This is the FCB Podcast Network. This is The l Laws Extra. Welcome to the Outlaws Extra. This is DARVEYO to Kingpennmorrow. Don't forget too Like us on Facebook at Facebook dot com, slash the Outlaws Radio, follow us on Twitter and Instagram at the Outlaws or Radios. It's gonna be real quick. We have a special episode once again with Cleveland City Council President Blaine Griffin talking about the results of the Issue thirty eight vote that we have talked about numerous times on this show. For those of you who are unaware, Issue thirty eight failed, which is the outcome that I was rooting for and hoping for. And so we're going to talk a little bit with Council President Griffin about what to do next, what comes now moving forward. So stay tuned. We are going to take a break now and go to the interview in its entirety. You're listening to The out Laws Extra. True Sir Pray, welcome back, Welcome back, and now is our interview with Cleveland City Council President Griffin. All right, we have a very special guest or with us today back on the show, Cleveland Council President Blaine Griffin. I'm gonna say, taken a little bit of a taking a little bit of a victory lap, but there's more work to be done. Welcome back. How how you doing, sir, How are you feeling this morning. I'm doing great, man, I'm doing great. Thanks for asking, man. I know it was a long day yesterday. Yeah, it was a long day. And but you know, we're happy about a hard part, you know, our victory. And I really think that I'm proud of my council. They really fought for the citizens of the City of Cleveland, and we stuck together and we built a great alliance with the residents and organizers throughout the city of Cleveland, as well as the labor unions. And I think we've built the momentum and we've you know, started something in the City of Cleveland that hopefully we can keep the momentum going. Yeah. For people who haven't seen, who aren't aware, Issue thirty eight, which was the so called participatory budgeting initiative failed in the City of Cleveland. I was personally glad to see that. I mean, I've made no bones about the fact that I was opposed to it. I've been opposed to it from the beginning publicly, what message do you think and we'll talk about the fact that it was you know, it was close later, but what message do you think the voter sent by rejecting this proposal, that the voters are more in tuned with government. Then people may think, I think that some people have seen the flaws in the proposal. I think that, you know, some people. The more that we got a chance to educate people on this, that we made people recognize that they really had to take their time and understand the issues, because we know that there were like three populist issues that were going to be a yes. So our entire conversation was to educate and persuade the voters to go our way. And I think we did a great job of really articulating our position and helping voters, which are very smart because you can't take advantage of Clevelander's helped them understand how this would have been a catastrophic to their service delivery system, right right, And I mean, obviously I believe that, I mean, I agree with all of that. It's one of the reasons why I was opposed to it, and people who followed me know that I, you know, I don't often go all in on an issue or you know, make it, make my views known publicly where I'm going to go on a certain issue. But I thought this one was important enough to h to address that fully and publicly because it could have been catastrophic to the city had it passed. Now, the fact is it was a narrow victory, so that that says that they were successful in convincing some people. How do you reach out to the people who voted for this and bring them in. Well, what it taught me is, you know, the lesson I learned from Fanny Lewis, delay, Fanny Lewis, and also most recently Frank Jackson when he was counseling Frank Jackson, is that we have to spend a tremendous amount of time educating people on how government works. That's number one. You know, how council is structured, how our committees are structured, our decisions are made, the different parts of dollars that we have, from the general fund to the capital outlay, which is really done through restricted income tax dollars, which is like one point nine percent of the budget. Really helping people understand, you know, the enterprise funds like the water and the airport, and the reason I'm mentioning all these things to you, even with council discretionary fund like CDBG dollars and casino dollars, the reason I'm mentioning this to you is because this is a very you know, very complicated thread of funding streams from federal, state, and local revenue that causes this city to run. And I think sometimes people put misinformation and they make populist messages, but the broader public doesn't really understand how all of the dollars really work and what they are supposed to be applied to. So we need to do a better job of really educating our public, which I really want to put out a call to the public, even people like yourself. I think I would love to have more seminars where we actually host how does the government work for you? And how would you like to see your government work, and being more inattentional with the you know, the public on what they would like to see. I also think Darville, the biggest message that they were trying to get across is this whole stadiums over streets conversation. But what a lot of people don't realize is that we fought hard as a community to get the Browns. Somebody made a decision, you know, decades ago, if not more than that, to get into the sports business as a major economy and a major driver of our economy in the city of Cleveland. So these stadium deals that people try to condemn, they actually translate to the city services that they're saying that they don't get that. They translate to the streets getting paid. They translate to having more police officers. They translate to trying to make sure that you have your potholes field and you know, that house torn down. So what they don't realize is these are you know, that are going towards the capitalistic structure in order for us to make sure that we have the resources we need in order to provide the city services. So we got to do a bit of job of showing people that they're getting a return on their investment. We're talking with Cleveland Council President Blank Griffin. I've always found the you know, the stadium, the people over stadium's argument to be disingenuous, partly because of what you said, but also too I've seen, you know, I've went behind the scenes when you go to a Browns game, uh in particular, and you see who who's working at the stadium, and the most of the people who are working at the stadium look like us exactly. The ones that are doing the concessions, the ones that are security, they're one. So it's not only you know, the tax dollars you know that the team brings in, but there are people in our community who are working there who were you know, they have jobs from the stadiums and from the teams and stuff like that. So I've always found that to be that argument to be a little disingenuous. You know. On the other hand, though, I do understand that there are people who feel like they are not full participants in the city's process, in the city's decision making. So what can be done to make people feel like they are a bigger part of the process? Well, I mean, and that's a good question. How can people feel a bigger part of the process. One of the things that was frustrating through this whole conversation is, first of all, there was a lot of outside people and a lot of outside money that was helping propel the Yes side, And you know, there were a lot of promises being made as if you know, everybody was going to get a chicken in every pot, and there was going to be grants passed out. They were going to be able to just you know, do a bunch of things that it was disingenuous. You know. The reason that I bring that up is because what we have to do is we have to tell people the truth. We have to start telling people how government is supposed to work, and that you know, you got to put some skin in the game. Like I said, a lot of the frustration that we had was that yet outside people and people quite frankly that were a part of this team, that were giving this information to people, and that's dangerous. So we got to make sure one we aren't people with the information. But then number two, you got to come and put some skin in the game. You can't sit back on your couch and not participate. One of the reasons, let's face it, the reason that they tried to take advantage of this is because they used one of our disabilities as a community is our lack of voting. So the fact that we didn't vote, this group of people with radical ideas, you know, was were able to come and try to infiltrate that, and you know, that's so we got to get our voting percentages up. And then, Garbrielle, I told you this several times before. We have to do a better job of attracting, you know, the middle class, middle income, middle class folks coming back into our neighborhoods because they have more at stake. A lot of people behind this. They don't have homes that they bought their children, don't go to the schools, they don't live in the communities that you know they need safety in. They're basically renters in a lot of cases where people that don't have steak in the game. So we got to make sure that the people that really have steak in the game come to the table too, because they're going to be the ones that's going to be more practical about what they'd like to see in their community as opposed to less ideological. It's funny you said that too, because I was actually just getting ready to bring that up, because I do find it interesting that you have people who are making this argument and they're attacking you because basically you were the face of the opposition, but as far as what people are actually saying that they need, you're one of the only people in city leadership that I ever hear talking about it. And I've told you, I've told you that publicly and privately. You know, the middle class restoring the middle class conversation is an important conversation to have in this city, and you seem to be the only one willing to have it because that ultimately, that's really what is needed. You have people who came in from the outside who were playing on the real, legitimate issues that parts of our community still have. There are issues in our community. There are times where development dollars and all these other things don't get to the areas that they need to as quickly as they as they could and should. We should be growing economically and making sure that more people can participate in it. But it's interesting to me that they hold you up as some roadblock when you, in my view, you're the only one willing to have that conversation exactly. And you know, first of all, people are always going to try to define, you know, someone who's in opposition. The biggest issue is I'm in their way. You know, they want they live their a microwave generation that feel like they just want to press the butt that make change. But often tell people that change is a process, not an event. Okay, so just because you arrived and you got great ideas, you know, you got to recognize that sometimes there's been guardrails put in place in order to protect our democracy. And it's not about me, which they try to claim sometime upholding a status quo or anything else like that. It's about me sometimes being the adult in the room and telling some people that you know what, hey, guys, you know may not be able to have all of that sugar because we need to actually have something healthy in our diet. And it's hard to have that conversation because you're not talking about all of the sweet stuff that everybody want to see in all of you know, nice feel good stuff. Sometimes you got to have a hard conversation with people and say what we can afford and what we can't afford, what are our priorities and what are not are our priorities? And when you have to be that adult in the room, you oftentimes are the person that are seeing as the obstructionists or trying to uphold the status quote. Know, what I'm trying to do is protect people who have sacrificed for years to make this a great city and I'll be damned if I let people come to the table and try to undermine it. All that hard work, with all the posts that we do every day well, and part of the issue too is that you know, what they were proposing still doesn't do anything to address those underlying issues. Exactly exactly, it's minuscule if you would have divided up that money. And we're not going to rehash all the arguments, but if you would have divided up all that money, you know, it would have been a minuscule amount. It would have been less than it been. Let's say on the top end, if it was five hundred to seven hundred and fifty thousand per district as they were propos Each district has about five different wards. If you would divide all of that up, let's just say it's five hundred thousand, that wud have been about one hundred thousand dollars plum ward. You know, darf I can tell you that there's no way possible that you're gonna get people from Little Italy to East ninety third to agree how to split up one hundred thousand dollars on projects, because there's different priorities, that diversity of neighborhoods, diversity of needs, so it was not it was not going to be able to be implemented in an equitable and peasical way, and the money would have been almost inconsequential. It'd been almost to almost one of those sayings that just give you just enough money to fail. And I think your perspective was a little unique in that regard because your ward is unique. You have a ward that has areas of wealth and areas of poverty in it, so you see different things, and you know that when competing interests to the table, you know it's not gonna be as pleasant and everybody holding hands as people think it will, because they all have different needs. Right, I have seventeen. You know, there's seventeen of us on council, and then if you want to add the mayor, then there's eighteen elected officials at six on one lake side. I can tell you right now, getting seventeen to agree, even if you try to get to twelve to agree, or even if you try to get nine to agree, which is what you need is the threshold to get across. And then on top of that to make sure that you hold the line, to make sure that the mayor either comes around or you know, or he works with us on this building. Those kind of collaboration, that coalitions and that kind of agreement is a lot of work. And it's not something to just get a bunch of people in the room and say, you know, hey, what do you want to see you nice in your neighborhood. That seems nice, that seems like a great idea, but it is a recipe for disaster. My friend. So we're talking about Cleveland Council President Blaine Griffin, and as we you're ready to wind down here, one thing I do want to ask you, because I do think it is an issue that needs to be addressed. I have sympathy for the people who believed that Issue thirty eight would do what the proponent said it was going to do. Now we both believe it would not have done that, But I sympathize with the people who looked at this and said, hey, we need this. Look, I'm from a poor section of the city, so I get it. I understand that. So from a policy perspective, and again this kind of goes back to the middle class issue, the conversation that I only see you having what can be done from a policy perspective to make sure that everybody in the city gets to participate and feel the economic successes that we have when when companies come in or or when we redevelop stadiums and stuff like that. How do we make sure that more people benefit from that. Well, you know, Governor Brad that you ask that, because that's one of the reasons that we pass the Community Benefits coordinates. And the reason that we pass that is because not just the downtown projects. When you got developments that's going on in the neighborhoods and you got beautiful houses being put up, even if it's you know, you know, any kind of apartment complexes or anything, and people build it. And sometimes the developers think, well, the developer the development is the community benefit. No, no, no, no, you got to offer the long time residents that's been here sacrificing something. Maybe put money in a land trust, maybe building some infrastructure, maybe help with a public park, maybe you know, give access to broadband, maybe you put in some kind of community art project. But what we've done is we now have a bigger TILLI model that we are going to assess every project before on the proactive side, before it happens, and that's big or small. That's whether you're talking about a brown stadium or if you're talking about a neighborhood project. So when we did the Community Benefit Agreement, it wasn't just to get more you know, black folks, Hispanics and women and Asians and others more jobs, even though that was part of it, it was also to give the community a bigger and better and broader voice and what they would like to see whenever we do development. That's why I say we got to be better at articulating what is the return on the investment whenever we make these city taxpayer dollar investments. Well, and I think so too, that there are things that are available to people that people aren't aware of. And because you know, I think that like there we know that the conditions are real, there are people who are really suffering, and I think that there's a disconnect between the people who need the help and the help that's out there, the options, the opportunities that are out there. It's such a like the messaging I think from the other side was just so negative that there was essentially if we don't do this, there's no hope, right, And how that trust it was an indictment on counsel. And let me say this, Council people work their butt off. And the one thing that I thought was totally agregious that the other side was doing is that they really wanted to try to target counsel people to say trust us, don't trust them. They're the dark side, They're the people that are not spending your money, right, And I thought that was a very disgagous argument. Is one thing to promote up philosophy, it's another thing to try to promote yourself and your own interests over were the people who were duly elected right right? So no, no, no, no, really process, No, that's good, that's good. But so I think it's how do you what do you think counsel can do to make sure that people are more aware of the things that they can that they can do right now? And I'm not saying that there isn't more work to be done. I do. I'm a strong believer in what you talk about when it comes to restoring the middle class like that has to happen for a number of reasons. But what what can be done to make sure that people know and participate in the things that are available to them right now this moment. You got to be high touched and high tech. Okay. You know the reason that a lot of these people do some of the outreach that they do is because they're good on Twitter. They're good on not Twitter, what is an excellent Instagram and all these other things like that. And I've always been concerned about the misinformation and the disinformation that those kind of platforms can put out. But I've learned that you got to battle on that side. You got to keep messing out. I have a young man named Darryl Torbert that works closely with me and is a master at that and has been able to really help counsel up our game on helping to educate people and correct the story whenever misinformation and disinformation is being put out there. So you got to do hot tech, but you also got to do hot touch. Your best ability in this business is your availability. You got to have people to see you. People need to see you show up. Leaders show up part of Leadership Cleveland and I'm on the board and I went through that class with you know, the Leadership Clean and Cleveland Leadership Center, and that's one of the things they talk about is how leaders show up. We got to be able to be present. We got to go to those block clubs. We got to be in those hot church basements. In the summer, we got to be in those cold uh you know, backyards, and in the fall, we got to be out here so that anywhere people are available, we have to be able to articulate what we're doing and really, you know, tell our story, because if you don't tell your story, somebody would tell it for you, right right, Man, you know this is ah. I know you've you've been been through a lot these past couple months. Man, I appreciate you don't know to have I appreciate you stopping by. Man. I do think we need to continue this conversation, especially economically. We need to uh continue to make sure that we're doing things to have to open doors for people to be able to participate more in the process economically, because folks who are folks who are making money and paying taxes and and and owning a home in the city of Cleveland are less likely to be willing to uh to listen to revolutionaries. So that's why I said, man, we need people who are practical, people who have skin in the game. If your house and your neighborhood and your investment and your livelihood is on the line. Those are the people that I want to come to the table and say, hey, this is what we want to see for our community. Right absolutely, So thank you for taking some time, man, Go get you some rests. Man, I know it's been a long few once and congratulations. Probably people could probably hear it in my voice man, and Darby R I do honestly want to say this. First of all, thank you to all the voters of Cleveland. I know this might have been a tough decision. People want to see more out of their government, and we get it, and we understand that as taking these jobs, you have to have a level of humility in order to really understand when people are really saying, hey, we want our government to be and do better. I also want to say this, man, is that thank you Darbo. One of the things I like about your show is that you really take the time to really try to help people understand different points of view. And I think that that kind of really middle of the line, let's get the fats out there really kind of is what we need to kind of break this polarization, this extreme polarization that we're seeing on all of these different issues, whether they're local, state, national, international. You know, you really really have put a sober voice to this. So thank you and I appreciate you, my friend. I appreciate that, brother, and just try to make sure that the people know what's going on and we need to address these issues seriously and not always have you know, some of the bombastic language that surrounds these and kind of poisons poisons the well and distracts the conversation. So thank you, my friend, and thank you for taking the time. Man, I appreciate it. Thank you to all your listeners, thank you so much. One more time, shout out to Cleveland City Council President Blaine Griffin for coming on the show. Really appreciated. We are out of here, see you next time. Peace. This has been a presentation of the FCB podcast Network, where Real Talk Lives. Visit us online at fcbpodcasts dot com.
