Cleveland-East Cleveland Merger (Columbus, Euclid, Cleveland Heights: neighborhoods, bankruptcy, university)

[Buckeye614]

Ohio proposes paying $10 million to help East Cleveland-Cleveland merger | cleveland.com

"As East Cleveland and Cleveland officials mull merging the two cities, state lawmakers could sweeten the deal with $10 million to fix up the inner-ring suburb.

The one-time appropriation would be available only if the two cities agree to merge and could only be used for infrastructure improvements such as roads, bridges and emergency equipment.

The idea is being pitched by Ohio Auditor Dave Yost for inclusion in the state capital budget bill or another off-year budget appropriation bill. Yost has warned East Cleveland's fiscal woes cannot be fixed without merging the city with another or filing for bankruptcy. "


Thoughts on this proposal?

[216facts]

The city of Cleveland should do it if and only if the State antes up $50M. That's what it will take to demo a lot of the properties and have some left over to fix the streets.

[Clevelander216]

East Cleveland is an absolute mess, but I do believe it is time for big brother to take over; it's the only way to stop the decline...

[bjimmy24]

I don't think being part of Cleveland will stop the decline.

For evidence, see basically the entire east side of cleveland.

Sounds like a waste of money to me.

[Clevelander216]

Originally Posted by bjimmy24

I don't think being part of Cleveland will stop the decline.

For evidence, see basically the entire east side of cleveland.

Sounds like a waste of money to me.

Well I mean, they're offering $10 million to sweeten the deal to merge the cities.... That's quite a bit of money for a city that has nothing and is literally crumbling.

[216facts]

East Cleveland population is down from 40k to 17k. There's really not much further down you can go. I think if Cleveland could get about $50M out of Columbus, that would go a long way towards demo costs. The short term goal, fix up Euclid between UC and Stokes/Windermere, open the area up to residential development. But the absolute first thing that needs to happen, demolition of abandoned properties.

[Cleverfield]

I agree with the people saying we should do it if the state gives us $50 million. There is a lot of potential in EC, between the Red Line rapid, Healthline BRT, areas close to Coventry and University Circle, the Forest Hills neighborhood, and Nela Park, these are all assets that could be built off of. The city has been so mismanaged and corrupt for so many years that it didn't capitalize on these amenities, but I think if Cleveland was running things, it could do a lot more to develop these areas, and more investors and developers would be interested, with the assurance that city services would be decent and consistent, and city management would be competent.

[Larry Siegel]

EC has lost the ability to govern and police itself. As far as I know (I no longer live there), Cleveland's government is not incompetent although I wonder about the state of the roads. EC would be better off merged into Cleveland.

[reioh]

What are the yearly ongoing costs for Cleveland to provide services to East Cleveland?

[TBideon]

I don't know if many of you drive through or know East Cleveland all that well, but I do and it's beyond repair (barring a massive population surge, which isn't happening anytime soon). Better to unincorporate the city and evacuate current homeowners to Cleveland neighborhoods.

A merger would be a complete waste of Cleveland's already exceptionally strained resources. Perhaps the Forest Hills neighborhood could be annexed to Cleveland Heights along with some of the adjacent areas by University Circle to Cleveland, but for the most part it is a completely lost cause and would add nothing to Cleveland other than a brief population surge.