Friday, June 11: Tremont Anti-Gentrification Rally : Cleveland IMC (((i)))

Cleveland Food Not Bombs! will be serving a tasty assortment of free food, and the radical cheerleaders will also be performing. Throw in a free CD of local music, literature about gentrification and Tremont, and a whole lotta Tremonters tired of being ignored and pushed around, and the event is sure to be a powerful criticism of both city and corporate plans for Tremont.

A dozen ultra-expensive restaurants & bars in a working class neighborhood, yet not one grocery store? Older, affordable housing destroyed to make way for pricey town houses and condos? 148 public housing units permanently destoyed, their residents carelessly shipped off, while "mixed income" rental properties with high rent replace them? An elementary school destroyed while millions of dollars are spent attracting wealthy outsiders? WHAT IS HAPPENING IN TREMONT?

The word, of course, is gentrification. Developing companies, such as Tremont West and Sutton Brothers, continue to buy properties all over the neighborhood, building expensive, overpriced stores and housing. The result is the forced dislocation of the areas working class residents, pressured out of the community in which many were raised so wealthy development companies can profit by attracting upper-middle class investors, property owners and renters. Locally owned businesses are pressured by the city and developers to sell and move out, while greedy development companies continue to ignore the community's needs.

Some people may remember the "old days", when Tremont was known as the Southside. Hardware stores, delis, barbers, grocery stores, laundromats, and countless other stores sprawled across the neighborhood. Today, these shops are nonexistant, replaced by overpriced properties being milked by rich investors for a couple quick bucks. Property taxes for long-term residents, many on fixed incomes, skyrocket while affluent investors are given tax abatements.

It's not too late to fight back! The city and the developing companies aren't going to give us any options, we have to demand them! Join Tremont on June 11 as we stand together against corporate greed and exploitation!

I can't speak about what's going on in Tremont in its entirety. I can speak of the proposed HOPE VI projectin Valleyview. Being extremely familiar with the HOPE VI projects McCormack Baron has done in St Louis, Pittsburgh, Kansas City and Atlanta, I can tell you this developer's projects do not gentrify. They really do intergrate. They have positive impacts on the schools. Talk to the CDC's in Centennial Place in Atlanta or Crawford Square in Pittsburgh if you doubt this. Talk to the principals of the local schools. I agree that gentrification is a problem, but let's not pain Valleyviews Hope VI with a broad brush stroke of stale complaints.

As for it being "outsiders", who here has confidence in CMHA or Mayor Campbell to do the best job for residents of ValleyView. The reson outsiders were brought in is that they have done complicated projects like this before and are experts in turning around dillapidated urban cores without gentrifying.

Here are pictures, before and after, of McCormack Baron projects. Most of these are Hope VI deals. THis seems better then the insiders of Cleveland have been doing, eh?
http://www.fanniemaefoundation.org/news/signature_events/rouse/2003RouseLecture.pps

Like all of the college educated, liberal-minded folks who move in from the suburbs and now claim this community and this political situation as their own? People who use the plight of the working and poor as a means to make themselves feel better.

Josh and David -
I wish you could have participated in organizing the rally, or (if you didn't) have attended the rally. During the organization, we spoke with dozens of valleyview residents and even more local persons and businesses. None of them had positive things to say about Tremont's gentrification. We also had support from several people who've lived in Tremont 20+ years, and have been trying to do the EXACT same thing for quite a while, but weren't sure what to do or how to do it.
And yes, what's happening at Valleyview is fucked up. I suggest talking to some of the people who live there. The city has promised it's residents "section 8 voucher" and "first in line" status for other housing, however there's a big difference between "first in line" and "guarenteed". Many, MANY people who live there are NOT receiving their "promised" section 8 vouchers (including a people who were at the rally), and even more are being fucked during a not-so-good financial time from moving costs, the increased costs of section 8 housing, etc.
The HOPE VI project isn't intended to help the city's poor or working class, it's designed so that the city and rich developers don't have to provide affordable services to low-income neighborhoods. The current gentrification trend in Cleveland began shortly after the Hough riots of '66, during which low-income people who were "abandoned" by businesses in inner-city Cleveland because there isn't much profit providing services to poor people. There's also a strong odor of racism, since "white" wealthy investors don't like to invest in a neighborhood when concentrations of poorer, black residents seem to suggest "white flight" from the area, even if it's not true.

Mike,

Can you give us a recap of the event? Who spoke and who they represented, topics discussed, any possible future events, and an estimate on attendance? I like the Tremont area and would like to know more about what is going on. Also, it is great to organize an event that is intended to fight for the rights of the working class and their families but in the future maybe something could be organized to take place on a weekend when us working class people aren't actually working and could attend? Keep up to good work.

M

Not sure what shift you're on, but there was stuff happening @ 7pm-8pm and probably later....

property owners in tremont were heard joking this weekend that next artwalk _they_ would have a
demo-->
complete with overpriced tiny portions of food and chants: "what do we want?" "gentrification!"
"when do we want it?" "now!"

Many folks came out to show support for the Tremont Community. This picture was taken at the beginning when Food Not Bombs was beginning to set up, and voices were starting to be heard.

Thank god all Tremont residents aren't wack-jobs like this bunch. The "protesters" are a bunch of dilatante college kids "slumming" on their parents money. The instigator, Mike Ross(law student)doesn't even live in Tremont (W 25th.) . The "RADICAL CHEERLEADERS" even have a WEB SITE; they flounce to each social cause and protest-du-jour to shake their booties. As for the homeowners, long term residents are pleased that their houses are worth more, and the neighborhood is safer. The glut of new rentals have slowly been forcing the slum lords to fix run down units or lower rents just to keep them occupied. Valleyview residents actually VOTED to be relocated from that run down ghetto. I'm surprised our budding social activists aren't bothered by the constant drug solicitations they get when they pass through Valleyview's notorious open-air drug market. If they REALLY were committed they would settle here for the long haul, buy a house and raise their families here in Tremont. I'll bet they will scamper off to Solon or some other exburb when the time comes to lose the oh-so-hip purple hair, mohawks, tribal piercings, nose rings.... and take on the real responsibilities of adult life.

actually at least half of our Radical Cheer Squad lives here in Tremont.

Just so we get our facts straight.....

1) Every person involved in the above protest IS a tremont resident EXCEPT for me; I DID live in tremont for a year, but because I couldn't afford it anymore, I have recently moved to Old Brooklyn.

2) Yes, I am a law student, and am currently working 2 jobs and receiving loans/aid so I can pay for it. The reason I'm becoming a lawyer is to fight for the rights of the working class, and after becoming a lawyer i'll be living below poverty levels. yes, many lawyers are greedy, but not all. many of us fight for social justice instead (i.e. what a lawyer is supposed to do).

3) Our affordable housing group has surveyed well over 100 people in tremont, most being long-term residents, and 1 out of 8 had ANYTHING positive to say about the greedy developers; people we spoke with are OVERWHELMINGLY opposed to the development trend.

4) The majority of tremont residents, particularly lower-income residents, are renters, and do NOT benefit from increased property value. In fact, higher rent is driving many people (like myself) out of the neighborhood.

5) When we had the protest in tremont, and a crowd of people gathered, only ONE person spoke out in FAVOR of the development companies and (surprise, surprise!) he IS a developer (which we found out later; he obviously didn't volunteer this information).

6) The radical cheerleaders do NOT have their own web space; they are being HOSTED by kleveland.org for free.

7) I'm not going to reiterate about 50 pages worth of literature we've already put out explaining how developers are gentrifying tremont, screwing working class people for profit, and manipulating the CDC (Tremont West) into a tool for wealthy developments.

What's REALLY happening is Mayor Campbell and her cronie, Joe Cimpleton, are trying to draw rich people from the suburbs back into the city. To do this, they have to take working class neighborhoods and turn them into "rich" neighborhoods suitable for wealthy people. Cimperman and Campbell are "trying" to take precautions so the gentrification is minimal (don't want a media scandel, do we?) , but what they're doing is inherently destructive to working class communities.

Oh, and most Valleyview residents we spoke to are pretty pissed about the destruction of their housing ('cause rich people don't like poor people in their neighborhood, right? isn't that why it's being destroyed without equitable replacements?), but they were lied to by the city that they'll get "first pick" of the new housing. This is pure bullshit, and I even have spoken with a HUD HOPE VI representative in D.C. who laughed when I told him Valleyview residents thought they would get first crack at the new housing. "To begin with", he stated, "there won't even BE housing for them all; we're replacing only a fraction of what's being knocked down".

You're probably confused because you spent too much time talking to Councilperson Cimpleton.

oh, and for the record, i challenge you to name ONE organizer of the Tremont protest that lives off their parents. Also, I don't believe anyone who organized it had either piercings or mohawks.

also, higher property values do NOT benefit long-term residents who DON'T WANT TO MOVE. in fact, it makes their property taxes skyrocket, and many, many long-term residents (especially those on fixed incomes) can't afford the increase and are FORCED to move against their will.

that's particularly disgusting since new, wealthy residents are being given tax abatements for over a decade.

oh well. i guess only rich people get tax breaks in tremont.

if whoever posted the above comment was actually AT the protest, they would have met many working-class long-term residents who spoke out AGAINST the development companies, but don't know what to do about it. they feel like pawns pushed around in the rich person's game. and they're right.

Are there any other events planned in the near future regarding this issue? I would like to learn more about what is actually going on.

M

I used to live in Tremont, nearly fifty years ago when my family moved from Buffalo to Cleveland. We lived in a small bungalow on Auburn Avenue, between W. 14th and Scranton. The landlord lived in another bungalow right behind our own. The neighborhood was almost entirely Slavic, with a few Russian, Latvian, and Polish resdients, but at the time it was a predominantly Ukrainian working class ghetto. I harbor many memories of my residence there: swimming at the Lincoiln Park pool, exploring the abandoned warehouses in the flats, running to the nearby grocery store to buy my parents a pack of Old Golds (usually on weekend mornings when they wanted me out of the house for the necessary fifteen minutes). I once ran impatiently across Scranton Road and inadvertantly collided with an equally impatient Buick, a typically urban variation of the national ritual of "chicken". My father often allowed me to accompany him to Lemko's, before it became the icon of working class worship at the altar of alcoholic inebriation, where I would sit on his knee and sample the beer he bought to chase down the shot. My mother often allowed me to make the rounds of the neighborhood bars to find him and drag him home, where they might trade insults and recrimination, and share the acrimony of mutual discontent. Later, after the dissolution of our family, my sister and I would shuttle periodically between our respective foster homes and The Receiving Home, a temporary county residence for children who lived there prior to more "permanent" placement. The place was located at the ass end of Tremont School, near Professor and Jefferson, or Literary, or whatever. That neighborhood had once been slated for the constuction of a college, but the plan, for some reason, had been abandoned, with the construction of an elementary or high school, St. John Cantius, in its stead.

Most of the Slavic residents migrated from Tremont to Parma, or points South. The liberals like to blame busing for the exodus, and God knows there were enough of them (rednecks) to make their case (and populate the suburbs with it), but the principal event which destroyed the neighborhood was the construction of I-71, which cut through the heart of the neighborhood and isolated Tremont from its surrounding environs. With busing as the spur and a brand-new freeway to carry them to their utopian paradise, anyone who could afford the scratch to buy a car and assume the liberating burden of a mortgage qjuickly did so. The Autoworkers and Steelworkers unions assured them of an adequate income, and allowed them to send their kids to college, which further reinforced the outward migration. The people who remained behind were the aged, the indigent, the unskilled and the unemployed. In due course, the civic, religious and cultural organizations followed their clientele. Grace Hospital closed its doors to the remnants of a community which could ill afford its services and, in general, the neighborhood gradually deteriorated from a working class slum to a welfare slum.

I'm not sure the city can do much more than it has, which is to say, desperately attempting to lure back tax-paying residents to an economically devastated region devoid of the jobs and investment which are currently eloping out of the city, or out of the state, or out of the country. The corporations run the circus, and social darwinism is their justifying mantra.

I must commend you, full time law student, social activist, and holding two jobs, you must have superb time management skills, or law school must be really easy. You must be footing your own tuition because any reasonable parent would be concerned that someone so “busy” wasn’t paying enough attention to their studies.

How can you possibly protest against the Hope 6 project while Sutton’s proposed Belden Village on w. 5th. (a gated community!!!) will consist of luxury town homes starting at $300,000. I just don’t get your priorities. New subsidized housing= bad; new gated community= good.

By the way, Sutton owns Lucky’s, so I hope you aren’t supporting him by sucking down lattes.

Someone not so aware of your good intentions might think that Self-aggrandizement was your goal, with all the Free Times and TV coverage, (I noticed you didn’t dissuade the “press” of the impression that you actually live in Tremont), How else to explain why you have self-sabotaged your stated mission by alienating your strongest potential allies, homeowners, businesses and the councilman, with your juvenile antics. (hate monger cheers….come on …..really).

Your “organizers” are nearly all transients, shacked-up five to a house, living the urban hipster, bohemian lifestyle down in Tremont with the earthy blue-collar working class folks. Not actually the stability and long term commitment needed to build and maintain a neighborhood.

If you want to help the poor with their property taxes, start voting against the incessant stream of tax levies they are bombarded with…..schools, libraries, MRDD…etc. These have significantly more tax impact than increased property valuation (which generally occurs only when properties change hands). BTW, the rental market is so bad that landlords can’t pass on the tax increases for fear of losing tenants. Every time you vote for one of these stinkers, you sock another tax on the elderly homeowner. $500/ month for a two bedroom upper duplex, in Tremont, first month free….how much cheaper do you want rent to be? Free? You want a right to free housing?, maybe just free housing for students, like with mom and dad.

OK, tax abatements are a rip-off for the rest of us homeowners who pay property tax, and if there were good public schools, you wouldn’t need to bribe families to live in the city, or legislate city employees to live here. People actually move to districts with good schools, (oops, good schools raise property values… my bad)

I saw your stack of propaganda…. Gentrification happens in big cities where people want to live (think Boston, New York, Chicago), it is not some infill projects in one or two neighborhoods. It is massive displacement, leaving residents no other place to go. 50 years at this pathetic pace of development won’t get us near the point where gentrification is a problem. Then there are Hough and Addison and Collinwood, and East Cleveland once those are all gentrified. I know, you can move back to Cleveland once you have retired and protest gentrification. Maybe it will be a problem by then.

i don't have much time, so i'm gonna have to make this quick.

i'm not sure if i'm detecting sarcasm, but i'll assume otherwise. yes, i am paying my own tuition. no, law school isn't "easy", but it's not as had as people make it out to be. it does leave time for other activities.

How can you possibly protest against the Hope 6 project while Sutton’s proposed Belden Village on w. 5th. (a gated community!!!) will consist of luxury town homes starting at $300,000. I just don’t get your priorities. New subsidized housing= bad; new gated community= good. By the way, Sutton owns Lucky’s, so I hope you aren’t supporting him by sucking down lattes.

it's not an either/or issue. we're protesting both Hope VI AND new expensive developments. each have unique reasons for a critical analysis. sutton's gated community is destructive for different reasons than why Hope VI is destructive. we're critical of both. i'm not sure why you thought we supported one or the other.

and i don't drink coffee at lucky's, although i don't think that everything sutton does is fundamentally bad for the community. i'm far more concerned about the gated community than a coffee shop. lucky's by itself isn't destructive. when coffee shops are built NOT for the community, but instead to encourage gentrification, is when problems arise.

Someone not so aware of your good intentions might think that Self-aggrandizement was your goal, with all the Free Times and TV coverage, (I noticed you didn’t dissuade the “press” of the impression that you actually live in Tremont), How else to explain why you have self-sabotaged your stated mission by alienating your strongest potential allies, homeowners, businesses and the councilman, with your juvenile antics. (hate monger cheers….come on …..really).

i never told the press that i live in tremont. the press never stated that i live in tremont. have we alienated homeowners? i don't think so, at least not the ones we've spoken with on many occasions. have we aliented joe cimpleton? quite the opposite. when we organized the protest, it was cimpleton that immediately attacked us without even talking to us first. he has been confrontational since the beginning and ever since. frankly, homeowners in tremont had a lot more deep-seated anger toward him than we did.

Your “organizers” are nearly all transients, shacked-up five to a house, living the urban hipster, bohemian lifestyle down in Tremont with the earthy blue-collar working class folks. Not actually the stability and long term commitment needed to build and maintain a neighborhood.

first of all, they're not "my" organizers, they're THE organizers. second of all, every one of us is working class, and have jobs. third of all, we've done quite a bit of outreach, and have the support of many, many long-term residents. fourth of all, not a SINGLE ORGANIZER lives in a house with 5 people. you should try talking to us instead of making bigoted remarks.

f you want to help the poor with their property taxes, start voting against the incessant stream of tax levies they are bombarded with…..schools, libraries, MRDD…etc. These have significantly more tax impact than increased property valuation (which generally occurs only when properties change hands). BTW, the rental market is so bad that landlords can’t pass on the tax increases for fear of losing tenants. Every time you vote for one of these stinkers, you sock another tax on the elderly homeowner. $500/ month for a two bedroom upper duplex, in Tremont, first month free….how much cheaper do you want rent to be? Free? You want a right to free housing?, maybe just free housing for students, like with mom and dad.

you don't know what you're talking about, and i'm not repeating myself. if you'd like to discuss this in person, come to one of our meetings. to set one of your facts straight, NO, the city re-appraises homes whenever there seems to be shifting property values. it does NOT have to occur when a home is sold, especially in a neighborhood like tremont.

I saw your stack of propaganda…. Gentrification happens in big cities where people want to live (think Boston, New York, Chicago), it is not some infill projects in one or two neighborhoods. It is massive displacement, leaving residents no other place to go. 50 years at this pathetic pace of development won’t get us near the point where gentrification is a problem. Then there are Hough and Addison and Collinwood, and East Cleveland once those are all gentrified. I know, you can move back to Cleveland once you have retired and protest gentrification. Maybe it will be a problem by then.

Yes, gentrification is occurring at a much faster rate with a much higher displacement rate in other cities. No, that doesn't mean what's happening in tremont shouldn't be fought just because "it's worse in San Francisco". that's a terrible argument.

Once again, 'cause this doesn't seem to be sinking in, the organizers are NOT the only people who have a problem with what's happening in tremont. in fact, it wasn't until after we spoke with many, many people in the neighborhood who DID have SERIOUS problems/complaints that we decided to organize something. i know you'd like to think the only people complaining are "transient college kids", but it's far from the truth. we've received support from almost everyone we've spoken to in tremont, both before and after the protest. many of these people have families and full-time jobs, so it's understandable that they can't participate in organizing as easily as we who don't have children.

lastly, you've made a shitload of assumptions, almost all of which being wrong, about we who are organizing in tremont. i don't appreciate it, and i can't imagine the other organizers do either. you can lie to yourself about who we are and who supports us all you want. i'm sure you have your own agenda; people who spread lies and misperceptions usually do. but no matter what you may say or think, people in tremont are tired of being screwed around and manipulated by the wealthy and politicians, and nothing you do will quiet their voices.

whoops, almost forgot to address THIS ignorant accusation.

1. The Free Times interviewed several people; they just happened to go with what i told them.

2. The news named "me" because I sent out the press release. I, nor anyone else, EVER stated that i was the "leader" of the protest. in fact, the majority of the work was done by other people and organizations such as Food Not Bombs (who feed the homeless every Sunday; are they "self-aggrandizers" too?)

3. You seem to have a problem understanding how things work without a leader barking orders. the "hate monger" cheer (which you said was "my" cheer) was performed by the radical cheerleaders, who do all their own work independently. every person involved in the protest worked as individuals part of a group. your comments are extremely belittling to the many other people who worked very hard on this issue.

did you ever stop to think that our motives aren't "self-aggrandizement" or "being hipsters", but instead we're acting out of concern for our community and a sense of social justice? geez, what a concept. god forbid people in the community actually do something to help each other instead of letting the wealthy and the politicians make all our decisions for us (usually to our detriment).

i've read this thread with much interest. i think it got to the same stale point most discussions of gentrification go; it's bad, but now what? Gentrification isn't going to stop until capitalism stops. why? because kids born and raised in the suburbs will always want to move back into the city. the suburbs suck, the first couple of generations of wealthier white kids are starting to figure this out and are moving back into the cities. they tend to congregate around colleges and other white people. i've been observing this very closely as a community organizer in philadelphia where property values can range from 15,000 to 300,000 dollars in a mere two block distance. what's not happening, in philadelphia OR cleveland, is the support of low-income home owners. development wouldn't be so bad if we could bring up the wealth of ALL the residents of a neighborhood (which of course is going to be debated by many as totally impossible). for instance, our current campaign in philla is to have the city alocate 8 million dollars in home repair grants for low-income home owners. this would allow home owners to maintain the value of their property. the other essential card in this is to grandfather the tax rates of older residents while implementing taxes on the wealthier homes. now this, of course, doesn't wet the palate of developers. Community power to demand policies that are good for a neighborhood in most cities comes too late. protesting the destruction doesn't stop it. what cleveland needs, what all cities need, is a powerfull community organization that can resist bad development and fight for the rights of the working poor and elderly. untill that happens, we're really just analyzing the situation after-the-fact.

Exactly what do you want?

You don't like capitalism...so what would you replace it with?

I argue that capitalism (in general) is good. It creates competition that leads to innovation.

Why do you think so many people want to come to the US? --- Opportunity (and to exploit what the American people have built).

How many people are rushing to China? Russia? North Korea? Iran? Not many.

Like it or not, capitalism is the worlds economic engine. Your right, if you sit on your ass and watch TV all day...it won't work for you....except get you your welfare check.

If you want to help people, use your brain and invest something, create something, create jobs--not fear and hatred of capitalism.

Capitalism is just a method of exchange---you do this for me, I'll do that for you. What can be argued about is how to make ;the rules generally fair.

HA HA YOU STUPID TREMONT YUPPIES, GUESS WHAT,
THE JAY HOTEL IS RELOCATING TO PELTON PLACE ON LINCOLN PARK, SO YOU ARE ALL GONNA GET DIVERSITY SHOVED DOWN YOUR YUPPIE THROATS WHEATHER YOU LIKE IT OR NOT.
GET THIS!
"The proposed project serves adults with schizophrenic, schizoaffective, or other psychotic or mood disorders that result in profound cognitive and functional impairments. Many of these individuals choose not to participate in traditional office-based mental health and supportive services. Their failure to obtain treatment for their mental illness often leads to grossly disorganized thinking and threatening behavior fueled by delusional beliefs, hallucinatory experiences, cognitive distortions, and social misperceptions. Lack of treatment leads to repeated involuntary psychiatric hospitalizations or incarceration, yet upon discharge treatment is not continued. Because of their mental illness, they are socially isolated even from other homeless persons, and often live on the streets as opposed to utilizing emergency shelters.

Many of these persons also have co-occurring substance abuse or dependence disorders for which, as with their mental health issues, they are not receiving treatment. Substance abuse is the most common and significant disorder among adults with severe mental illness, and persons with both substance abuse and mental health disorders are at high risk for homelessness and are more likely to be non-compliant with treatment. The majority of clients who have a serious mental illness and are homeless also have problems of substance abuse"

AND THERE'S NOT A THING YOU CAN DO ABOUT IT. SO F**K YOU HA HA

i don't know who you're calling yuppie, but it certainly isn't me or anyone i know from indymedia. as for the j-hotel, i'de be very suprised if cimperman and twdc let that happen. remember how they stopped a women and childrens shelter because of the economic impact of that?

I'm not sure if the author's talking about us (activists) or the new yuppies moving into tremont. I assumed she/he's talking about the new yuppies moving into the townhouses, not the working class folk who've been living there for years.

I may be wrong (I sure hope not though).

Profit making developers are coming in our area for
one goal - they know that with todays financial strain on
most families and homeowners - those who cannot
afford to keep their houses and property up to muster
will either be forced to sell at below market values or go into foreclosure. Our city has an abundance of homeless people some with families and yet developers are allowed to come in and change the dynamics as to create more homeless families.
When low income families are barely getting by there
are those more fortunate pointing fingers at what is
wrong with somebody else's house. Never mind
that it's better to have an occupied home than an
empty one. Yes it's time to fight back.

Cleveland Indy Media Center

This FRIDAY, JUNE 11, there will be an anti-gentrification event in Tremont at the CORNER OF PROFESSOR & JEFFERSON.