Over the last seven years, the land bank has amassed more than 200 properties in this district, at the Cleveland-East Cleveland border. Now the quasi-governmental organization is serving as master developer for 33 acres, where preliminary plans call for building hundreds of homes and luring commercial developers to a depleted stretch of Euclid Avenue.

That vision, with an estimated cost of $122 million, comes at a unique moment for East Cleveland, a once-prosperous inner-ring suburb that now ranks as Ohio's poorest city.

Public officials insist that the government is stable, after years of fiscal distress and dysfunction. And they have the bandwidth to consider long-term investments, thanks to an infusion of federal pandemic-relief cash.

JobsOhio, the state's private nonprofit economic development corporation, is willing to put $1.5 million toward the land bank's plan to turn a former car dealership on Euclid into a home for life sciences tenants. Last year, Gov. Mike DeWine announced the rollout of high-speed internet access to underserved parts of the city.

Meanwhile, the Cleveland Metroparks is in discussions about stepping in to manage East Cleveland's Forest Hill Park, a 170-acre property that philanthropist John D. Rockefeller Jr. deeded to the city in the late 1930s. The park is only a half-mile from the land bank's target area.

I will not be surprised if City of Cleveland hires Western Reserve Land Conservancy to produce their park master plan - I am convinced WRLC has already parceled out Highland Golf Course to their developer friends like good ole Mitch Schneider... why does City need to outsource their plan in the first place? 

Cleveland Releases RFP to Revitalize Historic Highland Park Golf Course

9.15.22

Thursday, Sept. 15, 2022 – Cleveland – Today, the City of Cleveland released a request for proposals (RFP) for a vendor to lease, revitalize, and manage operations of the historic Highland Park Golf Course at 3550 Green Road.  

Highland Park Golf Course, first opened in 1928, is a 36-hole course and clubhouse owned by the City and operated by an external management company. The City of Cleveland is seeking to establish Highland as a tournament-ready course and a leader in community impact and sustainability. 

“This course has a rich history of promoting diversity in the sport of golf. As the golf course nears its centennial, this is an opportunity to elevate it as a premier public course for locals and a destination for golfers across the country,” Mayor Justin M. Bibb said. 

As the only public course near Cleveland’s east side, Highland has historically been a welcoming course for minority players in an overwhelmingly white sport. The Sixth City Golf Club (established in 1946) and Forest City Golf Club were two pioneering African American golf leagues that played primarily at Highland Park.  

The course also hosted the inaugural PGA Minority Collegiate Golf Championship in 1987, at which African American golf stars including Lee Elder, Charlie Sifford, Calvin Peete, Jim Dent, and Renee Powell held free golf clinics for the community. Sifford, known as the “Jackie Robinson of golf” and first black golfer to play and win on the PGA tour, claimed Highland Park as his home course for a time.  

During the PGA Tour’s Cleveland Open in 1964 and 1965, the course welcomed golf greats like Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, and Tony Lema.  

“As a young man, this was the first place I played golf,” Mayor Bibb added. “It would bring me immense pride to restore the course and create a professional tournament-level course while maintaining it as a space for Black golfers, both aspiring and seasoned, to enjoy.” 

The City is seeking innovative ideas to re-imagine the golf course for the next 100 years. The City aims for the course to continue its history of promoting diversity in golf by opening doors to the sport for new, young golfers from Cleveland and by honoring its past as a predominantly minority course.  

Responses are due October 20, 2022. Submissions will be evaluated based on their proposals for establishment of a best-in-class facility, exploration and expansion of community impact and thoughtful consideration of environmental sustainability.  

The RFP can be accessed here. 

SAVE FOREST HILLS PARK:

https://www.change.org/p/for-the-love-of-forest-hill

https://www.ideastream.org/government-politics/2023-09-13/east-cleveland-residents-urge-metroparks-city-to-revitalize-forest-hill-park-after-deal-falls-apart

For history of Brandon King: http://realneo.us/search/node/%22brandon+king%22

Ken Prendergast of NEO-Trans writes : 

https://neo-trans.blog/2023/08/23/the-fate-of-east-cleveland/ >> see 

https:// neo-trans.blog/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/East-Cleveland-Metroparks-letter-Aug2023.pdf

Council has learned that Mayor King and attorney Willa Mae Hemmons have been creating their own versions of legislation and submitting it to government agencies as authentic. Please forward copies of any resolutions or ordinances in your possession that are purported to be official records of the City of East Cleveland regarding the proposed lease agreement. ‘We look forward to a return of the $2 million that was transferred, unlawfully, to Cleveland Metroparks at the direction of East Cleveland's mayor as we have no agreement. It is not this Council's intent to drag a potential partner into a public controversy that has the appearances of a crime.

Respectfully,

— Juanita Gowdy, President of Council

 NOTE: I confirmed with Eric Brewer that he co-wrote the letter sent to the Cleveland Metroparks Brian Zimmerman.  Brewer has been working as the unpaid legislative aide to East Cleveland Council President - Juanita Gowdy.

Eric J. Brewer reported this on June 29, 2023

https://ejbnews.com/kings-temp-agency-finance-director-has-no-oath-no-bond-and-no-municipal-finance-experience-before-she-joined-east-cleveland/

Williams doesn’t have the depth of knowledge that would give her the strength of ethics to tell King “no” when he asks for the passwords to the city’s bank accounts; or instructs her to give him check signing authority on any account he wants.  Council has approved no lease agreement with Cleveland Metroparks; so the $2 million King wanted to give them before the council agreed was unlawful.  Cleveland Metroparks attorney Rose Fini wrote in an email that the agency did not receive the $2 million.  King told a council employee the $2 million was gone.

Lily Miller, Jerry Strothers, Eric Brewer reported on Brandon King's involvement with the Cuyahoga County Land Bank.  Noble Rd Dump Operator George Michael Riley is working as an informant with federal investigators to expose the East Cleveland Police role in the bribery ring. 

Scott Noll recently covered East Cleveland police hiring bad actors from other municipalities. 

https://www.news5cleveland.com/news/local-news/investigations/east-cleve...

Noll was cc.d on a vicious email recently sent to me.

 Cleveland dot com Peter Krouse article 

Plain Dealer, The (Cleveland, OH) - August 19, 2023 - page 3

August 19, 2023 | Plain Dealer, The (Cleveland, OH) | Cleveland, Ohio | Page 3

See Brandon King try to explain his way out of the mess :  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CEnBq8ykEzs

EJB Response to Brandon King video (deleted from the post): 

Let's go Brandon. If Brandon King's lips are moving he's lying. He should also blink when he lies. Patricia Blochowiak had nothing to do with the correspondence between Council President Juanita Gowdy and Cleveland Metroparks Director Brian Zimmerman. Thank you for producing and reading your crime confession into the record on an official social media channel. Try standing and talking to reporters instead of running away like a coward. Council received a proposed Cleveland Metroparks lease agreement on April 26, 2023. Council President Gowdy asked me to schedule a May 11, 2023 meeting with Zimmerman to discuss the agreement with her Contracts & Properties Committee, 15 days later. Zimmerman snubbed Council because you had already told him to send an invoice for the check in "late April," around the same time Council received the "proposed" lease. You left out that your "deal" included Cleveland Metroparks paying East Cleveland 99 cents for a 168 acre park for 100 years; and East Cleveland giving them $2 million and the lease. You negotiate like a fool. Zimmerman's letter, the one you shared, is referencing the "confusing" check sign out sheet your employees use to sign for vendor checks. Zimmerman's accusing your administration of allowing employees to sign for vendor checks. He implied that an employee signed for the $2 million Cleveland Metroparks check on May 12, 2023, the day after he ignored President Gowdy's May 11 meeting. He wrote that the check was in your office instead of the city's treasury, Brandon. He's accusing your administration, Brandon, of engaging in misconduct. You left out that you let a temporary payroll clerk impersonate the director of finance to sign the $2 million check. If she was authorized to discharge the director of finance's duties of signing a $2 million check on May 5, 2023, Latosha Williams would have an oath of office filed with the clerk of council dated May 4, 2023; and a bond approved by a resolution of council. She would not be an employee required to attend council meetings who council has never met. He wrote how you told him to send a $2 million invoice before or the day Willa Hemmons sent the proposed lease to Council on April 26, 2023. The email from Cleveland Metroparks to Hemmons was captioned as a Cleveland Heights / Forest Hill Park agreement. Willa recaptioned it as an East Cleveland / Forest Hill Park agreement before she forwarded it to Council, though none of the email in the chain previously referenced East Cleveland. You know damn well you had no business calling Zimmerman to get $2 million before Council discussed the proposed lease in public, and voted to authorize you to sign the lease. Hemmons, your bootleg, private attorney, law director impersonator, said she hadn't even read the proposed lease. The email chain doesn't show her contributing to any of the previous discussions. Nothing from you, either. Council President Gowdy should not have had to ask a vendor about a $2 million check Latosha Williams needed an appropriating ordinance or resolution to sign. Without a resolution or ordinance of council approving the lease and transfer of funds, Brandon, everything you did was unlawful. Thanks for a video law enforcement officers investigating your administration can now use as your unpressured crime confession. Mansell Baker said you told him you sent Zimmerman the check to force council into approving the proposed lease. In your twisted mind, you told Baker you were giving council and the public no choice in the deal. That's why Zimmerman explained how he chose not to receive the $2 million check you asked him to send an invoice for, around the day council received the proposed lease. He knew you needed council approval and were involving him in your conspiracy to obstruct the legislative branch of government. You sound like a straight up fool claiming that last year's legislation did not exclude you from delivering $2 million in public funds to Zimmerman around the day council received the proposed lease. It's as dumb as your "veto" argument the Chairwoman of the Financial Planning & Supervision Commission asked the Ohio Attorney General to reject. It's as dumb as you thinking you can appoint council members the Supreme Court of Ohio rejected. Council is the appropriating authority. Mayors don't supervise the affairs of council. Council President Gowdy acted to protect the city from you misappropriating $2 million like the $8 million the Ohio Auditor of State confirmed Gary Norton misappropriated from the $20 million unauthorized agreement he signed to let Cleveland Clinic close Huron Hospital. The distinction I just made is too complicated for you to comprehend, which is why you sound like a fool with your interpretation of what I wrote about Norton. I would never have agreed to closing the hospital or demolishing the property. Huron Hospital President Gus Kious and I were talking about using a 1953 state law to get council to pass a property tax for free resident services. You don't close hospitals in a majority American Negro city with a life-saving emergency room. East Cleveland EMS had the fastest call-to-emergency room response time in the region. The #1 gunshot wound trauma center for the entire state of Ohio was located in East Cleveland. Mayors don't let General Electric leave like you did. Mayors don't encourage the Cuyahoga County landbank to dump over 1000 homes behind residential homes on Noble Road and create a toxic dump. You negotiate like a fool. I brought the industrial hygienist to test the dust and create the data the Ohio EPA used to close the Noble Road dump you and Norton brought to town with Cheryl Stephens. You left out, Brandon, that you live in Euclid, Ohio and Cleveland Metroparks cares for the Euclid Creek Reservation along the road that leads to your home on a cul de sac with your wife. It's beautiful overlooking the ravine. No one believes you live in an uninhabitable illegal dump with your mentally ill, hoarder brother and his girlfriend. I didn't let police terrorize my people like you have done, Brandon. The FBI and Cuyahoga County Prosecutor didn't create a hotline for Americans to report police and city hall crimes during my administration, Brandon. I am the only mayor to have kept East Cleveland out of fiscal emergency for all 4 years of my administration. You have a $60 million deficit and don't possess the accomplishments to mention my name. If you were smart you would have talked to me instead of making me an enemy. You despise the fact that Council President Gowdy was brilliant enough to ask the city's most successful former mayor to serve as Clerk of Council and her advisor. I've forgotten more than you'll ever know as a mayor. The "city" is not being destroyed, Brandon. You're on the path to self-destruction by your own misdeeds because you are, at the core of who you are as a person, a criminal. It's why you praise Gary Norton. You and East Cleveland are, also, not "one." East Cleveland will be in place when you're in jail. If any mayor deserves to be locked up, you do. God is not on your side. Resign.

Uncle Gus also quickly got Vic Gideon to run a promo on their Mickey's deal to counter the negative publicity on the land bank: https://www.cleveland19.com/2023/08/31/part-east-clevelands-past-will-help-create-brighter-future-city/