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Early last week, in defense of his decision to boot the Marines, Carty barked to the media or in a speech, "Toledoans first!" Carty reiterated that sentiment a few days later in a press release when he said :

"Some Toledoans disagree with my priority to protect Toledoans first and foremost. That is the Mayor’s job."

Last month, Carty gave a reason why Toledo will not financially support the Lucas County Improvement Corporation :

"We can't be solving everything going on around us. We've got to take care of the city's basic needs."

Here is an excerpt from a Feb 13, 2008 Lee Conklin interview with Carty where Carty said :

"There are some people that I received what I would consider to be threatening telephone calls from around the United States of America who probably have never done in their local communities anywhere close to the amount of work that I have put into Toledo, Ohio to help make this a safer, cleaner, healthier, better community."

From the NBC 24 story that oldsendbrdy linked to :

Toledo city workers damage the home of a single mom, struggling to make ends meet. Now, she says, the city wants her to fix the damage. Ten days ago, city crews leveled a home on Elizabeth Street, right by Savage Park. When they did, falling debris, like bricks and wood, hit Glenita Kennney's home damaging the roof and destroying the fence. But, when she asked the city to fix the damage workers caused, she says, the law department told her, she was out of luck.

Nice attitude by the so-called leaders of the Most Liveable Community In North America towards one of its citizens.

If the person's home was damaged directly or indirectly by city workers, then I assume Carty will back up his words with actions and properly repair the person's home.

posted by jr on Feb 20, 2008 at 12:54:00 pm     #

"...the manager of the department assuring us that they city has “immunity”

Someone may want to advise that manager to read Chapter 2, Section 8 of the Toledo Charter.

posted by GraphicsGuy on Feb 20, 2008 at 02:14:18 pm     #

The manager may be right:
"(d) Nothing in this section shall be construed as waiving the City's defense of governmental, statutory, or common law immunity in any action brought against the City for damages based upon personal injury, death or property damage caused by the negligence of officers, agents or employees of the City."

The only thing I can find in Chapter 2, Section 8 is that the city has the right to "(b) To sue and be sued." Maybe you saw something I didn't.

What has happened has certainly caused me to question more the reason to pay vote for taxes. This could happen to any of us, I suppose. Our car could be damaged in a street cave. Comments on the link above at NBC 24 included one from a man whose son's car fell when the street caved in due to a faulty sewer line. He didn't receive any compensation from the city even though his car was badly damaged. Instead of paying taxes I might want to save the money for when my car is damaged because the city isn't able to maintain its infrastructure.

posted by oldsendbrdy on Feb 20, 2008 at 04:31:26 pm     #

This is the comment alluded to above on the NBC 24 comments to the post:

"Some tome ago my son was stopped at a stop sign and the street fell in under his car. It was a large sewer broken and washed out a hole aprox. 6 feet deep and 12 feet on diameter. His car was 90% in the hole and suffered damage from the fall and the removal.
The city said the same thing, we are not liable, you can't sue us !!" This certainly makes me think twice about paying taxes that the city doesn't use to maintain infrastructure anyways.

posted by oldsendbrdy on Feb 20, 2008 at 04:34:18 pm     #

Feb 19, 2008 WNWO story titled Reservist vs. city of Toledo, part 2 :

City, Streets, Bridges, and Harbor manager Kristen Cousino originally said, it looks like water caused the damage to the roof. Until Kenney pointed out the roof was recently repaired.

Cousino also didn't have much to say about the dangerous rubble that covered sidewalks, making them impassable. And she couldn't explain why crews demolished the home the way they did.

Bottom line, Cousino says, if the city accidentally damages your property, you have to pay for it .

posted by jr on Feb 20, 2008 at 05:55:04 pm     #

I missed paragraph (d).

My bad.

posted by GraphicsGuy on Feb 21, 2008 at 08:14:36 am     #

Feb 20, 2008 WNWO story titled City agrees to fix home it damaged

City officials said Wednesday that they would fix the home of a Central Toledo mother after it was damaged by city demolition crews tearing down a neighboring apartment building.

On Tuesday an NBC24 viewer confronted Toledo Mayor Carty Finkbeiner at a Old West End neighborhood meeting. The mayor said if city crews damaged Glenita's home during the demolition, then the city needed to step up and make the necessary repairs. "They told me they will rectify the situation. It won't be Wednesday or Thursday, but they will fix everything," Glenita said. "I'm very pleased and very grateful to NBC24 and everybody for supporting me."

NBC24 first introduced Glenita Kenney to you earlier this week. She said city crews demolished the apartment building next door to her home and damaged her roof and fence in the process. Kenney told NBC24, the city refused to pay, saying she is responsible for any damage the city causes. NBC24 checked into it and we were told that is true. The city can damage your property, and not pay to have it fixed. "Occasionally, we will, out of the goodness of our hearts, repair a fence," said Kristen Cousino, from Toledo's Streets, Bridges, and Harbor department.

So the city taking responsibility for the damage it caused to this person's home is probably a one-time-thing because it made the news.

NBC24 did speak with the mayor's interim spokeswoman. We wanted to know whether the city would pay for damage crews do to other homes in the future. She said, she wasn't sure, but it would probably be handled on a case by case basis. She added the whole issue is very complicated.

What's complicated about it? If the city damages a home, then the city boneheads need to repair it.

NBC24 also found out that Toledo is one city that has its own demolition crews. Several communities including Columbus, Maumee and Perrysburg say they contract out demolitions with insured, bonded contractors, so the city isn't laible for any damage.

On a somewhat related note, this Feb 21, 2008 WNWO story titled City of Toledo leaves debris

Neighbors in a South Toledo neighborhood are upset that the city demolished an apartment building weeks ago as part of a city program, but the debris has never been cleaned up.

Nine weeks ago, Toledo Mayor Carty Finkbeiner held a press conference to announce the city was demolishing the 300th vacant house that year--an old apartment building on Broadway across the street from Danny Thomas Park. At the time, city leaders lauded the achievement as a way of cleaning up Toledo's more troubled neighborhoods. But as NBC24 discovered Thursday, the debris is still there.

"Yeah, it's quite an eyesore, you know.", said neighbor Nicholas Wright. "There's nails sticking up and little kids can get hurt. And there's a park right over there. It's ridiculous. They should do something about this. They really should."

We tracked down the mayor to ask him about the mound of debris. He wouldn't answer any of our questions. No one from the city department of Streets, Bridges and Harbor returned NBC24's calls for comment.

posted by jr on Feb 23, 2008 at 07:25:51 am     #

Feb 22, 2008 Toledo Blade story :

For several hours during the day, the telephone voice mail greeting for the city's purchasing hot line was, "Carty Finkbeiner is a complete moron."

Finally, an honest comment by the city.

Audio of the voice mail.

The message was changed about 2 p.m. to start with the city's usual telephone greeting: "Thank you for calling Toledo, the most liveable city."

Just watch out for the mounds of debris near demolished homes. Seems the number one priority is downtown Toledo at the expense of the rest of the city where most Toledoans live. Make a small area of downtown Toledo look nice and give the false impression that all is well with the entire city.

posted by jr on Feb 23, 2008 at 07:42:34 am     #

You all should be glad the city can't demolish buildings "fast enough". They're ONLY doing these demos to support property prices. If they could manage it, they'd condemn and destroy homes right out from under people who are still living in them well enough ... again, just to support prices. Prices for homes in Toledo are too high, considering the economy is collapsing. Homes in Toledo should be priced to about twice the income of ONE wage-earner, considering how little the future holds for us.

posted by GuestZero on Feb 23, 2008 at 01:15:33 pm     #

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