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The other day I received an invitation from Cleveland365 for an event tonight to discuss the City of Cleveland’s redevelopment. The invitation came with this opening caption:

You are invited to join Northeast Ohio’s Emerging Leaders at the Upcoming Professionals in the City Event as we ask: “Who’s behind the region’s renaissance?”

The panel for the event includes some of the region’s busiest developers including Bob Stark (for whom I once worked on the Crocker Park project), and while I think that folks like Bob (I’ll bet anybody who attends $50 that he’ll mention Budapest in his comments tonight) are working hard to improve our city - I couldn’t help but wonder:

What renaissance?

Excuse me for pointing out that the emperor has no clothes, but a city and county that is losing population at a rate slower only than the hurricane ravaged New Orleans and Kwame Kilpatrick’s Detroit is not experiencing a renaissance. I’d say it’s more like a (to continue with the middle ages analogies) plague.

I really had no intention about posting on this topic - even after I got Cleveland365’s invite (I get a lot of email from people who think I ‘m a little heavy on the criticism), but

then there was this Op/Ed, Building a hole near a clock with no hands, from Dick Feagler in today’s local fishwrap and I couldn’t contain myself. Feagler makes a good point (it’s not often that I agree with Cleveland’s favorite MSM curmudgeon) in that this city is an embarrassment to itself, much less to the visitors we seem obsessed with failing to impress upon arrival.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll continue to say it - building more housing is not the answer. Building more shopping malls is not the answer. The first step toward curing this plague is to recognize it (denying it by claiming a regional renaissance is not recognition). The next step is to accept that our region’s future is tied to our past, but not anchored by it. Industries of old remain, but are dying. We must continue to support those industries, but at the same time develop new ones that generate revenue (a non-profit by definition does not generate revenue… are you listening Cleveland Clinic) and create jobs. We will never be a city of 1 million people again - get over it and work to be the best city of 400,000 people.

A renaissance is the result of rebirth. Until this region chooses to move forward through businesses that create permanent jobs (we cannot build ourselves into economic prosperity - jobs come first, the need for new housing and places to shop comes later), we will continue to whither from our own self-induced plague.