Toledo not a finalist in All American City Contest
20 Jun 2009
This in yesterday via e-mail:
All America Cities Announced
The judges stated this was the toughest competition in years. Toledo won by competing hard, putting on an outstanding final performance and by being a participant in the 60th Annual All America City competition.
Unfortunately, Toledo did not finish in the Top 10, but Toledo can be proud of the Toledo Team who represented Toledo in a truly All American fashion.
Toledo Mayor Carty Finkbeiner commented: “Our presentation was great, but so were 28 others. Everyone who participated is a winner.”
Could it be because of any of the following reasons?
a. Overgrown grass on interstates, parks
b. Brain Drain
c. Eyesores like Showcase Cinemas Secor/Northtowne Sq., Fiberglass Tower, (need I say more?)
d. Crumbling infrastructure i.e. Secor, Talmadge, downtown.
e. Did I say trash and overgrown weeds/grass?
f. 1.6 police officers per 1000 residents
g. countless abandoned strip malls
h. An interstate sign on I-75 proclaiming “Toledo Pride” that looks like a 2nd grader made it
i. For Sale and For Rent signs gracing the landscape
j. A community that cannot even support less than 3 star restaurants like “Champps” and Smokey Bones
k. gang fights/teen problems at what once used to be our best shopping center (Franklin Park)
l. the wasteland known now as “the Marina District”
m. CitiFest
o. Cosi taking up prime waterfront real estate.
p. Party in the park????????????
q. Where are the floating docks?
r. Pot holes
I am getting depressed… I will stop
Note: I commute 53 miles to live here because I love this city and have “Toledo Pride” I am embarrassed though even when friends come here from Cincinnati, Dayton, and Chicago because they all seem to have the same opinion of Toledo. It is based solely on their initial visual perception. We all need to take care of this place. That is Pride.
June 20th, 2009 at 10:04 amOnce again, the City focusing on something that has no positive impact. Toledo won the award in 1998. Anyone want to explain how that award helped create jobs, improve education, stop flight to the suburbs, fix the roads, etc?
June 20th, 2009 at 11:01 amThanks for trying, Carty.
June 20th, 2009 at 11:11 amFor what, embarrassing all of the
June 20th, 2009 at 11:42 amCitizens of Toledo??
Maybe this is Carty’s strategy
* Deaf people near the airport
* Blind in the city
June 20th, 2009 at 11:49 amOnly a fool would be stupid enough to present Toledo as All America City, besides all of the other reasons. The ultra lefty and union dominance of the society that creates a anti-business climate is un-American.
June 20th, 2009 at 12:30 pmWell, I can assure you, the timing of the media broadcast of the “ticketgate” fiasco, which made local news here btw, sucked if they were hoping nobody would see that stunt on their morning news in Tampa.
June 20th, 2009 at 2:43 pmLISA, PLEASE READ POST NUMBER 6, AND YOU ASK ME TO LEAVE HIM ALONE….(Admin edit)
June 20th, 2009 at 4:49 pmMichael, he is allowed to express his opinion, you are allowed to disagree with his opinion, BUT neither one of you needs to make it personal against each other.
That’s what I’ve asked you and others to refrain from, attacking the person rather than disagreeing with the opinion…
June 20th, 2009 at 4:55 pmNot Again is anti-labor?
Hey Mike? News Flash, buddy, but it’s the taking advantage of opportunity the unions excersized that put most of these financial failures of the automakers where it is.
Business will prosper when prices come down and taxes drop.
Because the unions failed to excerize restraint and instead pillaged and plundered to squeeze these companies dry, instigated the flocking of business to places where unions cannot go, yet sacrificed quality because of it.
but I think it’s cool that you exhibit such violent tendencies over someone excersizing logic and common sense.
By the way, Mikey, arent Madoff and Stanford Democrats?
June 20th, 2009 at 5:09 pmNA-
Your post is totally accurate. The unions in Toledo have a choke-hold on the business community and development…
It’s a damn shame, too. Toledo used to have so much more going for it.
June 20th, 2009 at 5:10 pmI don’t think you can blame the unions, there are actually more people in the City of Toledo that are not union workers. People will always strive to get power and control, that’s human nature. However, if people continue to sit on the sidelines and allow others to have the power, the control and not get actively involved in the political process, not necessarily candidates but at a party level or even at a minimum as informed active voters? Then those who are willing to abdicate the power and the decisions are really the ones to blame.
June 20th, 2009 at 5:17 pmLisaRenee wrote:
I don’t think I have responded to anything that idiot has said in weeks lisa. Your statement below is total bullshit and completely biased. To allow his worthless comment is entirely hypocritical on your part.
“BUT neither one of you needs to make it personal against each other.”
June 20th, 2009 at 5:27 pm-
June 20th, 2009 at 5:33 pmConsidering the months where the baiting continued after I asked for it to stop? I disagree, you have stopped addressing him directly until a few moments ago; but you do write things that you know he will react to that are at times not even related to the topic to the point where you and he are the main two that I have to repeatedly edit.
I’m also tired of taking up posts on the blog related to either one of you. It’s got nothing to do with the topic at hand so I suggest from now on? You email me.
His comment however was inappropriate about the cane, that was not the original comment, and will be edited, which you could have easily ignored, and instead? You didn’t…
June 20th, 2009 at 5:33 pmLisaRenee wrote:
Well you obviously had no intention of deleting it until I responded.
June 20th, 2009 at 5:40 pmAgain, wrong, it was not the comment that showed up in my email so I didn’t see it had been changed until you pointed it out.
June 20th, 2009 at 5:43 pmMaybe I got in way after it started,
June 20th, 2009 at 6:35 pmbut I guess I do not understand the
problem with each other or do they
actually know each other??
Sue, I’d rather we attempt to return to the actual topic, but neither man knows each other, they are just politically opposite and have a difficult time staying on topic.
June 20th, 2009 at 7:06 pmHow much did this venture cost the City?
Please don’t say, all volunteers with donated money. How many who went were paid City employees who rehearsed on City time or was Carty the only one?
June 20th, 2009 at 9:18 pmDid the mayor call the judges “fatso” after we lost? Just joking, all you Carty fans. I’m assuming one or more of the judges was fat.
June 20th, 2009 at 9:56 pmMichael, your A-R list was on point. I am so glad your last mention was “Pot holes”. I have a bad tire and too lazy to get a new one. I have to put air in it three times a week. We all know air is not free and at a rate of $.75 per visit I could have had a new tire along time ago. How can our city even be on the top 100 list? We had a riot that ended up on CNN. There are people moving to the “burbs” to “get the hell out of dodge”. When I think of a “All American City” it is not Toledo, but I do have the song in my head “All American, All American Coach”. They sell RVs and they don’t even reside in Toledo. It’s ok. I go to watch the Pistons play and they don’t play in Detroit but Auburn Hills. I have imagined Carty with a screen in the back ground trying to convice people to “Pick me, Pick me. The screen would have footage of police officers choking a kid until he passes out, homes being left vacant and city pools with no kids. Getting a parking ticket for parking in your own drive way that is not cemented. I too can go on and on but it is depressing me. Our All American Toledo Pride got tossed out with the babys bath water.
June 21st, 2009 at 8:05 amMine, and possibly many others,vision
June 21st, 2009 at 9:15 amof the All American City no longer
exits. It is being redefined and will
never be what it was in the past.
Sue,
I am with ya! It is fading fast…People that don’t want to help themselves and want free handouts, will never have pride in anything they own or are a part of. Midwestern cities are setting the stage of what is coming. I just spent the day (Saturday) at the Wright Patterson Air Force Museum in Dayton. I saw an interesting fixture next to a good piece of the former Berlin wall. It was a car for the “common people”. It was about the size of a Mini Cooper, (the original, not the new version) and it was a god awful piece of machinery. Guess what? It was developed and manufactured by the communist government. Hmmm, government making cars?? Where have I heard this?
June 21st, 2009 at 9:50 amThe judges must have actually visited Toledo and didn’t go soley by Carty’s presentation, which probably featured mostly the ‘burbs anyway.
June 22nd, 2009 at 3:25 pm