BuckeyeBlog

The Cleveland Plain Dealer had an interesting editorial about embattled Cuyahoga County officials Jimmy Dimora and Frank Russo:

Politicians aren’t like the rest of us. Take those two walking ATM machines known as Cuyahoga County Commissioner Jimmy Dimora and County Recorder Frank Russo.

They hired Nature Stone flooring to do some concrete work at their respective pools back in 2002. And like most of us hardworking wage slaves, they paid cash. At least, that’s what Nature Stone founder Russell Masetta says.

Dimora ponied up $10,125. Russo peeled a quick $7,990 off the roll in his pocket. These guys don’t carry wallets. They carry suitcases.

In case you forgot, Dimora and Russo are under federal investigation for a variety of corruption charges. Unless you subscribe to the Plain Dealer you probably wouldn’t have heard of this. There seems to be a distinct lack of coverage from the state’s other newspapers.

State. Rep. Ted Celeste has a good idea: don’t send deadbeat dads to prison. Send them to community corrections instead.

It’d be easy enough to lump this in with traditional Democrat opposition to punishing criminals, and of course establishing any program or option creates an incentive to expand it unjustifiably, allowing people to squeeze into it who ought not. But the courts are experimenting with fixing themselves–and that’s certainly needed–by establishing drug courts and mental health courts. Deadbeat dads–sure, it’s parents, but it’s dads–seems likely to be not the run of the mill criminal problem.

Of course, this is closing the door after the horse is gone. The real problem is the sloppy legal system by which these dads’ criminal acts accumulated. Most of these guys are marginal workers who entered poorly defined relationships and, no surprise, ended up divorced, through their own dysfunction and that of their wives. It doesn’t solve the problem by establishing mythical child support figures that bear no real relation to the payor’s productive capacity, and then calling the guy a criminal when the obvious, predictable  result happens. If the financial arrangement were reversed between the parents, there wouldn’t be much real difference in care of the children, and the only change would be the other parent would be the criminal.

So, this is an area that needs work, and Celeste’s idea would help. But the real fix is further up the pipeline. Take a look at organizations such as judgepedia.org, which are working to bring accountability to the judiciary, too.

The Cleveland Plain Dealer finds that Cuyahoga County had a chance to save $2 million on the construction of its juvenile justice facility. The construction of that facility is being investigated by the FBI in connection with the Jimmy Dimora and Frank Russo raid. The story speaks for itself but I figured I’d link to it because this involves state taxpayer money and you’d have a hard time hearing about this if you weren’t a Plain Dealer reader (calling the Columbus Dispatch…):

Cuyahoga County Commissioners celebrated as they signed a $2.75 million deal to buy land from Sunrise Land Co., a subsidiary of Forest City Enterprises, Inc. That deal ended a more than 14-year battle to find a home for a much-needed county juvenile detention center. There were lengthy speeches, applause and even jokes, according to a tape of that Feb. 29, 2000, meeting.

Commissioner Jane Campbell introduced her newest colleague, Jimmy Dimora, quipping that after “14 years of sturm und drang … you come here and in one year it got fixed. Want to, like, enlighten us?”

“It’s being Italian,” Dimora wisecracked. “You make people an offer they can’t refuse.”

Everyone laughed.

But the deal really wasn’t funny. Just seven months earlier, the county could have saved taxpayers more than $2 million by snatching up the property itself up before the land was sold to Sunrise.

The Plain Dealer reports that prominent Democrats are calling for Jimmy Dimora to resign his position as county Democratic chairman in light of an investigation that centers on him and Cuyahoga County Auditor Frank Russo. Although these “prominent Democrats” aren’t named, Governor Ted Strickland isn’t one of them. He says that it wouldn’t be “appropriate” for him to ask Dimora to resign.

Strickland’s reticence on this is amazing. Here he has a powerful Democratic Party county chairman who is also a county commissioner who is under federal investigation for a rash of financial improprieties and other misbehavior. A few months ago we had an Attorney General some of you may remember named Marc Dann. It was alleged Dann did some bad things, too — sexual harassment and an affair with a subordinate. No one investigated Dann for funneling money to his cronies or for getting free work done at his residence or for the systematic abuse of power that seems to be pervasive in Cuyahoga County. But for his relatively minor transgressions Dann faced a united Democratic front — led by Governor Strickland — who called for his resignation.

So why is the case of Dimora and Russo any different? Dann wasn’t under indictment, only under investigation, just like Russo and Dimora. But Dann’s alleged crimes pale in comparison to the alleged crimes of Dimora and Russo. The governor was correct in asking Dann to resign. I’m curious as to why he seems to have lost his zeal for ethical behavior in the Dimora and Russo case.

While the state’s main papers seem oblivious to the scandal unfoding in Cuyahoga County, at least some members of the media are asking why Governor Strickland is treating this differently than the Marc Dann episode. From the Hillsboro Times Gazette:

Shortly after former Attorney General Marc Dann held a news conference in May to answer questions about a sexual harassment scandal involving a top aide, the response from Democrats was quick and forceful: resign or be impeached.

Yet two weeks have passed since the FBI in Cleveland raided the offices and homes of Cuyahoga County Commissioner Jimmy DiMora and Auditor Frank Russo, and the Democratic Party’s response has been muted.

The party issued an initial statement that the two men should be held accountable if there was wrongdoing, but has not supplied the almost daily pressure it did with Dann.

The FBI seized documents related to fundraising, travel and deals with contractors in the searches, which were also conducted at local businesses with county contracts.

What explains the differences in the party’s reactions to the developing scandals? After all, neither Dann, who did eventually resign, nor DiMora or Russo, have been charged with any crimes.

The answer? Politics:

(more…)

Raided

Where is the New York Times on the Cuyahoga County corruption story? By my count this morning there were 17,000 hits for “Ted Stevens” in the NY TImes site for the past seven days (yes, 17,000, counting all articles, blogs and comments) and nothing for “Dimora“.

Now I get it that a Senator may be a bigger target than a Midwestern Commish for the national media, and perhaps our expectations for the ethics of the US Senate are greater than those we hold for a county position.

Still, we are talking about a county that is home to one of America’s poorest cities, one plagued by all kinds of evils the lefties ascribed to too little government, such as unemployment and the mortgage meltdown. A county that is the political cornerstone to a Democratic victory in Ohio and thus nationally in the November presidential election. A county that is nearly twice the size of Alaska in terms of population.

17,300 cites to 0 is simply out of whack, but then again, it is the New York Times.

BTW, Cuyahoga County also costs all of the honest, hard-working taxpayers of the rest of Ohio dearly to support. So that’s why it is also disconcerting about the silence of our Governor Ted Strickland on this issue, and our new Attorney General Nancy Rogers. Where’s the outrage over the foul smell of offenses which draw in 200 federal agents from across two states to investigate?

Forget this nonsense put up by Strickland about leaving this all to the FBI and the feds. Think of all of the times you’ve read of state and local authorities, smelling blood in the water, jump into cases looking for their own chance at a pound of flesh, like Michael Vick facing VA charges after the federal case was prosecuted. Any good prosecuting authority can figure out how to get into a game as good as this one is.

And then there’s Marc Dann, whose impeachment Strickland, et al. were jonesing so hard after. Not because Dann had been found to have done anything “impeachable”, but because, well, Marc had been kind of a slob in running his office.

Where is the alacrity in running Dimora and Russo out of office shown by Strickland in the Dann Affair?

The Cleveland Plain Dealer has done a great job in covering this story and should be commended for pursuing accountability of government to the people so vigorously. Too bad other media outlets in Ohio and nationally aren’t following suit. Yet.