by Danny Cross
09.20.2012
Posted In: Poverty, News, Not-for-profit, Social Justice, Homelessness, Urban Planning at 04:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Anna Louise Inn Wins Zoning Appeal
Western & Southern expected to appeal something else next week
In the ongoing saga of Western & Southern vs. the Anna Louise Inn, there have been several court cases and zoning rulings, most of which have been appealed by one side or the other. Today it was the Cincinnati Zoning Board of Appeals’ turn to rule on something that’s already been ruled on, and it went in favor of the Anna Louise Inn.
The Board upheld a certificate of appropriateness for the Anna Louise Inn’s planned renovation, which essentially also upholds the Historic Conservation Board’s right to issue a conditional use permit — at least for now. Western & Southern is expected to appeal that permit, granted by the Conservation Board Aug. 27, before its 30-day window to do so expires.
Before this series of appeals can play out, the 1st District Court of Appeals will hear arguments in the Anna Louise Inn’s appeal of Judge Norbert Nadel’s May 27 ruling, which set in motion the Inn’s attempts to secure zoning approval from the Historical Conservation Board in the first place.
(All of this could have been avoided if Western & Southern would have purchased the Anna Louise Inn when it had the chance. CityBeat previously reported the details of Western & Southern’s failure to purchase the Inn and the company’s subsequent attempts to force the Inn out of the neighborhood here.)
About 40 people attended today’s hearing, including City Councilman Wendell Young, who said he supports the Anna Louise Inn but was not there to testify on its behalf.
By upholding the certificate of appropriateness, the ruling keeps alive a conditional use permit that could allow the Anna Louise Inn to move forward with a $13 million renovation of its historic building, once the expected appeals process plays out. (CityBeat covered the Aug. 27 Historical Conservation Board hearing here.)
The Board heard brief arguments from lawyers for both Western & Southern and Cincinnati Union Bethel and then entered executive session for about 15 minutes before ruling in favor of the Anna Louise Inn.
Western & Southern lawyer Francis Barrett, who is the brother of Western & Southern CEO John Barrett and a member of the University of Cincinnati Board of Trustees, told CityBeat after the meeting that he disagreed with the board’s finding because a designed expansion of the building’s fifth floor has not yet had its use approved.
“With this case, the Historical Conservation Board is basically approving for the certificate of appropriateness the design of the building,” Barrett said. “But the design included an expansion of the fifth floor, and until that use issue is resolved the code reads, in my opinion, you can’t approve the design because the use hasn’t been approved.”
Barrett during the hearing read a written statement to the board arguing two main points: that the Historic Conservation Board didn’t have the jurisdiction to grant the certificate of appropriateness; and even if it did, Barrett argued, the physical expansion planned makes it a non-conforming use which wouldn’t qualify for the building permit.
Cincinnati Union Bethel attorney Tim Burke told the Board that the Anna Louise Inn is not seeking a permit for non-conforming use because it already received a conditional use permit from the Historic Conservation Board.
“Western & Southern is doing everything it can to block this renovation from happening,” Burke told the Board.
At the Historic Conservation Board hearing last month
Western & Southern tried paint a picture of the Anna Louise Inn’s
residents contributing to crime in the area because a condition of the
conditional use permit is that the building’s use will not be
detrimental to public health and safety or negatively affect property
values in the neighborhood. But the Board granted the permit, stating
that the Anna Louise Inn will not be detrimental to public health and
safety or harmful to nearby properties in the neighborhood and that the
Board found no direct evidence connecting residents of the Anna Louise
Inn to criminal activity in the neighborhood. Western & Southern has until next week to appeal that ruling.
by Deirdre Kaye
02.29.2012
Anti-Health Care Fight Is Un-Christian
There are protesters who have been standing outside of a pediatrician’s office almost daily since at least the summer. Why? Someone else in that same tiny complex is offering abortions. A woman who has taken her special needs daughter to that pediatrician’s office for more than 20 years was recently told by her minister’s wife that she needed to switch pediatricians. Abortion is “murder,” of course, so going anywhere near the “scene of the crime” must make her a co-conspirator.
On the opposite side of town is a Catholic organization made up of young people who were praying the rosary daily in hopes of a veto on the law that required Catholic employers to provide health care that included birth control coverage. Furthering their attack on small families are two Republican candidates for president. Rick Santorum and Mitt Romney seem to want to reverse the bill that legalized the sale of contraception.
Yes, the Bible says “Be fruitful.” The Bible also says to take care of children. Statistics from UNICEF report that in 2009 roughly 2.1 million children are currently orphaned in America. Who is taking care of them? Should anyone be so adamantly against birth control when they’re also clearly unwilling to help take care of the result from a lack of birth control?
Before abortion was legalized, women were forced to take to back alleys in order to end unwanted pregnancies. Those terminations consisted of the use of things like scalding water or hangers. Many women contracted infections from those unsterile and unsafe methods. Too many women died from those infections. Why wasn’t anyone looking out for them?
Many of the comments we’ve received at CityBeat in response to coverage of these issues have focused on the sinfulness of abortion and birth control (and, of course, homosexuality). Why are they overlooking all the other “sins” the bible suggests?
Click the jump for a list of all the crazy things the Old Testament says are also sins.
by Kevin Osborne
10.05.2011
Posted In: 2011 Election, City Council, Healthcare Reform, Poverty, Spending at 02:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Candidates On: City-operated Health Clinics
As part of CityBeat's continuing election coverage, we’ve once again sent a questionnaire to the non-incumbent Cincinnati City Council candidates to get their reactions on a broad range of issues.
Nine of the 14 non-incumbents chose to answer our questions. Others either didn’t respond or couldn’t meet the deadline.
During the next few weeks, we will print the responses from the non-incumbents to a different topic each time.
Today’s question is, “Do you consider the operation of health clinics to be an acceptable function of municipal government?”
by Danny Cross
10.05.2011
Posted In: Government, News, Poverty, Social Justice, Labor Unions, Technology at 09:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Morning News and Stuff
Occupy Cincinnati has changed the location of its first-scheduled occupation, which will take place 11 a.m. Saturday at Lytle Park rather than Sawyer Point, due to a previously scheduled event. (The Revolutionaries are respectful of other organizations' fundraising walks.) The occupation has no scheduled end time. Several unions in New York City have endorsed the protest and plan to join it today. Here's a live stream of Day 19 in NYC.
by Danny Cross
05.01.2012
Posted In: Business, Development, Homelessness, Neighborhoods, News, Poverty, Social Justice at 03:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Mock Rally For Western & Southern Scheduled For Wednesday
Group will show support for ‘bullying’ of Anna Louise Inn
UPDATE: The Greater Cincinnati Coalition for the Homeless has canceled its Wednesday mock rally for Western & Southern Financial Group. The Coalition Tuesday evening released the following statement: "Due to a change in plans the mock 'Rally to Support Western and Southern' has been canceled. Stay tuned for upcoming gatherings and events to support the Women of the Anna Louise Inn as we fight for the right of self determination."
The following is CityBeat's Tuesday afternoon blog post in response to the event announcement:
The Greater Cincinnati Coalition for the Homeless is helping to organize a mock rally to support what it believes is the bullying of the Anna Louise Inn women’s shelter by Western & Southern Financial Group. The mock group will be called “Citizens for Corporate Bullies” and will hold signs that say “Greed is Good,” “We Support Corporate Bullies,” “Poor Women Not Welcome” and “W&S Take Whatever You Want.” The event begins a noon May 2 at 4th and Sycamore streets.
The Coalition has created a fake persona who supports W&S’s desire to build condos to attract a more desirable class of residents and rhetorically asks, “Besides, what gives the Anna Louis Inn the right to stay in that building just because they own it and it’s been there for a hundred years?”
The protest is in response to ongoing legal issues surrounding the Inn’s proposed expansion and W&S’s development efforts in the neighborhood. CityBeat last October reported on the situation in a story titled, “Putting on the Pressure: Western & Southern won’t take ‘no’ for an answer.” The following is an excerpt summarizing the situation then:
Last summer the facility’s owners rebuffed an offer from the powerful Western & Southern Financial Group to buy their property, triggering a heated legal battle. The company, located near the Anna Louise Inn in the affluent Lytle Park district on downtown’s eastern edge, wanted the site so it could demolish or redevelop the Inn and build upscale condominiums.
After the offer was rejected, the Anna Louise Inn continued with a long-planned renovation and was awarded a $2.7 million loan by Cincinnati City Council. That’s when Western & Southern filed a lawsuit against the Inn and the city, alleging zoning violations.
The showdown pits the Inn, opened in 1909 with the help of prominent attorney Charles P. Taft, against a company that ranks in the Fortune 500 and is headed by CEO John Barrett, an ex-chairman of the Cincinnati Business Committee who is widely considered one of the most powerful men in the city.
The facility’s owners and some city officials say Western & Southern is trying to use its sizable financial resources publicly, along with its political clout behind the scenes, to strong-arm opponents and get what it wants.
Representatives for W&S have stated that the company's $3 million offer to purchase the building is fair and have also offered to aid the Inn in finding a new location.
WVXU reported that supporters of the Inn held a rally April 4 calling for a quick judgment in a court case that could delay funding for the renovation.
by Danny Cross
09.20.2011
Posted In: Poverty, President Obama, Social Justice, Technology, Death Penalty, LGBT Issues at 09:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Morning News and Stuff
Do you enjoy looking at slideshows of rich people? Here's a good one, themed “Most Corrupt Members of Congress.” Guess which local Eastside representative made the list … Here's a hint: Jean Schmidt.
by Kevin Osborne
04.13.2012
Group Pushes for Ohio Tax Change
Think tank: EITC would help working families
A nonpartisan think tank that advocates for poor and working class families is urging that Ohio adopt its own version of the federal Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC).
The group, Policy Matters Ohio, said a state version of the federal tax credit, set at 10 percent, would divert just $210 million from Ohio’s coffers but would benefit 949,000 low-income working families across the state. Such a credit would provide families with an average of $221 each, which Policy Matters Ohio described as “modest but helpful.”
Currently 24 states and the District of Columbia have Earned Income Tax Credits, ranging from 3.5 percent to 50 percent of the federal credit.
“A state EITC program enables families to work and build assets while reducing the impact of regressive income tax changes,” said a statement released by Policy Matters Ohio.
“A state EITC makes sense because recent changes to the personal income tax have provided greater tax reductions for higher-income earners than they have for lower- and middle-income families,” the statement continued.
The federal EITC is a refundable tax credit for low- and medium-income individuals and couples, and is considered the nation’s largest poverty relief program. When the credit exceeds the amount of taxes owed, it results in a tax refund to those who qualify and claim the credit.
To qualify for the EITC, a recipient must have earned income of $49,000 or less. The credit is worth significantly more for families with children and is refundable, which means families receive cash refunds above their tax liability.
Created in 1975, the federal EITC is aimed at helping lift families with children about the poverty level, along with offsetting the burden of Social Security taxes and maintaining an incentive for people to work.
In Ohio, 949,692 people currently claim the federal EITC. The credit generates $2.1 billion for state residents, and the average refund is $2,211.
Founded in 2000, Policy Matters Ohio is a nonprofit, nonpartisan policy research organization that seeks to create “a more prosperous, equitable, sustainable and inclusive Ohio,” through research and policy advocacy.
Based in Cleveland and Columbus, the organization is funded primarily through grants from groups like the Ford Foundation, the Sisters of Charity Foundation, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, the Corp. for Enterprise Development and others.
by Hannah McCartney
04.04.2013
76 days ago
ACLU: Ohio Courts Wrongfully Criminalizing Poor
Hamilton County Municipal Court included on list of offenders
A new report from the ACLU of Ohio released today suggests that in many courts across Ohio, it's a crime just to be poor.
The report, titled The Outskirts of Hope, delineates how several courts across Ohio, including Hamilton County Municipal Court, are unlawfully jailing people because they’re too impoverished to pay court fines.
It’s a system called “debtors’ prisons,” a tool in which people are jailed for debts as small as a few hundred dollars, even when the offense committed could have been something as minor as allowing a dog to walk off its leash in public, according to Mike Brickner, ACLU Ohio's director of communications.
“Today across Ohio, municipalities routinely imprison those who are unable to pay fines and court costs despite a 1983 United States Supreme Court decision declaring this practice to be a violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution,” reads the report.
It’s referring to Bearden v. Georgia, the landmark Supreme Court case in which the courts ruled it was unlawful to imprison someone for failure to pay a criminal fine unless the non-payment was “willful,” also upheld in the Ohio Constitution and Ohio Revised Code. That means that if a judge is able to determined than an individual actually does have the financial resources available to pay a court fine but refuses to do so, he or she is subject to incarceration, not for actually failing to pay the fines but for willfully refusing to do so. In the case of not being able to afford the fine, the jailing is for a civil misdoing, not a criminal one, and, according to the ACLU, that’s not something that merits jail time costly to the state of Ohio.
The report examined 11 different counties in Ohio and found that seven of courts in at least seven counties, including Bryan Municipal Court, Hamilton County Municipal Court, Mansfield Municipal Court, Parma Municipal Court, Sandusky Municipal Court, Springboro Mayor’s Court and Norwalk Municipal Court, were using some form of “debtors’ prison” practices by illegally jailing people for not paying fines without the judge-certified ruling that they’re financially capable of doing so.
In one finding, the ACLU points out that the staff at the Norwalk Municipal Court’s Clerk of Court Office in Huron County “openly admitted that whenever court records showed a person was incarcerated for ten days on a ‘contempt’ charge, this meant he or she had most likely been jailed for failure to pay fines.”
The ACLU’s investigation found that over a six-month period, 22 percent — more than one in five — of the total bookings at the Huron County Jail were related to failure to pay fines.
ACLU staff members attended multiple contempt hearings in the Norwalk Municipal Court and found a pattern for dealing with non-payment at hearings, noting that “people facing jail time were informed of the total amount owed and, without any inquiry into their financial situations, assigned arbitrary monthly payment plans. At no time were they informed of their right to counsel. The court informed them that, if they did not stay current in these payment plans, they would be required to turn themselves in to jail on a specific date several months in the future.”
That’s where the vicious cycle begins; if the fines weren’t paid and the individual didn’t report to jail, he or she would be taken to jail and incarcerated for 10 days with no bond. Ten days later, they’d be released with an extra stack of fines involved in the arrest, creating more crippling debt and often causing this process to be repeated.
The number of people living in poverty grew by 57.7 percent in Ohio from 1999 to 2011, according to the report — a trend mirrored across the Midwest. The ACLU calls for courts to be more transparent in communicating defendants their rights, consistently hold hearings to assess defendants' financial viability and "willfulness" to pay accumulated fines and provide retroactive debt credits to those wrongfully incarcerated based on circumstances of poverty.
Brickner says ACLU Ohio sent a letter to Ohio Supreme Court Justice Maureen O'Connor outlining the report, and he's hopeful the Supreme Court will issue statewide guidelines to make the laws extremely clear to judges across the state.
"With these 11 cases, we believe they're just the tip of the iceberg," says Brickner.
The report, titled The Outskirts of Hope, delineates how several courts across Ohio, including Hamilton County Municipal Court, are unlawfully jailing people because they’re too impoverished to pay court fines.
It’s a system called “debtors’ prisons,” a tool in which people are jailed for debts as small as a few hundred dollars, even when the offense committed could have been something as minor as allowing a dog to walk off its leash in public, according to Mike Brickner, ACLU Ohio's director of communications.
“Today across Ohio, municipalities routinely imprison those who are unable to pay fines and court costs despite a 1983 United States Supreme Court decision declaring this practice to be a violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution,” reads the report.
It’s referring to Bearden v. Georgia, the landmark Supreme Court case in which the courts ruled it was unlawful to imprison someone for failure to pay a criminal fine unless the non-payment was “willful,” also upheld in the Ohio Constitution and Ohio Revised Code. That means that if a judge is able to determined than an individual actually does have the financial resources available to pay a court fine but refuses to do so, he or she is subject to incarceration, not for actually failing to pay the fines but for willfully refusing to do so. In the case of not being able to afford the fine, the jailing is for a civil misdoing, not a criminal one, and, according to the ACLU, that’s not something that merits jail time costly to the state of Ohio.
The report examined 11 different counties in Ohio and found that seven of courts in at least seven counties, including Bryan Municipal Court, Hamilton County Municipal Court, Mansfield Municipal Court, Parma Municipal Court, Sandusky Municipal Court, Springboro Mayor’s Court and Norwalk Municipal Court, were using some form of “debtors’ prison” practices by illegally jailing people for not paying fines without the judge-certified ruling that they’re financially capable of doing so.
In one finding, the ACLU points out that the staff at the Norwalk Municipal Court’s Clerk of Court Office in Huron County “openly admitted that whenever court records showed a person was incarcerated for ten days on a ‘contempt’ charge, this meant he or she had most likely been jailed for failure to pay fines.”
The ACLU’s investigation found that over a six-month period, 22 percent — more than one in five — of the total bookings at the Huron County Jail were related to failure to pay fines.
ACLU staff members attended multiple contempt hearings in the Norwalk Municipal Court and found a pattern for dealing with non-payment at hearings, noting that “people facing jail time were informed of the total amount owed and, without any inquiry into their financial situations, assigned arbitrary monthly payment plans. At no time were they informed of their right to counsel. The court informed them that, if they did not stay current in these payment plans, they would be required to turn themselves in to jail on a specific date several months in the future.”
That’s where the vicious cycle begins; if the fines weren’t paid and the individual didn’t report to jail, he or she would be taken to jail and incarcerated for 10 days with no bond. Ten days later, they’d be released with an extra stack of fines involved in the arrest, creating more crippling debt and often causing this process to be repeated.
The number of people living in poverty grew by 57.7 percent in Ohio from 1999 to 2011, according to the report — a trend mirrored across the Midwest. The ACLU calls for courts to be more transparent in communicating defendants their rights, consistently hold hearings to assess defendants' financial viability and "willfulness" to pay accumulated fines and provide retroactive debt credits to those wrongfully incarcerated based on circumstances of poverty.
Brickner says ACLU Ohio sent a letter to Ohio Supreme Court Justice Maureen O'Connor outlining the report, and he's hopeful the Supreme Court will issue statewide guidelines to make the laws extremely clear to judges across the state.
"With these 11 cases, we believe they're just the tip of the iceberg," says Brickner.
by Danny Cross
10.31.2011
Posted In: Occupy Wall Street, Occupy Cincinnati, 2011 Election, 2012 Election, News, Sports, Social Justice, Science, President Obama, Poverty, Protests at 08:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
Morning News and Stuff
The Cincinnati Enquirer announced its endorsements over the weekend, and four incumbents were left thinking, “What the [expletive] did I do?!?” The current councilpersons who the paper decided not to endorse are Republican Wayne Lippert, who was appointed in March, and Republicans Leslie Ghiz and Charlie Winburn, along with Democrat Cecil Thomas.
Ghiz was described as having a penchant for starting arguments that have been “personal, petty and nasty,” while Winburn's “unpredictable behavior” was noted along with Thomas' problems fully grasping budget and finance issues.
by German Lopez
07.25.2012
Report: Nearly 1 in 4 Ohio Children in Poverty
Ohio has 16th highest rate in U.S.
The 2012 Kids Count report, released by the Annie E. Casey Foundation,
has found 23 percent of Ohio children lived in poverty in 2010, barely
higher than the national average of 22 percent. Overall, Ohio was No. 35
in terms of poverty with New Hampshire at No. 1 with only 10 percent of
children in poverty.
The report puts Ohio ahead of neighbor Kentucky, which had 26 percent of children in poverty, and Mississippi, which was the worst-faring state with 33 percent of children in poverty. However, Ohio was barely behind neighbor Indiana, which had 22 percent of children in poverty.
The report placed Ohio at No. 27 in its overall rank, which measures economic well-being, education, health care and “family and community” of children in the United States.
There were some bright spots for Ohio in the report. Ohio was No. 18 in terms of education and No. 24 in terms of health.
Overall, the report had some good and bad news for U.S. children and their parents. It found the poverty rate for children increased by 16 percent between 2005 and 2010, and children living in high-poverty areas increased by 22 percent between 2000 and 2006 to 2010. However, the report found that the number of children without health insurance dropped by 20 percent between 2008 and 2010, and the amount of eighth graders not proficient in math dropped by 8 percent between 2005 and 2011.
The report comes at a time in which children’s health and economic well-being have already taken the center stage in Cincinnati. The Children’s Defense Fund has been hosting its first national conference since 2003 in the city this week. The conference has been looking at children’s issues, including poverty and health care. Today, Trayvon Martin’s parents are attending the conference to discuss violence and racial issues in the United States.
For all the data and the full report, go to datacenter.kidscount.org.
The report puts Ohio ahead of neighbor Kentucky, which had 26 percent of children in poverty, and Mississippi, which was the worst-faring state with 33 percent of children in poverty. However, Ohio was barely behind neighbor Indiana, which had 22 percent of children in poverty.
The report placed Ohio at No. 27 in its overall rank, which measures economic well-being, education, health care and “family and community” of children in the United States.
There were some bright spots for Ohio in the report. Ohio was No. 18 in terms of education and No. 24 in terms of health.
Overall, the report had some good and bad news for U.S. children and their parents. It found the poverty rate for children increased by 16 percent between 2005 and 2010, and children living in high-poverty areas increased by 22 percent between 2000 and 2006 to 2010. However, the report found that the number of children without health insurance dropped by 20 percent between 2008 and 2010, and the amount of eighth graders not proficient in math dropped by 8 percent between 2005 and 2011.
The report comes at a time in which children’s health and economic well-being have already taken the center stage in Cincinnati. The Children’s Defense Fund has been hosting its first national conference since 2003 in the city this week. The conference has been looking at children’s issues, including poverty and health care. Today, Trayvon Martin’s parents are attending the conference to discuss violence and racial issues in the United States.
For all the data and the full report, go to datacenter.kidscount.org.
