Does Jimmy Dimora deserve the privilege of being considered innocent until proven guilty?

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Wed, 07/01/2009 - 06:56.
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how about

Submitted by noner on Wed, 07/01/2009 - 07:32.

 * Consider them innocent until proven guilty, but lets get on with it already - I actually ENJOY watching them squirm, but our county has too much to lose by waiting.

Name names

Submitted by lmcshane on Wed, 07/01/2009 - 12:15.

  I hope Dimora names all of the names in his extended network.  How many folks can be indicted?  I think that this is the point he is making here.  I give him credit for turning the cameras and lights on the whole scheme.  This is Detroit in the making...

And, just how ironic can this BE?

All 3 Commissioners are Guilty of malfeasance

Submitted by Jeff Buster on Wed, 07/01/2009 - 08:25.

 

Here's just 3 reasons - none debatable - why all THREE Cuyahoga County Commissioners are unethical, corrupt, and/or rotten stewards of the public trust:
 
1.  After buying the Breuer designed Ameritrust Tower from Jacobs - and then suddenly "discovering" that  the County could not afford the Tower - none of the 3 Comms insisted that advertisements for the COUNTY Sale of the building be placed in international media – instead letting Doug Price and other local “developers” play with it.
 
2.  Like Mr. Dimora said at his news conference, 98 % of the Commissioners'  votes funding County expenditures (Ameritrust Tower, Juvenile Justice Center, Etc) were unanimous.  So even if Dimora was steering money to his connections, Mr. Hagan and Mr. Jones were not savvy enough to see it and object - or each of the 3 had their own personal piggy bank projects.  (Mr. Hagan has the Medcon, Mr. Dimora the JJC, and Mr. Jones?- go along to get along?)
 
3.  MEDCON - Mr. Hagan shilled for his friend Chris Kennedy rather than recusing himself, Mr. Jones strategically voted no on the sales tax increase but then put no energy into opposition and then eventually advocated for the MEDCON, Mr. Dimora met repeatedly in secret with MEDCON officials and Fred the Fixer Nance.
 
The County electorate should FRY all three of them!

 

I think you are falling for the MEDiaCon

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Wed, 07/01/2009 - 14:11.

Everything you claim above you learned from the PD. What is true now, and what truths do you know about the past?

What we need is open collaboration on all these projects - open review of all the outcomes - but not because anything in the PD is true, but because our economy is so poor.

The economy is so poor here because of decades of corruption and poor leadership, including poor economic planning and analysis among a large group of professionals and academics, over decades, and the latest elected officials may or may not be responsible for any particular problems here, but they are not responsible alone.

I will unceasingly point out the long tail of all that we analyze here, through many administrations, including personal friends of many - all Guilty of malfeasance, or just poor leaders among many poor leaders.

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nope not exactly

Submitted by Susan Miller on Wed, 07/01/2009 - 18:14.

I know from personal experience that Jeff knows number one listed above because he was there when I asked the question of Barb Shergalis in person. Commissioners did not want the tower listed for sale outside Cuyahoga county - that was no media con except us hearing it directly from the staff person responsible for the project.

Number 2 and 3 have surely been reported in the media, but are also discoverable with a bit of research. No... I don't believe that Jeff B has fallen for the media con. It seems it hurts when the rose colored glasses of "Obama will change everything" or the "Jones is the right guy/the smart guy" slip a bit. Eyes wide open, Norm... open them wide. So what if dirty deals were done in the past? Does that mean each new elected official is elected to continue them. NO it doesn't.

I'm pleased with Obama and Jones

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 00:35.

Obama is changing everything and Jones is the right/smart guy. 

I don't see what is either of your point about the advertising - I think the world knows it is for sale... if not, HELLO WORLD - that seems an issue that may still be addressed. Sell the Breuer and collect a commission. I prefer we keep the Breuer for the County and use it for public good.

Jeff's items 2 and 3 don't make sense to me either... perhaps I missed some news.  I know the Juvi land deal was crooked but that was years ago and the past Administrators... perhaps they should FRY.

Go after those responsible for that deal, who are not the current administrators.

Is there evidence some crime has been committed about the juvi besides the poor past decisions about the site? Unjustified cost over-runs? Back-room bribes? I haven't seen anything about illegal activity about the Juvi... have I missed something?

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how does $254/square foot compare

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 01:13.

The historic Breuer still stands, and awaits future plans, in citizen hands, the MedCon will save the historic Cleveland Convention Center from Cleveland's hapless hands, and offer the opportunity to reinvent for good the aborted historic Mall Plan - give purpose to saving the historic school administration building, and many other historic buildings in that dead government and finance 9-5 zone.

To me all that is good - and each situation has enough good to balance the bad, to me. Now, make the best of each.

I'm just getting familiar with the Juvi. The Juvenile Justice Center is touted by the minority owned architects as state of the art, destined to be a model for the world, which offers such lofty goals, along with LEED certification, perhaps we should see if this isn't a good plan in the end - perhaps current leaders made the best of the situation and it is best-in-class as claimed.... perhaps there is some good thinking behind this...?

Who would have reported on that?

Jeff - trash these numbers, claims and qualifications as this seems to be what we are getting for our money and county leadership... for $254/square foot.

How does $254/square foot compare with the cost for similar state of the art LEED juvis in the world, because the number sounds in range to me... this is as the architect/engineer of record states... selected by the County Administrators, it appears in 2003 or 2004 (who were administrators then?).

Cuyahoga County Juvenile Justice Center

Board of Cuyahoga County Commissioners

East 93rd and Quincy, Cleveland, Ohio

As a result of a national design competition, the Cuyahoga County Board of Commissioners selected Ralph Tyler Companies as the Architect/Engineer of Record for this new $160 million, 630,000 square ft. Juvenile Justice Center.  Located on a reclaimed industrial site on the east side of Cleveland, this facility combines all court related and detention activity at one location.

Project Highlights

After 3 years of planning and design, the actual project started construction in 2007 and is expected to be complete in early 2010.  Located on approximately 12 acres, the Center will accomodate juveniles beween the ages of 10 and 18.  RTC worked closely with a team of specialty consultants, the Juvenile Court and the County Commissioners to create a unique design that provides security and rehabilitation of youthful offenders.

The Center provides space for 150 residents and a staff of 125.  The site had to accomodate parking for over 750 vehicles in a secure environment with a secure outdoor resident recreation space.  The main tower is a nine-story structure of almost 400,000 square ft.  and primarily houses the Juvenile Court system for the County. 

RTC's challenge was coordinating key design consultants with in-house design services to assure tight control of costs and schedules.  To date, the projects has stayed within the limits for both.  It is expected that this facility will serve as a national model for other large urban counties.

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so are we saying

Submitted by noner on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 07:10.

$30million was a good price for the vacant contaminated land?

and why is it always the same shady rich white guys who so grossly benefit from Cleveland's "public" deals?

This land deal?

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 10:26.

Cuyahoga County missed a chance to save $2 million on juvenile center

Posted by rdissell [at] plaind [dot] com cevans [at] plaind [dot] com and slivingston [at] plaind [dot] com August 16, 2008 18:22PM

CLEVELAND -- Cuyahoga County Commissioners celebrated as they signed a $2.75 million deal to buy land from Sunrise Land Co., a subsidiary of Forest City Enterprises, Inc. That deal ended a more than 14-year battle to find a home for a much-needed county juvenile detention center. There were lengthy speeches, applause and even jokes, according to a tape of that Feb. 29, 2000, meeting.

Commissioner Jane Campbell introduced her newest colleague, Jimmy Dimora, quipping that after "14 years of sturm und drang ... you come here and in one year it got fixed. Want to, like, enlighten us?"

"It's being Italian," Dimora wisecracked. "You make people an offer they can't refuse."

Everyone laughed.

But the deal really wasn't funny. Just seven months earlier, the county could have saved taxpayers more than $2 million by snatching up the property itself up before the land was sold to Sunrise.

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oops

Submitted by noner on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 11:34.

drop that 0

$3million, not $30 million, my mistake.

its still far too much to pay. ridiculous, in fact.

strange bedfellows - Justice Center construction

Submitted by Jeff Buster on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 10:45.

If you look at the Ralph Tyler web site, and click on their  “recent projects” you will find that they do not demonstrate  experience with mid rise steel office design or construction – they certainly show no justice/court design experience.  The historic experience that Tyler appears to have is primarily site related – demolition, surveying and utility verification.  
 
You will also notice that the images which rotate in the upper flash program include images of the Carl Stokes Federal Courthouse in Cleveland, but the Tyler company did not design the Stokes Building – the Boston architectural firm of   Kallmann, McKinnell and Wood are the designers. The Tyler web site does claim some work (reflected ceiling plans, surveying) on the first 4 floors at the Stokes.  You will also see the Browns Stadium and the Rock and Roll hall of fame flash by.  None of these structures were designed by Tyler, though the Tyler company did do some site work at each. At the R&R Tyler did some site lay out.
 
The use of these full building images by the Tyler site is perhaps misleading.
 Also, if you look at the Ralph Tyler “locations” link you will see they purport to have an office in Mumbai, India
301, 302, Vrindavan
Umed Ashram Road
Off. S.V. Road
Borivli (West)
Mumbai 400092
India
Phone: 011.91.22.28332812
Fax: 011.91.22.28332814
USA Direct: 216.916.696
 
Is the Tyler company outsourcing work from Cleveland to India? 
 
On the construction sign in front of the Justice Center (image above -Sorry about the distrating image through the fence.) is the name Heery Internantional and J.E. Jacobs Facilities. (no relation to the Cleveland Jacobs)  
 
 
 
 
Cuyahoga County
Juvenile Justice Center
Cleveland, Ohio
For more than 30 years, Cuyahoga County, Ohio, had tried to replace its aging and undersized juvenile detention facility, which had earned the moniker “worst juvenile detention facility in the nation” from the National Juvenile Detention Association.  With an increase in youth offenders to contend with as well, Cuyahoga County recognized the need to create a new detention facility, a new intervention center and a new juvenile courts building.  The county commissioners called upon Heery International to serve as owner’s representative throughout the comprehensive planning, programming, design and construction phases of the juvenile justice center which is slated for completion in 2010. 
Given the critical task of assessing sites and determining funding and delivery options, Heery evaluated potential sites assigning design, construction and operational costs for each.  The final decision was to acquire a 16-acre brownfield site in a nearby Cleveland community.  Heery provided environmental analysis, which uncovered a variety of chemicals on the former factory and brewery site.  Its efforts in helping the County obtain remediation funding and managing site clean-up not only enabled the county to create a healthy site, but also to win the OEPA Clean Ohio Revitalization Fund Award. In addition, the justice center is designed to achieve LEED Silver certification. 
The key components of the CCJJC include a secure detention facility with a capacity of 180 beds; a 330,000 SF court tower to provide 36 courtrooms with associated chambers and magistrate offices; a flexible-use space dedicated to the community to promote a larger continuum of prevention and intervention services for the youth.
 
 
So I suggest that the Tyler Company involvement with the Justice Center is primarily as a local liaison to J.E. Jacobs Facilities.  
 
 
 
So the considerably more complicated construction on the Stokes Court House site appears to have cost $208 per square foot when it was dedicated in 2002. 
 
Heery (in quote above) states the site has 330,000 sq feet while Tyler states 630,000 sq ft.    If the cost of the Juvenile Justice Center is 160 milliion, then for 330,000 sq ft (Heery number) the cost is $484 per square foot - almost 2 1/2 times more than the Stokes Building.
 
I think the companies involved in the Juvenile Justice Center are sort of strange bedfellows. For example, why would Heery, a subsidiary of a British firm, be the “Owners Representative”? 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 

You make lots of assumptions

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 11:18.

So far, in what you post, I see the County winning an EPA award, working with world-class firms to manage a big complex project, that is needed, with all parties publicly claiming commitments to build the best LEED Silver facility of this type in the world, for a fair cost.

The numbers you show don't match other numbers in the news and on websites so we may as well get some good numbers for apple-to-apple comparisons before getting too deep into that.

I think you need to do more than assume to surface where we should have a problem with current affairs... if in the past things were handled poorly or illegally, speak to the two past commissioners who you certainly know, who structured the deal... again, they are Jane Campbell and Tim McCormack (he was at Ed's road dedication at Whiskey Island... friend of Dan Moore)... they put this one together, so they are the insiders on the land deal and history making events here.

Gee... Moore, McCormack, Dimora = Whiskey Island land deal, too.

Ever look at the finances on that deal?

MEDiaCON.

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Complicity

Submitted by lmcshane on Wed, 07/01/2009 - 16:35.

  Which is why I don't pretend that everything is alright now that we have Obama in office--there are many lies and personal friendships involved in the structuring of our unbalanced economy.  We have to do better and not look away, just because we fool ourselves into thinking that we are not personally affected by the imbalance in our society.
 

I'm not so sure

Submitted by noner on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 07:09.

Obama has been gangbusters. To borrow from Alexander Cockburn in The nation (I could just reword, but I prefer honesty):

The list of Obama's sellouts is already far, far beyond the capacity of a tweetgram... Start with healthcare. Next, how much has Obama committed to financial rescue, telling the waiter that the American middle class will foot the bill for decades to come? ($12.8 trillion at last report.)

Obama recently came up with his master plan for regulating Wall Street to prevent the chicaneries of Boom-boom time that brought the world's economy to its knees. it will now pass from a presidential bought and paid for by Wall Street to the Senate Finance Committee, also bought and paid for by Wall Street, which won't even have to gut it because it's gutless already.

unemployment is climbing. Call it, at the current rate, 1,000 per hour losing their jobs. desperate thousands are surging back onto the welfare rolls, pruned brutally by Bill Clinton just over a decade ago, all of this presided over by the Hopeful President, who has blown the best chance in seventy years to take an effective swipe at the looting classes and try to get more money into the pockets of the working poor.

We can pass on to Obama's ghastly betrayals of all pledges to diminish government secrecy, improve "transparency", undo the unconstitutional rampages of Bush and Cheney's jackboot state. 

I like Cockburn's analysis. I think Bill Mayer has been doing an even better job of casting aside his rosey glasses and calling like it is in the past few "New Rules". Only it wasn't funny.

Now Obama can enjoy a fillibuster-proof senate. This should be a fucking shoe-in for Obama. But, I'm not holding my breath. I can't afford the brain cells. 

We need a new Progressive Party.

 

 

 

America failed completely, over the past century

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 10:46.

I really don't expect Obama to be able to eliminate every crook and shithead on Madison Avenue, Hollywood, Wall Street, and in DC, Cuyahoga County and Cleveland in six months or ever - I expect us to take care of local business, with respect for the failure we have caused on Earth. If Obama forced every shithead in America out of work for doing shithead things, like polluting the planet, there would be nearly 50% unemployment here and the halls of government would be nearly empty, awaiting leadership still in gradeschool to get old enough to vote and hold office.

If he really fixed the environment, the old economy would grind to a halt and you would not have electricity and gas for an automobile, and an even higher percentage of the population would be unemployed, by old economy standards.

If he really fixed healthcare, he would let 1,000,000s of people on life support die today, and we would all accept death is inevitable and stop spending money on most medical procedures - arrest those who made America 30% obese, including the advertising executives still pitching 2000 calorie pizzas and the TV network executives selling ad time to pitch them to moron Americans - on the networks paying the talking heads to make fun of the president trying to fix healthcare, whicvh means eliminating 2000 calorie pizzas from modern life

Obama - the first good president of my lifetime.

It will take Obama and other good world citizens as long to fix our world as it takes them to convince all the shithead citizens to grow their own food, and live within the planet's means, and die with grace. And, I believe he is doing a decent job of that.

And all those talking head shit heads on TV - even the funny ones - don't seem smart or funny to me... just a bunch of rich white sell-outs. They are all 0.1%ers dedicated to perpetuating their personal wealth and the wealth of 1%ers, and nothing more... nothing more.

The suffering is far from over and Obama can't protect us from that, as he couldn't protect us from ourselves and our parents and all who ruined this planet, for our entire lifetimes.

Time to get to work for change, as Obama certainly has.

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he's a bowl of smooshy vanilla pudding

Submitted by noner on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 12:00.

health care - why are no single payer advocates inlcuded in the debate? Why do most people not even KNOW what single payor means? Why are doctors and nurses getting fricking ARRested for speaking up at meetings? why isn't Obama stepping in or at least SAYing something about it? answer - pharma/big med/ insurance and Obama hasn't the balls to stand up to them

Wall Street - Geithner? Summer? give me a fricking break - they were the chief dismantlers of the regulatory framework that kept greedy white bastards from stealing the bread off the plates of the working poor. And now Obama is characterizing what happened as some kind of universal breakdown of the "system" with responsibility falling squarely on the shoulders of everyone. I don't think so.

And what ever happened to his campaign trail declarations against secrecy and for transparency in our government? That would not explain his insistence on continued secrecy around the issue of US abuse, such as in the case of Binyam Mohammed nor in his decision to keep torture photos hidden nor in his refusal to declassify torture memos. He continues to evoke the state secrets doctrine, just as Bush/Cheney did. None of these actions favor justice and accountability. And why is it the public may still not know who visits the White House, a practise started by Cheney and continued by Obama?

I'm not even going into his mushiness on gay rights... another Clinton manuever...

nope. I'm not buying it. I don't like being promised one thing and given quite another, with a bag full of excuses.

We need a new Progressive Party.

America is in a state of emergency

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 14:37.

Well before Obama took office, America reached a state of emergency and was locked down - it is still locked down, for more reason than ever. That we are not in a state of breadlines - state of riots - state of chaos is the Obama miracle. But we are in one hell of a state of debt.

We need to pretty much rebuild society and our economy from scratch, while trying to avoid further global economic disruption caused by declining confidence in American worth. This is very serious.

God knows who is visiting the White House these days.

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Healthcare reform

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 14:59.

Healthcare reform will not come until we have a full crisis - swine flu will work nicely. But problems will not be solved until we standardize and centralized medical information system and networks and global standards of care, which is partially in place but will cost like $1 trillion to complete - it will be universal and include universal coordination of benefits, regardless of who pays - that will reduce total global healthcare costs by like 30% and improve prevention and outcomes considerably - reduce need for costly services, per person.

Next, we need to stop going over the top with unnecessary services - home birthing to home dying must become the norm again - that will cut what we are still spending per peson in America in half.

That will still be too much, as our population ages and lives longer, and we start caring about the world rather than just Americans - but the infrastructure will be something future generations may handle.

For now, the healthcare crisis has to be universally recognized as a crisis - something nobody can afford - to force universal change. A major disease outbreak in America will force changes in public perception of proper universal standards of acceptable care and losses, but the IT changes will take a decade to fully implement... 20 year transformation process.

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stealing the bread off the plates of the working poor

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 15:09.

America was founded on stealing the grain from native people, and was never reformed.

Our economy is based on that principle of unbridled greed that spread nearly worldwide and has lead to a global financial meltdown - the strongest nations coming out of this crisis will be frightening to behold, and they already hold our economy by our balls. Do you know what will happen if the world truly disinvests in America for even a few days... weeks... years! We better behave and walk a straight line, now that we are far from the undeniable superpower.

So what are they doing with the US economy? Anything to give the world confidence so it will loan us more money. Anything to convince the world we are a PNC, rather than National City.

The USA is the Cleveland of the World, and Obama certainly isn't calling any global shots.

Let's see what the world leaves us for scraps.

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in fact

Submitted by noner on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 07:17.

 pre-election, i was teasing my mother-in-law saying I was voting for McCain-Palin just to bring the revolution around faster. Now I'm actually thinking it may not have been such a bad idea.

Please. Tell me ONE progressive ballsy thing Obama has done since he took office. Just ONE.

Grew a garden

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 10:56.

Bush was about tight pants and showing "balls" - Obama is about using his brain.

I think he is a very smart leader, in worse times than people allow themselves to imagine.

The world could not last 4-more years of ballsy leadership.

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my rooster

Submitted by noner on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 20:43.

 attacked your sweet boy today - sorry about that... my rooster also has our hyper just turned 3 puppy-dog afraid to go into the back yard alone.... we have a hen going broody, and Henry is excitable....

i'm also melting into an msg stoopor... we went and had dinner at applebee's... don't ask me why... 

anyway - i love the tight pants ball showing comment - very funny - and Bill Maher actually said he would prefer a president with the intellect of Obama and the balls of Bush. seriously - it was quite funny. so I will answer you later, after my msg stuper has passed.

hey everyone - enjoy the 4th of july fireworks brought to you by ward 14 - no problem... happy to do it..

We're gping to watch in big, broke Shaker

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 21:01.

I doubt my parents are glad to do it

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i used to take

Submitted by noner on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 21:14.

 my kids there (shaker fireworks) every year... lots of fun memories!

On Air Every Eve

Submitted by Jeff Buster on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 21:14.

Hello Dbra,

Maybe we need to produce a nightly video news...with you as the anchor.  

Rip it up!

With images of your brood, etc.

Seriously, you have the radio show, why not video?

I'm game.

Your writing is dynamic.

best,

jeffb

in a

Submitted by noner on Fri, 07/03/2009 - 12:01.

 MSG stupor???

you so funny Jeff!

 

oh yeah - i don't have my radio show anymore.... something tells me wcsb didnt like my delicate ranting, guess it wasn't so delicate. they said it was because i didn't do my 5 hours of move time, but i don't think so because i was doing graphics work instead and i had brought in good bucks for the radiothon as well as 5 new businesses to donate... and they replaced me with some bible thumping bornagain who plays the worst music that ever came out of radio in the 60s... nothing black - i assure you...

i'm just sayin'...

Submitted by noner on Fri, 07/03/2009 - 12:05.

 in the peedee today in reference to cheney busting Valerie Plame:

:::Cheney told the FBI about his recollection of discussions with his former top aide, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, and other White House officials on the media's questions. But the Obama administration is fighting in court to keep the substance of what Cheney revealed to the FBI from the public.:::

whats up with that?

they said "their disclosure could limit frank and open discussion about matters of national importance in the White House in the future."...

i'm not buyin' it...

oh yeah -

Submitted by noner on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 20:46.

 and it was MICHELLE Obama that had the balls to grow the garden....