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Citizen Watchdog - Todd Zinser · Brian Thomas

0:15
Speaker 1: Seven oh six. Here fifty five krc DE talk Station
0:18
Speaker 1: Happy Friday Extra Special Friday Got Todd Zinder. He is
0:23
Speaker 1: Citizen Watchdog. His podcast Not Parenthetic or Not coincidentally called
0:28
Speaker 1: Citizen Watchdog, and Joe Strekker produces it. And what Todd
0:31
Speaker 1: does in his former capacity as US Inspector General, he
0:34
Speaker 1: brings that skill set to his thoughtful analysis of all
0:38
Speaker 1: things that seem to be wrong with the city of Cincinnati.
0:41
Speaker 1: Todd Sender, Welcome back to the fifty five Cars Morning Show.
0:43
Speaker 1: My friend, appreciate what you do.
0:45
Speaker 2: Yeah, thank you, Brian. I'm happy to be here.
0:47
Speaker 1: I always have to observe as I contemplate life in retirement,
0:50
Speaker 1: what I'd be doing, And I certainly don't think I'd
0:51
Speaker 1: be taking the time to boil through countless thousands of
0:54
Speaker 1: pages of documents and ferreting out stupidity and fail to
0:58
Speaker 1: follow policies and practices in the city of since name,
1:00
Speaker 1: which is what you've been doing. And you've got a
1:02
Speaker 1: lot of things to dive on into and reveal to
1:05
Speaker 1: the listening audience today. So maybe they will make a
1:07
Speaker 1: better choice when it comes to the next election.
1:10
Speaker 2: That would be good.
1:11
Speaker 1: Like evaluating people for competence or something. And real quick
1:14
Speaker 1: before we dive on into the first one, which is
1:16
Speaker 1: the fact that you sued the city. You got a
1:18
Speaker 1: new lawsuit file, Todd Zenzer. You saw Adam Kaylor's salary figures, crunch,
1:23
Speaker 1: I did, since a public school salaries, Yes, they're asking
1:26
Speaker 1: for more money. Yes, they paid is what twenty one
1:30
Speaker 1: thousand dollars per child annually to educate them?
1:33
Speaker 2: Yes?
1:35
Speaker 1: O K. And I think the comparison figure that was
1:38
Speaker 1: provided when we were talking about the twenty one thousand
1:40
Speaker 1: per kid, you can go to a full year of
1:43
Speaker 1: university since a college for fourteen k.
1:46
Speaker 2: That's right?
1:47
Speaker 1: Okay, all right, well, you know, and what they should do.
1:50
Speaker 2: Is they should start furloughing people if they don't get
1:53
Speaker 2: this tax increase, they just have people take a few
1:57
Speaker 2: days off, you know, every month or every other week
2:01
Speaker 2: or whatever.
2:02
Speaker 1: Well, the salaries range from the top tier here at
2:05
Speaker 1: least on Adam Kellers's treasurer. And they call it assignment,
2:09
Speaker 1: like what is a custodian assignment? I don't even know
2:12
Speaker 1: what that moniker means, but treasurer assignment two hundred and
2:15
Speaker 1: seventy and thirty nine dollars The smallest salary figure on
2:20
Speaker 1: the list is, interestingly enough, custodian assignment one hundred and
2:25
Speaker 1: fifty seven six hundred and sixty five bucks, and then
2:28
Speaker 1: the ranges in between that you responded when I brought
2:31
Speaker 1: this up to you off air before we started Todds Inzer,
2:33
Speaker 1: you said, those are DC level salaryes. Absolutely, those are
2:37
Speaker 1: big city level salary.
2:38
Speaker 2: That's right, since Cincinnati is not a big city like that.
2:42
Speaker 1: No, And I can say for personal experience, having lived
2:44
Speaker 1: in Chicago, I was paid X, and when Paul Att
2:47
Speaker 1: and I moved back to Cincinnati, we were paid one
2:50
Speaker 1: third less than X. Our standard of living actually increased here.
2:54
Speaker 1: We got more stuff and things, we were able to
2:56
Speaker 1: afford more on less money because it's cheaper to live
2:59
Speaker 1: here than Chicago.
3:00
Speaker 2: So that's right.
3:00
Speaker 1: The same thing goes with DC compared to Cincinnati.
3:03
Speaker 2: And that's why I'm not living near my kids Boston, Seattle.
3:06
Speaker 1: Dac Oh. Oh. Yes, I feel their pain, having lived
3:11
Speaker 1: through a form of the ton Zenser. So I guess
3:14
Speaker 1: you know a legitimate question can ask? I guess I
3:17
Speaker 1: have to wonder, you know, when you're talking about a
3:18
Speaker 1: salary A twodred and fifty two and seventy five thousand
3:20
Speaker 1: dollars a year. You know, it seems to suggest that
3:22
Speaker 1: there is some high level degree or skill set that's
3:25
Speaker 1: brought to bear. You need to pay someone that much
3:27
Speaker 1: like engineering, Yeah, you got to be a real smart
3:30
Speaker 1: person to do a lot of engineering, Like I don't
3:32
Speaker 1: want an idiot as a nuclear engineer. And you do
3:35
Speaker 1: have to pay this guy's a lot of money. There's
3:37
Speaker 1: competition in the world out for that. What are they
3:40
Speaker 1: bringing to bear? What is justifying this twodred and seventies
3:43
Speaker 1: ISSU one thousands.
3:44
Speaker 2: The only thing I can think of is that the
3:45
Speaker 2: condition that conditions in the Cincinnati school system public school
3:50
Speaker 2: system are so bad that they have to pay this
3:54
Speaker 2: level of a salary to get people to even come
3:58
Speaker 2: work here.
3:58
Speaker 1: Just like trying to high police. That's the worse the environment,
4:02
Speaker 1: the more you gotta pay him, or no one's going
4:03
Speaker 1: to show up and apply for the job. Interesting analysis, Todds,
4:07
Speaker 1: And I'm glad I asked that, Yeah, because by all accounts,
4:10
Speaker 1: it can be pretty dangerous working inside the sit siney
4:13
Speaker 1: public schools. Yeah, Todd pivoting over he filed a lawsuit.
4:18
Speaker 1: I did we did you see PG sitting Feld's article
4:22
Speaker 1: on the Wall Street Journey yesterday is a piece. It
4:25
Speaker 1: was you know what, I'll give the guy props. It
4:27
Speaker 1: just a little insight into how much it sucks to
4:29
Speaker 1: be in prison. It was. It was just a really interesting,
4:32
Speaker 1: insightful piece about dealing with the loss of his cell phone.
4:37
Speaker 1: When you go to prison, you can't have one, although
4:38
Speaker 1: he did reveal that it's you know, with the inside
4:40
Speaker 1: the underground black market economy inside of a prison. You
4:43
Speaker 1: can get them, but you're not supposed to have them,
4:46
Speaker 1: and how difficult it was, And just I liked the
4:48
Speaker 1: fact that he wrote it because it's just one illustration
4:50
Speaker 1: of how loss of liberty can impact him. That's just
4:53
Speaker 1: one of a ton of liberties you lose in prison.
4:55
Speaker 1: So but but that he was in there because of
4:59
Speaker 1: open meetings violations, and you stumbled upon another one that
5:02
Speaker 1: gave rise to litigation.
5:04
Speaker 2: Yes, we have an issue on the West Side where
5:07
Speaker 2: the city is proposing, well of developers proposing affordable housing
5:14
Speaker 2: development in a particular part of West Price Sill. It's
5:18
Speaker 2: actually on the border of Westwood and West Price Sill.
5:21
Speaker 2: They want to put one hundred and sixty seven units
5:23
Speaker 2: in and the plan is inadequate. And the big problem
5:29
Speaker 2: we had is that the city did not consult with
5:33
Speaker 2: west Price Hill because west Price Sill is four hundred
5:37
Speaker 2: feet from the development in Westwood. So they did all
5:42
Speaker 2: their community engagement with Westwood, whose town hall is two
5:45
Speaker 2: and a half miles away, and they paid no attention
5:49
Speaker 2: to West Price Sill that is four hundred feet from
5:52
Speaker 2: the development. So that was the big the first problem
5:55
Speaker 2: we had. But at the Planning Commission meeting where they
5:58
Speaker 2: approved this project, it was so mismanaged. That meeting was
6:04
Speaker 2: so mismanaged. The developer came in with two issues they
6:09
Speaker 2: wanted approved. One was the zoning change and one was
6:12
Speaker 2: the approval of the plan development, and the Planning Commission
6:18
Speaker 2: of chairman didn't really know how to handle this, so
6:21
Speaker 2: they wound up approving the zoning change, and then they
6:25
Speaker 2: got confused about whether they should go ahead and approve
6:28
Speaker 2: the plan development. See the zoning change needs city council approval,
6:32
Speaker 2: the plan development doesn't. So what they did is they
6:36
Speaker 2: approved this development even though the zoning had not been
6:39
Speaker 2: officially changed yet, and they got very confused about the sequencing,
6:44
Speaker 2: and at some point during the meeting, the chairman so confused,
6:48
Speaker 2: He asked the attorney, can we go into executive session?
6:52
Speaker 2: And the attorney said yes, and that was it. Paid
6:55
Speaker 2: no attention to the rules that they have to follow.
6:59
Speaker 2: To go in to an executive session, you have to
7:02
Speaker 2: state the purpose of the executive session. He did not
7:05
Speaker 2: do that, and when the executive session is over, you
7:09
Speaker 2: have to say what it was all about. We hope
7:13
Speaker 2: they didn't do that either, and so blatant violation. So
7:19
Speaker 2: actually I had talked about this on one of my
7:23
Speaker 2: podcasts about the meeting and Pete Whitty, who is from
7:29
Speaker 2: the West Side, been involved in oh yeah, been involved
7:31
Speaker 2: for many years. He contacted me and he said that
7:35
Speaker 2: executive session is a problem. Do you have the video?
7:39
Speaker 2: I said yes, I sent it to him. He sent
7:42
Speaker 2: it to Kurt Hartman and several days later we filed
7:46
Speaker 2: a lawsuit.
7:47
Speaker 1: Kurt Hartman's great, yeah, the good man out there. So
7:51
Speaker 1: the allegation is the violation of a meeting's law to
7:54
Speaker 1: violate the provisions for executive session. What price is paid
7:59
Speaker 1: if it is found that they did violate open meetings? Well,
8:06
Speaker 1: the ramifications.
8:08
Speaker 2: The ramifications is that the plan development that they approved,
8:12
Speaker 2: there'd be an injunction against implementing that, okay, And so
8:16
Speaker 2: I think the simple solution is for them to just
8:19
Speaker 2: go back in and approve it without going into executive session.
8:22
Speaker 2: It'd be they could take ten minutes to do it.
8:24
Speaker 2: But the thing is, the issue became the West Price Hill.
8:29
Speaker 2: People wanted the project delayed so that we could have
8:32
Speaker 2: some input on it, right, and we had people on
8:34
Speaker 2: the Planning Commission who were very sympathetic to us. And
8:38
Speaker 2: it got to the point where if they delayed the decision,
8:44
Speaker 2: the developer would miss a deadline for low income housing
8:48
Speaker 2: tax credits.
8:49
Speaker 1: So there you have it.
8:51
Speaker 2: The whole thing became deadline driven. And when you get
8:54
Speaker 2: in a situation with this city council, if you mentioned
8:57
Speaker 2: the word affordable houses, you win. You'll get approval. That's
9:04
Speaker 2: their holy grail. They don't care what the quality is.
9:07
Speaker 2: They don't care what the quality of construction is, what
9:10
Speaker 2: it's really going to do to the community. When I
9:12
Speaker 2: went down to the Planning Commission, I read a post
9:17
Speaker 2: that I saw online from a woman who lives about
9:19
Speaker 2: a half a mile from there who said that, and
9:22
Speaker 2: we have people on Glenley Avenue that are in distress,
9:28
Speaker 2: drug addicts, prostitutes, people with mental health because we have
9:34
Speaker 2: all these transitional housing on the West Side. And I
9:39
Speaker 2: reported one incident where one of these people actually set
9:45
Speaker 2: the back porch of a woman on fire because a
9:48
Speaker 2: month earlier they had some kind of interaction on the
9:52
Speaker 2: street and the woman even said, I'm going to set
9:55
Speaker 2: your house on fire, and a month later she came
9:58
Speaker 2: back and did it. So when I re ported that
10:00
Speaker 2: to the Planning Commission, I got criticized. Oh, low income
10:05
Speaker 2: people aren't bad people, I said. I I didn't say
10:08
Speaker 2: anything about income.
10:09
Speaker 1: I love how they like to paint that ridiculous picture
10:12
Speaker 1: immediate knee jerk reaction.
10:13
Speaker 2: Exactly did they have Did they express any sympathy for
10:17
Speaker 2: the woman whose house was set on fire?
10:19
Speaker 1: No, the lawbreaker and that's in that's hiromaniac.
10:23
Speaker 2: That's what we're dealing with with this city council.
10:26
Speaker 1: Let's pause will bring Todd Enzer back. It's great stuff, Todd.
10:28
Speaker 1: I wish it didn't exist, but KCD conversation to have
10:34
Speaker 1: a happy Friday. And in despite of what Todd Zenser,
10:36
Speaker 1: our citizen watch dog, is revealing to us, and before
10:39
Speaker 1: we move away from the U into other areas of
10:43
Speaker 1: abuse of our city government. This West Side project. You
10:46
Speaker 1: said as one hundred and sixty seven units, it's quote
10:49
Speaker 1: unquote affordable housing, which I guess I understand and and
10:52
Speaker 1: and understand that to believe it's federally subsidized housing. It's
10:59
Speaker 1: like Section eight. Yes, and so the developer needs as
11:02
Speaker 1: federal dollars to build the project.
11:05
Speaker 2: Right, These are low income housing tax credits that the
11:09
Speaker 2: federal government would award through the state, and then they
11:13
Speaker 2: sell those tax credits to investors to finance the project.
11:17
Speaker 2: So the developers not out anything yet.
11:20
Speaker 1: You and I are, though, absolutely, because our tax dollars
11:22
Speaker 1: support the credits that are being offered to the developers.
11:25
Speaker 2: That's right.
11:25
Speaker 1: Well, you know, I asked you to just walk through
11:27
Speaker 1: that process, because you know, we get screwed everywhere whichever
11:33
Speaker 1: direction we find ourselves.
11:34
Speaker 2: It does seem that way, it doesn't, all right, So.
11:36
Speaker 1: Call it affordable housing. You immediately get greenlit by the
11:38
Speaker 1: City of Saints bye of the fact that all the
11:39
Speaker 1: details weren't apparently known to them. They go into the
11:41
Speaker 1: executive session in violation of the open meeting losso they
11:44
Speaker 1: can hurry up and pass this thing. Because of this
11:46
Speaker 1: alleged deadline. You said, you were at the meeting and
11:49
Speaker 1: the was it the mayor.
11:51
Speaker 2: No, it was it Planning Commission chairman.
11:54
Speaker 1: The chairman, the one who violated the executive committee. Okay.
11:58
Speaker 1: He said the word pressure three times, three.
12:02
Speaker 2: Times at the end of the meeting, after all was
12:05
Speaker 2: said and done. It was almost an apology from the chairman.
12:08
Speaker 2: I gee whiz, we just we get into these time
12:11
Speaker 2: situations and we get under these deadlines, and yeah, we
12:14
Speaker 2: felt pressure to move forward. He said, pressure three times.
12:17
Speaker 1: Pressure related to the federal dollar deadline that the developer
12:20
Speaker 1: was waiting for.
12:21
Speaker 2: That's right, Okay.
12:23
Speaker 1: The other component of this is, and I guess the
12:24
Speaker 1: folks on the West side might be scratching their head
12:26
Speaker 1: over it. This is one hundred and sixty seven units,
12:28
Speaker 1: one hundred and eighty parking spaces. I think you told
12:30
Speaker 1: me yes. And it's right next to West High.
12:34
Speaker 2: Right across the street from West High End Data High School.
12:37
Speaker 2: And there's two thousand kids that go to that school
12:39
Speaker 2: every morning and every afternoon coming out and hitting the streets,
12:44
Speaker 2: and they've even come up the students at West Tie.
12:46
Speaker 2: The city has been so poor about pedestrian safety in
12:49
Speaker 2: that area that the students themselves have come up with
12:53
Speaker 2: a pedestrian safety plan. Okay, no kidding. And then the
12:56
Speaker 2: city said that we didn't need a trap thick study
13:01
Speaker 2: for the development.
13:03
Speaker 1: You're adding that many people in an already congested area
13:07
Speaker 1: and they don't even a traffic study.
13:08
Speaker 2: That's right.
13:09
Speaker 1: So it's just gave. Everything's gonna be the same, nothing's
13:11
Speaker 1: going to change, that's right. How can they possibly say
13:13
Speaker 1: that with a straight face? He did.
13:15
Speaker 2: I spoke to a traffic guy personally, and he did
13:19
Speaker 2: say it with a straight face.
13:21
Speaker 1: Holy cow, Toddzenser.
13:23
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's it's really something. If you say affordable housing,
13:26
Speaker 2: everything else goes out the window.
13:28
Speaker 1: Keep that in mind. I'd like a raise. Affordable housing,
13:32
Speaker 1: no problem, you got one seven twenty five if you
13:34
Speaker 1: five cares to detoxication more todds Ensor. Yes, we've only
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13:46
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, todds Enser. I can't get away from this
13:49
Speaker 1: housing development. Now, moving away from the specifics of that project,
13:52
Speaker 1: the idea is you're bringing in more quote unquote affordable
13:55
Speaker 1: housing unit, which is I guess new speak for government
14:00
Speaker 1: subsidized housing, and that subsidy for the folks that are
14:04
Speaker 1: in these particular dwellings which are income capped, right, I mean,
14:09
Speaker 1: you don't qualify to get into one of these quote
14:11
Speaker 1: quote afordable units unless you make less than a certain
14:13
Speaker 1: amount of money. So you then have bought into the proposition.
14:18
Speaker 1: By building it, you are guaranteeing and ongoing and constant
14:23
Speaker 1: funding of rent payments by government, whether it's Section eight
14:28
Speaker 1: or some federal program. The taxpayer dollars will basically allow
14:32
Speaker 1: them to afford to live there. So how does as
14:35
Speaker 1: a business model for a city bringing in folks who
14:39
Speaker 1: will perpetually be having their rent subsidized and I don't know,
14:43
Speaker 1: maybe even snap benefits or some other welfare program, which
14:47
Speaker 1: I think that's logical to assume that that's going on.
14:50
Speaker 1: So bringing in a bunch of people who are basically
14:52
Speaker 1: perpetually dependent upon government, does that translate into revenue or
14:57
Speaker 1: better things for the city. It sounds to me like
15:00
Speaker 1: more of an obligation for the city, because, let's face it,
15:02
Speaker 1: with the deficit and all the other you know, ongoing problems,
15:05
Speaker 1: the infrastructures decaying and eroding. And even the point you
15:07
Speaker 1: made off air, the government subsidized houses that are out there,
15:11
Speaker 1: the affordable housing you have said, are in a dilapidated state,
15:15
Speaker 1: the stuff that's been around for a long time and
15:17
Speaker 1: no one takes care of it, and they're horror shows
15:19
Speaker 1: when you're going to them.
15:21
Speaker 2: Yeah, Westwood has has a couple of notorious multifamily developments
15:27
Speaker 2: that are crime ridden, and if you look ten years
15:32
Speaker 2: down the road, this plan development could be the same way.
15:35
Speaker 1: And well, if history is a guide, I think you
15:37
Speaker 1: can pretty much count on it. Right.
15:39
Speaker 2: Well, that's what that's what I think.
15:42
Speaker 1: Yeah, because you exercise a tremendous amount of logic and reason,
15:46
Speaker 1: and your decision making processes they're todd I just I mean,
15:50
Speaker 1: I don't want to sound like you and I and
15:52
Speaker 1: we are not disparaging the poor among us, you know,
15:55
Speaker 1: it's something that we are always going to have to
15:57
Speaker 1: contend with. But the city's struggling financially anyway. This is
16:04
Speaker 1: just fighting on more of a financial struggle as opposed
16:07
Speaker 1: to the whole idea. Let's say, regentrifying over the rhine.
16:11
Speaker 1: Why did you want to do that? Why was all
16:13
Speaker 1: the money invested in to bring tax paying urban hipsters
16:18
Speaker 1: in there to work and live, thrive, surviving in a
16:21
Speaker 1: walking community, but basically where they have to pay taxes.
16:24
Speaker 2: That's right. And then this project is the exact opposite, right,
16:28
Speaker 2: and I think part of the plan. I can't be sure,
16:31
Speaker 2: but for those people who are displaced from their gentrification projects,
16:39
Speaker 2: this is where they go. This is Price Hill, Yeah,
16:42
Speaker 2: to West Price Hill to Well, that was the old.
16:44
Speaker 1: That was what was asserted regularly, and I don't know
16:47
Speaker 1: upon what factual basis, but again, just looking at the dynamics.
16:50
Speaker 1: When over the Rhine started getting transformed and rehabilitated and
16:54
Speaker 1: polished and Washington Park got done, the street car shows up,
16:58
Speaker 1: rents went up. People who who used to live there
17:01
Speaker 1: couldn't afford to live there anymore. Maybe they even got
17:02
Speaker 1: their building purchased out from under them, right, formerly rented
17:05
Speaker 1: building then converted into condos. That happened a lot, Yes,
17:09
Speaker 1: and the apparently I mean people noticed that they were
17:12
Speaker 1: either offered an opportunity to move over to the west
17:14
Speaker 1: side of Cincinnati or that's where they chose to live
17:17
Speaker 1: after being displaced.
17:19
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was turned into all economics yeah.
17:21
Speaker 1: Okay, and that transformed and changed the dynamic of the
17:24
Speaker 1: West Side pretty provailed.
17:25
Speaker 2: And then on top of that, we're trying to get
17:27
Speaker 2: a handle on how many of these they call them
17:29
Speaker 2: transitional housing or group homes or whatever you want to
17:33
Speaker 2: call them. Those are also subsidized by the government through
17:36
Speaker 2: a multitude of programs, and the West Side in particular
17:40
Speaker 2: has become a magnet for these type of housing options.
17:46
Speaker 2: And so we have people coming from other counties, other
17:50
Speaker 2: states to take advantage of the social services on the
17:53
Speaker 2: West Side and the housing opportunities on the west Side,
17:59
Speaker 2: the mental health providers and drug rehab you know, all
18:06
Speaker 2: that it's all coming to the West.
18:08
Speaker 1: Side, a magnet for people who are reliant upon government
18:13
Speaker 1: and taxpayer dollars. It becomes a concentrated number of people,
18:17
Speaker 1: all of whom are broadbrush speaking, I get it.
18:20
Speaker 2: The city, the city policies like they have with this project,
18:24
Speaker 2: continues to concentrate poverty on the West Side, and there's
18:28
Speaker 2: no question about it. And my problem is that that
18:33
Speaker 2: goes against the whole purpose of this low income housing
18:36
Speaker 2: tax credit program. That that program, part of its rules
18:41
Speaker 2: is that they should not be concentrating poverty and that's
18:44
Speaker 2: what they're doing. And this woman that's set the back
18:48
Speaker 2: porch on fire of this one woman, Yeah, that is
18:51
Speaker 2: one of the people that is attracted to the West
18:54
Speaker 2: Side for these kind of.
18:56
Speaker 1: Benefits illustrative of that type of Yes, not all of them.
19:02
Speaker 2: That's right.
19:03
Speaker 1: When you get painted with the broad rosch Todd zones,
19:04
Speaker 1: you get called out for it constantly. These are genuine problems, though,
19:07
Speaker 1: I mean, we can sort of tongue in cheek it
19:09
Speaker 1: a little bit. In the final analysis, it it's effectively
19:12
Speaker 1: an economic war that's being waged.
19:15
Speaker 2: Yes, and I don't know, it's not only happening on
19:18
Speaker 2: the West Side, but it is happening in pockets of
19:21
Speaker 2: the city and it's by design.
19:24
Speaker 1: Well it is Hyde Park struggling with this kind of
19:26
Speaker 1: problem there, Todd Zinser, Not yet, Yeah, I didn't think so. Okay,
19:29
Speaker 1: I wonder why that might be. Huh oh gee.
19:31
Speaker 2: I wouldn't be surprised if it gets there, though.
19:33
Speaker 1: You think so, yeah, Well, it might change the hearts
19:36
Speaker 1: and minds of voters to maybe choose a different path
19:39
Speaker 1: when they're electing officials A Todd. There's an idea, I.
19:42
Speaker 2: Don't know, Brian. It didn't on the Hyde Park Square thing,
19:44
Speaker 2: did it?
19:44
Speaker 1: No, it didn't. Didn't get anybody off their butt to
19:48
Speaker 1: go vote. Seven thirty five right now more we've got
19:50
Speaker 1: more Shenanigans. Reveal with Todd Zenzer and thank god for him.
19:53
Speaker 1: Seven thirty five fifty five KRE fifty five Krcity talk
19:55
Speaker 1: Station Right time is with Todd Zenser, citizen watchdog, former
19:59
Speaker 1: inspector jennerf for the n States of America, bringing those
20:01
Speaker 1: skills to his analysis of crazy crap going on from
20:04
Speaker 1: downtown Cincinnati. Thank to our elected officials, you make more
20:07
Speaker 1: informed decisions, and we have Todd here to remind us
20:10
Speaker 1: that we didn't make very good informed decisions in the
20:12
Speaker 1: last election. So the question is, well, the last man
20:15
Speaker 1: bring the flag out? Is it going to crash and
20:17
Speaker 1: burn before the next election cycle? Todd Zinzer, because what
20:20
Speaker 1: you're telling me, things are not looking good, at least
20:22
Speaker 1: from a business standpoint, a business model for the future here,
20:25
Speaker 1: at least in the city. Let's pick one. Should we
20:28
Speaker 1: focus on the flood and the reaction to that, the campaign,
20:33
Speaker 1: zero information, the overall poor management which led you to
20:36
Speaker 1: write a forty nine page letter to the auditor. I
20:40
Speaker 1: mean we've got listen, dealer choice.
20:43
Speaker 2: Let's talk about flooding for a minute. Yeah, let's do that, okay.
20:46
Speaker 2: So a whistleblower came forward to Adam Taylor, Yes, and
20:52
Speaker 2: showed that the gates for the Madison floodgate had been
20:56
Speaker 2: chained open.
20:58
Speaker 1: Yes, And the gates come down when the low lying
21:01
Speaker 1: area beneath the bridge gets to a certain water level.
21:04
Speaker 1: That's to prevent cars from driving into it and getting
21:06
Speaker 1: into trouble. Right, it's like a traffic or it's like
21:09
Speaker 1: across the gate with the rail.
21:10
Speaker 2: That's exactly right, all right. And then when the gates
21:14
Speaker 2: go down, then the floodgate goes across the street, and
21:19
Speaker 2: those gate arms were chained open.
21:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, So preventing the water stoppage mechanism from working.
21:28
Speaker 2: That's right. And so the story was that, well, it
21:33
Speaker 2: was malfunctioning, and so that's why they changed it, I guess,
21:36
Speaker 2: But we don't have a lot of clarity about that.
21:39
Speaker 2: But when I looked at it, I says, well, where
21:40
Speaker 2: on the deferred maintenance list is this floodgate malfunctioning? Because
21:46
Speaker 2: they had a report from back in twenty two I
21:49
Speaker 2: believe twenty twenty two that the thing needed to be replaced.
21:53
Speaker 2: They needed to The recommendation was.
21:55
Speaker 1: The bridge a bridge five years ago. Yes, the problem
22:00
Speaker 1: that had been identified, A study was done in the
22:02
Speaker 1: response to the flooding problem was well, we need to
22:04
Speaker 1: have a wider path, We need to have a big,
22:06
Speaker 1: different bridge which will allow the water to get through.
22:08
Speaker 2: So then the city decided that we were going to
22:11
Speaker 2: sell our one hundred and thirty year old railway to
22:14
Speaker 2: raise money to fix these kind of things. So I
22:19
Speaker 2: pulled out the deferred maintenance list that they put together
22:23
Speaker 2: before the railway.
22:24
Speaker 1: Sale, work that they didn't do, And.
22:29
Speaker 2: Then I looked at Sincely on Track to see where
22:32
Speaker 2: this floodgate might be listed as a project. And I
22:36
Speaker 2: found that there was no sewer district, water district, or
22:41
Speaker 2: storm water management utility projects in any of the city's
22:47
Speaker 2: planned projects with the railway money. There's no mention in
22:52
Speaker 2: Sincely on Track, which is their plan for spending the
22:55
Speaker 2: railway money. There's no mention in there about our sewer system,
22:59
Speaker 2: water system.
23:01
Speaker 1: It's really incredible, aren't we subject to a consent decree?
23:04
Speaker 1: Because of so much work that hadn't been done over
23:06
Speaker 1: the years, the deteriorating situation of our sewer and water systems.
23:09
Speaker 2: And that that could go on in perpetuity. From what
23:12
Speaker 2: I understand, the consent decree on the on the combined
23:15
Speaker 2: sewer overflow, that consent decree I think can go on
23:20
Speaker 2: for imperpetuity.
23:21
Speaker 1: And that means billions of dollars worth of work.
23:24
Speaker 2: Yes, So the question is, well, why why wasn't some
23:28
Speaker 2: of the work that needs to be done, Why wasn't
23:30
Speaker 2: that put into our plan? Why wasn't the Madison floodgate
23:35
Speaker 2: put into the plan? And there's no, there's no sewer
23:39
Speaker 2: or water related projects in the plan.
23:43
Speaker 1: Those are all existing infrastructure.
23:45
Speaker 2: Exactly, and existing infrastructure that needs maintenance and repair.
23:50
Speaker 1: Well so much so that we hit we were subject
23:52
Speaker 1: to a consent degree with the federal government for all
23:54
Speaker 1: kinds of pollution violations.
23:55
Speaker 2: So it's very it's very wacky what happened. I went
23:58
Speaker 2: back and said, well, how did this how did this
24:00
Speaker 2: list get put together? And this tells you how devious
24:05
Speaker 2: this city council is. They started looking into what the
24:09
Speaker 2: deferred maintenance was before they even before the deferred maintenance
24:13
Speaker 2: needs were, before they even announced that they were going
24:16
Speaker 2: to try to sell the railway. So the city council
24:20
Speaker 2: asked the administration, the city manager to look at deferred
24:25
Speaker 2: maintenance needs in five departments. Those five departments did not
24:30
Speaker 2: include the sewer department or the waterworks or anything like that,
24:34
Speaker 2: so at the get go. From the get go, that
24:38
Speaker 2: list was deficient. But it looks good. And I'm not
24:44
Speaker 2: sure why they didn't include any of those projects, like
24:47
Speaker 2: maybe because it's those functions. Those departments are supposed to
24:51
Speaker 2: be self financing. There's enterprise funds where the fees that
24:56
Speaker 2: they collect are supposed to pay for their operations. Well,
25:00
Speaker 2: does that include all this maintenance that they're supposed to
25:02
Speaker 2: be doing. It's really a mystery to me.
25:05
Speaker 1: It really is more with Todd Zenzer. And I assure
25:10
Speaker 1: you the additional information Todd will be sharing with us
25:13
Speaker 1: here in the fifty five Carsite Morning Shore won't be positive,
25:15
Speaker 1: smiley face happy information. Sadly, none of it has been
25:18
Speaker 1: this morning. This is why we need to talk about
25:19
Speaker 1: it so much. Seven the talk station seven fifty to
25:25
Speaker 1: fifty five KRCIT talk Station, Happy Friday. Todd Zenser in studio.
25:28
Speaker 1: Citizen Watchdog is the name of the podcast. That's what
25:31
Speaker 1: we call Todd Zender because he is former Inspector General.
25:34
Speaker 1: Before we get to I guess we'll close up with
25:36
Speaker 1: campaign zero, reflecting what happens when you drop the ball
25:39
Speaker 1: and allow outside organizations to sort of steer the narrative
25:42
Speaker 1: as wrong as it may be. One of the remind
25:44
Speaker 1: folks at top of the our new is Eric Conroy,
25:46
Speaker 1: who's running against Greg Landsman. He'll be in studio plus
25:48
Speaker 1: Jack Winsor in the next hour. All right. So contact cards, yes,
25:54
Speaker 1: a source of information. It's when a police officer interacts
25:58
Speaker 1: with a member of this Cincinnat community.
26:01
Speaker 2: Right, a traffic stop or a pedestrian stop.
26:03
Speaker 1: All right, they have to explain the who, what's why when?
26:06
Speaker 1: Of course, age, race, heightweight, all it's identified on a
26:10
Speaker 1: contact card. The purpose of the contact card was to
26:15
Speaker 1: do what and when did these things start being used?
26:18
Speaker 2: The contact cards came out of the collaborative agreement back
26:21
Speaker 2: in the early two thousands.
26:23
Speaker 1: So this has been going on a while.
26:24
Speaker 2: Yeah, about seventeen years or so, hald.
26:26
Speaker 1: Right, think, so fine, collect the information. But then what
26:28
Speaker 1: was supposed to have been done with the contact cards
26:31
Speaker 1: after they were created.
26:33
Speaker 2: Well, they should have been doing something. The whole purpose
26:35
Speaker 2: was to document whether or not the police were biased,
26:40
Speaker 2: all right, you know the minority community. Okay, those where
26:46
Speaker 2: a lot of the stops are happening.
26:47
Speaker 1: And as I understand it, the University of Cincinnati was
26:50
Speaker 1: paid to create a thoughtful and reasonable mechanism to analyze
26:57
Speaker 1: the contact cards.
26:58
Speaker 2: That's right. What happened in twenty seven seventeen, the city
27:00
Speaker 2: brought back the federal monitor that was overseeing the collaborative
27:06
Speaker 2: and when he looked at the status of things with
27:09
Speaker 2: the city, one of the things he pointed out is that, hey, great,
27:12
Speaker 2: you're collecting these contact cards, but you're not analyzing them.
27:17
Speaker 2: So the city manager at the time contracted with the
27:20
Speaker 2: University of Cincinnati to come up with a model that
27:23
Speaker 2: they could use to do that type of analysis. And
27:26
Speaker 2: then I'm still in the process of trying to get
27:29
Speaker 2: their records. But the city never implemented whatever the University
27:34
Speaker 2: of Cincinnati came up with.
27:35
Speaker 1: So if you see paid to do something, here's your
27:37
Speaker 1: analysis process that was never put into place. But the
27:41
Speaker 1: card information was posted and available for anybody who wanted
27:45
Speaker 1: to take a look at it, right, which is exactly
27:47
Speaker 1: what campaign zero did.
27:49
Speaker 2: That's right.
27:49
Speaker 1: And Campaign zero, I think you maybe had mentioned Marxism.
27:52
Speaker 1: But they're a very very far left advocacy, ye direct,
27:56
Speaker 1: no doubt, no doubt, and so they're like a defund
27:59
Speaker 1: police type end absolutely all right. So they took it
28:01
Speaker 1: upon themselves to take this information and draw their own conclusions,
28:05
Speaker 1: not following the University of Cincinnati's model, which you can't
28:07
Speaker 1: find yet, but using their own that's right, which maybe
28:11
Speaker 1: has some bias built into.
28:12
Speaker 2: A todd that's correct.
28:13
Speaker 1: Uh huh? How about that? And they come out and
28:15
Speaker 1: the accused the police officers of being racist all because
28:19
Speaker 1: the city of Cincinnai didn't do its own contact.
28:22
Speaker 2: The city got caught with their pants down, there's no
28:24
Speaker 2: question about it.
28:25
Speaker 1: So if the city had its own analysis and University
28:29
Speaker 1: of Cincinnati's methodology was applied and it showed no, there
28:35
Speaker 1: isn't bias, this is explainable for any number of reasons.
28:38
Speaker 1: Here's the reasons why they could have pulled out that
28:40
Speaker 1: report and said, oh, come on, campaign zero. This has
28:42
Speaker 1: already been analyzed by a neutral set of governing principles.
28:47
Speaker 1: So campaign zero is then left with their conclusions which
28:50
Speaker 1: aren't which aren't countered by anything that's correct.
28:53
Speaker 2: My thinking is that if Cincinnati had followed through with
28:58
Speaker 2: the UC model, Campaign zero would have never come here.
29:04
Speaker 1: I looked better, you get out in front of the problem,
29:06
Speaker 1: That's right.
29:06
Speaker 2: I looked at For example, a New Orleans Police Department
29:10
Speaker 2: is also or was also I think it still is
29:13
Speaker 2: under a consent to CREE. They are doing an annual
29:17
Speaker 2: report on their bias free policing, and Campaign zero's never
29:24
Speaker 2: gone there.
29:24
Speaker 1: How about that?
29:26
Speaker 2: So if Cincinnati had done what.
29:28
Speaker 1: They were told to do in twenty seventeen.
29:31
Speaker 2: That's right, Campaign zero would have never come here. That's
29:33
Speaker 2: my view anyway.
29:36
Speaker 1: See this is why I love you, Todd zinzer Man,
29:38
Speaker 1: just boiling it down to its simple as points incompetence,
29:42
Speaker 1: rules to day in city government, and you have these
29:46
Speaker 1: nefarious actors in here to make things absolutely worse for
29:48
Speaker 1: us because I'm not certain Campaign zero is really interested
29:51
Speaker 1: in racial harmony.
29:52
Speaker 2: To be honest with you, Todd, Oh, I don't disagree, Todd.
29:56
Speaker 1: Thank you so much. On behalf of my listening audience,
29:58
Speaker 1: whether they fully appreciate the hard work you do or not.
30:00
Speaker 1: They should and I do, and I know a lot
30:02
Speaker 1: of folks do. And I hope that the city Council
30:05
Speaker 1: would take upon taking upon themselves to listen to you
30:09
Speaker 1: and to analyze what you have provided to them time
30:12
Speaker 1: and time and time again. Seven fifty five. Right now
30:16
Speaker 1: we're gonna hear from Eric Conroy. You have an option
30:18
Speaker 1: when it comes to a well got option against Greg Lansman.
30:22
Speaker 1: It's Eric Conroy. Eric's goon to join the studio after
30:24
Speaker 1: the top of the air news, and we're gonna hear
30:26
Speaker 1: from a high Press networks Jack Winsor, who's got some
30:28
Speaker 1: great things to talk about, including the Husted Brown raised
30:31
Speaker 1: and socialist housing policy, which I think Todd just kind
30:34
Speaker 1: of touched upon during our discussion here in this hour.
30:37
Speaker 1: Don't go away and be right back. Celebrating two hundred
30:41
Speaker 1: and fifty years of the iHeartRadio app give or take
30:44
Speaker 1: a few