Mayor Bibb Community Media-Only Roundtable on WOVU 4pm March 22

Neighborhood Media Foundation exists to strengthen existing neighborhood and community media, to foster new media outlets in underserved communities, to provide funding and expertise to overcome obstacles for small media outlets, and to build networks of assistance and collaboration between small media outlets anywhere in the world where there are communities. Our startup project, the convening and support of NCMA-CLE (Neighborhood & Community Media Association of Greater Cleveland), has helped spark or sustain a list of 15 (and growing!) new and longstanding ethnic and community media produced by and for community members in our focus area of Cleveland, Ohio. Our community-media-only roundtables with newsmakers are an example of our cooperative, collaborative work.

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Mayor Bibb Cleveland Southeast Side Town Hall 2023

Mayor Justin Bibb hosted a town hall meeting on Wednesday, November 8th, at 6:00 p.m. to discuss Southeast Side initiatives. The event featured a panel made up of key members of the mayor’s cabinet, including representatives from public safety, building and housing, and public works. The discussion was moderated by Richard T. Andrews, editor and publisher of The Real Deal Press, and president of NCMA-CLE, Cleveland’s ethnic and community media network. This was an opportunity for community members to learn about the upcoming plans for the Southeast Side and ask questions. Residents of the Southeast Side attended in person at Bethany Christian Church or watched the livestream on the City’s Facebook channel (video courtesy of TV20 Cleveland, distributed by Neighborhood Media Foundation).

Cleveland Community Media Producers Hold Roundtable with Mayor Justin Bibb

[Republished with permission from the Plain Press]

At the Neighborhood and Community Media Association of Greater Cleveland first press conference with Mayor Justin Bibb, time allowed each news outlet just one question for the mayor. Below are the questions from the members of the Neighborhood and Community Media Association [and other community media producers] and Mayor Justin Bibb’s responses.

Chuck Hoven, Plain Press

A number of years ago at Walton School I sat in a session with grade school kids and they were asked a what if question.  What if they could have whatever they wanted for afterschool programs at their school. And the kids came up with maybe seventy or eighty things within about a half an hour – everything from a sewing club to their own soccer field.

What I wanted to ask you about is the Comprehensive Extracurricular Activities Program. In the late 1990s the Cleveland Browns Stadium was given a tax exemption. The Cleveland Schools were promised that they would be made whole – they wouldn’t lose the tax dollars that would have come from the stadium. It was supposed to be two million dollars a year. And for the first decade it was $2 million dollars a year.

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The Marshall Project is a nonpartisan, nonprofit news organization that seeks to create and sustain a sense of national urgency about the U.S. criminal justice system. We have an impact on the system through journalism, rendering it more fair, effective, transparent and humane.

New support from the Gund Foundation to drive expansion of local investigative reporting

The Marshall Project, the Pulitzer prize-winning nonprofit newsroom covering criminal justice, will launch a news operation in Cleveland in 2022 with the support of the George Gund Foundation, among others, which announced a significant grant for the project this week.

The Cleveland news team will report on and expose abuses in Cuyahoga County’s criminal justice system, producing investigative, data and engagement journalism with the support of The Marshall Project’s national newsroom. The Cleveland news operation will serve local audiences — including those directly affected by the criminal justice system — who are often neglected or mischaracterized in media coverage.

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Medworks hosts FREE dental clinics Nov. 20 & 21

CLEVELAND – Medworks, a Cleveland-based, independent nonprofit organization offering 100 percent FREE medical, dental, vision, and mental health services to anyone in need, no qualifications, no question asked is hosting two dental clinics this weekend. 

The clinic takes place:

Saturday November 20 

9a.m – 2 p.m. 

Care Alliance Central Campus

2916 Central Avenue, Cleveland 44115

Extractions only

Saturday & Sunday November 20 & 21 

9a.m – 2 p.m. 

NEON Southeast Health Center

13301 Miles Avenue, Cleveland 44105

Extractions & Cleanings only

Appointments are required and limited. You can make an appointment online at www.medworksusa.org or by calling (216) 201-9325. 

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Local Coalition Raises Over $5.8M to Launch Nonprofit News Organization in Ohio

NEO Collaboration Conference on October 25, 2019 (photo by Stefanie Murray, The Center for Cooperative Media)

Independent newsroom in Cleveland to launch in 2022, producing daily, high-quality, community-oriented journalism as part of a new statewide network of newsrooms across Ohio

CLEVELAND – Nov. 9, 2021 –  A coalition of Cleveland-based organizations and the American Journalism Project are partnering to launch an independent, community-led, nonprofit newsroom serving Cleveland. The newsroom will be the first in a larger network of independent, local newsrooms across Ohio, as part of a new nonprofit effort called the Ohio Local News Initiative, which will aim to launch additional newsrooms across the state over time.

Cleveland’s newsroom, slated for launch in 2022, will produce high-quality journalism on a daily basis that centers community voices and lets residents help set the agenda for newsgathering. The newsroom will dramatically increase the volume of original, in-depth, non-partisan reporting in the region and support the efforts of Cleveland news outlets and community initiatives to make critical information available to all who need it—information will be available in numerous formats across multiple platforms, and will be free to access.

Residents will help set the newsroom’s priorities, through a community reporting model that will train and pay Clevelanders to report for, and gather requests, questions, and ideas from their communities. The program will begin in Central, and grow to serve more communities throughout Cleveland.

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Cleveland Consent Decree Public Meeting on Youth and Policing

The October Cleveland’s Consent Decree meeting focused on “Youth and Policing.”

By Rich Weiss, for Neighborhood & Community Media Association of Greater Cleveland

The Neighborhood and Community Media Association of Greater Cleveland is providing monthly reports on a series of community conversations about the 2015 Consent Decree negotiated between the US Department of Justice and the City of Cleveland regarding the policies and practices of the Cleveland Police Department.

“This question comes from a fellow student here at Tri-C. He asks in what ways can the policies instated by the Consent Decree be proactive rather than just reactive?”

“Based on research, it was discovered that police officers may hold unconscious biases against minority youth and make assumptions about them based on their age, their race, their dress style, appearance, and other parameters—sometimes Black folks look older than their age. My question is how do we practically reconcile this unhealthy sentiment while ensuring it’s a saner, a safer, and a happy society?”

“Do you believe the Cleveland Consent Decree has prepared police officers to carry out their tasks safely and effectively in such a unique time?”

“What things specifically are being done to have officers engaging and becoming more relatable to the community?”

“Can you file a complaint with the department if they feel like they’re they have an encounter with the officer that was inappropriate?”

“How do Cleveland Police Officers feel about what has been happening, for example last year, and then the overall police brutality, and what steps are you taking to make sure that these things do not happen in the city of Cleveland?”

These were among the questions asked by three Scholars of Cuyahoga Community College (Tri-C) Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Scholars Academy during the last conversation held online seeking public input on Cleveland’s Consent Decree. The October meeting focused on “Youth and Policing.”

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Cleveland Consent Decree Public Meeting on Community Involvement

By Rich Weiss, for Neighborhood & Community Media Association of Greater Cleveland

The Neighborhood and Community Media Association of Greater Cleveland (NCMA-CLE) is providing monthly reports on a series of community conversations about the 2015 Consent Decree negotiated between the US Department of Justice and the City of Cleveland regarding the policies and practices of the Cleveland Police Department.

“On a scale of 1 to 10, what percentage of the Consent Decree [is] considered to be completed? 10 percent, 30 percent, 70 percent?”

“Do you think the Community Police Commission (CPC) should play a more significant role with enforcement power? And are there any down sides to shifting disciplinary enforcement power from the Chief of Police?”

“Why should Clevelanders believe that the CPD can police itself and its behavior without significant oversight from citizens, since we’ve had two federal probes and we still are underneath a Consent Decree beyond its five-year deadline?”

These were among the questions being asked and answered during the monthly conversations held online about the workings of Cleveland’s Consent Decree. The September meeting focused on the “Cleveland Police Commission and Citizen Involvement.”

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Community meeting on consent decree to focus on CDP search and seizure practices

By Rich Weiss, Neighborhood & Community Media Association of Greater Cleveland

The Cleveland Consent Decree mandates that the City of Cleveland Division of Police conduct all investigatory stops, searches, and arrests fairly and respectfully as part of an effective overall crime prevention strategy that considers community values.

How well they are discharging that mandate is the subject of the next community conversation in the series of discussions jointly sponsored by United Way of Greater Cleveland and the Cleveland NAACP.

The next meeting in the series is this Wednesday, August 11 at 6:00 p. The theme will be Search and Seizure. The public is invited and encouraged to attend these sessions to help in the monitoring process.

To attend, ask questions or voice your concerns, register for any of the four remaining Consent Decree public meetings by visiting unitedwaycleveland.org.

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