Category: Local Politics

Civil Rights · Education · Local Politics

2024 will be a wild ride in politics

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Last month, pundits aplenty predicted that national politics in 2024 will be a wild bronco ride. With many of the current do-nothing Congress members in Washington up for reelection and a likely rematch of President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump, that seems to be more statement of fact than prognostication.

Local and state politics will be similarly tumultuous.

As for local politics, the bad news first. Akron Public Schools, a major anchor for the city, which in turn is the economic and cultural driver of Summit County, has suffered poor leadership for far too long.

Last summer, Akron’s school board rushed to pick a new superintendent. This was after Superintendent Christine Fowler-Mack, hired by many of the same board members, was released from her contract 17 months early.

The board chose a candidate who has no experience running a district as large, diverse and poor as Akron’s.

I often feel like a bookie given the number of people who volunteer how long they think C. Michael Robinson will last. All bets are between 18 and 24 months.

There was an opportunity last November to elect school board members who could effectively mitigate the district’s many problems. Yet voters, as they often do everywhere, instead treated the election like a popularity contest. Two of the three open seats were filled by candidates with high name recognition but who in the debates revealed a critical lack of understanding of the district’s issues or any practical solutions.

The good news is that Akron has a new mayor. The city was long overdue for a new generation of leaders. In the May primary (Akron’s de facto mayoral election), voters hired 32-year-old Shammas Malik by nearly 18 points more than the second-place candidate.

Some citizens, especially those who have long known Malik, are wildly enthusiastic about his ascension to the city’s highest position. Others remain skeptical of his ability to root out cronyism and effect positive changes for every ward in Akron, especially those that need it the most. 

Anyone who speaks with Malik quickly realizes his passionate commitment to Akron. He’s smart and a tireless worker who has shown acumen in the appointments he’s made to his administration. He deserves the chance to show the city what he will do.

Last fall, Ohio voters overwhelmingly approved both a constitutional amendment guaranteeing the right to an abortion and a law legalizing recreational marijuana. In response, Ohio Senate Republicans unsuccessfully attempted to modify the new marijuana law. They’ll likely try again, but with the law now in effect, making substantive, if any, changes is less likely.

Meanwhile, Ohio House Republicans discussed moving the jurisdiction of the abortion-rights amendment from the judiciary to — ta-da! — the Republican-controlled legislature. This is not the first time Ohio’s Republican state lawmakers have decided they need not comply with laws that they do not like.

Republican legislators have long enjoyed a supermajority in Ohio due to gerrymandering and in 2022 had no qualms ignoring two Ohio Supreme Court rulings that rejected Republican-drawn state redistricting maps as unconstitutional.

And like so many Republican-dominated states, Ohio’s legislature has taken aim at transgender youths and their families. A bill that would have banned trans females from playing sports on female high school and college teams, as well as severely restricted the medical care of trans youths under the age of 18, passed both the Ohio House and Senate.

But with a signature that angered many Republicans, Ohio Republican Governor Mike DeWine vetoed the bill. Ohio Democrats shouldn’t have been too surprised.

After stridently opposing the passage of the constitutional amendment protecting the right to an abortion in part by falsely claiming it would take away parents’ rights (it doesn’t), DeWine could not bring himself to sign into law a bill that openly and aggressively takes away the rights of parents to make medical decisions for their trans children.

These wedge issues will continue to dominant this important election year as Republicans try to draw attention away from the restrictions to reproductive rights they’ve imposed since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June 2022.

So, yes, hang on to your hats; 2024 politics, here we go!

This was first published in the Akron Beacon Journal on Sunday, January 14, 2024.

Postscript:

Ten days after this column was published, Ohio’s Republican legislature overturned Governor Mike DeWine’s veto of House Bill 68. Now, “access to gender-affirming health care for transgender minors and adults in Ohio is set to be heavily restricted under proposed administrative rules filed earlier this month by the state Health Department.” Once enacted (90 days after the overturn), many believe it will be a de facto ban on gender-affirming care for any Ohioan.

HB 68 also includes a ban on transgender females from participating in scholastic athletics. Currently there are only six such athletes in Ohio. Those six athletes had to meet rigorous qualifications to ensure they were not competing with an unfair physical advantage, which is why many referred to this ban as a solution in search of a problem.

Since DeWine’s veto of HB 68 was overturned, many Ohio families with transgender members have reported plans to leave the state. There also are concerns that people offered jobs in Ohio, including at the new Intel facility near Columbus, will no longer be willing to relocate to the state.

Civil Rights · Local Politics

Akron’s stagnant status quo has got to go

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Coaches do it. CEOs do it. Teachers do it. Parents do it. And, ideally, elected officials do it. They routinely ask: What worked? What would work better? What failed, and why?

Sometimes the limitations of an approach are revealed when implemented, particularly in situations that are uncommon. An unwillingness to consider that a different response may have yielded better results all but guarantees that past failures will be repeated.

It’s hard to find Akronites who think our current mayor and his administration responded perfectly to last summer’s killing of Jayland Walker by eight Akron police officers.

And yet five days before a grand jury chose not to indict Walker’s killers, mayoral candidate Marco Sommerville claimed the current mayor’s administration, in which he serves as deputy mayor for intergovernmental relations, “handled [the Jayland Walker killing] the best way we could have handled it.” He spoke as if it was all in the past, as if the horror and outrage over Walker’s killing had magically dissipated.

After the grand jury decision, Sommerville issued a call for change that was too little too late. “I do know that community safety and police reform go together, and Akron needs both,” he said. “We need our law enforcement members and our community members to commit to lasting change.”

Wounds left to fester do not heal. Even before the grand jury announced last Monday that they would not indict any of the eight officers who shot Walker, freshly boarded windows downtown signaled the tension that remains 10 months after Walker was shot 46 times.

Peaceful protests understandably resulted in the days after the grand jury’s decision. At a march last Wednesday, reporters filmed police pepper spraying the crowds while also deploying chemical canisters.

Because too many Akron leaders like Sommerville think everything was handled just fine last summer, nothing was learned and here we are again.

In polling, Akronites claim to want new leaders with fresh ideas who will move the city forward. Unfortunately, the May 2 primary likely will be the de facto general election for who becomes Akron’s next mayor as there are no Republican candidates.

Akron mayor’s race:Akron mayoral hopefuls answer citizen questions in latest debate

Is Akron truly ready to pivot to a new direction and away from the stagnant status quo?

Consider the fraught White Pond Drive development. Issues include the viability of the land for housing given the soil’s toxicity and the destruction of wetlands and trees that the city itself identified as essential to managing Akron’s stormwater, pollution and summer heat.

There also are concerns about pursuing high-priced housing on the edge of town when so many neighborhoods in the inner city are filled with vacant lots.

But more concerning was Mayor Dan Horrigan’s peevishness when citizens learned of the secretly planned development and quickly organized against it. Horrigan’s open disdain for these citizens, and the council members who opposed the development, revealed an administration whose members flout accountability to the people they have sworn to serve.

Shortly after the trees on the future development site were cut down, the Beacon Journal informed readers about Section 56, a provision that has been in Akron’s budgets for 57 years. It has effectively given mayors a legal way to work around the checks and balances outlined in the city’s charter, which requires expenditures of $50,000 or more to be approved by City Council.

Learning about Section 56 was an “Ah-ha” moment. With Section 56, the option for a mayor to legally ignore the charter, essentially the constitution of our city, has been baked into every budget for six decades.

As a result, consultants have been paid huge sums to do work that city employees are also paid to do. Contracts are awarded without public bidding. And in the past two years alone, Mayor Horrigan has awarded contracts worth more than $121 million without city council oversight.

That is not good governance, but last month enough members of City Council voted to approve the current budget that contains, yet again, Section 56 with no modifications. Two who voted “yes” were council-at-large members Jeff Fusco and Ginger Baylor. Both are running for re-election and have latched their campaigns onto Sommerville’s.

Last fall, Fusco proposed a City Council resolution opposing citizen-backed police reform. It was directly aimed at thwarting Issue 10, a ballot initiative to create a citizen-led police review board whose members are chosen by City Council. City Council never voted on Fusco’s proposed resolution and in November’s election Issue 10 passed with 62% of the vote.

When City Council voted to seat the members of the police review board earlier this year, Fusco was chief among those opposing Imokhai Okolo, a 27-year-old Black attorney, as one of the board’s nine members. Young Black men are disproportionately the victims of police brutality in this country, making their inclusion on the review board not just important, but essential.

Fusco said he opposed Okolo, who was also opposed by the FOP, because last summer, in the wake of Walker’s killing, the young attorney had referred to police officers who aren’t held accountable for their violence as “pigs” on his Facebook page. Baylor switched her vote from supporting Okolo in early rounds to abstaining in the final round. She and Fusco now have campaign signs listing both their names and Sommerville’s.

Fellow Akronites, reflect on those who are currently in office. Many are honorable servants. But far too many others are comfortable conducting the city’s business in ways that may work for them, but clearly do not work for all the people of Akron. We can move our city forward only by voting for officials who support good governance that includes transparency and sorely needed checks and balances.

New faces with fresh ideas running for mayor and City Council in the May 2 primary can be found at the League of Women Voters voting guide.

This column was first published in the Akron Beacon Journal on Sunday, April 23, 2023.

Local Politics

Malik, Mosley and Greer offer best hopes for Akron’s next mayor

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In the recent Akron mayoral debates, Marco Sommerville‘s performance has underscored my position, outlined in my March 5 column, that he should not be Akron’s next mayor. Luckily, these debates have also shown voters they have a strong slate of candidates to consider. 

At the first debate, Sommerville was hubristically ill prepared, as if the debates are a pretense he must endure before becoming Akron’s 63rd mayor. He also churlishly mocked another candidate by raising his hand and making it “talk” like a sock puppet when the other candidate spoke.

At a subsequent debate, in which the questions were provided in advance, Sommerville read prepared answers. For rebuttals to other candidates’ comments, his six opponents (all seated at the same table) watched in astonishment as Sommerville received text messages on his cellphone, which he quickly read before responding.

Adding important voices to the debates are candidates Keith Mills, a high school teacher, and Joshua Schaffer, a cellphone store manager. But neither have the experience to run a city with $772 million annual operating budget and roughly 2,000 full-time employees.

Interestingly, Schaffer routinely doles out pointed criticism of the candidates who’ve worked in local government, with the glaring exception of Tara Mosley and Jeff Wilhite.

Wilhite, a Summit County Council representative, has a command of the issues, an engaged demeanor and, frankly, the dignity that Sommerville lacks. He might have been a serious contender in previous elections, but after decades of white, middle-aged men being mayor, Akron voters are demanding change and his chances of winning seem a long shot. 

Malik had the admirable chutzpah to announce his candidacy not only first, but before the current mayor, Dan Horrigan, announced he would not seek re-election. A 2009 graduate of Firestone High School, Malik has an impressive resume, work ethic and detailed plans for Akron’s future. 

After graduating from Harvard Law School in 2016, Malik worked with every department and at every level of Akron’s government for two full years as an assistant director in the city’s law department. He’s now in his fourth year as a city council representative. Concerns about his lack of experience are specious.

Two months after Malik announced his candidacy, Ward 5 council representative Tara Mosley threw her hat in the ring. Ward 5 is a long, skinny ward that runs through the heart of the city and encompasses some of Akron’s most diverse and lowest income neighborhoods. 

For 10 years, Mosley has exhibited calm and effective leadership while addressing difficult problems not faced in every ward. The past year has proven that Akron can no longer avoid addressing systemic issues of race and policing and Mosley’s time representing Ward 5 gives her a clear-eyed perspective on what needs to happen.

And then there is Mark Greer, who was until recently the Great Streets administrator and Small Business Program manager for the city of Akron. He filed his paperwork to run for mayor just before the deadline. 

Greer was very hands-on in his roles at the city, and many small business owners are on record as enthusiastically appreciating his leadership. While his late entrance in the race meant an uphill battle for him to break through the crowded field, his performance in the debates shows he can win that battle.

Like Malik and Mosley, Greer has a deep knowledge of the city’s issues and promise, and well thought-out plans on how to address the former and maximize the latter.

Greer also brings an element of gravitas to the race, which was prominently displayed after Sommerville made a tone-deaf statement at the social justice debate at Garfield Community Learning Center just a mile from where Jayland Walker was shot and killed by police last summer.

That night, Sommerville described — as he has in every debate — technology that allows police to shoot a tracking dart onto cars that flee. Police can track that vehicle without a chase and then, as Sommerville put it, “move in for the kill.” His comment surprised the audience, and yet Sommerville didn’t acknowledge the horror of his own words until asked about it after the debate.

When Greer next spoke in that debate, he stated, “First of all on behalf of anyone who has experienced violence or trauma at the hands of law enforcement, when I heard one of my colleagues say ‘move in for the kill,’ I apologize,” he said. “That is not the language that is going to move this community forward.” 

Greer’s response to Sommerville’s painfully gross language — he was the only candidate to do so that night —showed another side of leadership our community desperately needs: someone who facilitates healing.

Akron, we have a group of strong mayoral candidates who are forward thinking. I emphatically encourage everyone to watch the debates on April 5 and April 12 hosted by The Akron Press Club, Ideastream Public Media, Akron Beacon Journal and the Ohio Debate Commission. These will be the most rigorous of the election cycle.

How the candidates perform is not a one-to-one ratio of anyone’s ability to run our city, but it’s as good a test as there is before May 2.

This column was first published in the Akron Beacon Journal on Sunday, April 2, 2023.

Local Politics

Why Marco Sommerville should not be Akron’s next mayor

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My eldest son was a freshman at Akron Early College High School the same year I provided educational outreach at a similar high school in the region. While both schools had the same model — high schools on college campuses whose students take some classes at the host university — the difference between the two schools’ faculties was striking.

Most evenings my son, Claude, regaled me with stories about his teachers. Doc Hensley, a former nun and Army officer who had her PhD in math, replaced Claude’s fear of advanced math with a joy for how numbers do not lie. Larry O’Neil taught world history so energetically and passionately that Claude later wrote a college application essay about him.

At the school where I worked, however, far too many teachers lacked energy or enthusiasm. One teacher, whose students I worked with for several months, never got up from her desk in my presence except to head to the faculty lounge where I’d overhear her complain about the students.

In a discussion with the then-principal of Akron Early College I learned that, unlike the school where I worked, Akron’s school refused to hire teachers based on seniority. This didn’t mean some of the faculty didn’t have seniority — Doc Hensley retired not long after Claude had her. But they were all chosen strictly on their qualifications.

Marco Sommerville has entered the upcoming Akron mayoral race as the hand-picked successor of current mayor, Dan Horrigan and is endorsed by former mayor Don Plusquellic. Plusquellic also tapped Horrigan when he first ran.

Sommerville’s more than 35 years in local politics is touted by his supporters as a reason, if not the reason, for him to be the next mayor. Yes, Sommerville understands how Akron’s government currently works, but few Akronites are pleased with how it currently works.

In the results of a poll released last week and published in this newspaper, “Akron residents resoundingly said they want a leader with high ethical standards, fresh ideas and a clear vision for the city, by margins of 71% or better.” Fewer than half of the respondents prioritized prior city experience in a new mayor, underscoring the desire for change.

According to a political scientist at the University of Akron who reviewed the poll’s numbers, the emphasis on reform in Akron politics is stronger than the emphasis on economic growth. Which makes sense — if our current government officials are inept, ineffectual or worse, how can they successfully plan for and enact sustainable economic growth?

By the numbers:What Akron wants in a mayor and what the next mayor should do

Yet if Sommerville is Akron’s next mayor that’s just what we’ll get — we’ll get four more years of stagnant leadership.

In remarks at a Martin Luther King Jr. Day event this year at the Akron-Summit County Main Library, Sommerville pointed out a problem in our community: approximately 10% of Akron’s police force and fire department are Black.

Good governance would have the percentage of Akron’s Black police officers and firefighters closer to 30%, which is our percentage of Black residents. Sommerville’s solution? The empty aphorism, “We have much work to do.”

Why, in 35 years in local government, including several years with his hands on the levers in high-level positions, hasn’t Sommerville developed and deployed a comprehensive plan to rectify the lack of Black representation on our police force and in our fire department?

Perhaps he was just too busy.

Sommerville was the city council representative for the ward I live in when I moved here in 2003. On a mild afternoon a couple of years later, my adolescent sons called to tell me that I could not come home because the police had barricaded the street on our block. Using bullhorns, they told residents to stay in their homes.

Just five houses down from our home, a young man who appeared high on drugs waved a handgun out of a second-floor window for the better part of half an hour. Because our street curves, the man had a clear shot at our front yard.

I have witnessed excellent police work in my neighborhood many times in the past two decades, but none better than that day. The Akron police controlled the situation, successfully protected residents and ultimately accessed the room the man was in and then tased, cuffed and arrested him.

In the days that followed, I repeatedly called my council representative, Marco Sommerville, and left multiple messages at his council office and at his business office. I never, ever heard back from him. Nor did any of my neighbors.

In 2022, several events highlighted leadership problems in Akron’s city government, police department and schools. But calls for Sommerville to return us to the halcyon days of Mayor Plusquellic are like Russians waxing nostalgic for their former Soviet dictators when the often-embarrassing Boris Yeltsin was their democratically elected president.

Akron’s Democratic city government reminds me of Ohio’s Republican state government. Both have been ruled by one party, and many of the same faces, for decades. As a result, officials who do not fear losing their seats pay little mind to the needs of the communities they purport to serve.

Holly Christensen:Wanted: Real leaders in Akron

Under a Sommerville mayorship our city’s potent promise might as well be placed in a lead vault that is then coated in rubber and buried in the deepest part of Summit Lake.

Like some of the high school teachers I witnessed counting down their days to retirement, there’s plenty of reason to believe Marco Sommerville is running for mayor because he believes after 35-plus years in Akron government, his ascension is his reward.

Whether Akron’s voters truly want new leaders with fresh ideas or just more of the same will be determined on May 2.

This column was first published in the Akron Beacon Journal on March 5, 2023.

Local Politics

Wanted: Real leaders in Akron

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Both generational Akronites and those recently transplanted here often tout our city’s advantages: great parks, a phenomenal housing stock that’s affordable, arts and culture institution and venues, and a sizable university with many highly rated programs. The weather is neither too hot, nor too cold. And the people are friendly.

Other mid-sized cities located outside the sunbelt have become desirable post-industrial places, hotspots even. Consider Overlook Park, Kansas; Fort Collins, Colorado; Boise, Idaho; Omaha, Nebraska; Madison, Wisconsin and more. But few in this list have the combined geography, climate and arts, educational and cultural institutions Akron enjoys.

Unlike those cities, however, Akron is like a promising runner stuck at the starting block. Without invested, visionary leaders, the city’s potential remains unharnessed and less able to attract people and businesses that would make our community thrive. 

Part of the problem is the three-decades-long stranglehold one man had on the top leadership position. Don Plusquellic was so secure in his position as mayor of Akron that when he abruptly announced his retirement in 2015, few, if any, leaders had been cultivated to fill his shoes. 

Similarly, Akron’s city council has far too many representatives who have been there for far too long and become ossified to change. Motivated primarily to protect their positions rather than develop a bold, long-term vision of the city, council as a whole does not have what Akron needs.

How long have Akron’s elected officials touted the decommissioning of the Innerbelt to make way for vibrant development along the city’s western flank? A quarter of a century. And yet the road to nowhere remains. It is a concrete barrier between downtown and the neighborhoods brimming with possibilities on the other side.

Yes, some interesting work is happening downtown, particularly on Main Street. But it started before the COVID pandemic and has progressed at a snail’s pace, forcing businesses to close and increasing vacancy rates — stifling, rather than invigorating, downtown. Just who exactly benefits from this never-ending project?

Meanwhile over at Akron Public Schools, where I tutor elementary students, we have a school board with too many members who do not spend real time in the buildings and an administration that, until a teachers strike became imminent, seemed deaf to the concerns of faculty, staff, students and parents. 

Three of my children have graduated from Akron Public Schools and I have two more whom I hope will. But I am far from alone in stating I won’t keep my kids in the district if substantive improvements do not happen in our schools beginning now.

A strong public school system is an essential component of a thriving city. Without it, middle-class families leave for better school districts. Without middle-class families, cities become donuts with big holes. Neighborhoods decline, tax revenues decline, the quality of city parks decline, businesses relocate.

A quality workforce is one of the top things businesses look for when considering locating in a community and one of the surest ways to grow a solid workforce is through education.

Before becoming Akron’s chief of police in August of 2021, Steve Mylett‘s last job was chief of police for Bellevue, Washington, a well-to-do, mid-sized city in the same county as Seattle. Bellevue has a median income near $115,000 and its population is 63% white and 2% Black. 

Less than a year into his job, it was clear that Mylett’s previous experience and acumen did not prepare him to run a police department in a city with far fewer resources and far greater diversity than the one he’d left. 

It is impossible to avoid a comparison between the Memphis police chief’s response to the recent police killing of an unarmed Black man there with Mylett’s response to the police killing of Jayland Walker here seven months ago.

Within days after an unarmed man in Memphis was beaten to death by police after a traffic stop, the names of five of the officers involved were made public. In a few short weeks, those five officers were fired from the department and prosecutors filed murder charges.

Meanwhile, more than seven months after eight police officers shot Walker 46 times, also an unarmed Black man stopped initially for a traffic violation, we still do not know the names of those officers. The officers not only were not fired, they were returned to administrative duties little more than four months after the killing.

Lawsuit filed:Beacon Journal asks Ohio Supreme Court to order release of Akron police records

Akron’s police department owes Akron’s citizens transparency, not obfuscation; accountability, not entrenchment. Without transparency and accountability, neither of which anyone expects from Mylett, our community has a festering wound that will not heal.

Akron has so much promise, but a fish rots from the head down. Our city will not sprint from the starting block and head toward a better future unless we, its citizens, sweep out ineffectual leaders and support the election (or hiring) of people with innovative thinking, energy and a commitment to all of Akron’s citizens.

The primary for the mayor’s race is May 2 and incumbent Dan Horrigan is not running. As many believe the Democratic winner will be our de facto next mayor, it’s important not to forgot this spring’s election. 

Akron primary May 2:These eight people want to be the next mayor of Akron

This fall, three school board members will be up for re-election. Look closely at their actual involvement in our city’s schools and decide at the polls if they should keep their positions.

Fall is also when Akron’s citizens choose their city council representatives. As three incumbents are vacating their seats, we will certainly have three new representatives. Hopefully there will be more than those three. Several new voices, many from younger generations, are clambering to replace current incumbents. Listen to what they have to say.

Rise up, Akron. We, her citizens, are her lifeblood. It’s time to clear out the rot and race toward the future we know is possible.

This column was first published in the Akron Beacon Journal on Sunday, February 12, 2023.

Local Politics

Akron’s lame-duck mayor is deaf to residents’ concerns

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Akron has a lame-duck mayor assuming carte blanche to proceed with a development along White Pond Drive. This proposed development doesn’t pass the sniff test.

The proposed development by Triton Property Ventures would create nearly 250 units of housing, a mix of townhomes, apartments and houses, along with retail spaces that have been likened to Hudson’s First & Main shopping development.

Why that development? Why that location?

White Pond:Development plan drives wedge between residents, Akron city officials

There’s plenty of shopping, including a Whole Foods, Acme and several restaurants just a few blocks from the proposed site. The proposed development is also on a section of White Pond Drive that is the primary thoroughfare for West Akronites to get to Interstate 77. Yet a traffic study for the development has yet to be conducted.

According to nearby residents, the area is a wetlands with several endangered species.

Under James Hardy, the Horrigan administration’s former director of integrated economic development, Akron produced a State of the Canopy report in 2020.

The report identified the trees on the White Pond acres as essential to managing Akron’s stormwater, pollution and summer heat. Most, if not all, of the trees would be cleared away if the project is approved.

Meanwhile, for the better part of a quarter century, city leaders have said that the Innerbelt freeway will soon be decommissioned, opening up land ripe for mixed-use development like what Triton proposes for the White Pond green space.

Would it not make more sense to create a housing and shopping development on the land taken from predominantly Black residents by eminent domain half a century ago? Where a meaningless road cuts off downtown from the west side, development akin to Columbus’ Short North District could fill its place.

Furthermore, like many Rust Belt cities, Akron remains full of vacant lots and abandoned houses more than a decade after the Great Recession started with a housing bubble that blew up. Why not direct developers to fill these lots with affordable housing, which would also stabilize neighborhoods?

All of this certainly deserves a communitywide conversation, which makes the mayor’s resistance to doing so alarming. He has publicly suggested that the citizens opposed to the White Pond development are outsiders, which is outlandish and ironic given that the developers are themselves not local.

Dan Horrigan has refused to be interviewed by the press on the White Pond development, instead directing reporters to a letter his administration wrote to be sent to residents near the development.

This begs the question: If there’s nothing to hide, why is he not talking? The mayor’s obfuscation and dismissive attitude toward citizens’ concerns gives the impression he has something to hide, whether or not that’s the case.

City Council members Shammas Malik, who would like to replace Horrigan as mayor in 2024, and Russ Neal, who represents the ward where the development would occur, are both on record calling for the development process to slow down so the city can engage in discussions with citizens over their concerns.

How did Akron end up with a leader who ignores its citizens?

Horrigan replaced former Mayor Don Plusquellic, who’d held the position for nearly 30 years, in 2016 after winning a campaign in which few viable candidates ran. Horrigan had been the Summit County clerk of courts since 2007, an important administrative job ensuring the proper processing of the county courts’ paperwork. Before that he was Ward 1 City Council representative for seven years.

At first, Horrigan’s lack of experience seemed unimportant. Akronites were relieved for the end of Plusquellic’s arrogant attitude and self-created dramas. And Horrigan further allayed any concerns by filling his new administration with people with notable skills, ideas and energy.

However, after Horrigan’s re-election in 2019, the wheels soon came off his administration’s bus. The most impressive and effective members of his administration left one by one. This brain drain exposed Horrigan’s limited abilities in matters small and consequential.

Last summer, Akron became infamous in international news. Police Chief Steve Mylett’s and Mayor Horrigan’s responses to the deadly fight near the I Promise School and the police shooting of Jayland Walker too often were uninformed and dismissive, which only escalated citywide tensions.

By summer’s end, many saw Horrigan as unqualified to meet Akron’s needs. Thus, it came as little surprise when, on Oct. 4, Horrigan announced he would not seek reelection in 2023.

While Horrigan’s announcement caused many Akronites to sigh with relief, having an already weak mayor become a lame duck for the next 15 months is problematic. The passion Horrigan expressed for Akron when he first ran, and which seemed genuine, is no longer present.

A week after Horrigan announced he’d not seek reelection, Mylett reinstated the eight police officers who shot Walker to administrative duties, citing a staffing shortage.

In a city that just lived through a summer of protests, curfews and deep discord, the ensuing feud between the police department and leaders in the Black community has been public and contentious. Rather than intervening, Horrigan’s silence has been deafening.

Somehow Akron unwittingly replaced an arrogant, drama-creating mayor with a negligent mayor. Our city deserves better. Akron needs a competent, committed leader willing to address not only its problems but its potential with intelligence and passion. Instead, we have a placeholder mayor who refuses to engage with the citizens he was elected to serve.

This was first published in the Akron Beacon Journal on Sunday, November 27, 2022.