Various Items From Cincinnati City Council
As if the name of Councilwoman Laketa Cole's committee wasn't already long enough, council added parks to it Wednesday. So now it's apparently the Vibrant Neighborhoods, Recreation, Public Services and Parks Committee.
Council appointed two people to vacancies on the Cincinnati Human Relations Commission: Nseabasi Ufot and Sandra Spinner. Both of their terms continue until Jan. 31, 2011.
Councilman John Cranley, a partner in the City Lights company that's redeveloping the area of East Price Hill around Queen's Tower, said his company had nothing to do with the recent demolition of a house on Mt. Hope Avenue. The house was once owned by the Price family for whom Price Hill was named.
Council agreed to amend the city's ordinance governing the "possession or sale of wild or potentially dangerous animals" to mandate that any entertainer who uses such animals to entertain the public must be properly licensed according to requirements of the federal Animal Welfare Act. The new rule comes out of the controversy last year at the Hamilton County Fair in Carthage, where a pizza-eating bear was kicked out of the fair by officials because the weather was too hot.
22 Comments:
at 9:13 AM, March 27, 2008 
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at 12:12 PM, March 27, 2008 
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at 2:09 PM, March 27, 2008 
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at 3:31 PM, March 27, 2008 
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at 3:48 PM, March 27, 2008 
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at 5:13 PM, March 27, 2008 
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at 6:47 PM, March 27, 2008 
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at 8:45 PM, March 27, 2008 
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at 9:36 AM, March 28, 2008 
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at 4:02 PM, March 28, 2008 
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at 10:36 PM, March 28, 2008 
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at 1:54 PM, March 29, 2008 
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at 2:05 PM, March 29, 2008 
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at 3:07 PM, March 29, 2008 
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at 11:31 PM, March 29, 2008 
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at 2:44 AM, March 30, 2008 
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at 9:55 AM, March 30, 2008 
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at 3:38 PM, March 30, 2008 
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at 10:19 PM, March 30, 2008 
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at 2:24 AM, March 31, 2008 
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at 2:39 PM, March 31, 2008 
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at 11:04 AM, April 02, 2008 
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Post a Comment*I think "Public Services" should be its own committee. This city needs focus - throwing everything under one umbrella committee is the tactic of an ADD council.
Plus, it places everything as the same priority. Our city needs to prioritize. Different areas crumble without decent services or attention while Council tries to build something new like a trolley line!
You can't build new things without maintaining the foundation. The first three rules of any council should be:
1. Prioritize
2. Prioritize
3. Prioritize
Maybe they do prioritize, and they just do it all wrong.
I concur Public Services/Works should be its own committee. Plus, I think it should be in the evening hours and rotate around the City's communities (Westwood, Price Hill, Oakley, ...). Representatives should include Cincinnati City Council Members, Public Services/Works supervisors from various divisions (sanitation, litter, ...), and City Manager. This way, the community could really voice their opinions because this area of services needs some improvement! Thank you. By the way, their website is www.cagis.org or 513-591-6000 for reporting neighborhood complaints.
Count me in, too! I believe Public Services-Neighborhood Action needs to be separated out from the other committee interests. The neighborhoods have lists & lists of items that need to be addressed [yesterday] by the City & they won't get the undivided attention they need when bunched together with the rest of this stuff.
City Hall needs to do the neighborhoods a big favor - put in a chairperson of the Public Services-Neighborhood Action committee who will honestly & fairly facilitate needs for ALL 52 neighborhoods, not just "pet" neighborhoods.
As it is right now, I get so tired of hearing about Bond Heeeel & CollegeCheeeel. According to my arithmetic, that's only 2 of 52.
Cranley is a major reason that SO MANY homes have been demolished. Vacant lots do nothing good for Cincinnati or the County tax base. And many of these vacant lots will never again occupy a home. Look at Price Hill and look at the Cities old neighborhoods. "Lots" of lots. Home rehabbers avoid Cincinnati and it's foolish housing regulations. Blame Council on this.
12:12-
I think that happens now. I know in the past Cole has hosted the Neighborhoods Committee in the evening and out in the community once a month, with Council and staff present.
3:31 must be a slumlord who had one of his slum properties torn down. Vacant, neglected properties are amongst the worst thing that can blight a neighbourhood. I'm glad that the City is tearing these eyesores down, or else we will end up looking like Detroit.
When paying your next water bill, be aware that you will also be paying the costs of using Water Works personnel, Water Works trucks, Water Works front end loaders and Water Works fuel to remove snow from Cincinnati’s city streets.
With Crowley and Cranley termed out, Mallory et.al. are trying to bump up Cole's profile so she can be Vice Mayor in Mallory's next term, her last on Council.
She has Corny Scroggins' vote!
Anon 5:13,
Just look at the dirty vacant lots all around the city. Many are owned by the City of Cincinnati. Tearing down homes is not the answere. Detroit is a pitiful city with vacant lots (where houses once stood) and look at Detroit now. Our city must find a way to work with vacant home owners and get these repaired. Northern Ky. is repair friendly (and booming) Speak to them. The problem is city government and it's lack of vision, thinking, and leadership. Tearing down housing should be the last measure. Anon 5:13, Give it some thought and report back (when you're sober). Hopefully you are not one of our "leaders". Crime produces slums (as you call it) not houses. Enjoy the weekend.
Slumlord 9:36,
NKY does not have even a small percentage of the blighted & abandoned property problem that Cincinnati does.
Vacant properties bring down the value of homes nearby, and attract crime, arson, drug users and vagrants. Blighted vacant properties hurt neighbourhoods and cities. They consume more resources in terms of police and fire calls and provide little to no tax revenue to the City.
A 2001 study in Philadelphia found that houses within 150 feet of a vacant property declined in value by more than $7,000. The same is not true of houses near vacant lots.
it's both expensive and time-consuming for the city to tear down the properties, and it is done as a last resort. But it is more cost effective than letting those blighted properties stand.
Evidence shows that vacant properties are an expense that local governments simply cannot afford. That 2001 Philadelphia report also shows:
-- Blocks with vacant structures had 3.2 times as many drug calls to police and 1.8 times as many theft calls as blocks with no vacant homes.
-- The U.S. Fire Administration reports that more than 12,000 fires start in vacant structures each year. More than 70 percent of fires in vacant or abandoned buildings are arson or suspected arson.
Homes that are torn down are significantly dilapidated, and the cost to rehab these homes would not be cost effective. No developer would touch these properties, the return on investment simply is not there, even with the tax abatements offered by the City. Also, many abandoned homes have had their copper wiring and plumbing stripped by thieves due to the record high price of copper.
Tearing down nuisance properties is a slow and tedious process. It's more than the building inspector going out and slapping a notice on the door and saying 'this building has to come down'. Our legal system has strong protection for people's property rights -- those who maintain their properties and keep them up to code. Those protections even extend to slumlords.
As to Detroit, that City has let their abandoned, bighted property situation get so out of control that they now have in excess of 12,000 abandoned homes. And they do not have the funding or resources to tear all of them down.
It sounds as though you were the absentee owner of an abandoned property, you allowed the property to become dilapidated, you then ignored warning after warning to bring your property up to code, and then lost the property to the City in Housing Court. Well, I am sorry, but you cannot simply hold onto a dilapidated, blighted property and allow it to rot and pollute a neighbourhood. The City will no longer allow you to do so, we will take the property from you and deal with it ourselves. You had every chance to rehab or sell the property, you had due process, and you did nothing.
Sorry Charlie. No more soup for you. Same to the other slumlords polluting our fair City. You are all on notice.
4:02
You are right on target.
We need to take out as many multi-family units as possible, now!
The market can't support them.
Western Hills is looking pretty bad along Glenway and Queen City avenues. There are buildings that could be taken down, but what generates tax revenue in their place? People are moving away from those areas in droves.
anon 4:02, you sound like John Cranley ( maybe you are John). You are right. NKy doesn"t have the housing problems that Cincinnati has, Strange huh... But NKy has the same cross section of people. Let's see - same people, little housing problems. And a booming economy. Take it from there. John.
Conclusion - Cincinnati restricts housing, Nky, promotes and works with Developers on housing. And this "broken window" theory only works in crime ridden areas. Crime comes first and vacant buildings follow. As for vacant buildings becomming fire hazards - foolish. Over 90% of fires are owner occupied. Furnaces, kitchen grease, smoking , extension cords, portable heaters are the main causes of fire. YOUR occupied house is a fire disaster waiting to happen. Be careful. And a fraction of the crimes come out of vacant structures.
Now these are the true facts from Greater Cincinnati, USA.
Yea, because, you know, we need all of the old, broken down abandoned homes in Cincinnati that we can get!
I guess if we tear down all the vacant housing, crime will disappear. Those nasty houses. Those houses are criminals. Bad, bad, bad.
The asshat at 2:05 that is preaching the BS about the 'great economic development' in NKY has no idea what they are talking about. If NKY had this "great development" then they wouldn't be desperate to raise taxes to pay their bills. Which they are.
NKY doesn't have as many abandoned buildings as Cincinnati because NKY has a much smaller population, and a smaller inner-city area as compared to Cincinnati.
But of course the slum lords know this, and only use NKY as rhetorical straw man argument. Can they explain why they should be able to keep their crumbling, dilapidated nuisance properties ad infinitum, ad nauseum? Of course they can't.
If you don't allow your properties to become run down, abandoned eyesores, you have nothing to worry about. On the otherhand, if you are a slumlord and you have a bunch of run-down slums. then you have something to fear. We are going to get you and hold you responsible for your slums.
And the properties in "Western Hills along Glenway and Queen City avenues" that are abandoned WILL be torn down. Those properties are NOT earning tax revenue, and they are blighted slums. We will get around to tearing them down. Worry not.
WOW. It looks like there is a big fight to tear down buildings. Probably some structures need to be razed, but, when you tear down the house that the Price family lived at, that is foolish. And it is a fact that Cranley is a big factor in tearing down Price Hill homes. He believes that will curb crime. I don't think it worked in his Price Hill. Crime is way up. And the amount of vacant lots is unbelievable. There is also a move to tear down a house that Doris Day lived in on Glenway Ave. and that house looks pretty good, but vacant. The City Building dept. gets it's direction from Cincinnati Council.
I don't believe one moment that Cranley was unaware of the Price home. I am a neighbor of his in Price Hill. John means well but is young and out of touch.
I dont get the fascination by people of a house that was once owned by a prominent individual. They are no longer living there. The Price home was dilapidated and in disrepair. It was time to go. It would be very upsetting to know that redevlopment and progress would be halted because a house once belonged to some notable from days gone by.
I agree with 2:05 and 9:55. Has Cincinnati lost its tradition? Are we that selfish? Cincinnati history should be important to all. Is this one of the reasons why Cincinnati is no longer the most livable city. OTR is making a comeback and based on its tradition and housing. Why is Price Hill given second status? Even Europe appreciates housing. It was mentioned that Northern Ky. has less population than Cincinnati and that is the reason for lack of NKy. housing problem. I think that is a foolish statement. By that logic, anon 2:44, Cincinnati should have less problems than NY, Chicago, Cleveland, LA, etc. But per capita that is not the case.
I also feel that our present leaders must do a better job working with the home owners. And anon 2:44 stop insulting my Price Hill by calling it slums. Where do you live?
Moron 10:19 (and slum lord 2:05)-Cincinnati DOES 'have less (HOUSING) problems than NY, Chicago, Cleveland AND LA' do.
Can you site some actual facts-you know, statistics, etc - which prove that Cincinnati is not friendly to rehabers/redevelopers, or that NKY is more friendly? I bet that you can't.
Cincinnati offers aggressive tax abatements and economic assistance to redevelopers. Much more aggressive than many NKY communities offer.
By the way, I LIVE IN PRICE HILL. So do not lecture me about 'our Price Hill', because you obviously do not know what you are talking about.
For your education, here is an overview of some of the incentives that Cincinnati currently offers to residential developers:
http://www.cincinnati-oh.gov/cdap/pages/-17897-/
Now how about proving your assertion that Cincinnati is 'unfriendly' to rehabbers, or that NKY is offering much better programs. And please offer some facts, not some "this guy I know said' bullsh*t.
Put up, or shut up.
we will continue to tear down neglected, abandoned eyesores, and prosecute their owners. Sorry Slum lords, you are not going to be able to pollute our City with your nuisance properties any longer.
Will the Democrat Party be applying for a license per the amended city ordinance for their April 19th event? I can think of no animal wilder or more dangerous than the Golden Donkey.
When anonymous 2:24, and his other comments above, starts calling people "moron" and "slumlord" this indicates that he is losing the debate. I sure hope that this individual is not a city leader or John Cranley himself.
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