So Apparently There Was Another Elephant War and Apparently It Is Over

The ABJ carries the story today of local GOP Chair Alex Arshinkoff being unanimously reelected. The story suggests that there was another New Summit County Republicans attempt to win enough central committee seats to vote him out, but the effort stalled in February.

It is difficult at this remove to see exactly what the point is. In the first Elephant War, Arshinkoff's opponents could point to a few bad cycles, but the Republicans pretty much cleaned up in 2009, winning two Akron Muni judgeships over appointed incumbents and the Barberton Muni clerkship. Summit is a Democratic county, so winning positions like this has always been the measuring stick for the party's success.

The once well-populated New Summit Republicans website has devolved into a political blog that is A) a mess to navigate and B) exceedingly nasty even by the adjusted metric for evaluating right wing political blogs. With regard to Arshinkoff himself, the only substantive attack is the rehashed charge that he keeps losing, notwithstanding his recent successes. Aside from that, it's all fat jokes and gay slurs. Classy.

Bottom line, Arshinkoff knows how to win in unfriendly territory and how to rake in piles of cash. As long as both things are true, he is an effective party chair. As a Democrat, I'd be happy to see him replaced but it's not happening any time soon.

* * *

So it's time for another of my pathetic comeback attempts. Once again something happened that took me out of the game -- computer issues this time -- and once again the loss of momentum made it ridiculously difficult to get back in. The other stuff on my plate has been mostly cleared away, so hopefully more blogging from here out.

On Akron's New Transparency (By Request)

Jill asks about the back story of this ABJ story last week. The city of Akron is posting regular daily updates of income tax receipts. I have some things to say about a few comments from the interweb now that I'm back on top of things. Might as well start with a friendly one.

This is happening because of a) the fiscal crisis every city is experiencing b) the deep distrust of the Mayor on the part of the public safety unions and c) the highly vocal anti-Plusquellic minority.

It goes like this. Because tax receipts are way down, the city has to make deep cuts. Ultimately those cuts include laying off a number of firefighters. No one is happy about this. We who live in the city really want to have confidence that our houses won't burn down. But a deficit is a deficit.

As unhappy as the residents are, the firefighters are extremely unhappy, and they accuse the administration of not doing everything they can to prevent the layoffs. The antipathy between the Mayor and union leadership cannot be exaggerated. They actually believe he would endanger residents in order to screw over the union.

The debate has taken on a surreal turn as the Mayor's various antagonists have claimed that the administration isn't forthcoming about the city's finances. This echoes the debate throughout the recall effort. Every time the Mayor would answer a charge about city finances, his critics would move the goal posts again.

Jill ventures into the dark place of madness and despair that is the Trollhio.com comments section. Needless to say the denizens are unimpressed. Jill is right about the limited capacity of regular folks to objectively interpret information like that being posted. What the posting does offer is the Mayor's critics the opportunity to find someone who does have the chops and have at it.

Not that they will. It's far more enjoyable to just sit back and bitch. Hell, a certain Akron attorney has practically made a career of it.

Deeper Meaning in Akron Primary Results: Ward 8

Ward 8

First off, since posting last night I've been confronted with evidence that my assessment of Sandra Kurt's volunteer corps was off. I was out of town over the weekend and apparently they made themselves known with canvassing and live calling. Hers was the only campaign we got a live call from. She also had plenty of money and hit the mail hard as Redhorse notes in comments to my last post. On the other hand, I could have papered a room with the mailers from Bolden and Padilla as well. In the end, an appealing message plus lots of shoe leather worked.

And the result was an overwhelming victory. In a five-way race (OK, one candidate managed 37 votes, but still) she garnered almost half the total votes.

In a way Sandra's victory is a victory for identity politics. In the post-racial age of Obama, we're supposedly beyond voting based on group identification. But Sandra wasn't afraid to say that she is part of constituency that is very important in Akron politics but long neglected on Council.

I'm talking, of course, about engineers. Sandra's victory is a victory for Engineering-Americans everywhere.

OK seriously. Her identification of her profession with her problem-solving approach was a nice bit of messaging. It also had the happy effect of making her candidacy about her being a good candidate, not about prospectively being the first openly gay member of Council. This could be the way identity plays in politics. Identity motivates a base and members of the community rightly take pride in milestones. But the candidacy itself is judged on merits, not trail-blazing. Identity is more of a sidebar than the story.

Not to say this will be a seamless transition. For example, the picture accompanying the Ohio.com story is captioned "Sandra Kurt (right) laughs with volunteer Tina Jarosch (left) and campaign manager Shelley McConnell as they celebrate Kurt's victory" Well, OK Tina certainly volunteered, but she is also Sandra's spouse -- at least in eyes of the State of Iowa. Did the ABJ just miss that? Hard to imagine the paper not learning the spouse of a straight candidate to avoid a similar mistake. Did they take into account the fact that the State of Ohio doesn't recognize the marriage? And if so, is that a proper stance for the paper to take?

I don't mean to say that ABJ is bad, bad, bad. Just acknowledging that the media will have a learning curve when covering officials who are not only out, but also either married or civilly united.

Meanwhile, there were other candidates in the field. I hope we haven't heard the last of Bruce Bolden and Will Padilla. Both are good guys with solid credentials and a real desire for public service. Unfortunately, there was room for only one at the top.

I also hope that Raymond House will take from his experience some knowledge or real-world governance. His time on Council was pretty much a rumor to those of us living in the ward. If he had reached out to constituents early and maintained contact during the campaign, he likely would have gotten the nomination -- he certainly wouldn't have finished third out of five. It's hard for academics to appreciate the importance of retail politics. Hopefully Cox has learned it, if too late.

Linkage: WKSU story here. ANN, including interview w/Sandra here. Official canvass at BoE here.

Rambling Thoughts on Primary Night

Here in Akron we have primaries going for City Council races. While flocks of candidates crowd the ballot, the election actually made only moderate noise, at least in my ward. Raymond Cox sent out a couple of mailers -- and that's pretty much it. A commenter some time ago went off on what a great asset he is to Council. In terms of knowledge, sure. In terms of any kind of constituent contact whatsoever, not so much. Three other candidates burned plenty of shoe leather canvassing. There have been no Ray Cox sightings, at least not by reliable witnesses.

Incumbency certainly means something, but the race I think comes down to Sandra Kurt vs. Bruce Bolden vs. Will Padilla. All three have great qualifications and any one would be a fine representative for the ward. (For that matter, Cox isn't bad, it's just that he doesn't do much and he certainly won't let us know if he does.) I expected a bigger canvassing push from Sandra. She did plenty of work, but I expected more volunteers. Padilla and Bolden did the same. I have no idea how this will turn out.

Unlike Ward 8, the At Large race results will Mean Something. This race, more than the recall, will measure the continuing viability of the Mayor's brand. The lopsided recall result was certainly in part a vote against recalling a mayor absent malfeasance. With three candidates running on a pro-Mayor slate and two competing slates promising to be less Plusquellic-friendly, this race is much more of a test. The administration took some grief when they announced budget shortfalls just after the recall election. Tonight will tell just how badly the Mayor's stock has slipped as a result.

The real surprise this cycle has been the pretty much stillborn campaign of Kelly Mendenhall -- no signs, no mailers, no voter contact I've heard of). Recall that Joe Finley spoke out against the recall, so his slate isn't necessarily alligned with the recall folks (though Citizens for Akron would have you believe differently.) Kelly Mendenhall therefore is the only candidate running under the Team Mulligan banner. Her lackluster campaign suggests that she attracted as much donor interest as the recall did.

Turnout is reported to be light, which isn't a surprise. Things were very quiet at my polling place which houses four precincts.

AkronNewsNow will be the best place for up-to-date results, though I'm disappointed they aren't streaming video tonight.

What Kind of Democracy, Indeed?

Some time ago, in response to my post endorsing Sandra Kurt for City Council, a commenter posted:

What kind of a Democracy is it that allows 15 Democrat PC's win the endorsement of the entire Democratic Party?

Wayne in Akron revisted the point with a link to an Eric Mansfield post.

Not for want of trying, I'm having a tough time getting lathered about this. And I think it's not just because a friend of mine has benefited from the process.

The question presented is what sort of criteria the party should have for endorsing a candidate. It shouldn't be a big surprise that at least one criterion is service to the party. As an organization the party wants people who will be loyal soldiers. This shouldn't be a surprise to anyone. It's like saying "OMG, the Dem House Caucus endorsed all the incumbents!!"

I'm no stranger to criticizing the local party and it's leadership. But in a way I think the fact that Precinct Chairs have gotten endorsements is a potentially more democratic result, given that the Chairs themselves are elected unless no one runs in which case they are appointed. SCPD caused a stir some years back by running in as many PC races as they could. The party establishment wasn't exactly thrilled when a bunch of them won. They didn't take over, but it did highlight at least one way regular folks could demand change within the party.

And by the way it was her involvement in that sort of grassroots insurgency that brough Sandra Kurt to the attention of the party leadership. To their credit they embraced her, her energy and the important constituency she represents. Given some of the other, very fine candidates in Ward 8, Sandra certainly wasn't the "safest" choice, PC or not.

At any rate, in response to the question posed, what kind of democracy is it? A representative one. If you don't like what elected representatives do, you vote them out. But it's rarely a direct democracy. Happily, it's only an endorsement. What really matters is who gets the votes next week.

City Council Website Updates

While I was out a number of campaign websites went live. OK Kelli Crawford's has been up awhile, but I'm just getting around to updating the sidebar. Anyway, the sidebar is up to date with respect to the campaigns that have contacted me, plus some candidates I have run across. I'm including Facebook groups for those candidates for whom such a group is the only web presence.

I have to say that the project has been made more difficult by the surprising number of candidates who share names with people just that much more famous that Akron politicians.

Search for Joe Finley and the results are swamped by coverage of an NHL hopeful from the University of North Dakota. Ward 8 candidate Bruce Bolden (who still doesn't have a web presence, apparently) shares a name with an Australian basketball player. Search for John Conti and you get lots of hits for John Conti Coffee.

Happily Kelli Crawford is holding her own against Australian kid show performer and mens mag model (!?) Kellie Crawford. And happily I found Mike Williams before needing to Google him.

I'll keep picking at this, but needless to say, if you are working on a campaign with a website, the best way to make sure the site is on the roll is to drop me an email. (Thanks, e.g. to the DiLauro campaign who hit me today.)

I would note that I haven't heard from any Republican candidates and have only found one so far. I'd especially like to see/hear from any R's making a run to break the current hegemony on Council.

Akron Candidates Roll Is Up

As promised I've added a list of candidates with websites at left (third list down.) After my last post about the races I've been contacted by Will Padilla who is running in the crowded Ward 8 primary (site of the House of Pho) and Lisa Mansfield who is running for school board.

Will Padilla has a nice site up and a fine looking resume. It will be hard to make headway in such a crowded field, but he will be someone to watch in the future.

Lisa Mansfield also has a Friends of group on Facebook and is twittering -- you can find those links on the website/blog which is a work in progress.

As the season wears on and sites go live I'll add to the list. I check every once in a while but someone who wants to be added should drop a line to be sure.

Jeff Fusco Is Canvassing

Count City Council at-large candidate (and Citizens for Akron Treasurer) Jeff Fusco among those getting a jump on the very very crowded field for Council this year. I didn't see him in my neighborhood but got a flier stuck in my door. Fusco is one of three at-large candidates, along with Terry Albanese and Jim Shealey, whom Mayor Plusquellic is endorsing in the race.

I've been scrying the internets for council campaign sites. Fusco is one of the few I've found. I'll start a roll at left for them. Fusco is simply using Blogger as a platform for his site, but is keeping the blog updated (ahem, Sandra Kurt). Bare bones to be sure -- he didn't even spring for a non-blogspot url. But it still puts him well ahead of the pack in terms of web presence.

At large incumbent Jim Shealey has a personal webpage up -- one that got him some criticism when he linked to it on his Council page. It's not exactly a campaign website but not exactly not either.

I have three or four projects in mind for the blog this summer. Sifting through the Council candidates is one of them. If you know a candidate -- or are a candidate -- feel free to touch base.

City Council: Finley's Slate

Last Thursday the latest salvo in the battle for the soul of Akron began as Joe Finley announced his slate for City Council. Finley is styling his slate "Democrats for Reform," though as the ABJ points out, he hasn't been specific about what needs reform and what these guys plan to do about it.

Here's the Finley slate:

Ward 2: Bruce Kilby (incumbent)Ward 3: Jan David (vs. Marco Summerville - good luck with that)
Ward 5: Willis Smith (v. Kenneth Jones)
Ward 6: Wayne Kartler (open seat -- Terry Albanese is vacating to run at-large)
Ward 7: Dave Reymann (v. Tina Merlitti)
Ward 10: Jay Moore (v. Kelli Crawford)
At-large: Joe Finley

Say this for Finley -- he's not shy about going after hard targets. On the other hand, he does seem to trying to distance himself from Team Mullligan. From the ABJ post-recall story:

Plusquellic accused Finley of being in league with those behind the recall, noting that Finley appears in a photograph from one of the group's early meetings. He said Finley's slate is the ''same group'' at the ''same time'' who will use the ''same tactics.''

Finley, who along with his ally, Ward 2 Councilman Bruce Kilby, came out against the recall in late March, acknowledged he attended one of the pro-recall group's early meetings. But, he said, he didn't circulate petitions or otherwise help the effort.

Hmm. Yes he came out against the recall. But according to the ABJ the bulk of the Democrats for Reform worked on the recall. And Joe himself joined all three pro-recall Facebook groups. I certainly understand Finley not wanting to be associated with the toxic asset that Mendenhall has become, but he probably should have thought of that sooner.

As of now, the Finley slate has no web presence, so it's pretty much impossible to know what exactly they are proposing aside from being unfriendly to the Mayor. During the Mayoral primary, Finley seemed to have no position other than the opposite of whatever Plusquellic said, and he famously doesn't have much of a record as a Councilman. His main claim to fame at this point is having come closer than expected to winning the micro-turnout primary in 2007 (then getting horsewhipped in his run at Russ Pry for County Executive). If he wants to be something more than a drag on his slate-mates, he needs to come up with some specific policy goals.

And for God's sake, can he run without bashing the city he wants to serve? Nothing irked me more during that primary than his constant poormouthing of Akron and its prospects. The same thing happened in the recall election. Akron is challenged by economic forces not under anyone's control, but it's better postioned for the Twenty-First Century economy than any other city in the region. Candidates who fail to acknowledge this fact do themselves and the people whose votes they court a disservice.

Recall Roundup

Briefcase Radical called it before the polls closed, but like everyone else, he low-balled the final tally. Fem Dem has a brief post-election post up.

Ohio dot com has full coverage. Some, but not all, of the anti-Plusquellic comment trolls are out. The loudest appear to be keeping their heads down today. BTW, Ohio.com's breaking story about the election posted around 9:20 last night after they called it. I suppose being a source for real-time updates isn't going to make or break ABJ but it's worth noting that ANN owns them on this score as of now.

For their part, ANN has audio of the Mayor's victory speech, audio and video of his remarks to reporters and some snippets from Mendenhall.

Cleveland Magazine's politics blog saw it ultimately as a contest between Chrissie Hynde and Miss Tia. This sort of thing will happen when you let a lifestyle magazine carry a politics blog.

As noted in comments in the last post, CAN lost in every ward, in every precinct. Think about that. The recall effort couldn't even win a ward in Ellet, which to this day resents having been annexed into Akron two generations ago. You can find that official canvas here.

Whither Akron?

So now it's time to ponder what all this means. Contrary to what the recall supporters say, the only messages they sent is that there aren't very many of them and they don't learn very quickly. The conventional wisdom was that the actual election result would be about ten percent worse for the mayor than the actual sympathies of the population, given the motivation gap. Given the final tally, it probably isn't that high, but when you start with a 3:1 split it doesn't have to be. Fact is, the people who think the administration is bad enough to be run out midterm constitute a fairly thin group.

That said, we need to have a sensible loyal opposition in this city. Akron has been proactive in bringing and retaining business. That means it has funded improvements, granted tax breaks, cofunded ventures and otherwise spent a great deal of tax money. While I won't pretend to believe that it's all lily-white, it's damned impressive to see the combination of robust spending on business development and political hegemony hasn't bread a patently, undeniably corrupt administration. Nonetheless, with temptations abounding, it would be good to see some division of government to provide checks and balances.

Unfortunately we don't have a sensible loyal opposition. A sensible loyal opposition doesn't bray about restaurant receipts, it doesn't pretend that the city's difficulties are unique to the region, and it doesn't mutter about corruption then resentfully skulk away when people expect, y'know, proof for gawd sake.

Most of all, (pace Akron Watch and the CANCANners) sensible loyal opposition doesn't count all of the spending and none of the benefit. The SLO of which we dream would seriously analyze the benefits of the various projects, acknowledge the ones that work and decry those that don't. By refusing to acknowledge anything positive about either Plusquellic or Akron (Mendenhall's "good heart" comment being a classic damning with faint praise) the pro-recall/anti-Plusquellic forces have painted themselves as untrustworthy hacks.

Going forward it will be interesting to see if they can come up with an actual coherent platform. And no, "The Mayor should play nice with others" isn't such a platform. They will certainly say spend more money on neighborhoods, the problems being a) Akron already spends money on neighborhoods and b) if the city ignores business develepment there won't be any money to spend. When confronted with those problems, expect Mendenbot candidates to do the political equivalent of "Na na na I can't hear you."

So. The city will not be rendered leaderless as a result of this folly. But the recall election hardly puts to rest the challenges the city faces. The Mayor's Office continues to confront those challenges, but will anyone we can trust confront the Mayor's Office?

Following the Recall Results

The best online place to be is Akron News Now which has a live feed from the newsroom. It's kind of cool -- you can see anchor Lindsay McCoy gathering info from online and from the BoE and relaying it to on-air talent. A bit of behind-the-scenes.

One thing we learn from Lindsay is that the online BoE updates are more current than what the reporters at the BoE can get from staff there (having done voter protection duty at BoE, it's not surprising. At this time of night, the main BoE office is essentially vacant as everyone is in back processing the ballots.) As such, you can keep an eye on the BoE page by loading it and refreshing it every couple of minutes.

As of now (around 8:30) the Board shows 48% reporting, the results are 76.85 against the recall to 23.15 for. The trend line has been slightly toward narrowing that enormous gap. At around 8 the first 12 percent of precints showed an 80/20 split.

UPDATE 8:36 56% in, still 3-1 advantage for Plusquellic. ANN is calling it against the recall. Fascinating to see how manifestly unscientific the "call" decision is. Also, ANN is Twittering the results under hashtag #akronrecall

UPDATE 10:20 It's official -- Change Akron Now got boatraced. 74%-26%. Akron News Now signed off their live feed, but the recall page now features an interview with Mendenhall in which he confirms that his group will try to field candidates in all the city council races and that his wife Kelly is running for council at large. He also whines that he didn't have any money to run the campaign. Of course if people agreed with the recall they would give money, but . . .

Some recall results fun facts:

The received wisdom was that pro-recall voters would certainly vote and that the election would be close if turnout was low. Well turnout was low -- 21% -- and the recall still got crushed. That means either the pro-recall folks weren't significantly more motivated than anyone else (possible) or that there just aren't that many of them (more likely.)

At a total vote of 7325, Team Mulligan didn't even double up the 3800 some-odd valid petition signatures. That is, if everyone who signed the petition voted and brought a friend to vote, they would have exceeded the total actually garnered by 275 votes.

At 20895 the anti-recall vote is 30% higher than the 15895 he got in the uncontested general election in 2007.

Last Thoughts on Recall Election Day

Mostly, if you haven't already, GO VOTE. The general impression, bolstered by anecdotal evidence and what the anti-recall camp has said about their internal polling, is that a clear majority are against the recall but that the pro-recall voters are fanatical highly motivated. It would really be a shame if the will of the majority were defeated by the zealotry of the minority. Yes it's a beautiful day and all, but GO VOTE. You won't be in their long.

A few other points.

• I was voter number 46 in my Ward 8 precinct. The flow was pretty steady this morning at my polling location which includes two other precincts. That is consistent with the report from Summit BoE that Ward 8 is heaviest, and that Ward 8 voters led in absentee voting. In that last story, Mendenhall acknowledges that Ward 8 is more Plusquellic territory
  
• It's a shame that the recall has cast a shadow on the rare bits of good news Akron has heard in the current climate. For example, the rollout of the downtown wifi zone has been scheduled for June since at least last Fall. But because that prescheduled date happens in proximity of the recall it's dismissed as a political stunt.
  
• That said, the Mayor skipping the the rollout was the political equivalent of Darryl Strawberry acknowledging the Fenway crowd. Hizzoner needs to ignore the bleacher creatures.
• The Team Mulligan campaign has been able to pull off little other than volunteer canvassing. No mailers, no bilboards, no yard signs. But over the weekend someone tried to go online-linkage with FixAkron.com signs. The website is more of the same. (E.g. Akron is losing population (as is every city other than Columbus and Cincy). One interesting aspect -- hanging problems with the Akron Building and Health Departments on the Mayor. But remember how Mendenhall tried to pump up Joe Finley's campaign by claiming that the mayor had a tirade at the Building Dept? And that we found out later that he went off because they were offering lousy service to property developers? And that in fact that same building dept was put on probation by the state? Same stuff as we've seen this entire campaign.
• Count me among those who grew weary of the anti-recall mailers that demonized Warner Mendenhall. I'm assuming that with a quarter million to play with that stuff was focus-group tested and all, but after the third mailed reminder of Mendenhall's tax delinquency, I was done.
• Having said that, look for a reprise this fall. Mendenhall's "band of radicals" (according to the mailers) will have candidates going in a lot of city council races this fall and I'm guessing their linkage to Mendenhall will be a frequent talking point in the campaigns.
• One interesting feature of this election has been the total radio silence from the local Republican Party. It may be that the Republicans prefer the devil they know. It may be that the rank and file was insufficiently interested in a recall to make it worth putting the party behind the effort. Still, given the past practice of A²cutting deals across the aisle, it's worth keeping in mind going forward that he never put a dog in this fight.

BTW, if you missed the tweet, my absence the last few days was due to technical difficulties. As of now, those difficulties appear resolved.

Now GO VOTE.

Tomorrow in Akron Legal News

My column for tomorrow will answer the question so many of you have been asking (OK, it was one Facebook Friend responding to a Tweet, work with me): what do I think about last week's case about residency requirements for city workers?

The case, Lima v. Ohio, upholds a state law passed a couple of years ago that bans residency requirements. Both Lima and Akron sued to challenge the law under the Ohio Constitution. And lost.

My focus in the article is about the implications of the case for home rule in Ohio. Under the home rule provision in the Constitution, municipalities are afforded some protection against state laws that exist only to limit municipal power (there are other aspects to home rule, but that is the one that generates the most -- and most interesting -- litigation).

At first blush the case looks like it should be an easy one for the cities. But the anti-residency requirement law was passed under a section of the Constitution that grants the General Assembly broad authority to regulate employment for the benefit of workers, and says specifically that no other constitutional provisions can supersede it. The Court broadened the reading of that section, but as precedent it only applies to employment cases, not to other aspects of home rule. It certainly isn't a ruling friendly to home rule, but it's also not a dire as the urban papers made it out to be.

I quote three editorials singing dirges to lament the death of home rule. If you are keeping score at home, 's the PD, here's the LMJ and here's the Blade.

As for what I think of the residency requirements themselves, I think Akron should have gotten rid of ours some time ago. I think we lose more in damage to morale than gain in keeping the employees here. In a time when Ohio cities are shrinking, I understand the impulse, but the best way to keep people in the city is to make the city an attractive place to live.

All that said, I thought the legislature overstepped its bounds banning the practice. It's not the worst insult to home rule of late (that would go to a state law forbidding cities from banning assault weapons.) But whatever the bounds of home rule, local autonomy should be respected.

Norka Notes

A semi-regular round up of news and ephemera about our hometown.

TV on the Internet

AkronNewsNow has started a short Akron News video segment on the website (h/t Eric Mansfield who enthuses about the effort). Today's effort includes one substantive news story (Summit BoE staying open late for early recall voting) one feature (on Temo's Candy) and a sports story about the Aeroes. Given that local TV too often is little more than a parade of burning homes, it's not bad. Ohio.com's video capability has pretty much gone by the wayside since they did a great job with the airdock fire, so it's good someone is picking up the ball.

Changes at CVNP

John Debo, the Cuyahoga Valley National Park Superintendent, is stepping aside after 21 years to head a nonprofit that raises funds to support the park. He presided over the transition from National Recreation Area to National Park, has kept thing together through funding cuts and floods, and maintained what have to be tricky relations with the many many political entities that border the park. Cuyahoga Valley is one of the treasures of the region. Here's hoping we get another able Superintendent to continue the good work.

Goodyear Job Cuts -- It Could Be Plus Mal

Goodyear announced this week it got union approval for 120 job buyouts. Worse news: "The vote clears the way for a possible move of rubber-making production from Akron to Buffalo, N.Y., within two years." But we may be getting let off easy -- Amiens, France is losing 820 jobs.

Another Week, Another National Award

Akron -- where things suck so bad we have to recall the Mayor, you know -- has won another national award. This one is the City Livability Award from the US Conference of Mayors, awarded for the innovative plan to rebuild Akron Public Schools as Community Learning Centers.

DowntownAkron.com Tries Blogging

The Downtown Akron Partnership, the business consortium working to improve and promote downtown business, now has two blogs up. One is the DowntownAkron blog, and the other is about the GO -- for Get out of the Office -- intiative which encourages, well you can figure it out. So far one post each over the past week, but surf by and offer encouragement.

Chryssie Hynde Pretending Again

The Telegraph offers a rare interview with Akron native and entrepreneur Chrissie Hynde as she readies a new Pretenders release and a best of collection. Not much specific about Akron, aside from acknowledging Vegiterranean.

ESPN: Akron Football Is "Soft"

Penn State will host Akron, and for it's effort is being awarded with the title of second-softest non-conference schedule by ESPN columnist Bruce Feldman. According to Feldman, "Akron also is an OK opponent, but is still coming off a 5-7 season." Something to hold onto for the maiden season of InfoCision Stadium.

Mendenhall Grasping at Straws Again

Team Mulligan leader Warner Mendenhall's comment to last week's post about the recall warrants special attention. Quoth he:

My opinion is based on knowledge of the city's current and future liabilities. The expert failed to include about $500 million in liabilities that are coming due--Sewers and Retiree Health Care. When those future, but imminent, debts are accounted for we are bankrupt.

The expert is only as good as the information he is given to review. The input from the City was junk. The expert never called Change Akron Now to become informed about what our concerns are.

The Bond ratings companies are similarly kept in the dark about these liabilities and property values. (the median sale price of houses in Akron fell 50% over last year).

That bit about retirement liabilities didn't sound right. While that's a broadly germane topic, what with Chrysler and GM sinking under legacy costs, local governments in Ohio generally aren't saddled with such costs for retired workers. Local governments are responsible for some contribution into a statewide retirement fund (e.g. the Public Employees Retirement System [PERS], Ohio Police and Fire Pension Fund [OPFPF]; State Teachers Retirement System [STRS]). Once an employee retires, the liability for benefits and health care shifts to whichever fund the employee participates in.

Entertaining the possibility that Mendenhall knows something I don't, I contacted the city and confirmed the above. The city does not have an imminent legacy cost liability.

And so it goes with Team Mulligan. Aside from the conceded fact that the Mayor can be a piece of work, they've been consistently wrong in their critcisms of the city government.

Early Pho Endorsement: Sandra Kurt for City Council

My friend Sandra Kurt is running for City Council in Ward 8. I've known Sandra for a few years now, having met her at Summit County Progressive Dems. Professionally, she's an engineer but off hours she's a tireless advocate for causes she feels passionately about, particularly domestic violence prevention and LGBT issues.

The Ward 8 seat is the one vacated by Bob Keith. Sandra was in the mix for the appointment to replace him, but that appointment ultimately went to Raymond Cox. While Dr. Cox has great academic credentials, I want a fighter on Council.

Bankrupt: The Fundamental Incoherence of the Recall Argument.

The nature of the recall campaign allows each discontented resident to project his particular gripe onto the Mayor. Job losses? Mayor's fault. Money spent retaining or wooing employers? Mayor's fault. Crime? Or "out of control" police? Check and check.

As a result trying to take on the recall argument is no easy task. And it's made harder by the slipperiness of Recaller-in-Chief Warner Mendenhall. The Beacon Journal has been braving the fray and reporting on the major arguments raised by the Warneristas. Two weeks ago the paper examined the Mayor's travel expenses (Yielding Warner's precious "The business of the city is not business" quote). Yesterday the lede was an analysis of the argument that the city's debt load is excessive (the city is "broke" they like to say.) None of this will matter to the hard core of the recall movement, but at least they do not vent their folly in a vacuum.

The bottom line of the ABJ story is that Akron's debt is not out of line with that of similarly situated Midwestern cities. The story could have been better -- I would like to have seen opinions of experts who are more generally hawkish on debt that the CSU prof they rely on. But overall it's a good read.

The major lesson of the article is that not all debt is the same. Much of the $760 million that Team Mulligan goes on about is special obligation debt -- that is, debt incurred with a funding stream already in place to pay for it. The best example of this is the school rebuilding project for which the city has taken out $200 million in debt to be paid for by a voter-approved income tax.
Confronted with evidence that the debt is not crushing the city, Mendenhall shift the subject. The problem, says he, isn't the debt. No, that's not what he's saying at all. It's what we've spent it on:

Mendenhall said Akron should have spent more on neighborhoods, rather than on public improvements to assist projects like the Northside Lofts and a student housing and retail complex being built on South Main Street downtown.

''When you have strong neighborhoods and good housing, this supports the tax base and the schools,'' Mendenhall said. ''The neighborhoods have clearly suffered.''

First and foremost, if that's the argument, it surely is not a recall argument. I might listen to an argument for recalling a Mayor who has recklessly spent a city into bankruptcy. But this amounts to different policy priorities, which is not an appropriate reason for upending an election result.

Second, the city has spent money on neighborhoods. When I first moved to 'Akron in the early 90s we lived in a neighborhood a little dicier than the one we're in now, one in the midst of a city-sponsored street-level upgrade. The city fixed sidewalks, driveway aprons and sewer lines and provided grants to homeowners to bring their houses up to code. This was going on all over the city in "transition neighborhoods" -- basically those that could go either way. Neighborhood level work has limitations in that people will only allow the city to do so much on their private property, but the city does have a history of doing that sort of work.

And of course the AMHA has been revamping housing projects and trying to create mixed-income subsidized housing developments, first in Cascade Village and in now in Edgewood. Not the city per se, but certainly the city has been at that table.

Moreover, the school/community learning center building project is all about neighborhoods. Good schools grow good neighborhoods. A shiny new building isn't the end of school reform, but at least anecdotally the new schools have seen improvements in student and parent morale which can't hurt.

Ultimately a lot of how people feel about the recall comes down to how they feel about Akron. Team Mulligan has been poormouthing the city from the start. I see a city no longer reeling from losing it's one-time manufacturing base and reinventing itself as a tech center. Doing so requires investment, and not just from the private sector. Akron may have debt, but we also have a more discernable future than most of the metro areas in Northeast Ohio.

Recall Catch-Up

With the recall election 15 days away, that will be a focus of this blog in the near term. A few developments from last week deserve attention.

• This week Akron FOP will vote on what stance, if any, to take on the recall. The fact that there is a debate at all is good news for the Mayor. His conflicts with APD and the rank and file's distrust of him is legendary. Personally I think it's a good thing that the two most powerful agents of executive power -- the police and the executive himself -- are not on the same page.
  
• The funniest event was recall face guy Warner Mendenhall declaring that he won't run for Mayor if the recall is successful. The anti-recall messaging has in part focused on him, his tax delinquency, his general nuttiness. Clearly he felt the need to allay fears that a vote against Plusquellec is a vote for him.
  
• More nuttiness from Team Mulligan. They have petitioned Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner to remove Wayne Jones from the Board of Elections. According to the Beacon Journal article, the letter to Brunner criticized Jones for being "overly partisan in his efforts against the recall." Not, mind you, in his work on the Board, but in his political work outside the Board. *sigh* For those of you still in touch with reality, Ohio's election administration system is built on a theory of bipartisanship, not nonpartisanship. Wayne Jones, Chair of the Democratic Party is, wait for it, partisan. Not exactly a news flash.
• The ABJ lede yesterday was an analysis of the city's debt burden. Thoughts on that later.
  

Why the Y Bridge?

Since Team Recall has put the decision to spend stimulus money on fencing around the Y Bridge, it's worth contemplating the decision to go with that particular project. First off, Grumpy Abe does some well taken grumping about the ABJ's coverage last Friday (toward the bottom of his post.) But regardless of whether the paper laid a sufficient foundation for "some call it wasteful" then, it's certainly the case that people are doing so now.

The comments in Ohio dot com track the usual criticisms of suicide fencing on bridges -- that it's not worth the money, that people would just find another way to do the deed. (Of course, this being the ohiodotcom comments section, they go way beyond that to the "just let them kill themselves" "why are we coddling these losers" and "Mayor Don's just doing this to keep his job." Vernon Dursley thinks these people need to find their souls. But then no one accused Plusquellec of driving anyone to jump off the bridge so probably we should just thank God for tender mercies.)

I'm all for rigorous cost-benefit analysis of public safety measures which the discussion of the Y Bridge is lacking. That is to say, can we spend $ 1.6 million where it would prevent more than (at most) one or two deaths a year. But contrary to the gripes of the comment trolls, there is evidence to suggest that fencing highly visible suicide bridges does prevent suicide. Studies (summarized here) indicate that fencing does stop suicides on bridges, without leading to increased suicides on other sites or by other means. Other studies indicate that would-be suicides who are "rescued" rarely continue to attempt.

Then there is the copycat effect. Suicide researchers worry that high-profile suicides that get reported in the media prompt rashes of other attempts. Someone doing the big splat off the Y Bridge will inevitably get media attention that they wouldn't by downing a pile of pills or monoxiding their garage.

Finally, preventing public suicide from a place like a well-travelled bridge also prevents untold psychological trauma on potential witnesses -- either of the leap above or the crater below.

Again, this is not to say that preventing suicides on the Y Bridge is the best use of the money. And running under all of this are questions about how the project fits with the stimulus program. It may well be that fencing the bridge is a particularly "shovel-ready" project.

Regardless, the evidence indicates that fencing the bridge will indeed save lives. We shouldn't pretend it's a trivial waste just because it fits with someone's favored political narrative.