When police came to arrest Sowell, they found the first bodies that have focused international attention on his Imperial Avenue home.  This morning, surrounded by a phalanx of county deputies, Sowell pleaded not-guilty to the seven charges against him, stemming from the September incident.

Judge John P. O’Donnell set bond at one million dollars.  That’s in addition to a five million-dollar bond already in place against Sowell for murder charges.  Claiming a lack of financial resources, Sowell was assigned an attorney.  A pre-trial hearing is scheduled for next week. 

In the meantime, the FBI plans to use thermal imaging equipment at the Sowell property over the weekend to search for further evidence connected to the eleven bodies discovered so far. 

Grace Missionary pastor Ivory Jones was one of many ministers present who tried to help the mourners come to terms with her death, allegedly at the hands of accused serial killer Anthony Sowell.

REV JONES:  Telacia’s life was cut short by a selfish, sick individual.  She was robbed of her dignity.  But, we’re here with dignity to give her dignity.

To the left of the pulpit, a line of nurses sat along the wall to tend to any mourners who were overwhelmed with emotion.  Pastor Jones noted that Telacia’s mother, Inez, started hyper-ventilating during the service and had to be taken to a hospital.  Afterwards, family friend Rose Burt recalled that there was a strong bond between Inez Fortson and her adopted daughter.

ROSE BURT: Over the years, Telacia did what most young kids do --- they give you problems, they give you joy, but she stuck in there with her.  That’s what parents do.

“Family” was a strong theme at the three-hour service.  And it was announced that area churches will extend the concept by adopting the families of the Imperial Avenue victims, and helping the with funeral expenses.

Tayeh: He seemed like regular. He was a very nice man very quiet he never said anything never bothered anybody. He was actually from a very nice family. I mean I’m shocked because I know the whole family I know his father I knew his grandfather I knew his mother in law and now I’m shocked what he did.

When a murderer is exposed, neighbors will often wonder at how this could have happened. He seemed so normal, they say, but his actions were the act of a mad man. 

West: Society tends to believe what serial killers do is crazy.

Dr. Sara West is a forensic psychiatrist at the Cuyahoga County Jail. She says it’s not that simple.

West: Insanity or the presence of a severe mental illness is actually very rare in a serial killer because that requires a great deal of organization.

West says it’s likely that in a case like Anthony Sowell’s, the defendant will plead not guilty by reason of insanity, as did the infamous serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer. But Dahmer was not deemed insane, because the law is very specific and narrow in the way it defines insanity.  J. Dean Carro teaches law at the University of Akron, and he’s worked with several defendants who have pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. 

Carro: The legal concept is a person who lacks responsibility cannot be punished for the crime.

Basically, pleading insanity in a court of law means the assailant doesn’t know the difference between right and wrong. Carro says the legal system treats the mentally insane as it treats children.

Carro: A civilized society does not punish individuals who are irresponsible. We only punish individuals who have the understanding of what he or she has done. If that person is insane, they lack that understanding.

Only 1 percent of defendants in felony cases nationally plead not guilty by reason of insanity, and in Ohio fewer than 2 in 10 of those are actually deemed insane by the courts. That’s partly because it can be extremely difficult to prove that someone was insane at the time of the offense. Plus, Dr. Sara West says it gets even more difficult to prove insanity in the case of a serial killer because they typically seek to cover their tracks which indicates they know what they are doing is wrong.

West: The serial killer has to be able to plan out a crime so that he or she won’t be caught when committing the crime and do this over and over again and sometimes do this for years. Mental illness tends to cause disorganization and dysfunction in a way that doesn’t really allow this to happen.

So, if serial killers usually aren’t crazy in a legal sense, how are they classified? West, the forensic psychiatrist, says serial killers often suffer from personality disorders, diseases commonly known as sociopathy or psychopathy. That pretty much means they lack empathy – they have no appreciation of another person’s feelings…and unlike other mental illnesses, there’s no treatment that can change that.

West: The idea that the person with antisocial personality disorder doesn’t care makes it very difficult for them to engage in any kind of therapeutic relationship, and no medications have been shown to be effective.

In Ohio, personality disorders are excluded from the legal definition of insanity. This is just fine with many of Anthony Sowell’s neighbors, including Andre Matthews.

Matthews: I don’t think he’s insane I think he really understood what he was doing so I don’t think an insanity plea is warranted in this, because I don’t believe he’s crazy at all.

If he is found guilty of these crimes, some of his neighbors say letting him go to a mental institution would be letting him off easy. 

BRAY:  They told her there was no use of doing it because she was grown and she would come home when she’s ready.

Bray says its really hard for her to understand why the police didn’t do more and why Sowell’s immediate neighbors didn’t notice all these women going into his house and never coming out.

It’s stories like these that keep Lawrence Boone up at night.  He’s pastor of a church in the neighborhood.

BOONE:  I do feel a bit of remorse.  What could I have done; what could we have done to save some lives.

In a way Pastor Boone’s introspection is a bit odd given that for the last ten years his Covenant Community Church hosted monthly meetings between the community and the 4th District Police to try and air out fears and concerns about crime.  Unfortunately, says Boone, not a lot of people attended.

Ronnie Dunn, an Urban Studies professor at Cleveland State, says long-standing mistrust of the police by African-Americans is one of several social conditions that made this area ripe for a serial killer to operate in.

DUNN:  36% percent of the residents of that neighborhood are home-owners; 64% are renters.  So there’s a high mobility rate and transience in that neighborhood.  Those long-term residents are elderly; they go in their homes and stay to themselves for fear of retaliation and that is how Anthony Sowell was able to commit these crimes in the prolific manner he did. 

Another factor, Dunn says, that’s causing a lot of second-guessing is that the area right around Sowell’s home was known to be saturated with drug dealings.  Several of the women Sowell allegedly preyed on had drug addictions.  So, Sound of Ideas host Dan Moulthrop asked Blaine Griffin, Cleveland’s Director of Community Relations, why the drug dealing wasn’t more aggressively pursued.

GRIFFIN: It’s the community’s responsibility to make sure they keep government in check and that government is accountable for what goes on and that’s the kind of support that we ought to have.
MOULTHROP:  Ok.  Let me ask you this though.  If you have a comunity where you know the culture of that comunity can no longer take care of itself, at what point is it the government’s responsibility, the police responsibility to go in there and change the dynamics?
GRIFFIN:  The police department will always respond to those types of situations but whenever something goes on on our street the families are out there and visable, and if we have to call the police and deal with them, they respond and the reason is they know in our neighborhood we’re not having it.
MOULTHROP:  Are you saying if there’s a no snitching culture in a neighborhood then it’s there own fault if there’s drugs and criminal behavior there?
GRIFFIN:  I did not say that.  What I said is there has to be more street clubs, more cooperation between the citizens, more people attending our police com relations committee. 

Griffin promised again that all the police department actions and procedures will be reviewed in the course of the investigation and that there’s little doubt “we could have done more.” He also pointed out that this part of Cleveland is a “weed and seed area” where federal grants are specifically targeted at weeding out crime and funding social service programs to help prevent crime and the conditions that cause it.  David Molpus, 90.3

ADA AVERYHART: And that bothers me.

Longtime resident Ada Averyhart says it’s just one of a number of longstanding disconnects between the community and city government.  She maintains there’s a distinct impression of indifference to neighborhood needs --- in everything from policing to housing inspections.  She sees that symbolized by the presence of an abandoned elementary school that takes up an entire block, just a few houses down from here --- a potential magnet for criminal activity.

ADA AVERYHART: That should not just be standing there. This wouldn’t happen in Beachwood or west side Lakewood.

Looking to spur more action from City Hall to some community concerns, a small group of protestors staged a demonstration downtown, yesterday afternoon.  Kathy Wray Coleman said it’s going to take more than candlelight vigils to ease the anger.

KATHY WRAY COLEMAN: We’re calling on Cleveland mayor Frank Jackson and City Council to adopt ordinances that address what’s going on in terms of missing persons.  We want an ordinance where they respond within a certain time, we want education and training for the police force to be more sensitive to these issues.

Area social service agencies have sprung into action to deal with other tensions and fears that may be bubbling below the surface.  At a community meeting at the Mt. Pleasant Library last night, the Cleveland Rape Crisis Center announced that a fulltime counselor will be stationed at the nearby Murtis Taylor Social Center to help area residents directly or indirectly impacted by the Anthony Sowell case.  In addition, a Shaker Heights-based family counseling group is setting up shop tomorrow in a Mt. Pleasant church. 

JACKSON: I know that everyone in here can identify with the family and victims. That all of us in our families, all of us including me, have someone who could have been there.

Jackson said the community must stay focused, and save questions about whether the police did enough for when the investigation is over.

Police Chief Michael McGrath urged families with missing persons to come forward, especially if they fit the profile of African American women between the ages of 21 and 60. And, he said police, government, clergy, and the public need to work together to stop this kind of tragedy from happening again. 

McGRATH: Across this nation, there’s an attitude out there that we have to adjust, and the only way we’re going to do that is to do it together.

REED: Is our system so broken that the health department could go out there and smell the stench… get a local owner try to clean it up. You have a sherrif’s office who goes. You have a police department. You have people that continue to tell you about this stench. Is the system so broken that we just say, callous, it’s just a stench…

And there’s another problem with the system, says Judy Martin, founder of Survivors/Victims of Tragedy. All the different police districts are so busy, she says, they can’t always coordinate with other departments to track missing persons.

MARTIN: We need a centralized missing persons department so that there are three or four, even five, detectives dedicated to working with families of missing persons.

Many on the show raised questions about of double standards. Did police pay enough attention to this community and the issues on this street? Caller Elizabeth from Lakewood wondered if the response would be different in the suburbs.

ELIZABETH: What would happen if three women went missing from the community that I live in of Lakewood or a near suburb like Westlake or Rocky River? And, I was just astounded because this would never happen. This wouldn’t have happened this way if it was another community.

West Side resident Mike thinks it’s more about what’s expected in an area.

MIKE: People shouldn’t make such a race and class issue out of it, which I believe is a misconception. I think it’s more a high crime vs low crime areas. When they talk, if it happens in Westlake, well of course it’ll be more news in Westlake because there’s not as much crime.

TOBIN: This is not a horrible area.

That’s Plain Dealer metro editor Mike Tobin, who says there’s a misconception about the Mt. Pleasant neighborhood where Sowell lived.

TOBIN: This is not the poorest area in Cleveland. It’s working class, but it has homes, it has people, it has families. This home has been in the Sowell family for decades.

And there were businesses in the area, including the now-famous Ray’s Sausage, which many people assumed was the source of those horrible smells. Councilman Reed says after the news came out about Sowell, he went to apologize.

REED: Before I could get another word out, he knew exactly what I was apologizing for. Because he knows for two years, I’ve been on his back to clean up this stench. If you go out there now, there’s a hole in the sidewalk that’s been there for two years. And he said, councilman, I’ve spent over $10,000 on new sewers, new pipes, bleach, to get this out. And it wasn’t him.

Now, that we know the truth about what happened on Imperial Ave in Cleveland, Tobin thinks this story says a lot about our communities. 

TOBIN:  To just look at it as a police response issue narrows it far too much. This is about the breakdown of families. This is about the breakdown of services. This is about the relationship between the police and the community.

Council President Martin Sweeney told assembled Third Ward residents that they should not feel singled out that the murders happened in their area.

MARTIN SWEENEY: “This is so senseless; it is disturbing. This could have happened on any street in the City of Cleveland, and we are all standing with you as a council, as a community. And we have to talk about right now… the healing, the mourning.”

Other members spoke, but then as they tried to take questions from reporters, the group was shouted at by angry residents, who accused the city of ignoring the victims because of their backgrounds. As councilman Kenneth Johnson tried speaking, another resident began demanding to know why Mayor Frank Jackson was not at the scene.

BYSTANDER: “It’s a concern in the community, and I understand that he don’t do it, but at this time - it’s not about politics, it’s about making your presence, to let the people of this city know that you can care.”

Sweeney and Johnson answered just a few of the protests before leaving the podium - and a neighborhood that is growing increasingly angry over the deaths of 11 women.

At a press conference this morning, more than three dozen Cleveland clergy - members of the Mount pleasant Ministerial Alliance - consoled families of victims and neighborhood residents traumatized by the events of the last week. 

The group called for called for an independent investigation into procedural aspects of the case, and urged families of missing women to supply police with their DNA - for testing.

Rodney Maiden, Senior Pastor of Providence Baptist Church, said the community is determined nor to let murder and other crimes to define it. 

REVEREND RODNEY MAIDEN “And this is no time for us or you to point fingers or blame at anyone other than the one who committed this vicious act, and he needs our prayers as well. (Amens follow.....)”

Reverend Eugene Ward is the Auxiliary Bishop of the Greater Peace Church of Deliverance, praised the city and the police department, but called on congregations to stay vigilant. 

REVEREND EUGENE WARD “There’s a demon in this community. And we who are in the faith-based community and those who sit in the pews must do everything that we can to fight the demons that continue to plague our community.”

The Alliance has planned a Sunday evening prayer vigil (6:00pm) - to be hosted by the Mount Olive Baptist Church.

Rick Jackson, 90.3.

ED TOMBA: In 24 years in law enforcement, we’ve never seen anything like it.

Officials have now identified one of the 11 victims --- 53-year-old Tonia Carmichael, who has been missing for about a year.  After police informed the Carmichael family, Cuyahoga County Coroner Frank Miller provided some of the first forensic details of her murder and that of the others.

FRANK MILLER: They are all African American women. 7 died of ligature strangulation. 1 - Manual strangulation. 2- undetermined / 1- ongoing autopsy. A case of strangulation or homicidal violence.

Miller says some of these crimes may date back as far as 2005, the year when Anthony Sowell returned to his home neighborhood after serving a 15-year sentence for rape. Sowell’s neighbors stood across the street from his white duplex, watching TV crews from around the world setting up cameras and satellite dishes.  Darnissa Wiley says, until recent weeks, there was no reason to suspect what was going on in the house.

DARNISSA WILEY: He had a block party in the summertime. He barbequed for the whole neighborhood. People were going in his house, in his backyard, and no one knew that kind of behavior was going on.

Despite the fact that the a strong stench hung in the air, she never tied it to the house or suspected it was decomposing bodies. Some neighbors blamed it on a nearby sausage factory. Charles Sharp says he figured it was a dead dog that had been hit by a car.  He went downtown to City Hall to complain, but says nothing ever came from it.

CHARLES SHARP: When you smell that odor in the neighborhood and you don’t get nobody’s attention on it, what can you do?

That report to authorities is one of several that remain unexplained. Did officials investigate? When? If not, why not?  Some residents have complained that they had no idea that Sowell was a registered sexual predator and that police were slow to investigate reports of missing women in the neighborhood. That’s understandable, according to Dr. David Licate who directs the Criminal Justice Program at the University of Akron, He says the sheer number of registered predators living in the mainstream population is hard to keep tabs on.

DAVID LICATE: It takes a lot of human resources to do that. Obviously today budgets are not in the favor of law enforcement or any other business enterprise in terms of hiring.

The sheriff’s office handled Sowell’s probation check-ups but whether the Cleveland police were aware that he was a convicted sex offender or when they knew is still unclear.  Ada Averyhart, who lives a couple of blocks from the crime scene says city officials bear part of the blame for being slow to react to the recent events in her neighborhood, but she also worries about a culture of silence that pervades these streets.

ADA AVERYHART: Once upon a time this was a viable neighborhood. Everybody got along. But now, everybody’s going their own way. They just don’t talk anymore.  Whatever happens, happens.

Local councilman Zack Reed has organized a gathering of area ministers this morning at 10:00 for what’s billed as a community meeting to pray for healing and to seek justice.  Reed is also calling for public hearings to get answers to the many unanswered questions about this tragedy. 

The search continues, but Cleveland Police Chief Michael McGrath says he hopes there are no more victims.

McGRATH: Do I believe there’s more bodies? I don’t know at this time. What we’re going to do is search the property until we’re totally satisfied it’s totally clean.

Police have already charged Sowell with five counts of rape and aggravated murder. Sowell is a convicted rapist who served 15 years in prison for that crime. Now, many are already asking why it took police so long to find these victims. 

Some claimed the police and city housing inspectors didn’t follow-up on leads.

VOICE ONE: The inspectors need to come in and inspect every single solitary vacant house --- starting with this area, starting in this ward.  Hold them accountable. 

Others cast blame on community members who didn’t report the suspicious activities of Anthony Sowell, who is being held on suspicion that he kidnapped, raped and strangled the victims.

VOICE TWO: If we as black men was standing in the gap, like we’re supposed to be, this would have not happened.  There ain’t no where in the world that you’re going to get some vagrant…some bum…walk up and down your street and terrorize your community. 

Vigil organizer Judy Martin said there was plenty of blame to go around.

JUDY MARTIN: We need everybody’s eyes and ears.  Something like this is happening in plain sight.

After Martin lost her son to street violence 15 years ago, she started the organization Survivors/Victims of Tragedy.  She said one of the biggest frustrations for families is the difficulty of getting and giving information.  One solution, she suggested, would be to have a county-wide bureau that tracks missing people.

JUDY MARTIN: Because, as it is now, individual precincts handle missing persons cases.  If I was to get information today, who would I call?  And who will act on it?  You have to call all around to find out who has the case.  We need a centralized location.

Over the course of last night’s vigil, Shannon Mason watched as family members vented their anger over the disappearance of his mother, Michelle, from the neighborhood over a year ago.  Now, pending the coroner’s report, maybe there will be some answers.  Some closure.  He was having a hard time processing it all.

SHANNON MASON: I’m mad about it…and then, I’m deeply troubled about it.  I just want to know what happened to my mother --- that’s all I know for sure.

In our little corner of the world, John Kenley is best known for creating a legendary chain of summer theaters that brought big shows and Hollywood stars to small towns. The Kenley players ruled the midwest between 1957 and 1995, giving many a fledgling actor valuable experience from a master of the craft.

Back in February of 2007, Dee Perry caught up with the irrepressible impresario by phone from his home in Florida and he shared some of his career highlights, including a memorable stint with Al Jolson in the show Artists and Models in 1926.

FRANK JACKSON:
“It is what it is, and it’s pretty good; it’s a balanced budget. It’s no layoffs. Its no reductions in service. It is what it is, is a future for Cleveland. It is what it is - is all these things that make Cleveland great.”

Patmon, the former city councilman, shot back though - saying Cleveland has not seen the resurgence of other cities like Chicago, Philadelphia, and Pittsburgh—and he blamed poor leadership - and political gamesmanship.

BILL PATMON:
“So this is no game. It is the business of people’s lives. Yes, we are some imperfect people, working in an imperfect world, looking for perfect solutions. I believe the founders of this country did the same thing and that’s what I profess to do as a politician.”

The two candidates did agree on one ingredient necessary for Cleveland’s resurgence - establishing a “green” economy that can provide environmental and economic sustainability.

DAVE SHOUP:  They’re called replacement “gilts” --- a gilt would be a female that’s never had a litter of pigs. 

SOUND: door opens to sounds of pigs UP & UNDER

The dozens of gilts in this barn are just a portion of the 3000 pigs that make up the Shoup family swine operation that covers almost 23 hundred acres in Wayne, Ashland and Stark counties.  Most of the animals here are grouped in pens of 12 and, in a few days, Dave Shoup’s crew will walk a male pig through the barn to try to get the ladies aroused.

DAVE SHOUP: We’re going to take the boar through, and try to detect heat and see who’s receptive that day.  And the ones that we find, we’ll move down here and inseminate them.

What happens to female pigs once they are inseminated is at the core of this major battle between the farm industry and animal welfare advocates.  Most of the Shoup herd will spend their pregnancies roaming in indoor pens with other pigs, but some of them will be put into individualized stalls made from steel pipe that have just enough room for a 300 pound pig to move side to side a bit & back and forth a few feet.  The floor is slatted so that animal waste can fall through.  Dave Shoup says the enclosures protect pregnant females.  But, these so-called “gestation crates” have been condemned by the Humane Society of the United States. 

DAVE SHOUP:  HSUS would probably tell you that this animal is so tightly confined for his entire life and can’t do many things that he normally would do.  But, these animals in these stalls have fresh feed, fresh water, and their waste materials are removed through the concrete slats.  So, they have everything that they need. 

A sow at Shoup’s operation can spend as much as thirty days in the gestation crate; at many other farms though, the sows are confined for as much as three and a half months.  A major lobbying effort by the Humane Society convinced California voters, last November, to ban gestation crates and other tight livestock enclosures.  The group met with Ohio agribusiness officials this past February trying to persuade state farmers to support similar treatment measures here.  Instead, the farmers set out to head-off any Humane Society effort in Ohio.

The farmers fear that would force them to spend millions retrofitting their operations.  They got lawmakers to craft the ballot measure known as Issue 2 --- a constitutional amendment that would create an Ohio Livestock Care Standards Board.  This 13-member committee would regulate the treatment of farm animals… As we drive to another livestock barn, Dave Shoup says he’s not afraid of state scrutiny.

DAVE SHOUP: We know that we’d much rather have it in their hands than some outside organization come in here and just raise the emotions of people who really don’t know what goes on out here.

The Washington-based Humane Society argues that the Ohio Livestock Care Standards Board would be stacked with members favorable to agribusiness who would prevent meaningful animal treatment reform.
The Shoup family has farmed this country for more than a century.  The operation has tripled in size over the past decade or so.  Shoup, who is also a veterinarian, suspects some people might consider him a factory farmer.

DAVE SHOUP:  People use “factory farm” as a negative connotation to disrespect our industry, because they want the general public to think that, all you care about is making money.  You don’t care about the animals, you don’t care about the environment, your goal is to put pigs through what ever is needed, in order to kick out more pigs on the other side.  Well, farms don’t survive doing that. If you’re mean to them, if you’re crowding them, then they don’t eat, they don’t come in heat, they don’t breed, they don’t have good litters. 

SOUND: Soft squeal of piglets and the snorts of their mothers

As we step into a birthing barn, it’s apparent that the Shoups have animal husbandry down to a science.  There are rows of what’s known as “farrowing stalls”, where mothers lie on their sides, as suckling newborns get their nutrition under the warmth of a heat lamp.

DAVE SHOUP: Each sow gives birth to anywhere from 11-13 pigs.  We actually induce these sows to farrow at a certain time --- just like you can induce a woman to have a child the next day, we can induce these one afternoon to farrow the next afternoon. 

SOUND: truck door slams…engine starts…

DCB: Most every yard along these rural roads has a “Vote for Issue 2” sign on it. Shoup says that farmers, by their very nature, are independents who don’t like being told what to do.

DAVE SHOUP:  Years ago, the family farm was just kind of left alone; there weren’t many regulations for it.  As long as the product you produced was wholesome, nobody seemed to care.  Now, we’ve got people looking over our shoulders all the time. 

Still, Dave Shoup figures that an Ohio-based animal care standards board would weed out a few bad apples in the state and keep everybody honest.  But, what isn’t clear is: if you build it into the constitution, will there be enough legislative oversight to keep the Standards Board honest? 

Klegg: I mean we did physical work so we’re trying to find something that’s easier on our bodies. We’re getting older now, we’ve worked most…well I’ve worked most of my life in the factory and I’m real excited about getting out of the factory and doing something different.

…which is why they spent much of yesterday at an education and community expo in Twinsburg. The pair was laid off from General Electric’s Ravenna plant in May, and both are considering going back to school in a health-care related field, especially since the government will foot the bill with federal stimulus funds.

Wally Hoffer and Frank Tinus are handing out information on Stark State College. They’re regulars at these events.

Hoffer: Certainly individuals are out there understanding that education is a way to more opportunity and maybe a better lifestyle in the future.

And George Bentfeld, District Coordinator for the Ohio Department of Jobs and Family Services - which sponsored the event - says now is the time to gear up for a new career.

Bentfeld: We want to make sure they have all the training education opportunities they can before we turn the corner on this slight down turn and full production starts up because once production starts up it’s kind of too late you wanna get in there and you wanna work.

Healthcare was one of four industries heavily emphasized at the resource expo, alongside information technology, renewable energy, and advanced manufacturing jobs, all areas where local jobs are expected to grow in the next few years.

GARY THOMPSON: We ask where they live.  And when they give their address, it turns out they’re in the Township.  So, we say, “We’d love to help you, but you’re not in our jurisdiction.”

For the better part of two centuries, Olmsted Falls and Olmsted Township have been separate communities --- on paper.  But, they have more in common than just their names.  They already share the same school system, the same churches, the same zip code.  And in about three weeks, area residents will vote on the idea of taking that one step further --- the creation of a commission to study the idea of merging. For Township native Jeanine Kress, there are all sorts of reasons to merge.

JEANINE KRESS: Economies of scale would be one.  But, there are other issues, including clout in Washington and Columbus.  Being a bigger city, that could be a relevant issue. 

As it is, Olmsted Township residents have watched neighboring cities nibble away at them for years.  For instance, Berea was able to annex land along a major industrial corridor because the city offered landowners improved services and waterlines that the Township wasn’t able to provide.  Local historian Bruce Banks says that when they lost that land, they also lost revenue.

BRUCE BANKS: The tax base keeps shrinking, because you have less real estate tax, so it gets more and more challenging, the smaller you get. 

But, Banks says not everyone in Olmsted Township …population 10,500… is so sure that banding together with the Falls…population 8,000… will be to their benefit. 

BRUCE BANKS: Some of the people in the Township feel that their control of their destiny will be diluted if we become part of something bigger.

This isn’t the first time a merger between the Township and Olmsted Falls has been proposed.  Several previous attempts have failed to win over the public but more may be willing to at least consider the idea this time.  Longtime Township trustee Karen Straka has opposed past merger efforts, but says she won’t stand in the way of residents who would like to see the issue studied.

KAREN STRAKA: I support the people’s right to vote on the issue, and I’ll help them in anyway I can, but I don’t feel there’s an overall financial benefit for a merger to take place.

Olmsted Falls mayor Bob Blomquist is more upbeat about the prospects.  By conducting a merger study, he thinks that these two small communities could be trail blazers that others would emulate.

ROBERT BLOMQUIST: It would be the perfect case study.  As the region looks to consolidation, as it looks to combinations of different ways to deliver government services, we could answer a lot of broader questions, and perhaps demonstrate a little leadership to the rest of the county and to the region.

Voters from the Falls and the Township will decide November 3rd whether or not they want to be part of such a case study.