It's a Mansfield Trifecta!
On Sweeney and redrawing districts, Mike Trivisonno and the Catholic Church

The Fix is Already In

I attended a meeting of concerned Westside citizens on Wednesday March 4. The residents were gathered in an attempt to get some answers regarding the redrawing of the ward boundary lines in the City of Cleveland. An Eastside group will hold a similar meeting at the Fatima Family Center, 6600 Lexington Ave. on Tuesday, March 17 at 6PM to try to do the same thing: get some straight answers on how City Council will be "fixed."

The Westsiders were basically stonewalled, and I'm afraid the meeting on the 17th will only result in more stonewalling. The date the lines have to be re-drawn by is April 1, and Council President Sweeney isn't about to let the citizenry know in advance where those new lines will be, since this might spark reasonable questions in regards to how the determination as to where the new lines were arrived at.

Sweeney will wait until the last possible moment to announce the changes, so there will be no time left for citizens to question the process. Was it an honest and fair process, or did politics play a role? Were favored members of council treated better than those on the outs with Sweeney? Looking at how wards 14 and 15 were carved up (and how Zack Reed’s ward will probably be decimated), it’s hard to believe the process isn’t tainted with partisan political gamesmanship.

These are only academic questions and speculations since the citizens will only have two choices: Like it, or don’t like it, but either way, there’s not a damn thing we’ll be able to do about it — except at the next election, when we remember how shabbily we were treated by Sweeney and his stooges.

Wash My Mouth Out With Soap

Since Channel 19/43 finally got rid of the segment they did with that chowderhead Mike Trivisonno (he always reminded me of the Friday night barroom drunk who spouts off all sorts of banalities and coded racial slurs once he’s had a few too many; when we really wish to begin looking at what’s wrong with Cleveland, he and his avid listeners would be a good starting point) I agreed to take part in a live Town Hall discussion that was held outdoors across the street from Perk Park, where two young White guys were shot in the head in what has to be one of the more high profile crimes the city has been hit with, not to discount he killing of five people by an obvious madman.

However, since the shooting of the two young Cleveland Clinic employees occurred downtown it immediately sparked a debate over how safe the center of the city is.

About a dozen citizens (including appointed and elected officials) were on the panel, and Safety Director Marty Flask bore the brunt of the questioning, which was expected. Much of the conversation, however, centered on those Big Brother cameras that many cities are resorting to in an effort to curb crime. While the cameras do make citizens feel safer, by and large they can create a false since of security.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m for putting cameras on every corner of every street; that way, if someone kills me, the police will have a much better chance of capturing my killer … but I will, nonetheless be just as dead. Alas, cameras don’t prevent crime, they only show which hooded thug committed the deed. Why do you think hoodies were invented in the first place?

Placing our trust in camera technology to keep us physically safe is akin to building more coffins to solve the problem of AIDS. Thugs don’t give a flying fuck about a camera, especially if they know that the chances of someone actually sitting there monitoring them is slim. What the cops do is, after a crime is committed, they go back and look at the tape. It’s not like someone attempts to rob you and the camera is going to spot it, and a cop is immediately dispatched to save you … it really ain’t that kind of party folks.

When my turn to give input came around, I said that downtown safety cannot be separated from neighborhood safety, and that all lives have to be valued equally … a statement which was a setup for what I then asked: Had the two young men who were shot been minorities, would we being having a TV Town Hall meeting?

Well that comment, while it might have won me some admirers in the Black community, it went over like a fart in church with some Whites. I was accused of “bringing race into the issue.” Duh?

Excuse me, but every negative thing that transpires in America between Blacks and Whites is “racial,” and it’s not because we Blacks want it that way. Whites set up this despicable racial divide immediately after the Emancipation Proclamation … and have perpetuated it, but when we Blacks remind them of it … we’re the ones being “racial” for bring the subject up. It’s called speaking truth to power.

Some have suggested that were the victims Black and the perpetrators White, this would be viewed as a hate crime, and they’re right. And this heinous act should be viewed and prosecuted as a hate crime as well, because if the victims had been Black, the Black perpetrator might have robbed them, be he probably would not have shot them. Hate is hate no matter the race of the hater.

Destroying our History

The Catholic Church has every right to tear down historic Cleveland landmark churches since, indeed, it does own them. But rest assured no city in Europe, where history is treasured, would allow such destruction to happen. Maybe someone should ask if these beautiful edifices (mainly in inner-city communities) can be placed on the list of National Historic Landmark Buildings, thus making them immune to the wrecking ball. I’m almost positive that someone has already thought of this, but in case no one has, I’m throwing the question out there; I just hope I don’t get excommunicated or something for making such a suggestion.

But, hey, I just realized … I’m not even Catholic, I can’t be thrown out of a religion I was never in!

From Cool Cleveland contributor Mansfield B. Frazier mansfieldfATgmail.com

Frazier's From Behind The Wall: Commentary on Crime, Punishment, Race and the Underclass by a Prison Inmate is available again in hardback. Snag your copy and have it signed by the author by visiting http://www.frombehindthewall.com.
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