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The Justice for Janitors Campaign is building momentum. Both State Sen. Mark Mallory (D-West End) and City Councilman David Pepper — Democratic candidates for mayor — have signed a letter expressing support for the effort to win better jobs and health benefits. In an April 12 rally on Fountain Square, the Baptist Ministers Conference, the AMOS Project and other religious groups released the letter, calling on building owners and property managers to make improvements in the contract cleaning industry.
The Service Employees International Union (SEIU) is trying to organize janitors for collective bargaining. Union janitors in Chicago, Detroit and Pittsburgh earn between $11 and $14 per hour, work full-time positions and receive health benefits through their employers, according to SEIU. Janitors in Cincinnati work mostly part-time, earn between $6 and $8 per hour and have little or no access to affordable health care, the union says (see “Dirty Little Secret,” issue of July 21-17, 2004).
A new state law that would force former sex offenders out of their homes is now under challenge by the Prison Reform Advocacy Center (PRAC) and the American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio (ACLU). The two groups last week filed a class action lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Cincinnati, seeking to block a state law that allows prosecutors to evict all registered sex offenders living within 1,000 feet of a school as of April 29 (see “Postcards From the Edge,” issue of Jan. 12-18).
“This is a bad law that does nothing to protect children but makes it very difficult for sex offenders to find a place to live, which makes it harder for them to become productive members of the community,” says David Singleton, executive director of PRAC. “This is particularly true in densely populated urban communities with a lot of schools.
Our clients are effectively banished from the community and from their families without any assessment of whether they actually pose a risk to children.”
Equally troubling is the unintended result the law would have on certain neighborhoods, according to Jeff Gamso, legal director of the ACLU.
“Along with violating various constitutional rights while failing to achieve its end, Senate Bill 5 also has the peculiar effect, in some of our communities, of creating sex offender housing zones in the middle of business and tourist districts,” he says.
Defendants named in the suit include Hamilton County Prosecutor Joseph Deters, Sheriff Simon Leis and Brigid Slaton, the Cincinnati regional administrator of the Adult Parole Authority.
Two days after CityBeat reported a serious error in the investigation of a case of alleged cyber crime, the prosecutor’s office agreed to a two-month delay in the trial. Jesse Tuttle of Camp Dennison had been scheduled for trial April 11 on charges of hacking into the sheriff’s Web site and possessing child pornography. But a CityBeat investigation showed the sheriff’s employee who executed a search warrant at Tuttle’s home isn’t even a police officer (see “Virtual Crime,” issue of April 7-12). That prompted defense attorney Chris McEvilley to move for suppression of evidence found on Tuttle’s computer. It also apparently moved prosecutors to agree to a delay; the new trial date is June 21.
Higher Office and Just Being High
Several hundred people turned out for the keynote speech at Global 3: Reclaiming Community and Environment, a conference last weekend at the University of Cincinnati (see “Take Back Your Self,” issue of April 6-12). A smaller crowd participated in a Downtown march against globalization of the economy. The third annual conference drew grassroots activists from as far as New York City, Arizona and Canada. Free concerts and vegan food were part of the conference.
After one popular workshop, a small group adjourned to admire the flowers in Burnet Woods and smoke marijuana. We’d name them, but a certain journalist also partook and asked that their identities be protected.
City Councilman Christopher Smitherman announced last week that he will not run for mayor this fall but will instead seek election to a second term. Smitherman, a member of the Charter Committee, has been vigorous in demanding reform of the Cincinnati Police Department — a stance that has angered the Fraternal Order of Police leadership and led to insults last year by then-County Prosecutor Mike Allen.
Smitherman said he decided against the mayor’s race because he likes being a councilman, not because of concern about whether he could win the higher office.
“As I continued to talk public policy, the political pundits speculated on whether or not I could win the mayor’s office,” he said in an April 7 statement. “My simple response to the pundits was, ‘No one thought that I had any chance to win a council seat in my first run.’ But Charter, my team and the community proved them all wrong.”
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This article appears in Apr 13-19, 2005.
