after one week are the lunatics running the asylum?

An open letter to the mayor from Council Members Wendell Young, Yvette Simpson and Chris Seelbach

Cincinnati's progress and momentum are undeniable. As elected leaders, we want to be part of continuing our success, to ensure we continue to grow, create good-paying jobs and foster a welcoming, inclusive environment.
That's why we are very disappointed in Mayor Cranley's first week in office, causing us great concern about the direction of the city for the next four years under his leadership.
On Nov. 27, The Cincinnati Enquirer said it was concerned Mayor Cranley was not reigning in his "dictatorial tendencies" in order to be "diplomatic, respectful and collaborative." We agree.
Cranley's first week lacked structure, included attempts to purposefully silence the voters of Cincinnati and elected members of council and seemed to really crumble when Cranley delayed the vote of his city manager choice, shortly before the very competent Willie Carden, eliminated himself from consideration altogether.
The first meeting of the new council started with the "Streetcar Committee" meeting without any agreed upon rules, any agreed upon committee assignments and without any ordinances to actually vote on. The chair of the committee, Vice Mayor David Mann, had to recess the meeting because he hadn't even seen the 11 ordinances Mayor Cranley had prepared.



When the ordinances were presented, they contained financial allocations, preventing them from going to a referendum, even though Mayor Cranley had called that right "sacred " earlier in the year when fighting to put the "Parking Modernization Plan" up to a vote of the people. As Council Member Sittenfeld said in chambers, "What makes a sacred right sacred is that it doesn't go away when you disagree on the issue."
The week continued by Mayor Cranley delaying a vote on his city manager choice after he had planned to have council vote on the decision without a national search and without ensuring that every council member had the ability to talk with his selection before voting.
With the vote delayed, daylong discussions of the streetcar continued, where Mayor Cranley tried to prevent Council Member Sittenfeld from speaking (and had to be overruled by an 8-1 majority of council) and misled Council Members Mann and Flynn into believing they could look at the streetcar numbers independently and ultimately decide to continue the project (when Cranley knew he would veto any decision to bring the project back to life).
Given that this is only the first week of Mayor Cranley's four-year term, we have hope he can change, and does so fast. That's why we are asking him to slow down, start caring about process and listening to every voice before decisions are made. We ask him to have more respect for the sacred rights of voters and the voice of every member of council. And we ask him to think about how he can be more collaborative and less divisive.
We're all in this together. And we hope Mayor Cranley starts to get that.
Email the new mayor your thoughts HERE
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