Well, let's continue how Bill cunning had the Great America. And this Tuesday afternoon, the tri State getting ready for Pete Rose celebration tomorrow night. The game has sold out forty thousand strong. There made me some SRO tickets available, but I put on my ex account a photo or two of me and Pete back in the glory days for the Corps all Stars, and rest in Pete, Rest in peace. Pete Rose is all I can say about that. And I think he's in the arms of God Almighty.
I pray he is. And he made many more positive contributions to our great country, in our great city the negative ones, and he belongs at least in the Hall of Fame, maybe more, but until then you may recall. April the twenty third, there was effort by city council to continue the plan development to come fundamentally change Hyde Park Square and it's something the residents don't want.
And the vote was seven to two.
There were two council members, Jan Michelle Kearney and Scottie Johnson who said no, it's too big, but the other seven fell in line with what the mayor wanted and they voted yes to allow these developments. To go forward north of one hundred million dollars, and at that time I had on John Zinzer part of the group saved the Hyde Park Square a little bit, a little bit unhappy with the vote, shall we say? The council sessions went on for hours and hours and they kind of
ignored what the people wanted. And of course I would say this and John Zinzer, welcome to the Bill Cunningham Show. But I want to relate to you a little story that happened a week or two later about the vote and what it is, John, is that I was told by a knowledgeable political type and city council that, well, look what happened when f to have peerival ran in the primary to stay as the mayor. He got eighty two percent of the vote, and so he said, I
guess Hyde Park Square is not that too important. So first of all, respond to that, and then we'll go back in time a little bit. But is there a sense the citizens are outraged but it has no pack politically because this political guide told me, look, aftav just got eighty two percent of the vote.
How do you respond to that? Before we talk about what you're doing?
Now? Thanks Bo, I'm glad to be here with you again, and I'm happy to go straight to that. We chose not to try to make an expression via the primary. We decided we were not going to try to make a political noise in the primary, especially in the mayoral race. This isn't just a mayoral problem, although I don't happen to agree with how he's handled this. This is both a city council problem, and this is actually a systems problem as well. Our planning process, our development process. All
of these need attention. But on top of all of that, what you and I have talked about most and what I'm really glad to be back here to talk about again today, is the role of citizen voice. I'm sitting where I am, I'm looking at City Hall, and I can tell you very simply, City Hall has stopped listening to the voice of citizens and especially neighborhood council and community councils. A lot of people, a lot of council members gave us some time and did some listening, but
they absolutely didn't do any hearing. And that's what this PD issue has really become about. It is about do citizens do neighborhood councils do community councils get a say in what happens in their neighborhoods around development. Hyde Park Squares stood up and said, we want voice in this. You didn't hear us in the whole process. And it wasn't just on the twenty third of April, goes all the way back to January. More than seven hundred emails
were sent to Planning Committee staff. More than sixty people spoke against it, about four spoke to it. Then again in March it happens in the Planning Commission meeting itself, then again the day before the twenty third, on the twenty second, in the Equitable Growth and Housing Commission Committee meeting. Then in front of City Council, the voice was overwhelming,
the hearing was underwhelming. We're putting it on the ballot now to show that citizen's voice and citizen issue still matters, and we need the help of people who listen to you, Bill to make sure we get that ballot measure on the ballot.
Jun Zenzer.
Of course, their attitude is know your role, John and shut your mouth. But on this issue, just explain in general what the general plan is. I've been to Hyde Park Square. I was there a few days ago, went to Zip's, got a cheeseburger, went at Graters and I got me a ice cream, sat on a bench with the family.
I loved it.
There.
Just explain in general, what did the city approve.
What the city approved, effectively, was a container ship dropped in on the south side of Hyde Park Square. They are talking about something about four hundred feet long upwards of potentially eighty five even ninety three feet high at certain dimensions, stretching from edwards to Michigan Avenue below Eree. It will be the biggest thing by far in that entire area, and it will absolutely change the character and
the tenor of Hyde Park Square. I hear you, I'm really glad you were there for your ice cream cone, and that is something you hear over and over again. People have memories, people have feeling about the square and the fact Sunday such a beautiful day hyde Park Farmers Market, thousands of people. I'm not kidding, incredible positive energy and feeling. I tell you that won't be the same if this gets built. And the fact of the matter is, if we can get the help of the people we need
signing to get this on the ballot. I have every faith. Once this is on the ballot, we win and this doesn't get built. But this again isn't about just Hyde Park Square. This is a city wide issue about citizen voice mattering. All.
Let let's talk about what's in the containership.
Explain the parking garage, underground parking garage, this huge building. Explained what's in the containership, and tell the American people about this underground parking.
I love this image. I'm so glad you grabbed onto that. What they said they want to put on board this container ship one hundred and twenty approximately apartments ranging from studios to up two or three bedrooms. They also want to put in a ninety room hotel. They keep using a word to define it. They keep saying boutique. I don't think of ninety as boutique. That's a little bit big. They also, therefore, to manage this, they want to put in three stories underground in a place that used to
be a lake parking. This to me doesn't sound like a great idea. All of this city council kept saying, well, it's about the housing. It's about the housing. It's about the housing. Then why are you approving a hotel? The thing that the city council could have done was that they could have said, no, you don't get the PD. That's what they actually passed. The PD is a development
to rule. It's called plan development. It removes many of the obstacles that the developers normally have to pass through, so citizens get to say it makes it easier for a developer to do some And here's our quick little piece that I hope other people will pick up on. A year ago, the rule required two acres. When they passed connected communities, they shrink the size from two acres to one point five acres to do a plan development. Guess what this project is on one point seven to
eight acres. It's almost as if they custom changed the rule for this development. I understand other places are now that's being used for, but the timing on that is really exceptional.
You talk about affordable housing. Affordable housing to me is a rent of between eight hundred and maybe fifteen hundred a month. The rule of thumb is you spent about one third of your disposable income for housing. That's the general rule. I can't imagine these apartments in Hyde Park at a cost overall of over one hundred million dollars will have quote affordable rents, and so you don't have the rent structure, but I imagine they're going to be quite high.
They have given the city and the public no real hard numbers about their business plan about where the rents will come out. They said, we have to wait for the PD. If we get the PD, we'll know more. They got the PD, they still haven't released that information. That's another one of my problems that city council is voting on something that's a concept, and then when they vote on the concept, they actually free the developer to do whatever they want. Beyond the concept. We have no
idea what the rents will be. They're building that's closest to this on Watson Way. Those rents start at three thousand, eight hundred dollars. Now, I don't know if that's going to be the same, but three thousand, eight hundred dollars a month is not affordable housing. I don't belie leave. Other than the studios, any of these apartments might come in anywhere near the kind of number you just shared. Eight hundred to fifteen hundred my guess, and it's just
a guest because they haven't shared anything with us. They'll have to start in the mid twos at the lowest. More likely they'll be starting, especially for something with a bedroom or two even higher than that. But again, the building that they've built closest, called the Ilia, starts at thirty eight hundred and there used to be buildings. There are buildings still on Hyde Park Square with vacant apartments for a fraction of that. Yet city council is saying
we need housing, we need housing, we need housing. Scotty Johnson was amazing, he said. Jim Selivan Kearney and he were the two champions here. Scotty said, I'm tired of city council hiding behind we need housing and then doing projects like this, doing things that don't bring us any kind of affordable housing.
Well, my simple Deer Park, matthe if you spend about four one thousand dollars a month for a one bedroom or a two bedroom might be five thousand a month, you'd have to have about sixteen thousand dollars net a month in disposable income. Now sixteen thousand dollars a month, that's about two hundred thousand dollars a year net and disposable income to most Americans the's two hundred thousand dollars a year after taxes. Is that affordable housing for average middle class Americans?
No? No, that's really true than that. This is a subsidy effectively to a developer to make more money and to put housing in a very expensive place and make it possible for them to do it the way they want to do It has nothing to do with affordability of housing. The average income in Hyde Park it's one of the highest in the cities. Yeah, but it's still nowhere near what you're talking about, and that's not affordable housing.
And I do agree with Scottie Johnson. I think that's been a smoke screen that has been used a lot. There's a project in Oakley which was shovel ready for housing units. City council turns it over and gives permission for them to build car condos. That's not housing. We just had another event just this week condo. Yeah, because everybody has disposable income for a ferrari that needs a conduct correct affordable Yeah, exactly, very affordable.
Let's talk about Hyde Park compared to the other I guess fifty one communities neighborhood councils.
Uh.
You mentioned off the air that you've hooked up with Reverend Damon Lynch, and every now and then he has a lucid thought, and I'm thinking to myself the way, by the way, I like to think we're friends. But nonetheless describe how this is not necessarily only about Hyde Park, but it's about all fifty one communities, and how this council, like many others, don't pay attention to you because it's Hyde Park and therefore you people can afford it.
Know you're shut your mouth. How have you broadened out this movement?
So this movement is actually supported by currently fourteen other neighborhood councils and community councils from all over the city, all the way from Washington Mount Washington in the east to Sailor Park in the west. We have fourteen different committees that took votes wrote letters saying don't do this, to which the city council responded with crickets. Absolutely no response to the letters. They did not write anybody and said thank you for your letter. Nothing. We also have
four different civic organizations that have teamed with us. This is not a Hyde Park issue, but I will say this, if this can happen in Hyde Park. It can will, and in fact already has happened in neighborhood after neighborhood after neighborhood, Bondhill, Clifton Cuff, I could go. These are all people who have joined us, and I could keep going. Neighborhood after neighborhood after neighborhood is getting railroaded by development that City Hall is getting a speed pass to rather
than letting the voice of the people be heard. I'll be clear, Hyde Park wants development. We want to improve the square, we want to grow it, we want development. We just don't want that development. The way it's sized, the way it will cost, the hotel. All of that is against zoning, which was just established a year ago in order to keep Hyde Park Hyde Park. And right now City Council is basically crumpling up that piece of paper, throwing it over their shoulder and saying, do what you
want to do. Pee, okay, all.
Right, John Zinzer, say Hyde Park Square. You need thousands of signatures. You have until May twenty third. Now we're about halfway through it. This is May thirteenth. You have only ten days to get believe it or not, it's May thirteenth and pete rose tomorrow night's May fourteenth, But nonetheless, where can people go to sign because your fight today we'll be the fight of other citizens tomorrow and the week after the month after. If you don't get the signatures,
it doesn't get on the ballot. And the way you go, and you're about halfway through the process, how you coming with signatures?
At this point, we are very excited by how we're doing. We have hundreds of volunteers in the field with thousands of petitions. We are really pleased with where we are. But we are absolutely keep on our foot, flat down on the accelerator. We are not letting up. We are going to get this number, and I would like to see us get double the number that we need. We are looking for fifteen thousand signatures. We're absolutely not there yet, so we need everybody to come and help us get
those signatures. I'd be happy to tell you about a couple of different places.
Tell me.
We want to set up a few things right now to make it so easy for people. We want to do a couple of different drive buys where you can just stay in your car. We'll come to your window, hand you the petition, talk you through whatever you need to answer, get your voting signature, your street address. You have to write out the word Cincinnati. You have to write out the word Hamilton, and then you have to date it and that's it. We can do this in
a minute or two. One of the drive by locations which will be functioning on Tomorrow, Thursday and Friday is three four three five Michigan Avenue in Cincinnati is just off of Hyde Park. If you come on Eerie and turn right onto Michigan. This is right in front of the Unwind Wine Bar. We'll have volunteers there. You'll be able to just drive up between ten am and four pm the next three days Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. Also on Wednesday at seven West Observatory Hill in Cincinnati, we will
have a drive by there. That's just up by Allt Park. You're more than welcome to come by. There will be volunteers there. Also, really great place. There will be volunteers at the Farmers Market on four to two for two to two two Hamilton Avenue from five to seven tomorrow another great place to go. I want to mention just three other quick events. On the fifteenth after Pete Rose Day, the day after at one one one West McMicken the
Northern Road Brewing. There will be an event inside. This is being run by our friends at Charter who are one of the civic groups who've teamed with us. They will be glad to do your petition right there. Please stop by there. Jim Tarbo will be a guest same night. A little further down the road, Price Hill Chili another place where we're getting collection of from five to eight pm. Pryce Hill Chilly.
I've been there pretty good. I've been there.
There we go, so you stop by, have a little something to eat, sign the petition. We would love to have that. This will also bring brought to us by the good folks at Charter. And then the last one of those is Saturday the seventeenth at six zero nine to five Montgomery Road nine and Brewing. That's another place that you can go all right, of course, one of the one of the great places also as well Sunday at Hyde Park Square there's the Hyde Park Farmers Market.
We'd love to have your signatures there. All of these are available. Easiest place to go get information rather than listening to me is save Hyde Parksquare dot org. All of these things are listed there. We love to have more people volunteer to help us get these signatures. We'd love everybody to keep showing up signing for us so we can get the voice of the citizens heard on this issue and every issue.
Well, you're making too much sense to be in politics.
Once again, Save Hyde Parksquare dot org and this Sunday, Hyde Park Square. I may stop by. I'll call you if I'm coming by and say a lot of that. I love coming there. Save Hyde Parksquare dot org. You know, John, they're counting on you and other citizens like Damon Lynch. Know your role and shut your mouth and hopefully that.
Won't be the case.
Not gonna do it, I said to that, But let's do it again as we to the twenty third. But John Zinzer, once again, thanks for coming on the Bill Cunningham Show. We'll do it again in John Zinzer, you're a great American. And give my best to Robert and Bobby Joseph. Bobby Joseph is the best. And once again, thanks for coming on the Bill Cunningham Show.
Thank you, John, Thank you, Bill appreciate it.
Let's continue with more.
Save Hardparksquare dot org is all the sights, know your role, and shut your mouth. I haven't done much of that. Bill Cunningham News Radio seven hundred WULW