The Camera Doesn’t Lie

Video below: On March 28^th, 2011, SEOversight attempted to obtain some answers from city officials.

Question: “There is currently no signed contract between the Coral Company and the City of South Euclid, correct?”  Council President David Miller can be heard responding, “Correct.”  Law Director Michael Lograsso contradicted Dr. Miller but offered very little explanation.

It was reported that the city’s Tax Increment Financing (“TIF”) proposal is currently in front of the Cleveland Heights-University Heights School District.  The Law Director also said the CHUH District had requested an extension until the end of April.  

The city Finance Director confirmed the amount still owed to the taxpayers for the Playground of Possibilities is approximately $90,000.  When asked about the costs for the rubber surface groundcover, Mayor Welo stated that those costs were unknown due to an “angel donor” that arranged for payment through a non-profit organization. 

Questions about privately owned commercial vehicles perpetually parked at city hall resulted in a surprising discovery.  According to Mayor Welo, permits can be purchased that allow commercial vehicles to park in city lots, which apparently includes the city hall parking lot. 

• time: 5 min. 42 sec.

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Please CLICK on the following links for information regarding:


CEDAR CENTER DEVELOPMENT AGREEMENT 

PLAYGROUND OF POSSIBILITIES EXPENSES 

Video below:  July 14, 2008 - Mayor Georgine Welo explains the purpose of Ordinance 31-08 - $150,000 will be loaned from city funds to pay for items needed "on a timeline" for the Playground of Possibilities.  Mayor Welo states that the loan is intended to purchase among other things, the rubber surface "groundcover" and "ramping."  It is unknown if the ramping being refered to is the wheelchair ramps which were donated to the playground on September 02, 2008 by then County Auditor Frank Russo.  It should be noted that city officials accepted that donation roughly 5 weeks after the FBI raided Cuyahoga County administrative offices in downtown Cleveland.  It was widely known that the main targets of the investigation were Frank Russo and County Commissioner Jimmy Dimora.
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• time: 2 min. 41 sec.

Video below:  July 28, 2008 – Commentary from the Mayor on the very day FBI agents raided the Cuyahoga County Administrative offices in downtown Cleveland. 

• time: 0 min. 38 sec.

Please CLICK on the following links to view:

2007 NON-PROFIT REPORT - PLAYGROUND OF POSSIBILITIES


2008 NON-PROFIT REPORT - PLAYGROUND OF POSSIBILITIES

2009 NON-PROFIT REPORT - PLAYGROUND OF POSSIBILITIES

 

 

Please see the previous related SEOversight posts:

 

Lapsed Contract Kept Under Wraps

 

A Desperate Chase

 

Toxic Tango

 

Why Did Ordinance: 35-10 Go Away?

 

A Perpetually Changing Story

 

What’s The Arrangement?

Why Did Ordinance: 35-10 Go Away?

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ORDINANCE: 35-10

• time: 1 min. 04 sec. 

Ordinance: 2-11
Legislation Cedar Center TIF-GFS and CRA-Coral Phase One[1]



Please also see related post regarding Cedar Center, Lapsed Contract Kept Under Wraps.

Snow Job

PLEASE SEE THE PREVIOUS RELATED POST, NO BACKUP PLAN

Service Director, Ed Gallagher discusses the policy should an emergency occur on a furlough day. Referring to the snowstorm of Friday, February 25th, Ruth Gray can be heard saying, “It happened!” Immediately, Assistant Service Director, Jim Anderson is heard exclaiming, “No it didn’t!” The dual Service Directors continued to reiterate how all staff members were on duty. “Every truck was on the road,” they proclaimed several times. “It was bad press,” they all agreed.

Some interesting things to ponder:

Furlough days for the Administration and non union employees were in effect on February 25th. Furlough days for the union employees such as the Service Department have not yet been instituted. Consequently, all the regular snow plow crews were out plowing streets.

Now, that brings us back to the local news channel report of furlough days being the cause for poor road conditions in South Euclid on that day. Curiously, Council President David Miller is shown on that news report stating, “Unfortunately, with the furlough days, with city workers being off, our streets were unplowed.”

There are only two reasonable explanations for Council President Miller’s statement. Either he was uninformed of the employee furlough days, or, he knew that road crews were out plowing, but had ulterior reasons for wanting the public to think otherwise. How is it the news reporter happened upon the Council President while filming his story in South Euclid? Who contacted the media? Was it an impromptu interview with Miller, or prearranged?

Statements to consider when watching the videos:

Ed Gallagher: “We had established a program for replacement of trucks from the time I came in (2004), but unfortunately because of funding and everything we had to not go along with that program.”… “It’s a tough situation like I said, we had a program but unfortunately because of funding aspects we couldn’t rotate the trucks and purchase the new trucks as we had proposed.”

Jim Anderson: “We only have 6 salt trucks to cover 5 square miles in our city. Lyndhurst has 12 salt trucks.”… “We have a hard time keeping up with the snow.”

“Every truck was on the road.”
Not quite.
The Service Director and the Assistant Service Director were indeed on a furlough day that Friday when the snowstorm hit. Interestingly, both positions are graced with the use of city vehicles which are driven home. One of those vehicles is a pickup truck with a plow. That vehicle sat in Mr. Anderson’s driveway not plowing city streets. Reliable SEO sources have confirmed those reports.

• time: 1 min. 20 sec.

• time: 9 min. 14 sec.

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