Northeast OH Local News

Real-Time Local News from Cleveland & Northeast Ohio

The medical safety net in one of America's greatest health-care cities is fraying.

MetroHealth Medical Center is in trouble, as costs mount and the number of people who need care grows.

On Sunday, The Plain Dealer examines what can be done. Community leaders and national experts combine to prescribe a remedy of collaboration, innovation and reform to heal MetroHealth and the rest of Northeast Ohio's medical safety net.

Downtown Cleveland becomes briefly more dramatic, slightly electronic and, dare we say, a teensy bit exploratory this weekend as IngenuityFest overtakes the streets, alleys and theaters in the PlayhouseSquare neighborhood.

The fourth annual celebration of art and technology begins from 4 to 6 p.m. Friday with a parade of musicians, robotics and performers around East 14th Street and Euclid Avenue, converging around Star Plaza. Festival admission is free during opening ceremonies. Activities continue through midnight at the theaters and the Idea Center. The festival resumes at noon Saturday with music on three stages, kids' activities in the Family Village at the Idea Center and an assortment of work by artists using innovative technology. The actions starts up again at noon Sunday, and the festival closes at 5 p.m. with a gospel revue. Need a little more inspiration?

Check out our critics' picks for festival fun.

Continue reading "Art and technology meet on the street at IngenuityFest" »

Officer Jim Simone doesn't have a problem with me.

"I agree with your right to be critical of me," he told me during a long phone conversation Wednesday night.

He's not angry that I called for an outside investigation. Simone has killed five suspects and shot at suspects 12 times in his 35 years as a Cleveland police officer.

"The people that pay my salary have a right to look at me," he said. "I don't have a problem with any investigation. I didn't do anything wrong."

He said everybody and their mother is investigating him, including Internal Affairs, homicide, the Office of Professional Standards, the coroner and the city's citizen review board.

"When I took the oath I became a public figure. If you find something I did wrong, let me know and I'll correct it," he said.

Why has he fired so many times as a police officer?

Continue reading "Officer Jim Simone not angered by criticism, he understands" »

Observations from the morning practice on Day 2 at Browns training camp ...

• While greeting camp visitor Aaron Shea, Ryan Tucker was besieged by the news-starved media. Tucker has been rehabbing his mended hip bone inside while his teammates practice outside. He said everything's going well and he won't rejoin the team until he builds up enough strength in his backside. There was a period after the surgery in June when Tucker could not even sit or lay down. Tucker is hopeful of returning in time to play in an exhibition game.

• There has been a lot of emphasis in the first two days on short, quick passes right off the line of scrimmage. It's one way to get Josh Cribbs into the offensive flow.

• An early inside run drill, during which several players lost helmets, was completed without incident (read: injury). You could almost hear the sigh of relief from team officials.

Continue reading "Cleveland Browns training camp, Day 2" »

Updated 5:12 p.m.

Home sales in Ohio rose in June for the fifth consecutive month, even as national home sales took a dive.

Sales of new and existing homes in the state rose 7.6 percent last month - but still lagged 16.4 percent compared with a year before.

Continue reading "Home sales fall in June, but Ohio bucks national slide" »

Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson ordered citywide penny-pinching on Thursday, instituting a hiring freeze, tighter travel and purchasing policies and 10-percent reductions in overtime, fuel and energy costs.

The cuts are necessary, Jackson said, to offset revenues that cannot keep up with rapidly escalating costs. He hopes cutting the budget now will eliminate the need for layoffs later.

"This is nothing new," Jackson said at a City Hall news conference. "If you look at the airline industry and banking industry, they're all taking steps to preserve fiscal responsibility."

Earlier in the day, the mayor shared the plan with more than 500 city employees who gathered for a meeting at the Cleveland Convention Center across the street.

"It went well," interim Public Utilities Director Barry Withers said as he left the meeting.

Continue reading "Mayor Frank Jackson orders cost-cutting measures" »

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Before an enormous crowd, Democratic presidential contender Barack Obama on Thursday summoned Europeans and Americans together to "defeat terror and dry up the well of extremism that supports it" as surely as they conquered communism a generation ago.

"The walls between old allies on either side of the Atlantic cannot stand," Obama said, speaking not far from where the Berlin Wall once divided the city.

Continue reading "Obama urges Germans to work with US to stop terror" »