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Doni: When you're talking about safety, what's important to remember is that statistics really don't matter.

What matters is the way neighbors feel about their neighborhoods.

And if you take a poll of neighbors in Toledo, what you will find is most of them are not feeling very safe.

We know what a group of former mayors pulled together by Paula Hicks-Hudson have said, We are tired of this.

We can do better.

We are not going to take this any more.

They've joined with community and other mayors and they've put together a 12 point plan for peaceful neighborhoods.

And we're going to be talking about that today with our guests, former Mayor Carty Finkbeiner and former Mayor Mike Bell.

Welcome to The Point.

Please connect with us on our social media pages, or you can email me at doni _miller@wgte.org And for this episode and any additional extras that you might be interested in, please go to wgte.org.

To the point we are so excited to have with us today two men who need such little introduction because they are so well known for their community contributions.

And in this particular case we're talking about their contributions to help end violence in this community.

They've actually put their money where their mouths are.

They've come up with a 12 point plan.

They and co-founders of the group Coalition for Peaceful Toledo Neighborhoods.

We're going to talk a bit about that today.

It's my honor and my pleasure to introduce you to Mayor Mike Bell and Mayor Carty Finkbeiner.

Welcome.

Welcome.

Michael Bell: Thanks.

Thank you.

Doni: It is so good to have you guys here.

And it's so good to see you being involved in an issue that the whole world is talking about.

But very few people are coming up with suggestions for how to change things.

Let's talk for a minute, though, just so everybody is on the same page about what it took to get you guys to work together.

What was the thing that made you say, we're we're going to do something about this?

Carty Finkbeiner: Well, I think it was Mike and Donna, probably initially, Paula and I way back, uh, late May or early June, we were different places, but we were talking about the same subject matter.

It led to the four of us writing a letter to the mayor and asking for a meeting with the mayor.

And the police were very respectfully asking for a mayor with it for the meeting with the mayor and the police chief and the safety director.

And that took place, if I'm not mistaken, in August, and didn't accomplish as much as we hope that it would.

So we put our heads together thereafter and thought maybe the four mayors.

Doni: Could get together.

Carty Finkbeiner: So together, Paula.

Doni: Would be former mayor politics and Donna would be former mayor Donna Owens.

Yeah.

Correct.

Same thing.

Michael, what pulled you in?

Michael Bell: Well, myself and Donna, we we meet on a pretty regular basis just to talk about things that are happening in the city.

And we get a lot of, you know, just talking.

And we realize that I mean, we are mayors, but we're also taxpayers.

Right.

And we thought what?

What if we could all just remove our egos and see if we can come together, all four previous mayors, and be able to help the current mayor?

You know, we figure that we have together probably about 35 years of experience being mayors.

So why wouldn't we take it thing that we're still in a city?

We all live in the city.

We all pay taxes here.

You know, if the boat's taking on water, everybody on the boats got to be bailing.

And so why wouldn't we step up together and be able to help the mayor?

Doni: That's a great metaphor.

And you've actually been joined by mayors from outside of the city.

Michael Bell: Absolutely.

Absolutely.

Because one thing that I think that I know that as mayors, we've all thought about this, what happens in Toledo affects our region.

And so we have to be willing to understand that they should also be part of the solution of helping us.

And so by reaching out, it just proves how much of a region we are and that, you know, if Toledo, you know, catches a cold, you know, the rest of the region can catch a cold, too, because we we drive a lot of it.

A lot of the people that live in these other areas actually work in Toledo, Toledo.

So it's important to to be able.

Carty Finkbeiner: To I'd like to mention by city those mayors and give them credit.

I won't remember everyone's name, but Sylvania and Miami were the first two mayors.

And we're so surprised a bit because some of us as mayors had battles with mayor of Miami and Sylvania over water issues and what they were paying for the water, but they always step right up to the plate with Mayor Owens and said, how can we be of help?

And then we were joined by the mayor.

And that in particular order I'm working my way around from Sylvania, mayor of Holland, Ohio, mayor of Anthony Wayne May of I shouldn't say Anthony Wayne Waterville, mayor of Waterville, mayor of Perrysburg, mayor of Rochford, mayor of Oregon.

And we got a call from the mayor of Liberty City Center.

And I haven't met him yet, but he says, count me in.

There's eight mayors at the moment.

Doni: It's really I mean, for mayor, our current mayor has committed to see.

Working with you.

Carty Finkbeiner: A present mayor.

Yes, not yet.

Michael Bell: Not yet.

We're we're trying to work through some things.

Once again, what I'm saying and I'll say it multiple times is you have to take your ego out of this formula.

If you want a solution.

Okay.

And we we are we're working.

We're doing this because we care.

We're not doing this to attack the mayor.

We're not against things that are.

We're just because we care and we still live here and we're on this boat.

We want to make sure that it's safe.

And if we've got a skill set, why would we sit back and not be willing to help the current administration?

Doni: Are you all stunned by the level of violence?

Are you surprised?

Michael Bell: Absolutely.

By what's.

Doni: Going on?

What do you what do you think's going on nationally?

Carty Finkbeiner: It seems to me that we frozen, I believe, a little before the point of the terrible incident in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

We were frozen then as a nation.

There was just so much bickering at the national level and hard language back and forth between political leaders.

And then the incident on the streets where Minneapolis policemen caused the death of an African-American gentleman.

I think that even brought more tension into the urban environment where there is a mixture of men and women in their families living.

And it does seem to me that there are many cities we could be one of the first cities.

And I give Mike credit for this.

Mike's the one who said, look, if we four mayors come together, that should get the attention of of of people not only in our community, perhaps in other community, because we're not alone in in facing this issue.

But on the other hand, we haven't made much progress since four and a half years ago.

The violence broke out in our city and other cities.

And it's time that the cities that have caring, smart leaders and mayors join hands.

It can't be done by one.

It can't be done by two.

It's got to be done by a collective.

Absolutely.

Private citizens and public officials.

Doni: You know, we had several shows ago, we had a young man on by the name of Anton Parks, and I actually met Mr.

Parks at one of your community gatherings.

And he talked about kids these days being different, feeling abandoned, not having mentors, not being a part of community the way perhaps the three of us were when when we were growing up.

As you're talking to people in the community, is that what you're hearing, Michael Mayor, about?

Michael Bell: Yeah, it it's you know, it's a matter of these kids are pretty much sort of disconnected.

You know what they're they're on the Internet and, you know, they're they're raised by the phone as compared to when I was coming up, you know, when we had to do activities.

And so what we have to do is we have to get them more involved in activities inside our community, you know, like the Boys and Girls Club and things like that that actually make a difference in people's lives.

They right now you have and it's a parenting issue in a little bit because what we have here is we have kids raising kids.

Okay.

And it's very, very difficult.

If you don't know how yourself how to do it then and you're raising kids because you're having kids at a younger age, we got to figure out a solution.

You know, we can say, well, okay, that's a problem, but what's the solution?

The solution is being able to help them somehow and in the program that we talking up 12 points, we talk about the ability to to push forward with parenting, parenting, mentoring, parenting, education so that some because where do you go if you don't know?

Doni: Right.

That's a great transition.

Why don't we talk about a few of the points in the 12 point plan?

The plan is extremely comprehensive.

Thank you for sharing it with me, the both of you.

We won't get through all 12 points today, but maybe there is a way that we can make that plan available to people who would be interested in seeing the entirety of the report because it is an extremely broad and inclusive approach to the issue.

But let's take a look at a couple of the points that you made that I thought were particularly probative.

One of them is that the Coalition for Peaceful Toledo Neighborhoods is suggesting that there be more support for communities and the building of community resources.

Why did you choose that one?

Why were people telling you that that one was important?

Michael Bell: That's some of the services that that they think they should be able to get to.

They're having a difficult time getting.

Doni: Getting to.

Michael Bell: Those.

And what it what it appears, whether it is just some sort of malfunction in the system that appears that it's biased toward certain groups of people.

And I don't think that that's the intent.

But if I'm a person and I'm trying to get a report, a police reporter or something like that, and I can't get it, okay, then I'm wondering.

Okay, then what am I paying my taxes for?

Doni: Right.

Well, and there is there is no secret to the fact that when you're encased in issues related to poverty and lack of resources, that those issues breed violence.

Absolutely.

And lack of educational attainment and a number of other issues.

So this first point that we're talking about today, putting more resources into the community can do nothing but help that.

Michael Bell: I mean, even the basic things I can remember, Mayor Jack Ford, he remember he he took and bought a bunch of lawnmowers.

That's right.

And had kids taking the lawnmowers.

We basically gave them the lawnmowers and they were they would cut city properties and then they had the ability to go out and and make money with those margins.

Doni: And that's right.

Michael Bell: You just have to give them.

And when we were younger, you said this earlier, we had to come up with creative things to do and our parents came up with creative things to do.

That was one heck of a plan.

Okay.

Where it actually showed entrepreneurship in in being able to learn how to make money and do it in a way that is respectful.

Doni: I want you to hold that point.

We're going to go away for just a minute, but we will be right back.

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Doni: This is to the point my name is Doni and I would love it if you would connect with us on our social media pages or email me at doni _miller@wgte.org or again for this episode and other additional extras that you might be interested in.

Please go to talk to the point.

We are talking to former mayors Carty Finkbeiner, Michael Bell about the Coalition for Peaceful Toledo Neighborhoods designed to make a dent in this issue of violence that we continue to talk about but seem to have great difficulty in developing a plan that really gets to the heart of the need for change.

And and Mayor Bell.

Michael Bell: One of the things I want to say is that this 12 point was created through multiple meetings of residents inside our city.

This wasn't just the four mayors coming together.

We were the the core to bringing those people to meetings.

But the things that you see on this point, they're not all right is they're the ideas of what people told us at multiple meetings.

And the only way you can actually understand what people want in this community is you have to go out and talk.

Doni: To and listen to them and listen to what.

Michael Bell: Exactly exactly.

Doni: You can't live the lives of people in those neighborhoods.

You have to listen to those experiences and bring those into your into your planning and into your processes.

And that's very first one that we've talked about.

Neighborhood support is is absolutely critical.

And your point about instilling pride and giving people the opportunity to be entrepreneurs.

Everybody wants the same thing, right?

We all want to be safe.

We all want to be proud of who we are and where we are.

Carty Finkbeiner: I heard a suggestion the other day.

It came from another city.

I won't report that city, but I would love that the mayor is giving his state of the city.

In this particular city.

And he reminded everybody of the of the term.

It takes a village That's right.

To to raise a child.

Do we really mean that, ladies and gentlemen, if we do a village?

Couldn't be my church in Miami reaching out to help children in the heart of Toledo.

And we yet see too many churches that are all white or all black.

We have an integrated our churches.

Now, that's not one of our 12 proposals, but the church as an entity that's getting involved.

Churches are losing their their base.

They do not have the number of of of regular attenders that they used to have.

I think they can churches all over.

Quote Holy Toledo.

We need to get people and ministers back and particularly the heart of the city's churches.

The churches that are presently very alive and well.

We need them not to just think.

It takes a village to be a part of it.

Create problem programs that can bring those children in and feel at home.

And there are programs that could do that.

Most of the old big churches have basketball courts.

You know, kids love to play, play the basketball.

Doni: I want to interrupt you for just.

Sure.

I want to interrupt you for just a second because I want to in in thinking about that, I also want to think about how one of your other points that's really important and that's increased police presence.

Sometimes churches can facilitate those relationships between police and the community.

So it's important, I think, to to understand that everybody can be a partner in this.

But as you raise that point, increased police presence, I'm curious to understand how you think that would work given the current tension between neighborhoods, especially neighborhoods of color and poor neighborhoods and police.

Michael Bell: I think that the key portion of that is that you have to establish a relationship.

One of the things that the late Chief Diggs was very good at doing was getting right into the community.

And you can't do it from a car, you can't do it from a distance.

You can't probably do it from a Zoom meeting.

You have to establish a relationship with people.

Everybody wants the same thing.

I don't care whether you live here in Toledo or in Perrysburg or whatever you want.

The same thing.

You want to know that you feel safe.

You want to know who your officers are.

I can tell you that in our multiple meetings that we've had, nobody has come in critical of the police.

But there was a perception.

So then that.

Doni: Would say.

Michael Bell: That they that puts that difference that you don't want us.

So we're not going to come through.

And really what needs to happen is we have to find the bridge to being able to bring the police in with the neighborhoods that they're supposed to be supporting, and they will find it.

I mean, these people really want to be able to know that they can talk to a police officer and be able to feel safe in their community.

But you got to get out of the car.

You got to really actually be able to talk to somebody one on one.

And if you have a differences, you've got to be able to express the differences.

Let's get over this, because most likely the person you got the differences.

Isn't that obviously that's in your neighborhood?

Doni: That's exactly right.

One of the things that both of you were quite successful with was your interaction with the community.

You were both very present and very available.

Carty Finkbeiner: You have to go into the community as the mayor.

When youngsters died, I was there.

When they died, I went to the home.

Whatever you just have to know the people of your city on a first name basis.

Two quick points, Don and I, I think I want to come down and speaking for Carty, I hope for Mike, Dana and and Paula, we believe that the police in Toledo, Ohio, over the years have done a very respectable, great job protecting families in the neighborhoods.

We believe today the police are uncertain of what is expected of them from the administration in terms of doing the policing that they're trained in the academy to do.

We think the police in a relationship with the citizens call it whatever you wish.

Some people don't like the term.

BLOCK Watch.

I know that getting people to meetings with the police, the way that worked for Elizabeth Pierson, who put 269 block watch programs together in Toledo, Ohio, a little small in stature, huge in heart in what she got done.

Black woman put together the block, watch programs at number 269.

And the police loved working with those programs.

Doni: Is this a reasonable thought, the idea that you would increase the police presence in a friendly way in the community, is that.

Carty Finkbeiner: Doable in Toledo?

And I'll turn over to Mike in Toledo.

Absolutely.

You go to where white boys like me are advised to go.

If you want to know what African-American people are thinking, go to the barbershops or the beauty salons on the weekend.

I don't go to the beauty salons, but I do go to the barbershops.

I learned a long time ago, Sit and listen.

They'll tell you what the undercover train is in the African-American community.

And it is we want to work with the police and we need the police in our neighborhood.

Doni: Do you agree, Mayor Bell?

Michael Bell: Absolutely.

But it what it's going to take, it didn't get in broken down overnight.

And so you're not going to fix it overnight, but you've got to start some initiatives that allow for people to understand that we're trying to reach across and make this connection to being able to help people.

The BLOCK Watch portion of it was critical because it actually established a relationship with the police officers in the neighborhoods.

Okay.

And in the idea of whatever you want to call it.

And then I think that that's been the big catch right now is that they don't necessarily want to call it BLOCK which I want to call it something else.

The purpose, though, still is real, that having a community officer that knows people in the neighborhood means that there's going to be great communication.

And when things occur, there's going to be a more urgency because I have a relationship with you.

If I have no relationship, it becomes a little bit more difficult to have the sensitivity that I need to be able to do what I need to do.

Doni: You know, one other point and and I'm so sorry we're not going to be able to get through all 12 of these points today.

But you list the importance of revitalization and cleaning up neighborhoods and feeling like you matter.

All of those things are important when you're talking about minimizing aggression in a community.

This other bear that I referred to did not put a name on it because I didn't want everybody attacking him or a city.

He just proposed a week ago that the neighborhoods that are the most challenged right now, not only by crime but by blight, that they present a proposal to a committee of city and community leaders that says how over the next seven months they are going to make a difference in erasing the blight and making it safer.

Carty Finkbeiner: At the end of that seven month, they bring those programs back and they're a competition.

The city will fund six of those programs for one year at $700,000.

Neighborhood neighborhoods, 3 to 4 blocks or roughly 700,000 if they come back a second year.

And they've done everything that they said they were going to do.

They're entitled to get a second $700,000.

Now, the city is three times bigger than Toledo, so we reduce that amount to 200,000 or 250,000.

Think of what some of those neighborhoods are capable of doing, what they're ideas they will tell you right now.

And I'll wrap it up.

The $180 million came to the city of Toledo.

A lot of people do not know where that $180 million ended up, except in generalities.

We're going to repave the streets, whatever we need to get that money into those neighborhoods that are the most challenged.

Doni: Quickly, Michael.

Michael Bell: You covered most of it.

It's just a matter that if you put money into these neighborhoods, then that means that you care.

If you're not putting money and you're not helping them, it means that you don't care.

Right.

Okay.

And people read that and they read it from there, from their porches.

When they're looking out on the street, they know if you care about them or if you don't care about.

Doni: That's right.

I totally agree.

We have like 30 seconds.

One word.

What will make this work, Mayor?

Go one word.

Michael Bell: Its actually two.

The egos.

Doni: All righty.

Mayor Finkbeiner, one word.

What makes this work?

Carty Finkbeiner: Deep, caring.

Doni: Deep caring.

Thank you both so, so very much for being with us.

Final word.

Yes, please.

Quickly.

Michael Bell: Love.

Doni: Love.

All right.

All right.

Thank you so much for joining us today.

This is to the point.

We will see you next time.

Have a wonderful day.

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