Dear Cleveland Citizens,

The future of our great city is highly dependent on the quality of education that our youth receive. If you, like any concerned citizen, are looking for a way to have an impact on the hiring of a new CEO for the Cleveland Municpal School District (CMSD), please download the attached excel spreadsheet which contains a list of the members of the Community Advisory Panel. The members of this panel were appointed by the School Board.

The Ohio Community Computing Center Network, the umbrella organization for free public computer centers and teaching centers, has provided testimony to the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio stating that the SBC/AT&T Merger and the Verizon/MCI Merger are not in the best interests of the public.   The following is a summary, raising the concern that further telecom consolidation will reduce vital high-speed Internet opportunities for low-income urban and rural areas.  Today, high-speed Internet is critical for education, work and other activities of daily life.  While technological advances in more robust networks, immense Internet speed and additional services are exciting, if only a portion of spciety can participate in yet another technological evolution, Ohio will again be left struggling.  The testimony called for efforts to reduce the divide that finds low-income and rural communities with lower levels of broadband access and an end to telecom efforts to limit the rights of cities to invest in broadband services directly, on behalf of their residents.

There is probably no need for Planners to consider this for Cleveland's downtown; however, this may be the way to help struggling neighborhoods within the city, as well as the the older, inner-ring suburbs - by encouraging pedestrian activity instead of vehicular.
I suppose the fast-food industry would put up a big fight to keep things as they have been.

Booyakasha! Much Respek! And I'll let you know that it's about friggin' time. 2 years this site has been going. Sometimes strong and sometimes slackerish. But let's face it, if there ever were a mirror for the people of Akron, this would be it. Hell this IS Akroness in all it's glory. That said, it's only fair that once every two years or so we get our just dues. This time our just dues mean David Giffels finally pimped us a bit in Akron's daily BJ. And to think we didn't even have to whore ourselves out too much to get it. It seems somehow mystical that our 'moment in the sun', as it were, came on the tails of telling some dumb chick how dumb she is. Perhaps there really is a God. Still doesn't make Pat Robertson any better though.

On Election Day, I stood at a polling location on Cleveland's eastside and talked to voters about Reform Ohio Now (RON) and issues 2-5 on the ballot in November. The voting location was JFK High School, one of the largest polling stations in ward one, the wealthiest and biggest voting ward in the African-American community. I was the one who learned a lot.

Philadelphia has chosen a provider for their municipal wireless network and the winner is...Atlanta-based Earthlink over HP.Click here to read the story .

In Wisconsin, new regional allliances are beginning to emerge, as civic leaders in Madison and Milwaukee recognize that they have more to gain from collaboration.

Here is a good article that surveys some of the recent developments. Read more.

In Albany, the Center for Economic Growth is a major player in the transformation of the economy. CEG is one of the leading organizations to support innovation in regional economic development.

In an interesting move to stimulate collaboration among their campuses, Indiana University and Purdue University are integrating their wireless networks.

The powerful aspect of this announcement comes in the next step. According to one of the project leaders, "[W]e should continue to work toward extending these capabilities across Indiana to other universities, colleges and related organizations." Read more.

The Kauffman Foundation has launched a new web-based tool to accelerate the flow of innovative ideas from universities to the marketplace.

The foundation's research showed that potentially valuable technologies lie dormant in universities too long. So, the foundation is investing in a new tool to tighten the connection between university labs and commercial markets. Initiallly, seven universities will participate in a pilot. Learn more.

Developing brainpower will determine the long term prosepects for our regional economy. As a result, we have a deep stake in improving the performance of the our high schools.

Few economic development investments are as sound as investments -- early childhood development, drop-out prevention, post-secondary education incentives -- that improve educational outcomes.

One of the biggest challenges facing Cleveland comes in building the networks needed to build wealth in our inner city neighborhoods.

The inner city is an important economic development frontier, and new models of development show promise. Some years ago, Michael Porter established the Initiative for a Competitive Inner City to apply cluster approaches to these markets. Learn more

More pictures from the final Waterfront Plan presentation on Tuesday.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/muscatello/sets/994365/

What Happens When the Federal Government Can’t Get Emergencies Right? And what does it say about our level of preparedness for disasters, wrought by nature or terrorists, even after the 9/11 disaster and the debate, planning and funding that all follows?

Had a great time this weekend at iNGENUiTY.
The family enjoyed it as well.

Here are some photos I took with my crappy camera.
Thursday
Friday
Sunday

Is a Cleveland Baseball Team Watching?

Earlier this month, the National Collegiate Athletic Association adopted a new policy to prohibit NCAA colleges and universities from displaying hostile and abusive racial/ethnic/national origin mascots, nicknames or imagery at any NCAA championship, beginning in 2008. So what is the leading name banned by the NCAA under the rule, calling for cultural sensitivity and respect? Simply, "The Indians."

California computer firm will fund ambitious high school to get kids ready for the real world.

could the same thing happen here??

read more HERE

from waste comes incredible opportunity, right on our lakefront...... click HERE for more info.

OUR CITIES NEED KIDS

*It seems like there's something quite cool going on in the city of McKinney, Texas. First there was the prototype of an eco-Walmart, then the eco-dealership by Toyota, and now - thanks to reader littleCatalyst for pointing it out - we learn that the city also has a sustainable elementary school that has been named (pdf link) one of the ten Most Environmentally Responsible Design Projects in the Nation by the American Institute of Architects. They have some great green architecture and landscaping, harvest rainwater in 6 cisterns (10,000 gallons capacity) and produce electricity with a wind turbine, but most importantly, they teach the kids about sustainability (it warms my heart!). Read more about it here >>http://www.edutopia.org/magazine/ed1article.php?id=art_1158&issue=sept_04

check out ClevelandBikes new website at http://www.clevelandbikes.org for all the info you'll need to know to ride your bike around our beautiful city.

Who are the gatekeepers in Northeast Ohio? I was reading what Jon Garfunkel (a fellow Drupal user) has written on his site, civilites.net. He has a series of 8 articles and the first asks, Who are the Gatekeepers?.

It appears Ohio State Senator, Senator Kim Zurz (28th
District) has jumped on the anti-eminent domain bandwagon. She has
started a personal blog called “Private Ownership and Public Good.� (http://ohioeminentdomain.blogspot.com/) She ends her opening post by stating:

Come to a celebration of REI's past and Northeast Ohio's Open Source Future

We will be having a party to demonstrate an important point: Building our future prosperity is exciting, engaging, and fun. Join other civic entrepreneurs to share stories, get connected, and enjoy NEO's home brew.

Jim Harris has posed a critique of Open Source Economic Development. Read more.

Here's my response to his main points.