Thank you, Ms Martin, for asking the PD to write about issues that affect the inner suburbs--long ignored by policy makers and the newspaper, despite warning signs many years ago that directing our taxpayer resources to pay for sprawl infrastructure while ignoring the fact that our county is not gaining population is clearly a downward trajectory. 

Tax delinquencies are a huge problem pretty much everywhere, as the middle class and working poor struggle to keep up with the demands of home ownership, rising food prices, medical care, taxes, etc. Also delinquent in numbers are those unscrupulous landlords/investors who hide behind LLCs who have bought up property to cash in on turning single family homes into rentals during the housing crisis, all the while planning to walk away after a few years of neglect and non payment of property taxes, is a huge problem in formerly stable owner-occupied neighborhoods in many inner suburbs. 

Until there is the political will from every city, however, to talk about regionalization there won't be much ability for individual cities to tackle these problems on their own, unless they band together to figure a few things out and share ideas and resources. There is a lot at stake here, and what affects the core and inner ring has a bearing on the fortunes of the stronger outlying areas. Unfortunately, many of those in positions of power and with the ability to actually influence larger efforts and support the grassroots, too --create policy or influence the placement of resources and large amounts of money--Cleveland Foundation are you listening?--seem to not really care about the inner suburbs. Everybody's on their own.