After the completion of Steelyard Secrets, the Cleveland-Cuyahoga County Port Authority said that it had included incorrect information in an internal e-mail that it had supplied to Policy Matters Ohio regarding the fees and proceeds from the Steelyard Commons financing. While the information on the Port Authority itself is correct, much of the information on Ariel’s fees and proceeds on page 10 of the report (see full report) is not. Some of those shown in fact went or will go to other parties. Port Authority President Gary Failor provided a correction to that information. NEODF President and Ariel partner Annette Stevenson asked that it be included in the report.

The following numbers, which show a different division of these monies, are based on Failor’s correction:

a) The $500,000 in fees was not paid to Ariel Ventures, LLC. It was paid to the two owners of NEODF, Cohen & Company Investment Partners (CCIP) and Economic Development Fund (EDF). CCIP, which received $370,000, is owned by some partners at Cohen & Co. EDF received $130,000 (EDF is owned by the three partners at Ariel, Annette Stevenson, Radhika Reddy and Irene Zawadiwsky, Stevenson said).

b) Of prepaid annual compliance fees of $723,404 to be paid over the next 8 years, 70 percent will go to Ariel Ventures and 30 percent to Cohen & Company Ltd.

c) As stated in the report, the Port Authority will be paid 45 percent of the estimated total of $1.78 million to be received on the NEODF loan between now and 2013. However, Cohen & Company Investment Partners will get 40.7 percent and Economic Development Fund, 14.3 percent.

Back to Full report

Investors in Steelyard Commons, the Cleveland shopping center project, are receiving tax subsidies worth $12.48 million over seven years. These federal tax credits were funneled through a private, for-profit corporation controlled by the Cleveland-Cuyahoga County Port Authority, a public entity whose board is appointed by the City of Cleveland and Cuyahoga County. The Port Authority was instrumental in the company’s success in winning the credits and received significant revenue for its part in the transaction that used them. Yet these subsidies were granted by a publicly controlled entity in virtual secrecy, with little or no opportunity for public scrutiny or debate. This September 2005 report raises probing questions about this project. The full details of the Port Authority’s involvement with the tax credits and the Steelyard Commons project should be made public, the report concludes, and future credits should require public approval by the Port Authority board. 

Executive Summary

Full Report

Reader’s Note 

WKSU

More than one hundred members of labor unions rallied at
the Ohio Statehouse this afternoon (MONDAY) in support of a
bill that’s been introduced in the Ohio legislature. Democratic
state senator Teresa Fedor is the bill’s sponsor. She says it
would limit the eligibility of companies that outsource jobs to
other countries to get state contracts. Fedor says these
companies have forgotten how to be good neighbors.

But a spokeswoman for the Ohio Chamber of Commerce says
it’s important to remember that companies must stay
competitive. Linda Woggin says companies that outsource
jobs are often doing business where their customers are
located.

Both democrats running for Governor spoke against
outsourcing at the statehouse rally. Policy Matters Ohio
reports the state has lost nearly 18 percent of its
manufacturing jobs since January of 2001.

Public Testimony
Amy Hanauer, Executive Director, Policy Matters Ohio
Monday, September 19, 2005, 10:00 a.m.
Moot Courtroom, Cleveland-Marshall College of Law, Cleveland State University
1801 Euclid Avenue, Cleveland

Full Testimony

Another lackluster month for Ohio s job market

The Ohio job market slowed again last month after employment had risen in July to its highest level since October 2002, according to the latest seasonally adjusted payroll numbers issued Sept. 16 by the Ohio Department of Job & Family Services. Ohio nonfarm wage and salary employment still remains well below where it was when the recession began in March 2001, a marked contrast to the experience after the early 1990s recession.

Full Report

In comparison to a generation ago, adults in Ohio are vastly more productive. Our educational levels, which have not risen quickly enough, still dwarf the educational levels of our parents and grandparents. And families are working many more hours, with more families having two working parents, and the average worker putting in more hours per year.

Despite all that, inflation-adjusted wages have been dropping for four years straight and remain below their 1979 levels, benefit provision has eroded in both the short and long term, median household income fell in 2003 and 2004, and employment levels remain a staggering 156,900 jobs below where they were when the recession began. The manufacturing share of employment has shrunk, probably permanently. Disturbing disparities endure and we’ve fallen behind on indicators where we used to out-perform the nation. In comparison with either history or with other states, Ohio’s economy has faltered. These facts, once disputed by Ohio’s establishment, have recently been used to justify policies that are sure to worsen the problems. This year’s State of Working Ohio points to more innovative ideas.

Press Release

Executive Summary

Full Report

_____________________________________________________________ 

Conclusion and Recommendations

Short Report (six pages)

The Joyce Foundation supports Policy Matters Ohio research on workers in Ohio. The St. Ann Foundation provides additional funding for presentations and popular education on these issues. We are also grateful to the Gund, Nord Family and Cleveland Foundations for other support.

Please contact us if you are interested in having Policy Matters present to your group on issues facing working families.

Athens Post Online

by Chris Yonker

Ohio’s poverty rate has increased despite positive gains in other aspects of the economy, according to a recently released report.

According to State of Working Ohio 2005, a report released by the non-profit state organization Policy Matters Ohio, Ohio’s poverty rate is up to 11.6 percent, an increase of 1.8 percent since 1980.

Amy Hanauer, Executive Director of Policy Matters Ohio, said median household income was down for the second year in a row and median hourly wages decreased for the fourth year.

The report stated this happened despite trends of increasing secondary education numbers (up 65 percent since 1979), productivity (up 78 percent since 1973) and hours worked by
two-parent families (up 18.4 percent since 1979).

The report also said the number of jobs in Ohio is 2.8 percent below where the state was when the recession began in March 2001. This means while there are fewer jobs in Ohio, the ones that exist are paying less on average.

Mark Rickel, spokesman for Gov. Bob Taft, said the focus in the state is to improve the economy through such programs as the Third Frontier Program, Public Works bonds and job-ready sites. Rickel said Ohio had more trouble during the recession than other states with the loss of many of its manufacturing jobs.

“The state didn’t come out as well as others did,” Rickel said. Athens County Job and Family Services media director, Tracy Gallway, said the poverty rate in Athens County was already higher than the national average. Gallway said the most recent federal census data from 2000 reported Athens County’s poverty rate at 28 percent,
and the number has probably gone up since the last census because of the number of manufacturing jobs lost in the county.

“If you look at the major companies that have left, they’ve been in manufacturing,” she said, citing examples such as the exits of The McBee Company and TS Trim Industries.

Gallway also said the Athens County Job and Family Services is attempting to push for better distribution of federal funds to help poverty-stricken families.

The Temporary Assistance for Needy Families fund, which is designed to help low-income families, is not doing its job correctly, Gallway said, because the fund currently has $600 million with no expected plans to spend the money.

Counties such as Athens County, who used all of their TANF money from the previous year and even used other counties’ excess funds to a total of $4.5 million, could really use the money, Gallway said.

“These families have to choose between their daily needs,” she said, “and they shouldn’t have to do that.”

The new constitutional amendment says that the General Assembly shall provide for
ensuring the accountability of all state funding provided for the purposes described in the
amendment. The bipartisan Agreement in Principle reached last summer by the
legislative leadership on the implementing legislation for the amendment calls for
“accountability, integrity and transparency with respect to the disbursement of funds for
the three components of this bond issuance.”…

Full Testimony

Dayton Business Journal

Ohioans are working harder for less financial gain, says a study by Policy Matters Ohio, a liberal think tank based in Cleveland.

Ohio’s median household income sank to $42,955 in 2004, from a peak of nearly $46,000 in 2000, according to Policy Matters.

Ohio’s median income measured $40,007 in 1984. Policy Matters adjusted all numbers for inflation.

At the same time, Ohio’s median wage had fallen to $13.37 an hour in 2004, down from nearly $14 in 2000, indicating Ohioans are keeping their income up by working longer hours, Policy Matters concluded in its report.

To bolster its claim, Policy Matters cited a recent survey by the Federal Reserve’s Cleveland branch that estimated Ohio’s worker productivity rose 3.7 percent between 2000 and 2004. The average state saw productivity rise 2.3 percent during the period, the Cleveland Fed reported.

“Productivity gains are being absorbed in profit increases, with working people seeing fewer of the benefits,” Policy Matters
said in its study.

Ohio’s job base is still 2.9 percent below its level at the start of the 2001 recession, according to Policy Matters. Only Michigan, Massachusetts and Illinois have suffered deeper job losses.

Although Ohio lost 19.2 percent of its manufacturing jobs between 2000 and 2004, manufacturing wasn’t the only industry that took a hit. Ohio’s professional services, construction, transportation and information services industries are also smaller than they were before the 2001 recession.

The economic pain doesn’t stop there, according to the report. Some 11.4 percent of Ohio residents are without health insurance, and around 48.6 percent of the state’s residents don’t have access to employer-sponsored retirement plans. The median white worker earns 19 percent more than the median African-American worker in Ohio; the gap was 10 percent in 1979.

To remedy these issues, Policy Matters said Ohio should spend more on education, improve its infrastructure and shift tax burdens toward wealthier taxpayers. It accused the state of cutting taxes for the wealthy, skimping on education spending.

The state also throws tax breaks at businesses without ensuring the incentives result in new jobs, according to Policy Matters.

WTVG – Toledo

CLEVELAND (AP) – A Cleveland think tank says the average Ohio worker has seen declining wages for four years.

In a report released today, Policy Matters Ohio says productivity, education and weekly working hours have increased during that time.

The report’s author say gains in worker productivity normally are mirrored by gains in compensation. Amy Hanauer says profits are being routed to executives and to corporate growth rather than to workers.

She also faults sluggish growth in the service sector for failing to absorb hits taken in manufacturing firms. In many states, job losses in manufacturing were tempered by gains in other economic areas.

Hanauer says in the report that last year’s median hourly wage was 13 dollars and 37 cents, lower than its been since 1998.