Thursday, August 31, 2006

Hale yes! signs


The Hale Yes crew was busy today.
The Mallorys have a Hale billboard in their side yard.
The Linn and Ravine area has billboards galore.
I-75 has a billboard on Dayton St.
Conroy's hill has a sign seen all over the West End and OTR.
Not a bad day.............Hale yes!

Update: Each sign has been photographed and time stamped. All surrounding property owners have been put on alert and are on the lookout for vandals attempting to remove the Hale Yes! signs. Additionally, the beat officer's have been notified and will keep their eyes open.

Wednesday, August 30, 2006

New Blood



This blog is about to get some new blood. I am going to be away on business and far too tied up to maintain this site on a daily basis. I will still be able to contribute from time to time. That is part of my story anyway. The truth is I am burned out.

You can let your new masters know what you want out of this blog. Not saying they will listen. Be nice; try to remember that winning an argument on the Internet is like winning in the Special Olympics. Even when you win, you are still retarded.

Have a blast.

Over the weekend we past the 100 Dale mark. It has now been over 100 days since Dale Mallory cleaned out and closed down the West End Community Bank Account, months after being impeached and removed from office.

The West End Community Council filed a complaint with the police. I guess the police don’t have to answer our community, because they haven’t. It doesn’t appear that they intend too. Case closed as far as I can see. FBI won’t touch it either; it isn’t a “Federal Case”. Don’t expect anything to happen without divine intervention. These actions give a lot of respect to the Mallory political dynasty, but they also give tremendous disrespect to the ordinary citizens of my community.

The case was a sure fire felony. You can’t clean out other people’s bank accounts. I shouldn’t have to mention that. Your ass would be in jail in a New York minute. Unless you are the Mayor’s brother, and you are next in line to the throne that is the Ohio 32nd. Dale isn’t in an election; he is involved in a coronation. It is the ‘family seat’. A Mallory has held that seat for 32 out of the last 40 years. Dale Mallory is the heir to the throne.

Who is Dale Mallory? He is a guy who can’t hold a steady job for his life. Despite his prestigious family name, he is a guy who got impeached by over 76% of the vote from his own community council. He is a guy who was executive director of Genesis Redevelopment, which spent close to a million dollars to build one house and do cosmetic repairs to homes of WECC member’s family and friends. He is a guy who promised to clean up the West End Community Council, but the only thing he cleaned out was the West End Community Council bank account. He is a guy whose only steady job in the last decade came after he appointed his cronies to the board of the Cincinnati Empowerment Corporation.

This blog did some great work with the Cincinnati Empowerment Corporation. At least we scared the shit out of them. We documented some of the inside dealing, hiring of relatives and family and friends. We brought to light the fact that 85% of their loans went bust. We showed people that funds went to people that were actually outside of the Empowerment Zone boundaries that had inside connections to board members and employees. And we told you how 60% of the millions that they are allocated never even make it out of Harold Cleveland’s office.

But who cares and what does it mean in the end? I have sources that tell me that the CEC is going to skate on the audit, and that funding will soon be restored. It doesn’t matter one bit. Joseph Stalin, a renowned humanitarian, used to say that it wasn’t who voted that mattered, but he who counts the votes. In auditing, it isn’t he who submits the proof of fraud; it is he who judges the fraud.

What we have is fraud on a massive scale. We have a continuum of fraud that spans over a decade. From Genesis Redevelopment to the Cincinnati Empowerment Corporation, we have fraud and public graft by the same documented characters. Much like STD’s, these are the gifts that keep on giving.

So who are you and why do you matter? The truth is you don’t matter one bit. Dale Mallory isn’t going to the big house for his crimes; he is going to the State House to represent the entire 32nd. And the Cincinnati Empowerment Corporation is going to continue to spend millions of dollars without any economic betterment to the communities that they serve.

I am burned out. We have been at this for the better part of a year. It was a great effort with much enthusiasm to expose the truth. The truth is out there; you can read it on this blog. Nobody is willing to do a damn thing about it. Color me cynical and jaded, but I can’t see things changing. It is hard to blame people that move out of the city.

Wednesday, August 23, 2006

CityBeat on the CityLink Appeal

Checking out the new Porkopolis blog from CityBeat:

City Link Loses Appeal

Pretty good take...

In February, the West End Community Council voted to oust President Dale Mallory — brother of Cincinnati Mayor Mark Mallory — from office. Several members were upset that he’d used rules to block a vote to oppose City Link. Although Dale Mallory denied any connections to City Link at the time, since his impeachment it was revealed he lobbied for City Link while working for the Cincinnati Empowerment Corp., which administers federal anti-poverty funds.


City Link’s supporters and people who have done work on their behalf are a veritable web of local movers and shakers. Besides Mallory, they include attorney and conservative GOP activist Christopher Finney, attorney and Hamilton County Democratic Party Chair Tim Burke, lobbyist Dick Weiland and a religious group affiliated with County Commissioner Phil Heimlich.



The Porkopolis blog also has a new entry on an old favorite, The Genesis Redevelopment Corporation:

Genesis Scandal Figure Back at City Hall

For about a decade beginning in 1991, the community council and Genesis received more than $825,000 and promised to build 130 housing units, but built just one house and repaired 11 other units. Most of the money came from federal grants administered by the city. Board executives included several well-connected West End residents such as George Beatty, who now owns Junebug’s Bar-B-Que and Steaks, as board president; his brother, Howard, who is now awaiting a verdict in a murder trial, also was a board member.


Check em both out.

Empowerment Corp. Director is Guilty Killer

Beatty guilty in Oba death
BY DAN HORN ENQUIRER STAFF WRITER

This is a relatively open thread about City Hall hitman Howard Beatty. Howard Beatty was appointed to the board of directors of the Cincinnati Empowerment Corporation by Dale B. Mallory.

Tuesday, August 22, 2006

In The News


Kim Hale has officially entered the race against Dale Mallory.

Republicans make matchup switches


Kimberly Hale, 38, will run against Democrat Dale Mallory in the 32nd Ohio House District, which covers central Cincinnati neighborhoods from downtown to College Hill. A West End resident, she owns a graphics business.

She replaces Mike Poast of North College Hill, who dropped out of the race after moving out of the district.
Good luck to Kimberly Hale. She has done well in leading the charge to save her community from the CityLink homeless mall which was to be located next to three schools and a playground. Her next mission is to prevent a criminal from holding office and representing the entire 32nd. If Dale Mallory isn't good enough for his own community council, he isn't good enough for you.

Another article coming over the wire...

IRS hopes Lawson boat will make dent in debt
Lawyer owes $660,000; 'Law Dog' goes up for auction soon

BY DAN HORN ENQUIRER STAFF WRITER

Prominent Cincinnati attorney Ken Lawson owes more than $660,000 in back taxes to the federal government.

The tax troubles cover at least the past five years and have resulted in the seizure of Lawson's 37-foot boat, "Law Dog." The Internal Revenue Service seized the boat in May and will auction it next week.
I have some suggestions for Mr. Lawson on how he could cut costs in terms of payroll. I doubt productivity would suffer.

An article I am still waiting on is:

Dale Mallory Indicted On Felony Charges

Sunday, August 20, 2006

CityLink claims to have "to much invested" to walk away, vows to continue fight


Look behind Mark Stecher. His property is now overgrown with weeds. The West End Community Council is organizing a community cleanup of the Bank Street property owned by the OneCity Foundation.

Ruling is against Citylink group
BY GREGORY KORTE ENQUIRER STAFF WRITER

Citylink, the consortium of churches and social service agencies, has suffered another legal setback in its quest to locate a five-acre social services mall in the West End.

A Hamilton County magistrate ruled Friday that Citylink is a "community service facility" barred from locating in a manufacturing-zoned district. That decision upheld a 3-2 vote from the Cincinnati Board of Zoning Appeals in February.


As reported here on Friday, CityLink has lost yet again. It has been clear from the beginning that what they are trying to do conflicts with the zoning laws. This was expected and did not come as a surprise.

But Citylink's president said the group has too much invested in the $1.4 million Bank Street site to walk away from it. He said the board had already decided to take the issue to Common Pleas Judge Ralph E. Winkler, who can overrule the magistrate's decision.

"We know what we're about. We're about fighting poverty," said Mark Stecher. "We're going to keep on doing that and do that even more aggressively."

Work on putting together the center's operational plan will continue even while the dispute over its location works its way through the courts, he said.


Curious quotes by Mark Stecher. He claims to have too much invested in 800 Bank Street. Try driving by 800 Bank Street sometime. The site hasn't been touched since they bought it and is overrun with weeds. They haven't started construction and they don't even conduct regular maintenance on the grounds. CityLink likes to talk about community cleanups, but they don't clean up their own property.

How can they possibly have too much invested? All they did was purchase a property that doesn't meet their zoning requirements. They haven't made any improvements to the property. The site looks more run down at this point in time that at any time in its entire history. Can't they can simply sell the property? That way they wouldn't have "so much" invested.

I get a creepy feeling about the whole affair. Mark Stecher, CityLink and the OneCity Foundation have always been dead set on this one location. The fact that this location is right across the street from three schools and a playground has upset many people in the downtown basin and on the hillsides. They have never appeared to be open or flexible about changing the location.

"We know what we're about. We're about fighting poverty," said Mark Stecher. "We're going to keep on doing that and do that even more aggressively."

So far the only thing that they have done is purchase a property and let weeds grow on it. From now on though, the gloves are off. Mark Stecher is going to let those weeds grow even more aggressively.

To put a stop this aggressive weed growing, members of the West End Community Council and the Dayton Street Neighborhood Association have banded together and have committed to clean up the Bank Street property. We the people have far more invested in our community than they do. If they aren't going to give a damn about that property we will take care of it with God's good grace. Frankly, I am sick and tired of looking at it.

The proposed CityLink Center has no place in any neighborhood, much less one like the West End that still struggles with open air drug markets. Bringing people with drug addiction to the West End is like having an AA meeting in a bar. It is just a bad idea. It is also a bad idea to locate a housing program for court ordered pre-release and post-release felons next to schools and homes. It isn't a good placement for the people that CityLink is trying to serve, and it isn't good for the community. It is bad for everyone. Their target population has high rates of mental illness, violent crime, as well as high rates of recidivism and re incarceration. Maybe those people need to get away from areas that struggle with crime and open air drug markets. Give them a fighting chance.

The article also talks about my good friend Dale Mallory:

The West End Community Council - which had removed its previous president, Dale Mallory, from office over his support for Citylink - intervened in the court case.


Dale Mallory was impeached and removed from his office as President of the West End Community Council by over 76% of the vote. Three months after being removed from office, Dale Mallory criminally cashed out and closed down the community's bank account. You can view the timeline here.

Saturday, August 19, 2006

Open Thread


Post youR off topic comments, diatribes, rants, and inane ramblings here.

Friday, August 18, 2006

CityLink Loses Again! WOO HOO! HALE YEAH!



CityLink and Crossroads Community Church have lost their appeal to put a homeless mall right next to three schools and a playground in the West End. Congrats go out to all that have fought the good fight, including Kimberly Hale who led the charge. She is one tough cookie. I wouldn't want to go up against her.

What is CityLink?

CityLink & Crossroads Community Church were trying to build a 100,000 square foot "mall for the homeless" in the West End. It would be the largest social service facility in the history of the region.

Our community rejected it; we were supported by surrounding communities, churches and business associations. You can check out the NoToCityLink site for yourself.

Who was opposed to Citylink?

The West End Churches and Ministers were opposed to CityLink. All the major congregations of the West End, including the Catholic Church came out against a plan to put drug addicts, the mentally ill, and prisoners fresh out of prison right across the street from our schools, homes and playgrounds.

The head law officer in the County, Sheriff Simon Leis came out against CityLink for the following reasons:

1) Proposed location and close proximity to three schools and the LeBlond Boys and Girls club.
2) Police calls and criminal activity in and around similar facilities.
3) Widespread Community opposition
4) Existing similar services
5) Scale of proposed facility
6) Economic revitalization efforts in and around the area.
7) Limitations of the proposed private site security.

Sheriff Leis observed that this “service will likely have a negative impact on the public safety of the residents and the neighborhood.”

Cincinnati City Council came out with a seven point resolution against the CityLink Center in February. The reasons? It was against the West End Comprehensive Plan, for one. In 2001, the West End Community Council, the Dayton Street Neighborhood Association, and the West End Business Association came together to forge the West End Urban Design Plan. This was later adapted and adopted by City Council as the West End Comprehensive Plan. The goal was to redevelop and revitalize the neighborhood.

To quote from the council resolution: “the neighborhood is rapidly becoming a mixed income neighborhood, with a 190% increase in household income from 1980 to 2000, and a 60% increase in the number of homeowners, making the West End single family market the fifth highest in sale value in the City”

The City also objected to CityLink’s obvious violation of the zoning code. The site was zoned for manufacturing, and CityLink planned to build a Wal-Mart sized homeless mall and service center for drug addicts, ex cons, and a special program for pre-release felons. That isn’t manufacturing, and it has no business next to the children of my community.

Local Businesses were outraged. The Over the Rhine Chamber of Commerce came out against the project. The OTR Brewery District came out against the project. Klotter Builders and Klotter Properties came out against the project. The Clifton Heights Business Association was opposed, as were the Brighton Business Owners and the Historic Hauck House Museum.

Eleven different community and neighborhood associations lined up against the project.

1) West End Community Council
2) Pendleton Neighborhood Council
3) Westwood Concern
4) Dayton Street Neighborhood Association
5) Klotter/Conroy Residents Association
6) CUF Neighborhood Association
7) Clifton Heights Improvement Association
8) West McMicken Improvement Association
9) Mulberry Hill Neighborhood Association
10) East Walnut Hills Assembly
11) Cincinnati Homeowners Association

The number of neighborhood groups that supported Crossroads / CityLink still stands today at zero. The number of business associations and law enforcement groups that support the Crossroads / CityLink concept still stands today at zero.

There are literally thousands of people who are vehemently against the Crossroads Community Church effort to build a monument to their own greatness by concentrating the homeless, bums, drunks, drug addicts, and both pre and post-release felons into a grand mall right across the street from three schools and a playground.

The people at Crossroads believe that they are doing God’s will. The people in the neighborhood that they plan to place their facility believe that they are about to rip apart a reviving neighborhood and put their children in harms way.

One of the biggest generators of the animosity is the pure arrogance of Crossroads Community Church. Crossroads Community Church is the biggest Mega-Church in the City. They had the audacity to flood our community forums with hundreds of “true believers”, and they invited the media to make believe that they had West End and community support. Brian Tome and Tim Senff literally asked hundreds of people from their own Oakley / Hyde Park congregation to come, and they even instructed them to cheer whenever they spoke. People from my community that attended meetings that were dominated by loud and shouting outsiders were offended. It was a bad idea for everyone, and a horrible way to conduct a public relations campaign.

Today is a victory for Cincinnati.

Thursday, August 17, 2006

Dale's Appointments to the CEC Board



This is a memo from Dale Mallory reappointing George "Junebug" Beatty to the board of directors of the Cincinnati Empowerment Corporation. As has been noted before, the West End Community Council never ratified this appointment. Junebug's brother, City Hall hit man/ functional illiterate Howard Beatty was also another Dale appointee who was never taken before the community council. These appointments happened behind closed doors.

I had some questions in terms of the timeline. This memo was written in November of 2001. It states that "George Beatty will remain on the Empowerment Zone board for the next term as a representative for the West End Community Council. From what I have heard, board terms have a duration of two years. It would seem to me that Mr. Beatty was first appointed to the board in November of 1999.

I am not sure when Dale came into the Presidency, but I am confident that he was not President in 1999. I believe that the President prior to Dale was George Beatty. Did Junebug appoint himself to the Empowerment Zone board? I also believe that Len Garrett was President of the WECC at some point during the 1990's.

Anyone want to fill me in with a more complete timeline?

If George Beatty was on the Empowerment Corp board in 1999, that would go against the theory that after the Genesis corruption he simply shifted it to the Empowerment Zone. This evidence would lead one to believe that he was doing both projects concurrently.

People at City Hall threatened to shut down the WECC because of Genesis and the financial malfeasance of the West End Community Council. People on council were demanding that the people who allowed this money to be wasted would never again be put in charge of the spigot of public funds. At that same time JuneBug was already firmly entrenched with the Empowerment Zone, the funding of which is overseen by the City of Cincinnati. While Cincinnati was saying “never again”, it was already happening again.

You also have to wonder how many years Junebug was with the Empowerment Zone. One source told me that he was term limited off the board after two terms as West End Community Council representative. But he is still on the board right now, and he was on the board presumably when his first term started in 1999.

Dale Mallory appointed George “Junebug” Beatty to the board. Dale appointed Howard “Hit Man” Beatty to the board. Dale also got Len Garrett in from Queensgate. Dale got people on the board, and those people gave Dale a job working for them. He reported directly to Len Garrett. Dale wasn’t the only person to get a job, Junebug’s wife Orlinda is also a paid employee of the Cincinnati Empowerment Corporation. Orlinda’s job title is “Community Liaison”. That is pretty much what Dale’s job title was too. They hire friends, family, and cronies, and then they spend the lion's share of the budget on each other. It is an orgy of graft. The Cincinnati Empowerment Corporation spends 60% of their budget on salaries and administrative expenses. Looking at Dale’s time sheets, it is great work if you can get it.

Wednesday, August 16, 2006

Homeless Drunks In Seattle



We have talked about CityLink being built next to schools and homes, so I am wondering what people think of this approach...

1811 Eastlake

This inital link has numerous links on the concept and idea, as well as reaction to the concept and idea of it all. I will give a few highlights.

Best Social Experiment

It was predictable that someone would go off his collective nut when the 1811 Eastlake project opened last December. The project provides permanent housing to chronic street drunks and allows them to keep drinking. And that sort of thinking sounds insane to uptight media types like KOMO-TV's Ken Schram, who denounced the place as enabling drunks. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer's Robert Jamieson has been nitpicking 1811 as well, since well before it opened, in fact, and the paper continues to refer to it as a "wet house." But here's the deal: Chronic street drunks cost taxpayers about $50,000 a year as they move through the current streets-jail-emergency- room-repeat program. The new approach, spearheaded by the Downtown Emergency Service Center, gives these guys a roof over their heads, lets them hooch it up, and saves the taxpayers money because the former street denizens will no longer be cycling through jail and ERs. Estimated savings: about $35,000 per person. Sounds counterintuitive, sure, but so far the reports are that the drunks are drinking less.—Philip Dawdy www.desc.org/1811.html


Check out the NPR report and listen in here.

From the New York Times

Also of interest by Malcolm Gladwell in the New Yorker:

MILLION-DOLLAR MURRAY
Why problems like homelessness may be easier to solve than to manage.
by MALCOLM GLADWELL

Click the links and check it out. Add more in the comments if you find some good ones.

Many people that post here know about the proposed CityLink homeless mall. Seatlle has quite a different approach and I thought it was interesting. They barricaded the facility behind highways and overpasses and put it in a commerical/industrial zone. Then they invited all the worst drunks in town and told them they could keep drinking to their hearts content.

They claim to be saving money hand over fist. And people don't have to step over passed out bums on the street. The worst drunks in town are no longer lurking, pissing, and crapping in alleys, streets and parks of neighborhoods. Just about everyone they asked took them up on the offer. Listen to the NPR interview and the guy talk about his 9 year old daughter. Salient points. Nobody wants to see it, and if these people have dedicated their lives to the cause maybe we should give them that freedom.

To continue to jail, hospitalize, and detoxify a group of dedicated people such as this may be throwing good money after bad. Read the Gladwell article. So much of the social service budget is sapped up by a small percentage. If we could isloate these people and let them be free on their own terms, (while not imposing on others), a huge chunk of the social service budget could go to those where it could make a differnce.

This is very controversial, and I understand that. I think it is interesting and deserves a look and a comment. Where the hell do you stand on this?

CEC Budget

A post concerning the City Manager's report on the CEC budget can be found here.

Let's talk about the "training" portion of the budget. Gordon Lafer wrote a book entitled "The Job Training Charade", and I found some gems in the pages.

Fraud and Abuse in On-The-Job Training

On-the-job training (OJT) programs have consistently reported the greatest success in raising the earnings of JTPA (Job Training Partnership Act) participants. But since they have also been the most common sites of program fraud, this success is suspect.

He goes on to list specific instances of fraud, including fictitious individuals as OJT participants. At times the OTJ acts as a subsidy to lure business, classifying people already employed as trainees just to get the subsidy. One company closed for a day just so they could reopen the next with subsidies.

"While it is impossible to know how common this type of fraud is, one GAO (General Accounting Office) survey found that half of the local governments surveyed had at least one OJT contract for workers who were already employed in the occupation for which they were being trained"

These programs constantly skim off the top, taking the most employable candidates that most likely would have been hired anyway. That way they can inflate their outcome statistics. Some even don't report prospects until they have been placed in a job.

"This suggests that the apparent success of on the job training may be almost entirely illusory, and the program may accomplish nothing more than subsidizing private sector employers, enriching poverty entrepreneurs, and offering local governments an easy way to claim paper success in combating unemployment."


The Aggregate Impact of Operation Problems

The lack of centralized date makes it impossible to conduct careful cost-benefit analyses of JTPA. However, using the studies cited above as a rough measure, it is clear that mismanagement accounts for a very substantial share of the program budget. Adding together the impact of only three of the problems discussed above, inflated claims of job placement, illegitimate costs charged to contracts, and OJT subsidies for individuals who would have been hired anyway--yields an estimate of up to 50% of the Title IIA funds that were wasted through fraud of mismanagement. While the total impact of the mismanagement is uncertain, it is clear the JTPA has suffered from more than minor implementation problems, indeed it has wasted money on a vast scale."


Look at the CEC budget expenditures again. 59% goes to administrative expenses. Three out of every five dollars that we pay never makes it out the god damned door. Of the money that did make it out, 90% went to programs that had no measurable economic impact. The most significant expenditure was for job training. How much of those dollars went to subsidize worker for Len Garrett’s company? How many other companies got subsidized labor. How many actual people learned a trade that they hadn’t known before? I would love to see some published outcome statistics for the success of the CEC’s job training program. Too bad they don’t publish outcome statistics. And if you have the balls to ask for them they tell you to fuck off. They City won’t cop to anything either. The money was spent, that is all they are going to tell you.

And I am telling you it is all a web of deceit and a pack of lies. Trust me on that one. The CEC spends millions per year and they have nothing to show for it. If they wanted to prove me wrong, they could start by pointing out their achievements. To date, I can’t find any.

Friday, August 11, 2006

Ballot swap puts heat on Mallory



Ballot swap puts heat on Mallory
Residency concerns drop Poast; Hale joins race in 32nd

BY KIMBALL PERRY AND GREGORY KORTE ENQUIRER STAFF WRITERS

Facing concerns that his questioned residency may cost him the election, Mike Poast will drop out as the Republican candidate for state representative in Cincinnati's 32nd District, to be replaced on the ballot by Kimberly Hale.

Hale's entrance in the race also portends a more aggressive GOP attack on Dale Mallory, who was removed as West End Community Council president this year.

"Dale Mallory, with all of his problems," should be concerned, said Brad Greenberg of the Hamilton County Republican Party.

Dale has reason to be concerned...

Mallory has been on the receiving end of attacks from his West End neighbors over his support of the CityLink social services center. Hale was part of a neighborhood coalition that removed Mallory from the community council post over the CityLink controversy.

The Enquirer later reported that Mallory, then a consultant for the Cincinnati Empowerment Corp., was billing the federally funded agency for his work on the project.

Hale's entrance into the race is likely to push that issue to the forefront of the campaign. She is president of the Dayton Street Association in the West End.


Hale doesn't seem to be a typical Republican, and web searches cannot find her previously running for elected office. She has emerged as a leader among many passionate people involved in the West End and surrounding communities in the downtown basin. This doesn't look to be a battle down partisan lines, but instead one of concerned citizens that have finally had enough of the way that Dale Mallory and crew do business on behalf of the constituency.

Dale Mallory was impeached and removed from office from his own community council. Months after being removed from office he cleaned out the community's bank account. He has yet to be prosecuted for that crime. Dale hopes to represent the entire 32nd district by riding on the back of the Mallory family name. The challenge to Hale will be getting the facts of these incidents to the voters. It is a daunting challenge, and Kimberly should be applauded for taking on the task of speaking truth to the Mallory political machine.

Prediction #1: Don't expect Dale to come close to touching a debate with Kimberly Hale. It would be political suicide for Dale. He isn't very quick on his feet to begin with, and the facts are not on his side. He can't explain away the obvious felonious action of cleaning out the bank account months after being removed from office.

Prediction #2: Dale will have his minions, (Nate on the blogs, Markus and others on the Buzz) claim racism in one form or another. It has been the only campaign strategy that Dale has ever had.

Let the fireworks begin. This is no longer about some bible thumping cooking oil salesman from College Hill giving speeches about God, Flag and Country. This is about someone on Dale's own street confronting him with the facts of selling out his community and shedding light on his criminal activity. The rules of the game just changed.

Good luck Dale, you will need it.

Politics Extra: Post Poast: Hale takes on Mallory

Wednesday, August 09, 2006

Day 83

It has been nearly three months since Dale Mallory cleaned out and closed down the West End Community Council bank account, months after being impeached and removed from his office as president of the WECC.

If you aren't familiar with this affair, you can view the timeline right here.

Here is an update on what has happened since the last time we broached the subject:

1) Not one thing.

Thanks for checking in, I am sure we will have more updates later.

Now a cynic might say that this investigation is over. In reality, it hasn't even started. A complaint was filed by the WECC treasurer, Maggie Moon. That complaint went to the Cincinnati Police. The CPD never opened a formal investigation. They never asked bank officials for records. They never interviewed anyone involved in the West End Community Council. When concerned parties got around to asking the question why?, the CPD stated that they were handing the investigation over to the FBI for another reason: They had an apparent conflict of interest with Dale being the Mayor's brother.

The FBI was given the case. They have had it for about a month. Has the bank been contacted? Has the WECC been contacted? Sources have confirmed to me that this hasn't happened. You would think at the least a perfunctory gesture would be done to admonish them of having to really take action, but they can't even fake it.

Pathetic.

At some point, I expect the CPD and the FBI to close out the complaint and tell people the case is now closed. In a way, it already is.

If the Hamilton County Democratic Party wanted to replace Dale Mallory on the ticket, that deadline is a week and half away. Since no investigation has been started in the last three months, the chances that an investigation will both start and find something in the next week and a half is very little. Dale Mallory is in the clear. He will be on the ticket and can't be removed.

At a later date, Dale could be indicted on felony charges for embezzlement, or passing bad checks (which he should be), but nonetheless he will be on the ballot. Given the nature of the 32nd District, that means that Dale Mallory is going to the State House.

We have two options now:

1) Dale’s case gets closed out, and he moves on to the State House.
2) Dale gets indicted for a felony, and he moves on to the State House.

Our goal was actually much different 83 days ago. We wanted the crime he committed to be prosecuted. We wanted Dale’s felony to be both indicted and convicted. Dale Mallory would have never made the statehouse. He would have been going to the big house.

That didn’t happen. People were advised by the CPD to be patient while they conducted an investigation. That investigation never happened. Right now we are being patient with the FBI, and that isn’t happening either. They have done nothing. Nobody has lifted a finger since the original complaint was filed. He is untouchable.

They don't try to tell us why. There are no explanations, and there is no investigation.

Just another day, Day 83.

Monday, August 07, 2006

CEC Budget Put In Perspective

I found a nice comparison that puts the budget for the Cincinnati Empowerment Corp. in perspective. I stole this from a poster nicknamed "FunnelCake" on a Beacon thread:

funnelcake says:
05 Aug 2006 at 04:05 pm | #
As Monican & the Dean requested, here are the comparisons between the United Way, The Red Cross & EZ (...is that EZ as in EZmoney?)

United Way of America report
Programs: 88.13%
Fund Raising: 1.02%
Administrative: 10.83%

Not bad but of course that is the national organization.
The local United Way of Greater Cincinnati self reports (PDF) the following numbers:
Program Expenses $55,646,400 (90%)
Administrative Expenses 2,198,300 (3.6%)
Fundraising Expenses 4,036,100 (6.5%)
Total Expenses $61,880,800

American Red Cross
Programs: 91%
Fund Raising: 3%
Administrative: 5%

CEC According to parent submission?
Administrative: $1,728,032 (59%)
Programs: $1,216,769 (41%)
Total Spending $2,944,801


He also had another comment on the subject of this forum that I liked:

It is hard to bring corruption to light. I think Justin Jeffery had been working for a while to air out issues with the handing over the Foutain Square Garage to the 3CDC. He wasn’t very successful either. I think it is important to air out corruption no matter where it comes up. So the question beggs, how has the impeach mallory blog been successful where so many others have failed? What can we learn from them? How can we apply their methods to other areas of corruption?

Here are my observations.
1. They are very passionate about the subject.
2. They created an issue specific blog that only deals with their subject. Thus a lower signal to noise issue.
3. There is more than one person working on the issue. Looks like a team of four working on the blog.
4. They have worked hard to establish a level of crediablity in what they say.
4.1 They back up their claims with indendent 3rd party sources, documents, pictures & video.
4.2 They freely admit what they cannot prove & ask for help.
5. They solicit help with proving their claims from the general internet community.
6. They don’t have an issue that conflicts with the interests of Main Stream Media.
7. They have people associated with their cause getting on TV & quoted in the news.
8. They do most of the reporters work for them.
9. They are clear, meticulous & thorough in proving their claims.
10. They don’t give up when they don’t get instant results.

I guess it doesn’t hurt that a whole community is upset, motivated & a high profile murder is thrown into the mix to make the whole subject attractive to reporters.


In honor of #5, soliciting help from the general net community, I am stealing his post and offering my thanks to FC.

Comparing the EZ Budget to those of other non profits is pretty damning evidence of what has been going on. I can't think of one good reason that they city wouldn't shut the thing down and clean the whole place out.

Sunday, August 06, 2006

An Entry Worth Headlining?

Original entry can be located as post 29 in "Genesis Rears It's Ugly Head".

anonymous said...
A note to the wise:

Use this blog to INFORM the public of what is going on with the various cases. Do NOT...I REPEAT...DO NOT give up ANY more information other than for the use of PUBLIC AWARENESS. These S.O.B's have folks monitoring your posts and it is imperative that you begin to operate more from of a position of SILENCE. This town is waaaaaaaaaaaay TOO small and people TALK! Less is MORE!!!!!


Godspeed, Truth Squad---take 'em DOWN.


Anon, rest assured the information hits this board long after wheels are in motion and claws are secure. If you think the Mallory Mafia is big, you'd be proud to know the true depth of the Truth Squad. It's monumental.

Tick, Tick, Tick...

Saturday, August 05, 2006

..and the Walls tighten....

A great article in today's Enquirer.

And, also related.

Tick, Tick, tick......

Friday, August 04, 2006

Friday Happy Hour Open Thread

Around the Web:

July 28, 2006
‘Cincinnati Edition.’ Sunday morning. NPR.

Greg Korte was on WVXU's Cincinnati Edition on NPR last Sunday, which somehow escaped this blog. Listen HERE

The Dean put a new thread on The Beacon about the appalling CEC expenditures: New Beacon Thread.

A thread posted in the last week on The Beacon is closing in on 70 replies. The thread became hot once legendary race baiter Nathanial Livingston came back from the dead to defend Dale Mallory. Nate claims that Dale Mallory is still the rightful President of the West End Community Council, and that Dale still has secret meetings of "The Real" West End Community Council.

That got our crack staff working overtime. Evidence points to the fact that Dale does indeed hold these meetings. We found a man who attended the meeting, and even procured a ticket stub from the event. True to form, this forum remains on the cutting edge. We are the worldwide leader in Impeach Mallory News.

The Ticket Stub:


Those Prices aren't just criminal, That amount constitutes a felony!



To assure journalistic integrity, the ticket stub has not been altered in any way. I wouldn't have believed it had I not seen it with my own eyes.

=====
Update: Tonight I added a counter on the sidebar to count the number of days since Dale cleaned out the community's bank account.

Have a great weekend.

Thursday, August 03, 2006

Genesis Rears It's Ugly Head

One story has hit a couple different media outlets in the last day, and that is the story of Kimberly Gray.

Jury will hear lawsuit against city
Ex-investigator claims she was demoted for comments


Gray claims city officials demoted her from acting director of OMI because she was investigating ties between city employees and the Genesis Redevelopment Corp.

Genesis was the target of an investigation because it received $700,000 in tax money but did not complete any significant housing development projects.


And it gets juicy here:

Gray said some city employees obstructed her work and shredded documents related to the case. She said she was demoted and ridiculed by her bosses after telling her story to council members.


The other coverage came from Channel 9 news: Jury To Decide City Worker V. Employee Case

The Channel 9 page also has three links:

Council tries to untangle its own Genesis probe

Investigator: New OMI chief quashed probe

City Council to question Genesis investigation

The real scandal of genesis was how the story was killed and swept under the rug. I suspect many of the same forces are still at City Hall, doing the exact same things for Dale Mallory and the Cincinnati Empowerment Corporation.

Tuesday, August 01, 2006

Empowerment Zone Data - A report from the City Manager




This is a report from David E Rager, the City Manager. The second page has a section that details the expenditures of the Cincinnati Empowerment Corporation.

“During the report period, the City disbursed a total of $2,944,801.00 of Empowerment Zone grant funds to the CEC for the following programs, services and projects that are directly administered by the CEC:

CEC Administrative Costs: $1,728,032
Loans to homeowners and businesses: $69,891;
Job training, job placement, and apprenticeship programs; $802,058
Business technical assistance in financial management, marketing, administration, and e-commerce: $39,245
Down payment assistance: $16,509
Youth recreation and internship programs: $253,286
Leadership skills of Empowerment Zone organizations and residents: $35,780

That is the way the City described it. I will try a few of my own:

CEC Administrative Costs: $1,728,032
All CEC programs combined: $1,216,769
Total Spending $2,944,801

59% of the money given to the Empowerment Zone doesn’t even make it out of the office. They spent 59% of the federal funds on administration, and 41% on the actual programs.

Put another way, it cost us $1,728,032.00 just to have them give away the other $1,216,769.00. Can anyone say “Time to shut it down.” This is outrageous.

What about development and job creation? Let’s take another look at the numbers:

CEC Administrative Costs: 59% of budget
Loans to Homeowners and Businesses 2% of budget
For every $1 they spent towards developmental loans, they spent $25 on Administrative Costs.

The CEC has a paid staff consisting of six people.
CEC Administrative Costs: $1,728,032
CEC Costs divided by number of staff: $288,005
Total Loans to homeowners and businesses: $69,891;

The administrative cost per staff member is over four times the amount of the total developmental loans given to businesses and homeowners.

The Empowerment Zone program came to be during the Clinton administration. A major push of the zone was attracting jobs to depressed areas to stimulate economic development. An overriding concern was how urban areas were being left behind. The goal was to attract more businesses and jobs into the urban core.

Looking at these numbers is sad. The Empowerment Zone in Cincinnati only seems to empower the current administration that gets to divvy up that fat budget.

Let's look at the numbers again.

Good non profits generally spend around 20% of the budget in administrative expenses. If you are a non profit and you go to the United Way for instance, they demand a written explanation if these expenses exceed 25%.

An important note is that most non-profits spend a good chunk of their administrative expenses on fundraising. They have to get the word out on who they are and what they do, and they have to solicit people to give them money so that they can continue to carry out their mission. But the CEC doesn’t even have fundraising expenses, because they are fully funded by the Federal Government and your tax dollars. Even with this obvious advantage they are still spending three out of every five dollars disbursed on administrative expenses.

It is disgusting. You don’t need to find fraud or embezzlement to shut this baby down. The fraud is on the taxpayer and the EZ residents, and it is hiding in plain sight.

Soft Programs

Of the money that did make it out of the office ($1,216,769), 90% (or $1,091,124) of that went to “soft programs”.

Job training, job placement, and apprenticeship programs; $802,058
Youth recreation and internship programs: $253,286
Leadership skills of Empowerment Zone organizations and residents: $35,780
Total Soft Spending: $1,091,124

This is a good example of mission creep. An agency that was founded for urban economic redevelopment is spending three and a half times more on youth recreation than it spends on economic development loans. Is youth recreation a good thing? Yes. Is that the mission of an organization committed to economic redevelopment? No.

The biggest line item in their budget (outside the 59% for administrative expenses) is for job training and placement. I would bet they find that Markus “fat-mouth” Jenkins gets a piece of that action. That would be the same Markus Jenkins who apparently lives in one of Dale Mallory’s abandoned buildings.

One of the advantages (to the CEC) of funding “soft” programs is that it is difficult to tell if these programs succeed in doing anything. What are the defined benefits vs. the opportunity costs? It is almost impossible to judge, and if you can’t judge success you can’t judge failure.

Another disturbing facet of these soft programs is that they are plagued with yet another layer of “Administrative Costs”. That means that the $1,728,032 that was previously pegged as the total administrative costs is actually substantially understated.

I will put it another way. The CEC spent $35,780 on enhancing Leadership Skills of EZ residents. That probably entailed paying one of their friends $35 grand to go round and talk to people. How do you judge the success of that? Were leadership skills of EZ residents improved? You can’t objectively measure that fact one way or the other.

Which leads to a political aspect of soft programs; Who can be against job training, youth recreation, or enhancing leadership skills? They sound great and that makes them politically viable. And since the success is never measured they can’t possibly fail.

On the other hand, “hard” programs have defined benefits for Empowerment Zone residents. If a loan or a grant is made for development, you can come along later and measure the progress in jobs created, increased tax base, as well as the physical bricks and mortar and other physical improvements to the infrastructure in the zone. This is what local activists mean when they say they want “Jobs, not job training”.

CityLink was going to provide job training, but such training isn’t effective if there aren’t any jobs. One of the pressing demographic problems in the urban core is the migration of jobs and people moving outside of our cities. The EZ program was initially designed to bring back companies and jobs. Grants and loans made in that respect provide actual and measurable economic development, bringing it back into the EZ communities.

The Sad Tale of the Tax Payer

Let’s say you send Uncle Sam a dollar in taxes. He won’t send you a thank you letter.

The Federal government is a big bureaucratic behemoth. Let’s say your dollar gets slated for the Department of Housing and Urban Development, which itself is a massive government bureaucracy. Then HUD decides to send your dollar to the Cincinnati Empowerment Corporation for economic development.

The first obvious thing is, your dollar won’t be a dollar anymore. Once you send it to Washington, the Feds and HUD have to take their cut. They have administrative expenses of their own. So let's say 85 cents of your original tax dollar makes it out of HUD and on its way to the CEC.

While at the CEC, they take 59% of your remaining 85 cents and spend it on administrative expenses. That money never makes it out of Harold Cleveland’s office. This further whittles your original dollar down to 35 cents.

As for the money that actually makes it out the CEC door, 90% of that goes to soft programs with no measurable economic impact. That takes your George Washington down to less than 4 cents of the dollar.

So you just sent a tax dollar to Washington and they earmarked it for economic development in the urban core. Expect less than a nickel to actually go to that intended purpose.

If you would have kept that dollar and either saved it, invested it or spent it, the economic impact would have been far greater that having it gutted and sliced up by Harold Cleveland and crew.

“Stop the Madness!” This program needs to be stopped cold in its tracks.

Open Thread

I was working on a post but I am slammed today and have nothing until tonight or tomorrow.

A side issue: Where in the hell is Blanchard? Does he think he can rest on his laurels just because he made it to the pinnacle of the Mallory-impeaching masses?

I have seen it happen all the time. Guys get made, they go soft and lose the desire. Staying on top is just as tough as getting there. We are the world wide leader in impeach Mallory news. That still means something to people Mr. Blanchard. Greatness such as ours comes with high expectations. I am calling Blanchard out.

The Dean chimes in on Dale's checks

Update: Nathanial Livingston is apparently back.
He is participating on a thread at the Beacon linked below. Among the things that Nate is claiming:

Dale Mallory is still the WECC President.
Dale Mallory still holds meetings of the "real WECC".

When it was first announced that the Cincinnati Police had begun looking into the impeachment instead of Dale's obvious crime, I wrote a post about it here.

This is what I said then:

On April 24, 2006, Dale Mallory stated that he had no intent on remaining President of the West End Community Council. That isn't hearsay, that is what Dale Mallory told a court of law. He openly admitted for the record that he was giving in and he wouldn't fight the impeachment, and that he had no intent of holding the office.

Two months later in June, Dale Mallory was cutting checks and closing down bank accounts of the West End Community Council. In his own defense, he is now claiming that he is still President of the West End Community Council.

Unbelievable.

This is Dale Mallory's last chance for freedom in this world. He needs to convince the Cincinnati Police Department that he is still President of the WECC, months after being impeached.





=================================================
The Dean just chimed in with a post about Dale's checks.

Seems that he is asking that same question that occurs to all of us, namely "Why don’t these checks provide enough for a formal investigation?" Nobody here seems to have a reasonable answer.

The timeline post on Dale Mallory's checks is here: Dale Mallory's Felony Investigation.

An article ran a while back that got past this blog's attention. It is about Cincinnati's Community Council system. Check out Micro Democracy.

It touches on the Genesis Redevelopment Scandal of the recent West End Past, and then goes on to say:

But the West End group again is embroiled in dispute after it voted in February to oust Dale Mallory from office. Several members were upset that he used rules to block a vote to oppose CityLink, a proposed one-stop center for the homeless and mentally ill that business and church groups want to build in the neighborhood (see "CityLink Divides West End," issue of Dec. 21-27, 2005).

Since Dale Mallory's impeachment, it was revealed he lobbied for CityLink while working for the Cincinnati Empowerment Corp., which administers federal anti-poverty funds. The board of the Empowerment Corp. didn't know about the arrangement and cancelled Mallory's consulting contract.


I am not sure how accurate that last statement is. Some Board members seemed to be directly responsible for that contract and it's administration.

The article also stated that some "business and church groups" were behind CityLink. Church groups for sure, but business groups? I am not exactly sure who they were talking about.