Revitalizing Cleveland--Bring On The College Kids!!

How many of you plan on coming back to Cleveland after college? Probably close to none. You want to go where to cities that your friends will gravitate to when they graduate—cities with an atmosphere and culture that appeals to young people. Fun cities, cool cities, interesting cities, like New York, San Francisco, Chicago. Maybe even abroad to London, Paris, Zurich, Rome, or Sydney. But Cleveland? The only time college kids have thought about Cleveland in the past year is when they saw the Hastily made Cleveland Tourism Video on CollegeHumor.com (come and look aaat both of our buildings...hey, it's catchy, what can I say?)

And in those few sentences lie Cleveland’s death-knell. We’ve heard it before, the brain drain and lack of brain gain that is ruining Northeast Ohio’s economy and future. But Cleveland has much to offer: A low cost of living, an incredible Metroparks system that should be the envy of every urban area attempting to create citywide green space, a foodie scene swiftly rising to national prominence, and perhaps above all, a small community that instead of being cutthroat like NYC, has the potential to help recent grads network and reach their potential in whatever fields they choose to pursue.

Nevertheless, Cleveland sucks because it lacks the robust social scene and cool jobs to be found elsewhere. It has no robust social scene because few young college grads move to Cleveland, and it lacks the competitive jobs because of this dearth of intellectual capital. It’s a classic catch-22. But it doesn’t have to be this way; my first week at Policy Matters, Tim Krueger, aspiring urban planner and recent Cornell graduate, shared with me his plan for revitalizing Cleveland. After much discussion between the two of us, I am here to present this tweaked and reworked proposal to all of you.

College students move along well-established social paths that don’t run through Cleveland. So the first step in revitalizing this city is to create social pathways to attract graduates. In an ironic way, the economic crisis provides the perfect opportunity for this city. The job market may suck in Cleveland, but it sucks everywhere. Thus, by offering graduates strong social and economic incentives, Cleveland can begin to change the social norms within academia, and position itself as a city worthy of consideration when college students decide where to begin their new lives.

The “Intellectual Capital and Fellowship Program” (if you have a catchier name/better acronym by all means let me know) would offer economic incentives in the form of free rent and an expedited job hunt, social incentives in the form of an automatic social scene and mentorship from a community leader, and would affect social norms within academia by reversing the manner in which new applications are typically solicited.

The Four Part Approach

1. Neighborhood Based - A core component of the Intellectual Capital Fellowship program is that it works through physical space. College graduates want to be independent, but they also want the community interaction and feel of a campus and a dorm. Just look at how everyone holds up examples of young companies like Google, and what they have done with their office spaces—casual, informal, and fun. Working in an office where there’s a snack bar, pool tables, and couches where you can lounge in sweatpants and jeans and do work on your laptop mimics the atmosphere of studying and working in a dorm. Example number two, the New York Times reported on new construction condominium towers that are being marketed to young professionals: “For anyone who has lived on a college campus, the feeling of Metrome and other buildings aimed at young adults in downtown San Diego will be instantly familiar. While they may have been marketed like hip hotels, the feeling of the social life in these buildings is more that of a college dorm.” We envision that the Fellowship would purchase and renovate a warehouse in the flats, Ohio City, or Tremont, and provide loft apartments to program participants—rent free for the first six months, and subsidized rent for the Fellowship’s final six months. This would also have the tangential effects of increasing nearby commerce and real estate development after time.

2. Mentorship – The small size of this program would allow for highly individualized experiences. Fellowship participants would have complete agency in the job search, and unlike a conventional internship model, the end of the Fellowship program is completely irrelevant to the (former) fellow’s tenure at her job. The crux of this individualized job experience would be the creation of a Board of Mentors, comprised of established business and community leaders in Cleveland from different fields. The Board would participate in selecting the fellows each year, and then each Mentor would be paired with one Fellow. Over the course of the yearlong program, Mentors would develop relationships with their respective fellows, and advocate for them on their job searches, as well as help them integrate into socio-professional networks. This relationship could very well continue after the formal end of the program.

3. Social Networks and the Application Process – The manner in which the Intellectual Capital Fellowship Program would solicit applications would be one of its greatest assets in continuing and strengthening its existence. Tim drew inspiration for this section of the Fellowship from his experiences with and observations of social networks during his time at the Roosevelt Institute (national student-run think tank) and the Obama campaign. He points out Summer on the Cuyahoga as an example of what the Fellowship’s application process should not be: Summer on the Cuyahoga solicits applications through college career offices and alumni networks, which means that because it takes one or two students from every school, every year it starts over again with the application process. It never builds its own social network, and never creates the kind of social incentives for students to follow previous graduates from their schools to Cleveland. Instead of this scattered model, the Fellowship would partner with 3 or 4 prestigious colleges and universities to solicit applicant, and would require that each Fellow solicit ten new applications from the most highly qualified individuals they know. The expected result, is that after a few years, almost all potential applicants would already have social connections who had gone through the program, and hopefully chosen to remain in Cleveland. In other words, it could become more normatively acceptable, and possibly even desirable, for students in certain social networks to consider moving to Cleveland after graduation.

4. Student Loan Repayment - Obviously, a major goal of the Intellectual Capital Fellowship is to convince graduates not only to come to Cleveland, but also to stay in Cleveland once the program formally ends. The soaring cost of tuition and the student loans that it engenders offer Cleveland an opportunity to tackle this problem of, “brain gain and brain remain” (I just thought of that one—brain remain—like it?) Participants who establish residency in the city of Cleveland proper at the end of the program, will be eligible two years later to receive $1000 a year, or up to 20% of their annual student loan payment, for the next five years (with back payment for the first two years after the Fellowship), contingent upon their continued primary residency in Cleveland, to be used for the repayment of their student loans. (Or we could just offer them free beer, that might make them come too).

Hopefully a critical mass of bright young graduates could help to turn around the city’s social and job scene by attracting businesses and culture. Or we could just wait for fresh water to become the next world crisis, at which point Cleveland and the Great Lakes region will become the most important area on Earth (you heard it here first—start buying all the lakefront property you can get your hands on). So hit us up and let us know what you think (emails can be sent to ahurst12@gmail.com).

ClevelandEats: Bar Cento

Over at ClevelandEats not every restaurant visit is a good one...

Jonathan Sawyer's Bar Cento, little cousin to The Greenhouse Tavern, is proof that trendy doesn't necessarily mean tasty. Paired with the "Bier Market," which serves outrageously priced, imported craft beers, Bar Cento is one of W. 25 Street's much praised new redevelopments. Obviously the praisers only drank there and didn't eat anything. What's so bad about it you might ask? Everything excep the standard burger/pizza bar fare.

Full review after the jump

ClevelandEats: Johnny Mango

Another guest post from www.clevelandeats.wordpress.com:

Johnny Mango World Café and Bar is a well known Ohio City hotspot. It’s friendly, inviting atmosphere is well complemented by an eclectic menu, and wide variety of juices, sodas, and soymilk/frozen yogurt shakes. The atmosphere is casual and unpretentious, and the food is good.

Full review after the jump

Sex Scandals: America's True Obsession

As humorous as the whole Sanford situation is (especially those juicy emails!), it really brings to light a sad truth about the state of politics in this country. Voters care far more about politicians’ personal lives than they do about their governing abilities, or even about issues. Where is the same outrage over the millions of Americans living in poverty, the tens of millions with no healthcare, our failing schools? Where is the outrage over the rampant and irresponsible pollution of our precious planet?

I am continually befuddled by the fact that Americans judge a politician’s ability to govern (and deservingness of office) far more harshly by what he does in his personal life than the actual track record of his career. The obvious comparison is between the Clinton and Bush presidencies. How is it possible that an entire party of senators and representatives could have spent months calling for, and almost succeeding in the impeachment of a president who damaged his personal life and marriage, but an opposition party was too afraid to display the same boldness against a president who wrecked the lives of hundreds of millions, and who endangered the very foundations of our nation—economy, security, and liberty.

But none of that seems to matter. No, what gets Americans really worked up is a good old-fashioned sex scandal. Never mind that who a president, governor, senator or representative sleeps with has no actual bearing on how he does his job. I wouldn’t care if Barack Obama had a harem, I would still rather have him and the policies he supports than the most straight-laced right-winger in the White House.

However, there exists this dangerous belief in American politics that governing is really more about the person than the ideologies that person supports and espouses. Its evident every election cycle when the media analyzes the seemingly perennial question, “who would you rather have a beer with?” Who gives a shit is the logical response. If the president is an asshole who is excellent at running the country, then let’s put an asshole in the White House…

Just look at the majority of the media coverage of Sanford. It has focused mainly on the details of his affair. But what about the fact that he abandoned his post as governor without telling anyone where he was going for 7 days? Mark Sanford should resign as South Carolina Governor, not because he cheated on his wife, but because he went AWOL from his job and was irresponsible with the office he was elected to.

First Ensign Now Sanford: Republicans Continue Self Destruct

The Republican Party just can't seem to help itself can it? Last week John Ensign admitted that he had had an affair with a staffer's wife (Ensign gets a twofer...not just cheating on his own wife, but with someone else's wife too), and just moments ago Sanford admitted that he was having an affair. Well duhh. What kind of governor disappears for a week and doesn't tell anybody (including, most tellingly, his family) where he is going, unless of course, he has something to hide.

Its so funny watching these family values conservatives make hypocrites of themselves. They all know that marriage is between a man and a woman...and another woman... Its even funnier watching the Republican punditry try and respond to these incidents without displaying the same kind of outrage and calls for impeachment and resignation that they did for a dear old Bill Clinton.

But I'm just upset that he had to go all the way to Argentina for his affair. Where's the patriotism?! What, aren't American women good enough for middle age Republican men?

Ensign and Sanford were two of the Republicans supposed front runners (if any could be declared so early) for the 2012 presedential election. Oops, not anymore. Further evidence of this now regional party sliding further into obscurity.

Any bets on when we get the next encore? I give it three months, tops.

Edit: I just saw this on twitter and couldn't resist posting it, "The Republican Recovery has started, powered by Viagra..." (from dabloguiman)

Cleveland Eats

I'm proud to announce that my new site (food reviews), Cleveland Eats, has launched over at WordPress. I'll be posting snippets and of the reviews on ClevelandEats here regularly, and linking back to the full posts, for your convenience. So feel free to hop on by www.clevelandeats.wordpress.com and check it out (It will get its own domain name as soon as I think of an alternative--clevelandeats.com is already taken unfortunately). But without further ado, the latest: A review of Sergio's Sarava in Shaker Square.

Over a year ago, I ended fourteen years of vegetarianism. After my first bite of red meat (beef short ribs at Lola), the siren song of steaks drew me in, and filet mignon became nearly the sole focus of my attentions when reading through menus. My pent up desire for good beef took me on a tour through Red the Steakhouse, XO, Chophouse, Lola, and Fire (reviews of all forthcoming). Sergio’s Sarava may have accelerated the end of that phase, by teaching me that the steak is not the end all be all of every menu.

Full post and pics after the jump...

Policy Matters Meets With VP Joe Biden

Policy Matters' Executive Director Amy Hanauer (and a board member) is meeting with Vice President Joe Biden this morning/afternoon at WK Solar in Perrysburg Ohio.

I tried to finagle my way into going, but no such luck.

It's on CNN at the moment, so if you're free and looking for something to do...

America Needs A Healthcare Transplant

Although on the campaign trail, Barack Obama claimed, "if [he] were designing a system form scratch, [he] would probably go ahead with a single-payer system," he has refused to travel in that direction in his quest to reform our badly broken health care system. Even more disheartening, the "public option" compromise seems to have been completely abandoned. The lack of will (or perhaps ideological belief) on the administration's part to pursue a single-payer system is of course disappointing, but maybe not entirely unexpected. But one would think that the Obama administration, which showed an extraordinary ability for political maneuvering during the nearly flawless campaign would have been smart enough not to play the compromise as their opening hand. Obama has dropped the ball, and unless he can resuscitate a swiftly fading legislative proposal, America will continue to pay the price.

Ideological Struggles

The United States remains the only first world, industrial/post-industrial nation that does not recognize healthcare as a basic human right, and does not provide blanket coverage to its citizens. Whatever problems exist within the Canadian/European models, they pale in comparison with the problems inherent in our market-based, commodity system. Yet, again and again, the discourse centers on a "uniquely American" solution, and refuses to acknowledge that in this arena, the United States is far, very far, from being the best in the world. Any healthcare proposal that fails to model itself on the "socialized medicine"adopted by the rest of the world is doomed to failure.

T.R. Reid's upcoming book on international healthcare systems, We're Number 37!, outlines 4 basic models that healthcare systems around the world follow:

• The Beveridge Model - The UK's system for healthcare, in which most hospitals are run by the government, and doctor's are government employees.
• The Bismarck Model - Used in Germany and France, where insurers ("sickness funds") are non-profits, financed by employers and employees through payroll taxes.
• The National Health Insurance Model- Most Americans are familiar with this as the Canadian system, where the hospitals and doctors are run private, but the government acts as the sole insurer.
• The Out of Pocket Model - Found in third world nation's, where those with money get healthcare, and those with no money do not.

Reid points out that the United States contains elements of all four of these systems:

When it comes to treating veterans, we're Britain or Cuba. For Americans over the age of 65 on Medicare, we're Canada. For working Americans who get insurance on the job, we're Germany.

For the 15 percent of the population who have no health insurance, the United States is Cambodia or Burkina Faso or rural India, with access to a doctor available if you can pay the bill out-of-pocket at the time of treatment or if you're sick enough to be admitted to the emergency ward at the public hospital.

Beyond the problem of America’s millions of uninsured, is the problem of cost. We spend far more in pure dollar amount ($6096 in 2007 dollars), and as a percent of GDP (%16) on health care than any other country in the world. Spending twice as much per capita as the next closest nation (Germany), demands an explanation. Perhaps Americans just visit the doctor twice as much as Germans, but a far more likely explanation lies in the fact that whereas German insurers are non-profits that don’t compete, American insurers advertise, pay stock dividends, rack up corporate profits, and generously compensate their executives. Indeed, a good 30% of US healthcare expenditure is insurer overhead costs. This makes sense logically—if healthcare is treated as a commodity in a market based system, then the goal is obviously to profit from it. If there were no profit from healthcare, there would be no private insurers. And that is exactly the point of the European systems in question. None of them treat healthcare as a good to be profited from, but as a service to be provided to all citizens regardless of their economic status.

The only way to bring down costs is to either eliminate private insurers, or force them to reduce their profit margins. Otherwise we end up even deeper in the hole, with a bill that might extend coverage to millions more, but will ultimately cost us trillions of dollars that we don’t have. Obviously neither of the two aforementioned options are acceptable to insurance companies, so if they acquiesce to whatever bill comes down to a vote in Congress, its obviously not one that will best serve the American people. The harder the insurance companies fight a bill, the better that bill is for all of us not profiting from someone’s sickness and misfortune. This is why the public option is a must-have in lieu of a single-payer system. A public option will force insurers to reduce their profit margins enough to compete with a non-profit government agency providing coverage. If 20-30% of Americans switch from expensive private insurance to be covered under a public plan, then private insurers will have to lower their costs in order to retain and even gain new customers.

This is where we come to…

Political Struggles

The Republicans have had nothing to add to the debate besides screams of “socialized medicine!” that are completely out of touch with what the vast majority of Americans actually want out of a healthcare bill. So let the Republicans complain—we had an election in this country last November, and the American public soundly defeated the conservative platform, which was stridently and vocally opposed to any kind of government solution to our healthcare ailments. This debate is no longer about the Republicans, unless Democrats once again wallow in a pit of bipartisanship and make concession after concession to a party that is growing increasingly irrelevant.

In fact, Republican opposition is really the least of our worries. Centrist and Blue Dog Democrats are where the real problem lies, with senators like Ben Nelson who proclaimed the public option a deal breaker because it might not allow private companies to compete. Earth to Senator Nelson—this isn’t about companies competing, it’s about fixing a broken system that is costing us money and lives.

The Obama administration should have anticipated this waffling from the less-Democratic wing of the Democratic Party, and should have opened with a single-payer proposal. Then the Blue Dogs could have barked and yelped their way down to a public option. But now, if the center manages to have their way, healthcare reform will become healthcare massive fail, and Obama will take the heat in the next election. And more importantly, one of the most pressing problems we have will once again not be fixed.

More to come next week on what Canadians and Europeans actually think of their health care systems…

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The Perils of Rent-to-Own

It's expensive being poor. The poor often end up paying much more for consumer goods and groceries than do middle-class and well-to-do families. This may seem illogical; shouldn't the poor spend less money by purchasing less expensive goods? Not if they don't have enough money to purchase goods all at once, and not if they don't have the requisite transportation to get to the mainstream department stores found at suburban malls.

Those without enough money to buy furnishings and appliances for their home use "rent-to-own" stores, like Rent-A-Center (RAC). These stores allow customers to essentially take out a lease on everything from televisions to washing machines with a low down payment, and then pay monthly or weekly payments for one to two years until they have payed the entire cost of the good, at which point they become the full owner. It may sound like a good idea, until you realize that these stores pray on the poor by initially charging up to two times the normal retail price of the products, and by also charging exorbitant interest rates that are almost comparable to pay-day lending and loan sharks. Furthermore, if a customer misses a payment, the store can reclaim the item and keep all payments made prior to the return.

Policy Matters Ohio (where I am interning this summer, and Wiki), just released a report on rent-to-own stores in Ohio. In Paying More, Renting Debt, Policy Matters found that not only did rent-to-own stores locate mainly in impoverished communities, but that the average rental purchase price was 4.5 times higher than the normal retail price for a stove, 2.7 times higher for a washer-dryer pair, and 2.9 times higher for a stove.

Few states in the US have strict regulations on rent to own stores: Wisconsin sued RAC in 1999 for not revealing the interest rates being charged to consumers, and New Jersey has ruled that these stores are subject to its caps on APR. Policy Matters recommends that Ohio enact price caps of 200% of normal cash purchase price, and treat rent-to-own transactions under credit laws and subject them to usury ceilings.

It certainly makes sense to me. It's easy for the poor to get sucked in to this never-ending cycle of debt, but very difficult to climb out of it. And it is especially important now, as more people find themselves in economic difficulties, that we attempt to protect consumers from incurring outrageous levels of debt.

iPhone OS 3.0

What a disappointment. So we finally get the features that other smart phones, and even the cheapo flip phones that carriers give away for free, have had for years. And we still have to wait for MMS. Seriously? Who makes a “revolutionary” phone (and don’t get me wrong, the iPhone blows everything else out of the water) in 2007, and doesn’t include picture messaging? Or video recording and video messaging for that matter.

It also pisses me off that Apple reserved software features, like video recording and voice command, for the 3GS, which was really just a slight hardware update to make the iPhone a little better in the speed department. If I can jailbreak my phone and use cycorder to record video, then why can’t Apple just make a more stable, official, standard app for it? Don’t tell me that I should spend hundreds of dollars on a brand new phone just to get those two simple features. For crying out loud, the RAZR I had in 2005 could video and picture message, as well as handle voice commands.

I’m not asking for the whole enchilada Apple, just throw us the bone that you should have included anyway last year with the rollout of the 3G.

Governor's Initiative Would Have Saved State Money

Ted Strickland's "Initiative on Increasing the Graduation Rate" didn't manage to survive the legislature's latest round of budget cuts. The program had targeted 33 urban high schools, and focused on increasing the 9th grade promotion rate of "at-risk" boys. In its first year, over 67% of the 5500 students targeted by the initiative were promoted to tenth grade. So what's the big deal?
Graduates cost the state far less money in the long term, in the form of Medicare, TANF, and the criminal justice system than dropouts. And 9th grade is recognized as being an exceptionally tough year--students who make it to tenth grade have an increased likelihood of graduation than students in the 9th grade. Timothy Krueger, a long-term intern at Policy Matters Ohio, wrote a report analyzing the Governor's Initiative.

The economic benefits of education for the state and society are tremendous. The University of Cincinnati Center for Education and Research recently calculated that the lifetime return on education is $11.62 for every dollar spent. Tim's report is far more conservative; he focuses only on the potential cost savings on social welfare programs and incarceration (while ignoring the costs of crime to victims). In short, adjusting for incarceration rates among graduates, average cost to Medicare, and increased tax payments, Tim finds that the Initiative would have (conservatively) saved the state roughly $28.5 million dollars, or $3.3 for every dollar spent.

I strongly urge you to go straight to the source, and see Tim's research and how he arrived at his numbers. It's definitely worth a read. You can check out other Policy Matters reports at www.policymattersohio.org

Ironic Iran

It’s ironic that in Iran, a nation the vast majority of the West regards as undemocratic, the voters and citizens have a much deeper appreciation and devotion to what semblance of democracy they do have than their counterparts in the United States. Iranian state media has announced that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won reelection with 62.9% of the vote (he apparently won between 60-70% of the vote in EVERY district, even the home district of his opponent, Mir Houssain Mousavi).

However, Mr. Mousavi and his supporters have refused to accept this fraud. Mr. Mousavi claims that he is the victor, and his supporters are willing to put their lives and wellbeing on the line to fight for their votes, to speak out in the face of oppression, to grab hold of their right to self-governance. If only voters in America showed the same passion about their democracy. If only voters in America understood how high the stakes were. If only voters in America were willing to realize that THEY are the democracy of this country, and that they must cherish it, participate in it, and take it back when it is threatened. If only the voters in America had refused to accept the farce that was the Bush “victory” in Florida.

How different would this nation and world be, if Al Gore had refused to accept the flagrant cheating, and voter suppression that marred the 2000 Florida election process? What if Al Gore had had Mousavi’s courage, and had called on his supporters to show that same courage by taking to the streets and standing up to democracy? But he didn’t, and it takes no genius to recognize that we are much the worse for it.

In 1953 the United States overthrew Iran’s fledgling democratic government lead by Mohammad Mossadegh. Now, more than fifty years later, Iranian’s are still suffering the consequences, but they have shown a determination to have their voices for reform heard and not ignored. The Iranian people realize that they are the power of their country, and they are not afraid to take to the streets by the hundreds of thousands and shout it to their neighbors, to the police, to the Ayatollah. Americans would do well to take note.