In a meeting with Cavs’ corporate leadership Feb. 6 (a meeting that included Cavs’ President Len Komoroski, but not Gilbert himself), GCC asked for a face-to-face meeting with Gilbert to seek his support for the fund. The $35 million that GCC wants from him would instantly capitalize the fund and provide start-up costs for the construction of two mental health crisis centers in Cleveland, one on the east side and one on the west. In addition to the crisis centers, GCC would like to fund “Job Access Pipelines” and “Neighborhood Capital Projects” with the community dollars.
Requesting substantial direct support from Gilbert stems from GCC’s idea that Cleveland residents are getting railroaded by downtown interests and that there needs to be commensurate investment in distressed neighborhoods if Gilbert and the Cavs’ (and, crucially, elected leaders) want voters’ support for what’s being spun as a “deal” — not like they ever asked for it.
“At a time when we need to unite our city and county, this deal as it stands further divides Cleveland,” GCC wrote in a letter to Gilbert, delivered to Komoroski on Feb. 6. “We are asking for a meeting directly with you to negotiate these terms, because you are the principal decision-maker. We believe it is your responsibility to ensure this deal builds one Cleveland.”
In a press release sent to media this week after GCC received no response from the Cavaliers’ organization, GCC got more specific about the imbalance of the deal.
“GCC’s belief is that the financial benefit Mr. Gilbert and the Cavaliers accrue from the Q far outweighs what Cleveland-area residents receive in return,” GCC leaders wrote. “Examples of these benefits include not paying property tax on the Q building, extracting exclusive value of the building’s naming rights, and a Cavaliers franchise now valued at $1.2 billion, up from $375 million when Mr. Gilbert first purchased the Cavs, which the public helps subsidize through the current Q arrangement.”
GCC plans to discuss the deal on March 9 at 7 p.m. at Elizabeth Baptist Church. They hope to be making a positive announcement, but given the response to date — nothing from the Cavs, not a peep from County Executive Armond Budish, whom they met with in January — they may have to settle for rallying the crowd against greed and injustice.
The March 9 assembly will build on the choreographed demonstration at County Council Headquarters last week, where more than 100 GCC members packed into council chambers to declare that they were #NotAllIn on the renovation deal.
Fairmount Temple’s Rabbi Josh Caruso, one of several speakers for GCC, asked why Cleveland’s income tax hike had just been passed, premised on a lack of resources for basic city services, when the city seemed to have access to tens of millions of dollars for the Q deal. He also posed the question: What’s to stop the Indians or the Browns from asking for a similar deal in the next few years? “Doesn’t this open the floodgates?” He wondered. “Where does it stop?”
County council will deliberate on the Q deal during their committee meeting at 2 p.m. tomorrow. That takes place on the fourth floor of the county administrative headquarters (2079 E. 9th St.).
This article appears in Feb 15-21, 2017.
second verse…same as the first
This issue is the absurdity of absurdities. Let me get this straight: the
purpose of the Sin Tax is to gouge those who purchase alcohol and cigarettes
not because anyone is trying to discourage consumption but rather so the
County can use that money to pay for sports stadiums that do not produce
anything but a fleeting moment witnessing the passing of a football, the
dribbling of a basketball and the throwing of a baseball so that such a minute
tidbit of diversion can be enjoyed by all. The stupidity of this proposition is
enough to make your head spin even though the spin doctors advocating
passage of this nonsense are already doing a pretty good job of hypnotizing
the voters to actually consider supporting it. At least the Robber Barons
of the previous centuries provided something tangible such as oil, steel,
railroads etcetera. These team owners do not even provide one tangible thing
that could ever be considered with the term value added. Almost everyone
discusses this enterprise as though it is the same thing as industry {which
it is not}. The price of admission is essentially a voluntary tax paid by those
who can afford it to pay those who dont need it. If this isnt a transfer of
wealth I dont know what is.
The real outrage here is the fact that taxes on alcohol and cigarettes will
not be used to aid in the reduction of addiction {hence the reference to sin}
but rather to stuff the pockets of all three teams who could easily afford to
pay for the repairs themselves. The vote was rammed through the last time
{under somewhat suspicious circumstances} and hear we go again. But this
time…not so fast!!! We the voters of Cuyahoga County are going to fight the
proponents on this one and we don’t care if the teams up and go somewhere
else {please see my views on entertainment below} because quite frankly there
are simply more important things than sports and the unearned money that
comes with it. Those in public office who are too stupid and lazy to find other
ways to grow a major American city need to resign and leave their self-seeking
political ambitions on the scrapheap of history. Dont ever let it be said that
this was time when the tide ran out on Cuyahoga County but rather was the
time when the voters rose up to welcome the rising tide of change and rebuked
this pathetic paradigm our previous elected leaders embraced.
Let the battle be joined.
And now to the real underlying issue at hand:
One of the most disturbing facts about our capitalist nation is the
misappropriation of funds directed to the salaries of entertainers.
Everyone should agree that the value an athlete, movie star, talk-show host,
team-owner, etcetera brings to the average citizen is very small. Granted,
they do offer a minuscule of diversion from our daily trials and
tribulations as did the jesters in the king’s court during the middle ages.
But to allow these entertainers to horde such great amounts of wealth at the
expense of more benevolent societal programs is unacceptable.
They do not provide a product or a service so why are they rewarded as such?
Our society is also subjected to the “profound wisdom” of these people
because it equates wealth with influence. Perhaps a solution to this
problem and a alternative to defeated school levies, crumbling
infrastructures, as well as all the programs established to help feed,
clothe and shelter those who cannot help themselves would be to tax this
undeserved wealth. Entertainers could keep 1% of the gross earnings reaped
from their endeavor and 99% could be deposited into the public coffers.
The old ideas of the redistribution of wealth have failed, and it is time to
adapt to modern-day preferences. People put their money into entertainment
above everything else; isn’t it time to tap that wealth? Does anyone think
this will reduce the quality of entertainment? It seems to me that when
entertainers received less income, the quality was much higher