Crowley: War has impacted the city

Cincinnati council member David Crowley leaves Friday for Washington, D.C., where he will attend a march against the Iraq war.

During the “announcements” part of Wednesday’s city council meeting, Crowley started to read an anti-war statement. Cincinnati Mayor Mark Mallory briefly interrupted him, trying to cut him off because he thought the content didn’t apply to the city.

Crowley argued it did.

“The loss of life, the loss of productivity and the loss of federal dollars because of the investment in this war has impacted the city,” Crowley said. He was allowed to continue.

Here’s what he said:

I am leaving Friday night to travel to Washington DC with the Inter Community Justice and Peace Center of Cincinnati to attend a march against the Iraq war.

I first want to say that as Navy Veteran and a resident of this great country I support our troops for their service.

Many of them are being savagely injured and still others are paying with the ultimate sacrifice and for this we are all grateful.

Almost four years ago I expressed my grave concerns about entering into this preemptive war. At the time I took a lot of heat for expressing my concerns.

Though there are scores of reasons why this war was a bad idea there were two reasons primary reasons I spoke about at the time.

One was the obvious concern over the imminent, needless loss of human life. As I am sure you are aware we unfortunately are learning about another local armed services member dying or being injured on a regular basis.

These are brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers, sons and daughters being lost.

The second primary concern was for what this would mean for the City of Cincinnati, and other large urban areas, in terms of needed resources including dollars.

Unfortunately both of these issues that I raised as concerns two years ago have now become facts.

For just one example….Right now, in already difficult economic times for our City we now have the added challenge of fighting our Federal government for needed dollars.

Dollars that pay for important needs such as urban housing and development are being cut by the Administration at unbelievably high levels.

In 2002, the year before we entered the war Cincinnati’s total HUD Grant amount was $23.7 million, in 2006 the amount was $18.9 million and we are estimating the amount will be further decreased to $17.5 million in 2007.

That would represent a $6.2 million cut and this does not account for inflation.

These dollars pay for critical housing services for the poor and disabled, they provide assistance for people with HIV-AIDS, and help promote homeownership.

How are we to rebuild our urban core and assist those most in need of assistance if all or our resources are no longer available at acceptable rates?

Many of you are probably hearing about major cuts being discussed for CMHA as well. The significant reduction of the quality housing that CMHA provides (they are estimating $100 per unit) will have a very negative affect on our region and county.

At the same time these resources are being lost from our community the number of homicides is increasing. The need is greater and I would argue that there is a correlation between the lack of support we are getting on the federal level and the significance of the problems we are facing on the local level.

While I am not attending this march in any official capacity I did want to let you all know they I am attending and wanted to raise some of these issues in your mind.

Let’s concentrate on peace, let’s embark on a new strategy in Iraq, let’s bring our troops home and let’s focus on a strong domestic agenda to assist urban areas in need such as Cincinnati.