Springfield Township, because I'm from Edgemont: we are not city. And then there was the city there with all the fellow Democratic candidates. But there was one person who showed up in person and it was Miss Keating, and there was one Republican [compared] to democratic people, handing out the Democratic ticket. And then there was Miss Keating handing out something for her. And I was there from 730 in the morning to whenever it was night. We were doing council members and just city things. We had like seven things we had to vote for. I was very small. And we did do city council, city school board, we did this. The rest of it with that was Keating; she was very present.
12:45:38 I met all of this democratic stuff, there was this one Republican who was there with her stuff. And she was there because they do pretty good research on this, and the numbers: they know where to go to get some support.
Howard: I vote here in the Clifton Annunciation church and the gym. And there were no less than eight out in front of my polling place on election day. And they were all handing the literature. And I had stuff coming out my coat pockets. I couldn't keep all the stuff I knew exactly what was going on. I really didn't need their help, but it was just like one after the other. And that was a very heavily democratic presence. Every last one of them that I saw there was a Democrat. I'll take that back--there was somebody passing out something for Kevin. And then it was mostly candidates.
Questioner: One of the touchy issues when we were interviewing candidates was the income tax. It seems that anything that's going to be accomplished by the City Council requires raising it but they were obviously scared of the business community which hates the idea. I'm just curious if you think there'll be some serious movement on that with this strong Democratic majority. For the candidates it was like it was like a third rail thing we don't want to talk about. But it's so low. So many of the positive things that people said they would just depend upon the city having much more income.
Howard: You're right. The only good news there is that, aside from the earnings tax the city now in the last few years, or particularly this year is starting to draw on other resources. The feds just walked into the city, and gave the city of Cincinnati $50 million for policing. That's a lot money. And there's also stimulus money. There's also money that was going to come in from the infrastructure bill. And I think that should ease the pressure, a little bit—a considerable bit for city council, and they may not be put in the position to always be raising the earnings tax, because these state and federal sources of money are starting to roll in. Now sometimes that's a good thing and sometimes that's a bad thing because there are strings attached--but you have to spend a certain way in order to get it, but I think you're right, there's earning taxes are not going back. You know they're going to go up. The pandemic hit the city very hard like every city in America. But they do have, as I say, some other sources of revenue, they can turn to.
Questioner: I just wanted to ask you about the relationship between Council and the business community. Cranley was so pro-business--very pro business. Those Democrats, that this group, I don't know how pro-business they're going to be. You're saying Aftab gets along well with them. That's good. The business community seems to be the shadow government here. And I'm wondering if you think this group is strong enough not to just get sucked into—"they're going to support my campaign so I got to do what they want me to. They're promising a lot of stuff the business may not like--like some of the tax abatements changing, that kind of thing.
Howard: That's an interesting question, and I kind of have a different perspective on it.
I think that the business community in the city while still very powerful has been losing its power in recent years, because there are too many other voices out there that have to be heard. The business community when I first came here and started covering Cincinnati politics in the 80s and the 90s were the ones who called the shots. Now, that generation is pretty much gone. And there are other business leaders who are younger and more attuned to the kind of development that we've seen like from free CDC. They're the powers. That's the power these days. It was interesting to note that the first meeting that Aftab Pureval had after being elected was a breakfast type thing with the Cincinnati USA Regional Chamber. Because he knows. And he's got to talk to those folks, because they can do much good in this community. And that's why he has, as I said earlier, Michael Fisher on his transition, because Michael can talk to those folks, and they listened to him. And he can tell them this guy is not your enemy If you work with him. But you're not going to get everything you want. You're just not going to get everything you want because urban politics in America in this day and age doesn't work that way.
Questioner: What will he be able to do? Do you think housing? I think that's one of the areas where he may be most effective.
Howard: He already has a supportive Council. A majority of the, the Council ran on those issues. And trying to move more resources into affordable housing--he's promised that. And David Mann did too. But David Mann made the argument, well we've already done it. Well we did do a lot but not enough. Every last one of those council candidates, even Liz Keating, were elected, campaigned on affordable housing and trying to fix those problems and trying to get more affordable housing into the city, because you just have to, we can't we can't go on the way we're been going on. The ballot issue I think was kind of ridiculous because it said it was like taking $50 million a year of general fund and putting it in housing for a while. That's not the way you do it. You find other sources of money. And there was a story the other day that there are millions of dollars that have been pledged to affordable housing in Cincinnati by private interests. That's where you put together the coalition with the private sector and the public sector to fix a problem. And I think there's the will on council now--this new council--to do that.
Here they hope the people need to have a place to live. And we've got thousands who do not.
Questioner: I wanted to ask a little bit about the gerrymandering and before we get out of here so we are the victims. here, particularly in the congressional redistricting. There is no reason on Earth why Hamilton County should be split into three different congressional districts. And that's what the Republicans have proposed.
Howard: Now that's going to be fought in court--efore the Ohio Supreme Court. But what one of the things that they did, which I thought was just outrageous and probably a violation of the 1965 Voting Rights Act was they took several communities--Forest Park, Lincoln Heights, Springfield Township Springdale, all of whom have substantial black populations- about 30,000 black folks living in those areas. They took those people, carved them out of Chabot’s District and put them in the district of Warren Davis from Troy high school, a heavily republican white district.; And those 30,000 black folks in Hamilton County, who are the ones Republicans want to put in Warren Davidson's district. They're basically disenfranchised. You talk about not being able to get a congressman to return your phone calls, those people will never hear from Warren Davis. And to me, that is the kind of thing not only the constitution, but the federal Voting Rights Act prohibits. You can’t dilute voters’ influence based on race. You just can't. And that's what's happened here. Can we still have this ridiculous land bridge from Hamilton County up to Warren County to save Steve Chabot? But one of the things that happened--this happened just this morning, Frank Rose, Republican Secretary of State, was here in Cincinnati. And one of the things he said was that we have got to expedite these cases before they will go to Supreme Court. Because right now, there's no Democrat in their right mind who would say I'm going to run against Steve Chabo. Because we don't know what the district's going to end up looking like. They need to know what the district. It's a mess. It really is.
Questioner: Do you have any faith in the Supreme Court?
Howard: Yes. I'll tell you why. There's four Republicans three Democrats on the Supreme Court. However, Maureen O’Connor, the Chief Justice, has spoken out many times against Gerrymandering by Democrats or Republicans. She doesn't care who wins, but she doesn't like it. And I could see a scenario where she ends up voting with the three Democrats: just send these maps back to the legislature and let the democrats win. And it doesn't matter what path De Wine takes: De Wine refuses to recuse himself. But it wouldn't matter if Maureen O’Connor sides with a democrat so I think there's a decent chance that these things will happen again.
Moderator: We really appreciate you coming Howard and bringing your views and your analysis is very important to us. Thank you for being with us. Howard you are wonderful.
Thank you for being with us Howard you are wonderful.

https://www.cincinnati.com/story/opinion/2021/08/25/opinion-issue-3-pitted-working-poor-people-against-each-other/8200887002/
Opinion: Issue 3 pitted working, poor people against each other
I was a vocal supporter of Issue 3, the Affordable Housing Trust Fund amendment to the city charter. I trusted the people behind it and supported their campaign to fund affordable housing. After ...

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Cincinnati's Office of Environment and Sustainability has partnered with Solar United Neighbors (a national non-profit) to set up a solar coop in Cincinnati. Signing up is not a commitment to purchase and install but to find out more information and costs nothing to join. There are a number of benefits in having a coop--bulk buying, quality installation, participate in selection of installer, trusted results. There are 22 coops in Ohio already and this will be number 23. There are info sessions: 6 PM on 2/25, 3/3 or 3/9. So, if you have been thinking about solar this is a good time to look closer. For those outside of the city there is still a way to participate. Check out the web site here.

Enthusiastic Recommendation:
There is an outstanding documentary called The Social Dilemma. If you have not seen it, it explains the tech industry effect on us and our children by hijacking social norms, and jeopardizing truth in our democracy. It is also addicting for some people and has affecting the mental health of pre-teens and teens. The top people who founded the current tech industry have come together to express their concern that it is out of control and how it is influencing how people think, without their realizing it. A must see and please share. It takes 90 minutes on Netflix and is highly reviewed.

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• Call your state representatives to support HOUSE BILL 560: Universal Vote by Mail
• Zak with Americans for Prosperity: Ohio is #2 in the nation for opioid deaths and our rehabilitation through incarceration policy has failed. Please follow the link to encourage your legislator to vote"Yes"on Senate Bill 3 this week and stop treating first-time possession offenses as a life sentence.
https://americansforprosperity.ivolunteers.com/ContactOfficials/Giving-Ohioans-a-second-chance
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