City Council Fights Over Who’s Less Absent

Cincinnati City Council’s recent bickering over the municipal budget has moved onto allegations of hypocrisy and double standards about attendance at public meetings.

City Hall insiders are abuzz about remarks concerning Councilman John Cranley, a Democrat who heads the Finance Committee, and Councilman Chris Monzel, a Republican who is part of a faction that calls itself “the Fiscal Five.”

During the past few weeks, the pair squared off in a debate on how to spend a $4.5 million surplus. Cranley’s group wanted part of the money to fund items like the city’s non-profit, private health clinics, the Cincinnati Human Relations Commission and the recycling program. Monzel’s bloc wanted the money to boost Cincinnati’s cash reserves, which is a “rainy day” fund to cover emergencies and affects the city’s credit rating.

Some Cranley supporters noted Monzel’s absence from this week’s city council meeting on Wednesday. Monzel, who is an engineer with General Electric Aircraft Engines, was away on business in Brazil.

Critics called the absence hypocritical, citing Monzel’s own comments during a budget debate at the Jan. 24 Finance Committee meeting. At the time, the Fiscal Five criticized Cranley’s attendance record as council’s appointee to the Ohio-Kentucky-Indiana Regional Council of Governments (OKI), which coordinates development and transportation projects among counties, cities and townships in the Tristate and helps allocate hundreds of millions of dollars in federal grants.

Records show Cranley had attended only eight OKI meetings since his appointment and missed 29 others, a 22 percent attendance rate.

“I think, to me, that when we are called to ask to represent the city of Cincinnati, we need to show up,” said Monzel, according to an official transcript of the meeting. “I understand … about having conflicts, but I think it is important that we set an example that when we are called to participate, that we do show up.”

Cranley has defended his OKI record, stating that worked outside of the meetings on issues affecting Cincinnati’s uptown area and, when absent, sent the city’s engineering director to fill in for him.

Although Cranley’s supporters wanted him to publicly mention Monzel’s absence at Wednesday’s council meeting, he refrained. Still, others around City Hall have been talking about the discrepancy all week.

As an example of how bad the climate has gotten among council members and their staffs, some people this week were blaming December’s protracted budget debate — during which negotiations lasted past midnight in at least two instances — on some council members drinking alcohol in their offices and deliberately delaying discussions.

— Kevin Osborne

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