Upfront

spokesperson for the United States Postal Service, a decommissioned sorting machine that was photographed behind the John O. Holly post office building in downtown Cleveland and posted to social media last weekend was removed “months ago.”

“It’s just one that was used to process flats (like magazines) which is a class of mail volume that has declined over the years,” the spokesperson wrote to Scene in an email.

But Daleo Freeman, the president of the Cleveland Chapter of the American Postal Workers Union, said he thinks the machine was decommissioned within the past couple of weeks, not months.

“They tarped it, then they Freeman said. “He has called for a dismantled it and then they put it reduction in retail hours. He has outside,” he said. “I’ve never seen called for removing processing anything like it in 26 years.” equipment. And he has called for a

Freeman said he believed the reduction in work hours. And this sorting machine included one is in the face of the pandemic when flats sorter, as the spokesperson we’re in desperate need of funding.” indicated, but also four Delivery Freeman said that in his Bard Code Sorter (DBCS) machines, experience, machines had been which are used to sort postcards occasionally moved to other and letters. facilities, and sometimes were

The removal of these sorting dismantled when newer models machines is consistent with were brought in. But he worked recent actions by the USPS in a processing plant for 20 years nationwide under the leadership of and said never once was a machine Postmaster General (and Donald junked outside. Trump megadonor) Louis DeJoy, “You won’t even be able to use who was appointed in June. them again, because they’re getting

Sorting machines are being rained on,” he said. “Not anytime deactivated in what many believe soon anyway. Maybe they’ll scrap is a deliberate attempt to slow them for parts.” down the mail before the November Freeman said there may be election. The delays could mean enough additional machines to votes won’t be processed in time in a sort the current volume of mail year when atypically high numbers in Cleveland, but stressed that of voters are expected to vote by regardless of USPS claims of mail due to Covid-19. Ohio Secretary reduced letter volume, mail is being of State Frank LaRose has said that deliberately delayed. It’s possible as many as 50 percent of voters in a number of blue collection boxes Ohio could vote by mail. were removed from Cleveland

Freeman told Scene that he streets as well. A man claiming to be thinks removing sorting machines employed by a local waste disposal and DeJoy’s other policies to delay company put up a “couple dozen” for delivery “go hand in hand.” free on Craigslist, but took the post

“The [Postmaster General] has down when Scene inquired about curtailed mail service severely,” the origin of the boxes. -Sam Allard 6 | clevescene.com | August 26-September 1, 2020

The United Way of Summit and Medina (UWSM) is now investigating a litany of workplace concerns raised by a group of former employees in an anonymous letter sent to the organization’s board of directors late last month.

The group of at least 15 former employees had drafted the letter, with a long list of examples documenting what they referred to as a toxic workplace, after the emergence of misconduct allegations at the Akron Art Museum and suspicions that the institution had used the pandemic as an excuse to fire those who’d lodged complaints.

In the aftermath of the museum scandal, according to the letter, USWM had “positioned themselves as a leader around Diversity, Equity and Inclusion.” Former employees said what was alleged to have occurred at the museum was rivaled by their experiences at United Way.

A draft of the letter was inadvertently sent to a board member in late July, and UWSM CEO Jim Mullen promptly engaged the services of a third-party investigator, Sindy Warren. Mullen and Board Chairman Mark Krohn also alerted area media outlets that they had done so, communicating that they were taking the allegations in the letter seriously.

The former employees then sent a final version of the letter to the full Board of Directors. It was recently shared with Scene. In introductory comments, the former employees said they never intended to share their letter with the media, but that they worried Mullen was now controlling the narrative, and that the narrative was focused primarily on saving face.

“While this is not the path we had wanted to take, it is the path we are on so we share this letter now with you, the Board,” it read. “While we understand the discomfort that might arise when reading through this letter, we hope the Board can look past this discomfort and focus on the systemic issues we are trying to shed light on.”

Those systemic issues can be boiled down to the following: a workplace culture “wrought with nepotism, sexual harassment, and racism.” In an itemized list,

with quoted material from former employees, the letter describes in detail a culture that employees say led to extraordinarily high rates of turnover. By their count, from March 2016 to April 2018, 25 people resigned, tried to resign or were fired, equaling a turnover rate of 71 percent.

“On the fundraising team alone, there was a 120 percent turnover rate from March 2016 to March 2018,” it read. High rates of turnover, especially on the fundraising team, were also hallmarks of a toxic workplace culture at the United Way of Greater Cleveland, which Scene exposed earlier in 2020.

Employees say they feared retaliation if they took concerns to HR, that they were constantly on guard against the mood swings of CEO Mullen, and that they watched, aghast, as those in senior leadership positions, including former VP of Community Impact Seth Kujat, made racist or inappropriate comments with impunity.

The letter later noted that Kujat recently left UWSM, but stressed

245 Acres of former Geauga Lake land sold to national developer Pulte Homes for conversion to massive residential development. The “Renaissance Park” community will feature homages to the beloved amusement park closed in 2006.

360+ Acres of former Geauga Lake land sold to national developer Pulte Homes for conversion to massive residential development. The “Renaissance Park” community will feature homages to the beloved amusement park closed in 2006.

$32.8 million - $36.6 million Projected Cleveland Public Power surplus in 2020.

Date of Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson’s virtual State of the City address. that he was not the only purveyor of the toxic workplace culture.

“His departure should not be used as the scapegoat when greater change is needed for the benefit of our community,” the letter read. “The fact that he was supported by the CEO despite numerous complaints and staff departures over the past four years is a testament to the leadership style that has prevailed since the start of the CEO’s tenure in 2015, enabling and perpetuating these severe issues.”

Jokes of a sexual nature, and other off-color, politically charged comments were described as a regular feature of office life. One top administrator was said to have referred to United Way’s clients as “those people,” and made disparaging comments about the parents of the children the organization served. Kujat and others reportedly maintained a view of poverty as the result of individual bad life choices.

The letter also noted “rampant nepotism” and advised that the board address the issue separately because it was alleged to run so deeply throughout the organization. It noted six positions at the Director or VP level that employees alleged were occupied by the CEO’s personal friends.

The anonymous senders said that they did not intend to seek legal action. “This letter is about values, ethics, and what is best for the organization and larger community,” the letter read. It did, however, offer suggestions for concrete steps they’d like to see implemented, including staff representation on the board of directors, racial diversity in leadership and racial justice training for current senior personnel. Finally, they asked that UWSM cede its leadership role on Diversity Equity and Inclusion work in the community.

Board Chairman Mark Krohn told the Medina Gazette that the allegations in the letter were very serious and that all employees had been notified.

“We’re going to get the facts, we’re going to find out what happened and we’re going to make decisions based on those findings and recommendations,” he said. “If we need to improve, we will. We care about the health of our work environment, our team and our board.” -Sam Allard

HOPING TO BETTER APPEAL TO MIDDLE AMERICAN VOTERS, President Donald Trump has named a new White House pet: Ohio Congressman Jim Jordan.

Much like presidents past, aides have long urged Trump to get a dog. It was part of a grander strategy to recapture the “suburban housewife” vote – a onetime staple of Republican support who now see him as a cross between Harvey Weinstein and the Golden State Killer. By appearing in photo-ops with a cuddly animal, Trump might hew closer to resembling a human being.

Yet for months the plan went nowhere. Advisors repeatedly pressed the president to select a teacup chihuahua, a breed that would underscore his reputation for noisy insignificance.

Still, Trump balked. He chafed at having to care for another living being and worried the dog would become the center of attention – especially to wife Melania, who only interacts with the president when she needs money to go shopping.

Eventually, a compromise was reached: Instead of naming an actual dog, Trump would select a member of Congress. Most had already undergone obedience training. And when it wasn’t needed, it could be chained to a fence in Stephen Miller’s backyard.

The move brought a flurry of applications from leading figures like Sen. Lindsey Graham and Rep. Devin Nunes. Graham even spent a night curled up outside Trump’s window, barking and offering to fetch him Taco Bell.

But Trump worried Graham would seem “too gay” for his evangelical base. Nunes wasn’t house broken. Besides, Trump already had his eyes set on a dog that would better fit his image. One that would growl without provocation, yet wilt under the smallest matter of substance: Ohio Congressman Jim Jordan.

In a Rose Garden ceremony this morning, Trump officially unveiled Jordan as his new White House pet.

As Jordan stood on all fours at his side, nuzzling at the president’s leg, Trump boasted that “no one’s better at having congressman dogs than me,” while praising Jordan’s willingness to let Trump kick him when the president’s KFC buckets come without enough drumsticks.

According to animal experts, the congressman already exhibits natural canine qualities, citing his obsequiousness and constant yearning for attention. His loyalty is also beyond reproach.

Trump noted Jordan’s “beautiful, beautiful whining – the best whining” during recent anti-trust hearings on Big Tech, in which Jordan incoherently yelped about the “censoring” of conservatives on social media.

Indeed, Jordan has proven himself among Trump’s leading enablers on Capitol Hill. He’s been a stout supporter of the president’s Covid Death March, and is highly regarded for his disdain for females, voting against the Violence Against Women Act.

Former George W. Bush speechwriter Michael Gerson praised Jordan as a “Truly Trumpian man – guided by bigotry, seized by conspiracy theories, dismissive of facts and truth, indifferent to ethics, contemptuous of institutional norms and ruthlessly dedicated to the success of a demagogue.”

In the Rose Garden this morning, Jordan preened for the cameras, playing fetch as Trump threw leftover chicken bones. At one point, the congressman tried to pee on the leg of CNN’s Jim Acosta, drawing guffaws from the adoring aides.

Yet the president quickly grew winded by the physical activity. Jordan was led by Vice President Mike Pence to a waiting van, where he would be taken to Miller’s house, muzzled and chained to a fence until his next star turn in the limelight. -Pete Kotz

Eddie Olschansky can be found in his kayak on the Cuyahoga River, trash grabber in hand.

From big plastic tubes to small plastic bits, from Styrofoam to tires and, apparently, basketballs, he retrieves the detritus that collects in and along the banks of the river, hoping to catch as much of it as he can before it finds its way to Lake Erie, where some 2,500 tons of plastic end up every year.

Olschansky, a Cleveland native, has been a one-man wrecking crew on a mission this year, but what was once simply a solo hobby has become something bigger, now involving occasional small group outings. And though those are limited by necessity for now due to the pandemic, expect a more fully fledged operation in the future, which may include a nonprofit, large group outings and concerted outreach. Olchansky wants to teach Clevelanders that the easiest way to clean the river is to fundamentally change how they behave as consumers from the start.

Starting at the start, what made you begin such a dedicated effort to clean the river?

Well, a long story long: It was a hobby within a hobby for a while. I broke my ankle and I was an avid fisherman. That put a damper on it, fishing from crutches and a wheelchair. So I bought a kayak sight unseen and just immediately fell in love with it. It was great for fishing, but it took on more importance — it was great for exploring more closely the waterways that I was enjoying recreationally. I was living in Pittsburgh at the time and our best fishing there is done right in the middle of the city in the middle of the three rivers, underneath the busiest highway overpass, next to the busiest street. Where I grew up, I could throw a baseball from my house to the Cuyahoga Valley National Park. All my fishing was about how pristine I could get, how far away from civilization I could get. But when I was in Pittsburgh, it was the opposite, and I started noticing: Hey, there’s a lot of garbage here. I never would have imagined.

I know Cleveland rivers have a very similar past, and my family still lived here and I was back here all the time going fishing. Some friends also got kayaks and we got to exploring outside of CVNP, into downtown and the Flats, and it turned out my hometown looked even worse on the rivers than they did in Pittsburgh. So I’d go out and clean up before or after work when I was fishing. And slowly but surely, if I couldn’t catch fish, I could always catch trash.

Are there others like you? Are there groups with cleanups like this, maybe not on a weekly basis, but monthly?

So, the difference between what I’m doing and what conservation agencies are doing, and not to take anything away from those amazing groups, it’s just not consistent enough. You can do beach cleanups once a month or a couple of times a summer, but the trash that was there two weeks before, it’ll be there two weeks after.

The Cuyahoga is different. It’s fluid. It changes day by day. If we get a lot of weather, you can’t hide from the trash. If it’s been dry, it’s all hidden in the banks and tucked into the vegetation. I know that because I go out every day, and if there’s a piece of trash that I can’t get one day, if it’s gone the next day, it’s not because someone else got it. It’s because it ended up moving down the river and into the lake. The river, especially those last six miles, it acts as a trash funnel, it all flows downstream, and it comes from not just the city but trash from the suburbs far outside. It all ends up here.

And you do this every day?

It wasn’t exactly a concerted effort at first. I’ve been doing this for years, and only a few people knew that I was doing it, especially with the consistency I was doing it. When I moved back to Cleveland, I was doing this most every day and I saw how much I could get done in just a few hours before or after work. So before I moved back

from Pittsburgh permanently I How much do you pick up? decided to take a couple days off I don’t really like to talk about and basically pay myself to be out how much weight we pull out: There there for eight hours. And it hit me are sections where I could sit in my really hard that I might never go kayak and never move and spend back to work. two hours picking up the tiniest

As my friends found out, they pieces of plastic and Styrofoam, wondered why I was hiding it. They and that’s a bag half-filled, and it’s, said if more people were aware, I to me, as good as 20 bags filled with could do more than I could alone. plastic bottles or when I get tires I didn’t come up with the analogy, out. but if your bathtub is overflowing, you’re not going to go downstairs What’s next? and grab a mop to solve the I have a million pipe dreams problem, you’re going to first turn and projects but up next, hopefully off the water. Well, at this point, in the next few weeks, will be a we’re the mop. It almost doesn’t website with a schedule where matter how much we can do if people can sign up directly and you’re not turning off the faucet. also getting to work on making this

And the faucet in this case is all a nonprofit this year. (Keep tabs the upstream consumerism? on the progress on his Instagram

Every time we buy a singlepage.) use plastic, we’re contributing Last year we did just shy of to that mess in the river and, 10,000 pounds. If we can double subsequently, the lake, and many that... Triple that... We could stop times without really knowing it. a significant portion of plastic You can do your best to recycle from getting into Lake Erie. -Vince and sort your garbage and put Grzegorek it in the right spot, but after it’s in the bin, that’s the end of your responsibility, and we’re learning more and more that recycling, here scene@clevescene.com and globally, doesn’t go exactly the way we think it’s going. @clevelandscene | clevescene.com | August 26-September 1, 2020 9