The Patriot Corner

During the early part of my life in Parma, my main concerns were my family and my career. During those years, like most of you, I did not think I really had time to get involved in my community. As my children got older and they became involved in activities such as sports and scouting, a lot of my time was then spent helping with those activities. I met a lot of people during those years, listened to everyone’s perspective and really started to see what was happening in this city, state and country. After a short time, I realized I was not proud of the direction in which everything was going. In fact, I was ashamed of the legacy that would be left to my children. I soon realized that the only way to fix the system was to truly be involved with those whom we have entrusted with positions of power and try to hold them accountable.

In 2001, I watched as this nation came together for a brief period of time with the vast majority of Americans pulling together for the first time in my memory. Shortly thereafter, partisan politics again reared its ugly head and has degenerated into the power struggle we see today. That power struggle is clearly visible at all levels of our government from Parma to Washington. Washington has become a quagmire with both houses of Congress and the White House pointing fingers at each other. Columbus is almost as bad with the constant threat of referendum on any piece of legislation the minority party does not like. The county government has begun to recover somewhat since a charter has been implemented. The change in direction has resulted in far less cronyism, nepotistic hiring practices and obvious corruption, but we must continue to be vigilant and not allow a relapse into the abuses of the past.

Parma itself is a microcosm of the problems we face as a nation but a potential solution for Parma may well be the same as what is beginning to work at the county level. Quite simply, that is to enact a charter form of government rather than the statutory government we currently have. I believe Parma is dysfunctional and we must make changes. The lack of accountability and transparency in our city government is appalling. It is not uncommon to watch one department pass responsibility on to another, and then yet another and another until eventually it goes full circle with no resolution. The services we pay for through our taxes and expect to receive are being scaled back through furloughs, etc. Our streets are falling into disrepair, our tax base is eroding and we face many other issues both minor and major. Yet our elected officials will tell us all is well and we don’t need to examine or change the way we operate the city. Do you really believe them?

On March 6, we in Parma will have choices to make. First, we must decide if we want to regain some control of our city and elect a commission to write a City Charter that can begin to address some of the issues our city faces free of the shackles of the Ohio Revised Code. We must also decide who we want to serve on that commission. Do you want to elect the same people to those positions who have been running our city for years and continue to tell us that nothing needs to change, or do you want to elect people with fresh ideas and a new vision for Parma? The choice is yours, Parma. Choose wisely.