$millions spent - outside advertising firm brought in - focus groups of kneeling cheerleaders and deer in headlights conducted - press conference in airplane - check, check, check and check. "NEO" leadership did it again. Another Case of mistaken identities, being those who hired those using outdated formulas to decide how to market our city to us and the world. Every identity mistaken, as plusers ask us to believe in them, and Case re-begets CWRU.

Today is a dreary day and it helps to remember brighter days do come around.  I know I feel discouraged by gun violence, decay and the creeping ugliness around me.  I cling to some hope when I remember others have persevered.  One person at a time.  Restore Cleveland's Hope.

 It is very nice to see my favorite real urban planner Joe Stanley featured on Lee Batdorff's very informative University Circle Blog - and thanks to Joe for mentioning us here at realneo! We set up and host his http://neomainstreet.com site, which is one of the best uses of Drupal in this region, and presents excellent work by a talented planner and designer. Joe is working on all the community development projects I'm involved with, including overall East Cleveland planning and the Star Intergenerational Neighborhood planning and The Intergenerational School, along with other work Joe does independently.

We live in "Forest City" so Arbor Day should be an important holiday in Cleveland. Here is one idea how you might celebrate ...

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Interesting perspectives on economic and community development from Coral's Peter Rubin, from the Villager Newspaper Online. I think Rubin makes some good points, and the reality is that we are overbuilding the Cleveland housing market, and other amenities, and that will make Cleveland a more powerful residential draw. As more of Cleveland becomes more "livable", more people will chose to live here. Add good schools and free city wide wifi and watch out. Clevelaqnd first will draw people from other parts of the region - empty nesters from the xburbs, students and young professionals from the inner heights - it will be cool and good to live in Cleveland again. That will attract people from other regions and parts of the world, and they will grow the economy - you need a critical mass of urban housing and culture to be a player and we aren't even near that yet - time to keep building and innovating in Cleveland housing! Now for the chair half there, with Rubin:

While not currently a powerhouse in Free Open Source Software (FOSS), Northeast Ohio is positioned to begin excelling with FOSS in some very strategic ways that may add great value to the regional economy. 

Because of FOSS, we may now bridge the digital divide more quickly and completely here than has any other large urban center in America, we may soon have the highest percentage of workforce properly educated for the new economy, and we may lead the world in some fields of application development and technology innovation with global, open standards, all if the region now embraces FOSS..

The Foundation Center-Cleveland is hosting a free brown bag lunch with
OhioVotes on how nonprofit organizations can participate in the voter
registration process. I think this is an important program for anyone

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Asterisk Gallery

Opening Reception: Friday, May 11, 6-11 p.m.

(during Tremont Art Walk)

May 11 - June 2, 2007

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May 14th at 7:00 Mayor Frank Jackson and Cleveland City Council will honor us by holding a City Council Meeting in the neighborhood.  Josaphat Arts Hall ( 1433 E. 33rd Street ) will host the meeting.  This is our chance to see decision making in action right here in our neighborhood.  Please join this meeting. 

-Jamie Baker/Executive Director/St. Clair Superior Development

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To:         To Potential CMSD Arts Education Strategic Planning STEERING COMMITTEE members

From:         Dawn M. Ellis, Consultant to the Cleveland Municipal School District

I was pleased to be invited to participate on the steering committee for developing the Cleveland Municipal School District Arts Education Strategic Plan, which is a fairly large workgroup of many CMSD arts educators and administrators and other community representatives, that is working with consultant Ms. Dawn Ellis, the facilitating consultant and writer of our strategic plan. We had our first orientation today at 3 PM, at Trinity Commons, and it was a well facilitiated and enlightening activity. The format was very interactive, with Dawn surfacing key issues, themes and opportunities and driving participants through structured brainstorming. 

"I think Cleveland is a good place. Inner city is rough, but the outskirts is real beautiful, and great schools there. Plus my family, my mom and my sisters, they're all in Cleveland, so it's easier for me to be there than anywhere else." This quote, from an excellent Free Times interview with Charles "Wish Bone" Scruggs, of Cleveland-roots, Grammy award winning, multi-platinum rap trailblazers Bone Thugs-n-Harmony, sings the woes of a place branded as a "Shrinking City", where even the urban hard-core Thugs chose the 'burbs over the 'hood. The result of such out-migration, and downright defection, as is the case with all the other members of Bone, is the subject of a series of art exhibitions and related events taking place over the next month, all over town... which event sponsor Kent Cleveland Urban Design Collaborative (CUDC) introduces by pointing out: "In 2005, the U.S. Census Bureau estimated that Cleveland had lost nearly 20,000 residents in just five years. The city’s population of 458,684 was the lowest in nearly one hundred years." Starting Friday, April 20, 2007, at 4:30 PM, with a lecture at CUDC, explore what it means when a city loses its Bones...

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I hate to say this but AM radio WTAM reaches more northeast Ohio residents than any blog or the PD.  Ask my 65 year old neighbor.  At least they put out some important community alerts along with the latest American Idol results:

Inner Belt cluster First, the Ohio Department of Transportation decides to close exit ramps on the Inner Belt rather than enforce speed limits, causing local businesses to go ballistic.

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About two years ago, the REALNEO team took on the challenge of helping to bridge the digital divide in NEO, in many ways, including recycling "obsolete" corporate computers, wiping the hard drives, and loading them with free versions of Linux and other Free Open Source Software (FOSS). One group of computers, provided by Progressive Insurance and Benesh Friedlander, that we freed from Microsoft-obsolescence, were given to a combination of Shaw High School seniors and senior citizens in East Cleveland. Shaw seniors have since taken their computers off to college, and, a few weeks ago, East Cleveland CIO Abulime Alli and I met with one of the senior citizens who received a desktop PC and now needed some tech support. I was  thrilled to help her out and interested to hear how having a Linux computer at home had changed her life.

Claes and I were picking up Evelyn at the University Circle Arabica Sunday around 5 and I heard one of my favorite sounds flowing over from my favorite area spot - the Barking Spider - roots jazz. I knew who I would find there... the finest roots jazz musician I know in town, George Foley... so we headed right over. George plays and sings, solo and with many area musicians, in every imaginable combo, all over town, and it is always a fun, uplifting and inspiring experience.

 I didn't get my copy of the Plain Dealer, this morning... probably stolen off my porch. So, I thought, I don't like paying for a dirty old paper anyways, and only read some of the content, so why not just read it on-line at their union-busting Cleveland-dot-com website. Unfortunately, that is not a realistic option... every time I load the home page or any main section on the site, a viral pop-up advertisement for some Health Club attacks my computer.

 

Be A Champion of Life

Dear Friends,

We're happy to announce some upcoming programs designed to give you the success tools you need, and give you the lasting results you desire!

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Westside Courts resident Emma Casey sits at home with her refurbished computer. Photo: Sarah Lai Stirland

Derek just sent me a link to this article that should get people here thinking about our local economy, violence, the digital divide and solutions... read about the type of bridges we're building for East Cleveland and Cleveland... from Wired, about 3,000 miles away from NEO....   Sarah Lai Stirland 04.04.07 | 2:00 AM SAN FRANCISCO -- The Westside Courts is a bleak concrete housing project in the city's Western Addition where violence is closer than a high-speed net connection, and one resident's first steps online include plans to create a memorial for the people who've died here. Last month, volunteers turned on a novel broadband network in this 135-unit block, throwing a digital lifeline to Emma Casey and other tenants. Using a refurbished PC she picked up for $100, the 47-year-old mother of two adult children is now going online to help her son find a job, get health information and, she says, pay tribute to neighbors who've met with violent or untimely deaths.

Academic debates about the reality and cost of the so-called digital divide -- and the ability of individuals to fight economic disadvantage with nothing more than a computer and an IP address -- seem to crumble in a place like this. Like water and heat, internet is a clear necessity in the modern world, opening doors to education, employment and engagement.