Some council members reacted with sharp criticism for the mayor and his team and with threats to hold up legislation.
Mayor Justin Bibb and City Council President Blaine Griffin talk during 2023 budget hearings earlier this year. Bibb's boycott of Council's meeting on Wednesday night appears to be a sign that tensions are growing between the mayor and 17-member council.CLEVELAND, Ohio – Growing tensions between Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb and City Council seemed to go nuclear on Wednesday night when the mayor and his entire staff skipped council’s meeting in protest.
talk about what he called “out of control” violence. Polensek, long known to rail against crime and the city’s response to it, had sent Bibb a scathingafter last weekend’s mass shooting downtown, and more gun violence in Polensek’s Collinwood neighborhood. Said Griffin: “I always try to use professionalism, decorum and always try to find ways to work across the aisle, and always try to find ways to work with people. But I also won’t allow council to be a punching bag, to be disrespected -- because this body of men and women work harder than anybody else in this city, deserve to be respected, and we fight on behalf of these citizens.”
Asked Thursday whether the mayor is concerned about the apparent deterioration of his relationship with council, his spokeswoman, Johnson, offered the following comment: In his own floor speech on Wednesday that prompted Bibb to skip the meeting, Polensek -- council’s most senior member, who has served 13 terms -- said he’d never seen anything like it.He said he, as safety chair, hasn’t been given an understanding of Bibb’s strategy to address crime. Polensek said members of the Bibb administration skipped a meeting scheduled for earlier in the day in which council members were to be briefed on the mayor’s plan to address summer violence.
The statement from Bibb’s spokeswoman also took a direct shot at council’s long-held practice of taking a summer recess, in which they only meet once per month. “The director of law tells me, according to the legislation, we can basically pick who we want. …It’s insulting,” Howse said.“Council members, when you have things going through this administration…please be very real and make sure you have everything in writing, because you are dealing with a team, a group of people, who are not fair dealers.”
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