Cleveland Does it Again

The great city of Cleveland, Ohio once again makes it on a list of worsts. This time it ranked 95th out of 100 for Best Places to Raise a Family. No matter what the list, the survey, or the question; Cleveland is the worst place for everything. This latest list has people in the city outraged. I'm trying to figure out why.

I was born and raised in Cleveland, Ohio. By the time I was 10 years old, I hated living here. Yes, 10. It also happened to be the same year of one of the worst winters on record. I'm going to leave weather out of this because, it is no secret that everyone knows Cleveland's weather stinks. I have my reasons for thinking, feeling, or even knowing that Cleveland is not "it".

Let's go back to 1978. During the 1978 school year, the Cleveland Public School system had a major teacher's strike. Then in 1980 the district was put under court ordered school busing. This not only uprooted students from their neighborhood schools, but also led to massive teacher transfers and other measures that the district has never recovered from. On a national scale from 1-10, the Cleveland Public School system gets a 1.

Economically speaking, when there are jobs, they don't pay enough. Every job I've looked up on www.salary.com for salary comparison to other cities with the same basic cost of living, Cleveland always pays less. I even chose a city in California to compare with Cleveland and its cost of living was lower, salaries were higher, and the weather is better. Oh, I said I wasn't gonna play the weather card. By the way, the city was Rancho Cucamonga, Ca.

Now let's talk socially. I apologize ahead of time because, this is probably one of my big reasons for not liking Cleveland, so forgive me. Cleveland is a city full of various cultures. It has a huge Slavic community, as well as Italian, Jewish, and Puerto Rican, to name a few.

The problem with all these wonderful cultures, there are some cultures I didn't name, they never intermingle. Eastside, mainly African American, stays east while Westside, mostly Caucasian and Puerto Rican, stays west. This is where the busing idea came from. And no, busing isn't still being done.

Races not interacting in my opinion in a large metropolitan area is a reflection prejudices. There is no place in modern day America for separatism, prejudices, or racism especially in a major city.

It is a Midwestern city with very set ways. Translation it's deeply rooted in tradition and shows no signs of breaking tradition or changing its socialism or politics, politics that has been under a long over due federal investigation on several levels of government.

Do I dare speak crime rate? Well, they ranked 11th for high crime rate. Kudos to Mayor Jackson's administration for not just saying they are mad and not accepting that title, but by also making sure that new firemen were hired and sworn in and by not laying off any of the police force.

Hats off to his Honorable Mayor Frank Jackson for walking the alleged high crime neighborhood himself and talking to its residence personally to listen to what they had to say. They too were angry.

Let's see I covered schools, economy, social & politics, along with safety and crime. Oh, I forgot what I call stuff to do. Cleveland boasts about all the museums, the zoo, and sport teams. That's all great for visitors. How many times can you go to the museum and what kid do you know that wants to go to a museum. The zoo is fun, but once you go that's it till you return next year. It does hold special events such as Boo at the Zoo for Halloween.

Cleveland sports, okay lets go there. LeBron James is all we got. The Browns haven't done anything since 1982 and I wouldn't bet on the Indians for anything that isn't related to mustard. I already mentioned basketball....LeBron James.

Back to stuff to do, the birth place of amusement parks doesn't even have one. Edgewater Park removed its rides a lifetime ago. Geauga Lake, not in city limits, closed in 2007. Even then it wasn't open year round, again because, of the weather.

I want to be fair there is plenty to do if you are 21 or older. There are bars, clubs, and various parties to attend. There are art galleries and restaurants to go to as well.

If you want a college education then Cleveland is a very good place to be. In fact, the entire state of Ohio ranks high on secondary education.

You like plays, concerts, and classical music? Cleveland has you covered on that too. Wait that's grown up stuff and it's not free. We're looking for family stuff right? We're looking for a reason to live here period.

Sources:
1.http://www.childrenshealthmag.com/parents/The-best-and-worst-places-to-raise-a-family3.php (CITY)

3. http://ech.case.edu/ech-cgi/article.pl?id=CPS2 (BUSING)

2. http://www.neighborhoodscout.com/oh/cleveland/schools/ (RATING)

3. http://tvnews.vanderbilt.edu/tvn-processquery.pl (STRIKE)

4. http://www.walletpop.com/mortgages/dangerous-cities (crime rate)

5.http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2009/08/cleveland_fire_department_grad.html (firemen)