A few days ago I saw the fallout shelter sign above still hanging on the outside of an old brick apartment building on Lee near Euclid in Cleveland Heights.  Fallout Shelters were a massive US goverment hoax - the signs and the buildings were just placebos for public nervousness.
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Merck/Sanofi-Adventis Recombinant DNA loose at a Cuyahoga County Park Near you!

Heard Bobby tonight at 3C - heard him in the 60's too.  We need leadership like his today in Cleveland. 

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Mr. Seale addressed a crowd of several hundred at Cuyahoga Community College Saturday evening.   I remember well the Black Panther Party from the 1960’s.  Mr. Seale remembers it well too.   Mr. Seale's visit was sponsored by the Sara J. Harper Leadership Institute.  Retired Hon. J. Harper was at the podium to introduce the evening’s program. 

The Cleveland Metroparks Zoo celebrates its 125th anniversary.  With two Cleveland Metrohealth Campuses, two libraries (free WI-FI), a rec center, Steelyard Commons and the Cuyahoga Valley National Park within walking or biking or train distance, you would think that hotels and great restaurants would follow Go figure?! (Hello Mitch Schneider--A residential inn at Steelyard Commons please! So my mom has a place to stay when she visits :)  

I do have to hand it to the Ohio tourism site--Discover Ohio--nice job! Mutiple language options. SMART!

ZOOBILEE, also, a great chance to see RED, an orchestra!

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On Friday August 31, 2007, while Air Show jets stalled out conversations and blasted ear drums,  Susan Miller and I visited the “open house” at the Post designed Cleveland Trust Rotunda building which sits on the corner of Euclid and 9th next to the Marcel Breuer designed Cleveland Trust Tower in downtown Cleveland, Ohio.   Lee Trotter had announced this open house at the County Commissioners meeting the day before and the Dirty Dealer had carried the news a few days prior.   I wondered, why is the County doing this? 

 The Cleveland Port Authority wore no clothes on Thursday.   The King was completely naked – yet about half (including a rep of “first suburbs”) of the 19 adults who spoke to the 100 plus in attendance raved about the “BOLD PLAN”  

I consistently attempt to have a “positive” outlook about North East Ohio and Cleveland.  I consider the substance of my posts on Realneo and affirmatively select material which I believe is conducive to improving the region.  However, there can be a problem with this self steered Polly Anna  editorial policy .   Always looking at the bright side might be just perpetuating a lie – maybe always having a positive outlook is actually misleading people and leading others into the false belief that the region is doing ok, that the region is improving.  Maybe it would be more helpful if I used my blog to accelerate failure – get to the bottom of it, get it over with and start new…

The Cleveland Port Authority has a new boss and a new plan. 

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Summer 2007—The Cuyahoga County Planning Commission quietly launched a new section on its web site for Whiskey Island, signaling its readiness to move forward with plans to enhance the existing natural areas at the 23-acre eastern end known as Wendy Park. Connections from the city would also be improved with a proposed bike path along the road from
Edgewater Park, and—further in the future—one over the
Cuyahoga
River for the Towpath Trail.

by Sean Fisher, Cincinnati, Ohio on 08.27.07

Good Day Everyone!

I'd like to invite each of you to explore Detroit Shoreway, or more specifically, the Edgewater Hill neighborhood, as the Detroit Shoreway Community Development Organization unveils our new home at 7405 Herman Avenue.  Please see the attached flyer for more info.

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Let's try to elucidate the elusive and concretize the abstraction represented by my Cross System  - start by drawing a Cross.

I just got the email below, from the head of a local arts not-for-profit to remain un-named, to protect the innocent: "Norm -- i just wanted to make sure you knew about the "sales pitch" we are about to get.". I read on to see that tax junkie CPAC - Community Partnership for Arts and Culture - is on the Cuyahoga County junk again, now hustling artists and arts organizations to tax themselves and patrons for the benefit of the dealers. Read on... anyone going to this who can cover for realneo?... Note: " RSVP’s are required!" Now, a little art, in honor of this event and the rush for the MedCon and taxation without sober representation, courtesy of Lou Reed:

I dont know just where Im going

But Im gonna try for the kingdom, if I can

cause it makes me feel like Im a man

When I put a spike into my vein

And Ill tell ya, things arent quite the same

When Im rushing on my run

And I feel just like jesus son

And I guess that I just dont know

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I spent the afternoon at the Burning River Fest on Whiskey Island.

An important addition was made to The John and Mildred Putnam Sculpture Collection, located on the campus of Case Western Reserve University and the grounds of University Circle, with the installation of a fantastic steel sculpture by masterful sculptor and Cleveland Institute of Art President David Deming, which is titled "Inner Circle". Located by the Case residential village, across from the Starbucks, at the intersection of East 115th, Juniper and Bellflower, this work is a great addition to an important art collection, curated by Evelyn Kiefer, that makes University Circle a much more inspiring and remarkable place, with public art.

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Thank god we have Roldo Bartimole in our region writing about the inequity and the corruption here. If not for Roldo, we might never know such tantalizing tidbits as we learn here in his CoolCleveland article this week: Should Hagan Have Recused Himself from Vote? (I link it here because I know that unlike the PD articles that disappear after a couple of weeks, this CC article will remain online in perpetuity.)

For example, did you know, we pay sales taxes on the sin taxes? "

I hope someone in Columbus or in the federal government is reading this -- oh, yeah, we have a corrupt judicial system, too.

Oh and there's this, "Among the gift-givers was Robert DiGeronimo of Independence Excavating. Precision Environmental Co., which won a contract last week to demolish the Breuer Building with a bid $915,000 above the low bid, is part of the DiGeronimo/Independence Excavating Co. family."

Does that mean that Madden's "eye on Carbone" saw that he may indeed be convicted in the Lorain trial and decided to let him go from the job? According to the docket in Lorain County Court, Carbone has relinquished his right to a speedy trial since one of his attorneys is in a federal murder trial, so the new court date is set for 8/20/07.

Government in Cleveland and Cuyahoga County is indeed a sucking swirling eddy of despair, corruption and backdoor dealing. Should Hagan have recused himself? Absolutely! Does he have an ethical bone in his body? Apparently not. Will voters stand by and let this continue? Hopefully not. Here's another example of Hagan's doublespeak: "

Why Good Things Happen to Good People

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Fools rush in -  if you are for a sales tax to build a con center and kennedy mart - you honestly believe that this will trickle down and improve the NEO economy - then you should READ the resolutions (sales tax, use tax) passed by Cuyahoga County Commissioners Hagan and Dimora.  Look at the second line of either resolution.  "money goes into general fund".   There is no language in the resoluions that says that either the sales or use tax is for a  con center and kennedy mart.  This tax will go on for 20 years sucking in about a million a week.  Where will Hagan and Dimora be in 2008 when their terms expire?  Promises, Promises.  Printed in the Plain Dealer.

And Commissioner Peter Lawson Jones, who voted "against" the tax is in fact complicit.  If he was really against the tax but for a con center (with support from hotel bed taxes as he said) Mr. Jones would have raised in the public hearings the fact that the resolutions were for money going into the general fund, not into a con center account.  Omitting to exercise this ringing argument puts Mr. Jones in a catagory of strong doubt about being "against" the tax.

So, if you REALLY want a concenter and kenmart you would do well to sign a referendum petition right away to help putitontheballot.com this spring.  Then you can vote the present resolutions down, and insist that the Commissioners introduce and pass   new resolutions which spell out specifically in the resolutions what the sales tax will be used for. 

But then again, maybe you were born yesterday. 

The dynamic leader of Habitat for Humanity will discuss the REstore program (http://www.gchfh.org/Restore/index.htm) at their offices as well as how providing affordable, sustainable housing helps end a cycle of poverty. http://www.gchfh.org Many opportunities to contribute in this worthwhile, ongoing project in Greater Cleveland will reveal themselves through this lively discussion. And if we are lucky, we may just get Jeffrey to veer off topic a bit and talk about his other life as a performance poet.

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Following are images of the concepts which were received by Sally Levine and David Ellison for the reuse of the Marcel Breuer designed Ameritrust Tower in Cleveland Ohio.  I extend my appreciation to the designers for their generous dedication and creativity.  I will endeavor to number each of the entries  so that comments can be directed to  specific designs.  I will also  try to make legible the text which is important on many.  A submission from Italy was especially poignant in its text.   Designers, please feel free to log in and amplify your presentations.   This is very cool that so much volunteer creativity went into this event.   Here's my hoping that all the designers who contributed will reap a referred commission or two from their contributions....

It is official - "Cuyahoga County commissioners voted 2-1 today to raise the sales tax a quarter of a penny to help bring a Medical Mart to Cleveland." Perhaps you'd like time to think about this more, and the opportunity to vote with other citizens on how you are taxed.  Other citizens feel the same and have formed a committee to "Put It On The Ballot"- a grass-roots campaign to collect enough signatures to force the 1/4% sales tax increase to be placed on a ballot. This Friday, July 27, there will be an Excellence Roundtable at The Inner Circle where some of the people involved with this campaign will join a discussion on this issue, from all directions.

To learn more about the campaign, visit http://putitontheballot.com - you'll certainly read more about this initiative on this site and on REALNEO throughout the coming months. 7GEN (developer of REALNEO) is providing this Drupal site for this initiative, and I look forward to learning more about the campaign and all related issues.

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