To discuss ordinance number two nine two zero two six.

Oh, yes, yes.

Right from the parking lot right now.

Yeah.

All right.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Let's just do time management.

Um this right here.

We do time management on it.

Let me process it and then we'll um move forward real quick.

Let's start discussing it now.

This is good.

This is great.

This is very, very good.

Ummissioner, when you were here, um didn't you come to was it in January?

I was here in January.

Right.

I was here in February.

Right.

I'm January.

You did a great job.

I can't say you're doing a great job today because we haven't you haven't presented a great job.

And it looks like your passion is there to um to help people and to get this done.

And I know other barriers have been put in our places, but you when I actually questioned you like, no, councilman, I went here, I went there.

I said, How do you get that done?

And you're telling me, so I like it.

Cause you know what?

When I leave any table or any um I always do reflection.

And the reflection which you said with David Marcola say even my colleagues say I um when I'm finished talking with you, I'll go back and I think about several things and different points.

That was made.

So whatever someone say at the table.

So that means a lot to me.

And uh can you resend me the email also that you sent me?

Yes.

Yeah, you you know what you know what I'm talking about.

Because we went in a budget hearings, and when we go into budget hearings, everything else out there really stopped in our focus on the health department budget and other budgets throughout the city because the budget is first in first uh for me.

So you sent that to me, so I was not ignoring you.

I would just focus on that.

Okay.

So with um ordinance number 229, 2026 by Council members Camwell and Griffin by departmental request.

It's an emergency ordinance authorizing the director of public health to enter into one or more contracts with the Urban League of Greater Cleveland for the purpose of providing facilitation coordination and implementation support for the racism as a public health crisis coalition, in order for the city to develop innovative solutions to address racial inequities and disparities that negatively impact public health systems, community outcomes, and overall quality of life for Department of Public Health for a period of one year with a one-year option to renew exercisable by the director of public health.

This ordinance number 2292026 have been approved by the health director, finance department, as well as law director.

Commissioner Thank you, Chair.

Uh, good morning, everyone.

Uh thank you for having me.

Uh we hopefully will be joined by uh uh Mrs.

Marsha Mockabee, uh executive director of the Urban League and uh Gabrielle Folks here shortly who are key players on this project.

Many of you will remember, well, some of you might not, because this is a fairly new panel.

Uh we'll remember in 2020 when the city uh declared racism a public health crisis, what that initial organ um ordinance allowed uh to happen was the construction of a working group.

Uh many uh components were already in place to begin that work.

Uh the working group was uh designed to bring together community members, um, experts in different uh uh areas, uh really focusing on how to understand and recognize where racism shows up in our systems and to help root that out.

Um the coalition that formed was set up around uh using social determinants of health as a framework, so basically understanding how uh systems impact our lives every day, from our physical health to our education to our economic stability and mobility.

Hello, good morning.

Um, and also uh our neighborhood and built environment, our housing infrastructure, our transportation infrastructure, uh jobs, those types of things, uh, and then begin to understand where we're finding racism show up by using data and then understanding what are the ways that we can help dismantle those uh those those constructs.

And so that coalition came into being shortly after the initial uh RAFC legislation was passed.

Uh the council also decided, along with former mayor Frank Jackson that beyond creating that coalition, we needed to have some internal um uh dogs in the fight, so to speak, and so that's where you created the division of health equity and social justice, which I uh currently head up, and so I've been working and my team has been working very closely with the Urban League uh as the um the fiscal agent of this particular contract.

The contract is basically for uh bringing together that coalition and um uh executing their goals and objectives.

And so basically they spent about two years really digging into the data.

Uh you were a part of some of those meetings, as was Council President Griffin, as was Stephanie House Jones, Councilwoman House Jones, as well as uh Councilman Slife.

I slip and say that sometime when I say Stephanie, I do.

Gotta go back, right?

Um, and so with that work, they uh came uh came through with a uh an overall report as well as uh recommendations based on all of those social determinants of health areas.

So this next phase of the project, we we have aligned the work um that health equity and social justice does uh with regard to our internal response to understanding racism as a public health crisis and rooting out those things in our systems, and so the internal response would be what you heard about in January with our interdepartmental equity team as well as our equity advisory group.

And so those three things along with RAFC work closely together, we are aligned.

Uh we also are looking at a lot of the same data uh that helps us to understand are we getting closer to that desired effect, are we moving further away from it?

And the Urban League has been our partner in executing that public-private partnership and the public facing response uh since its inception in 2020.

Um so I'm going to, if you don't mind, hand it over to Mrs.

Mockabee of the Urban League to uh further explain um where we've been and where we're going with this next phase of the project.

So while you champion um commissioner, have you had any problems on our end with um making sure that um you know just pushing back barriers to this um no, i if you mean city council or city council like with administration and city council hiring more African Americans, making sure that more uh um African Americans are on purchasing and procurement to make sure that uh you're cultivating uh more African Americans to be able to move into leadership and management positions.

Sure, no, I've never had uh any um pushback from administration.

In fact, when uh we got started, uh I got started anyway, about six months before the BIP administration came on board and we were able to integrate our ideals and uh thoughts around what this should look like moving forward, and so was able to take with us the things that we had already started uh and that came about even with uh the work that brought um RAFC to the forefront uh through uh current Commissioner Francis Wills, who was then the director of Office of Minority Health, not Francis Wills, Francis Mills.

We get I did it myself this time.

But um taking all of that legacy work and not dropping it, bringing it forward, and so yes, right now uh in terms of our internal response, we have uh uh the uh director of human resources is on our equity advisory group.

We're making advisory uh recommendations to HR at this point.

We're making uh advisory recommendations to chiefs and and c cabinet members.

Director can attest that I go and visit cabinet uh every few months to update them on the work and to give them the ask of what we need from them.

And so again, we're trying to look at uh our internal like people facing strategy.

So what we do uh with regard to equity, diversity and inclusion for our staff, city as a whole, w how we um include equity, diversity, and inclusion in how the community is able to access and approach the city governments process, uh, and then also our physical and infrastructure, so the environment that we're working in, making sure that those things are equitable and accessible as well.

And we have membership from all over city departments who are coming together to do that thing on the inside, and then we also work so closely with the racism as a public health crisis coalition on the community front where we have so many members of community that are working toward those same ideals outside of just the city, uh meaning across the city uh in all aspects.

And so, yeah, we've not had uh whenever I meet with Mayor Bibb, I'm bringing to him the internal progress as well as the external process and aligning that and making sure that he is aware of where we're moving to.

Uh and I've not ever had any any um pushback at all for what we're trying to accomplish.

Okay, that's great.

And lots of support from council.

You know what?

You know what I need?

Here's a need.

Um April is uh minority health month.

It is that correct?

Yes.

Um but it might be it might be too short of a notice.

I want to do something for minority health month.

You say on racism as a public health crisis, but if we could um in a retonda work with um I'm all I am always putting uh Angela in trouble.

But Angela Woodson if it's some kind of way that we could narrate some of the outcome measures, what we're doing of director to the commission, also the commission uh on minority health, but this correlated and some kind of way, if it's not this April, next April, so that you're not just having a festivity but is outcome measures with you know you see what I'm saying with the purpose.

I understand with the purpose, talking about outcome measures.

Do it for that month, minority health month.

We can do that.

Yeah.

If so, if it's not this April, then maybe the next April or something, our report or whatever the case may be.

I believe it is um to the chair.

I believe uh we have so we have some minority health month events that are set up right now.

The big one is toward the end of the month.

I want to say it's the 25th, it's the last Saturday in April.

It's the last Saturday in April.

There's a minority health walk that's happening at Zalma George outdoors.

Um and so that might be a place where we could kind of preview to make sure that at least a handout is available and that we say something from um sort of the kickoff stage to let folks know about this work um as well and include that in our um our pressers for for that particular event, but that is coming up, and I will get you that information sent over to the office as well.

Let me add the whole list.

I might I can't be there April the 25th.

Okay.

Oh, how lovely wedding anniversary.

And if I'm there, then I can't be nowhere else because then I have to deal with the boss.

I do deal with your vine on that.

You know, so I have to be there for you know at the white 41st wedding anniversary.

Marriage is very important too when you look at health, marriage and relationships, fatherhood, the whole nine yards is important.

So um probably can send someone else there on that date, but I can make the other ones.

Thank you.

Yes.

All right.

Now, directors, great to see my friend, the great director.

Good morning to the chair.

Could you give us also some of the uh my council members?

I have them introduce themselves to Urban League, and then you give a just a little bit of history, background about the Urban League, and you guys had a great, great, great event last year, and you brought a lot of dollars to the city of Cleveland and all of that.

Um I'll start with Joe Jones.

Yes.

I know I introduced you already.

Yes, Mr.

Chairman, I like that.

I love your committee.

Um I'm Councilman Joe Jones.

I represent the Southeast side of the city of Cleveland.

Privileged to have the opportunity and honor to serve the citizens of the first ward.

Good morning.

Um Councilwoman Nikki Hudson, I represent the new Ward 11 on Cleveland's West Side.

Nice to meet you.

Nice to meet you.

Hi, Austin Davis, uh Ward 7, most of the near West Side here in Cleveland.

He's our vice chair also extremely bright, very, very smart.

Councilman Davis, nice to meet you.

Hello again.

Uh Chris Harsh, Ward 4 Old Brooklyn.

Yes, Councilman Arch, good to see you.

Good morning.

Uh I'm Than May Shah, Councilman for the New Ward 12, which is Edgewater Quadella and West Boulevard.

Nice to meet you.

Very nice to meet you.

So I knew when you were looking, I'm like, ah, I gotta do the introduction.

You know Joe as well as Chris Harsh.

Thank you, sir.

Director.

Thank you, thank you, Council.

So Marsha Makabi, president and CEO of the Urban League of Greater Cleveland, um, where we are proud to be in the business of um serving our community and changing lives, empowering our community.

And so very thankful for the long-standing relationship that we've had with the administration as well as with council around a number of issues.

Um we have uh services that we provide in the area of small business development with our minority business assistance center and small business development center, um, as well as our um uh revolving loan fund that is a separate 501c3 that's under the umbrella of the Urban League.

So that's not what we're here to talk about today, but just want to give you an overall view of our history.

We also have work uh workforce programs and youth programs.

So our urban league is 108 years old, and uh I feel like sometimes I've been there for much of that time.

So I've been there for 35 years and started as the director of the uh youth education and youth area, and have been in the seat as the CEO now for 15 years.

And so uh as uh our chairman uh already shared, we had the ultimate privilege of hosting the National Urban League Conference here in Cleveland.

That is a big deal.

That's huge, it's huge.

A big deal.

It's the crown jewel that any CEO wants to have for their affiliate and their tenure, and I was blessed to to have that along with our board and of course our amazing staff who are with us.

Uh Gabrielle Folks, who is uh on our team for RAFSE, uh, who's been with us for uh with RAFSI since its inception and has done an amazing job.

So one of the things that we're excited about in continuing our partnership here is that we uh love working with Commissioner Wills.

Uh we we uh um are kind of you know walk hand in hand in the work, and what I think we should be very proud of for the city's perspective.

When we started this, we said the goal of RAFSE is to look at what is the state of racial inequity in the five pillars that we have, okay, and then to determine what would the state of racial equity look like in those pillars, and then how do we get the plan is how do we get from there from here to there?

So one of the things we knew is we'd be talking about how do we impact systems change.

So let me tell you that in the wisdom of how the city worked with RAFSI by establishing within City Hall, right here, a similar structure to the external work that was being done.

And we began to uh show how a system could be impacted, and there are other efforts that are being developed out there around some of the same issues that we uh raised in RAFSI, and others are now you know have taken those and have you know moved on, and listen, there's plenty of work, so so you know, no uh no problems with that.

There's plenty of work to be done, but the issue that we think that we can be very proud of is we've already demonstrated how external work that raises some ideas about what can change can also be impacted in a system.

So we think now, and we call this our phase one work.

So now in phase two, we really have to look at now given the many changes that have happened in our country, many changes that are impacting our cities, many issues that are impacting our communities.

We have to now rework and rethink how do we take these ideas that were born in phase one of RAFC and take them back to the people, make sure that we have community voice involved, and how do we then create something that continues to address systems change in a way that can make a difference in our community?

So that's where we're looking to go for the future.

And and um Director Rapsey means the acronym means what?

Racism as a public health crisis, and there's a C connected to that for Cleveland, right?

Um Councilwoman Hudson, Councilmember Davis, and Councilmember Shaw.

There's been milestones.

Well um, or they even their dependencies that I'm going to give you guys earlier, um, so that you'll know about the other um the five pillars that she narrated to you and you should know about them as well, it's part of this, but you should know about the racism is a public health crisis.

You'll get because I should have gave it to you earlier.

Um it won't stop you from listening to this, but it's gonna be other things that you should know.

And then you'll go, ah, see I just connect with this, so you know, so I'll make sure that uh I should have had Tina to email it to you.

Tina, you're gonna look it up, right?

And then you'll give it.

I needed to go to Councilman Um Shaw, he already know.

Chris knows he was here with us, but um Chris Horse, Councilman Chris Hart, sorry.

Um that way they they can see the way, which is very, very important.

All right, so you'll give it to Shaw, Nikki Hudson, Councilmember Austin Davis, Councilmember.

All right, thank you very much.

Okay, thank you.

And so again, we're excited about uh being able to move forward in our phase two in partnership with the city and in partnership with uh what's being done on the internal work side, and we've been doing lots of investigation already in terms of you know what has happened in some other cities, not you know not a lot in some cities, a few cities, you know, have gone a little bit further.

Um, but we we think that we're really poised to really um be in alignment with some of the other work that has started, but very unique in what we can do with the city of Cleveland because of the multi-layers of support that we have and alignment already.

So are you going to give us a report every quarter?

Let's say if this get passed today, and then in the finance committee, we're gonna need a quarterly report, and we need it from Commissioner Willis also.

I mean, you you you have this money here, but yes, we need to know, we need to see outcome measures, and even your dependencies where you're at, you know, if there's barriers to what you're doing, definitely need to see that report.

And um, Commissioner, do you have the report from um in the past also where I can give to my other council members?

Yes, we have um uh progress report and um uh of course all the uh management all of our meetings uh both Commission Hills and Oh, I'm sorry.

Yes, we do have uh report we can provide also the um entire report from that first phase uh has been compiled and uh the the draft is done that's ready for for you guys uh that compiles the work of all five pillar groups uh and I also um uh we'll be able to provide that going on if you want it on a quarterly basis, no problem.

Okay, and you have the um the successes, for example.

I mean, we gave money before, but we need to see here's the milestone.

We have so many contracts for purchasing and procurement.

Here's the milestone.

We have um uh like in the health department before um director Mongolias came, they were championing racism as a public health crisis, but they were firing majority of people with color was being fired in your department.

Are you aware of that?

And so he brought back so many people, cultivated so many workers, and they're in management positions, you know, like yourself in those spots.

That means a lot to us.

Those are the outcome measures that mean a lot.

Yeah, uh, we'll make sure that you have uh uh the progress report from the last phase uh along with the RAFC coalition report, and then moving forward, we'll make sure that the progress reports are quarterly for you.

Right, and then you'll give them to Tina.

Yes, and you'll see me and the council presidents so that that way we have it because you know when you deal with the dollars and the money, you gotta be able to show the outcome measures as well.

And so when you guys come back to the table, then the other council members will be the new ones, would be up on it even more so.

We'll do thank you.

Um council lady house Jones.

You were um you used to make it to the meetings, right?

Do you have anything to say about it?

Um, through the chair, uh to the team, good morning, thank you for everyone being here.

Um, yes, I have been going to the meetings.

Um of the biggest things is you know, many times because someone asked a question, like, well, the group has been made in all these years and nothing has been done.

And so one of the things that I always will lift up is that uh unfortunately, uh, you know, when we talk about the system that was created here in America, didn't just happen overnight.

And even getting to a point to be able to educate people on shared language, shared understanding, it takes time.

Hence we can see here in this body, and when you're talking about a whole city, and as you were talking about, um, as we look at the employees here within the city of Cleveland, just trying to understand and embrace practices, like literally, we are just now getting to the point where we're gonna be working with um our um health equity and social justice team to really look at our policy team of really trying to build in a health equity and social justice framework, right?

Even though we've talked about it, we've heard about it, we haven't necessarily embraced those practices day in and day out in our operations, and so that is just work as we're transitioning into phase two, is that we have the information, we have some structures, and hopefully in this next cycle, we will actually begin to see various departments in cities within the city of Cleveland develop frameworks so that the work that they do can be applicable and it will be implemented.

That that is much harder to get people to embrace things of change.

It takes more, unfortunately, than two years, three years, four years.

You're talking about life work now, and so that's kind of in the implementation phase where we're going.

You're definitely right.

Um people were asking me, Council um ladies saying, and I mentioned it.

I said, Well, you know what?

You're looking at something that go back to 1619 and beyond that.

And how can you just change it like that?

But a little, not even a little bit of money, it's not even a drop.

And it's people behaviors that you have to change, and that's hard to legislate, it's hard to manage.

And at this time, you also have in policy, you have moving parts.

So you created um, let's say in a scope that you're gonna change certain things, but then barriers come up to say that you can't change it.

And then you have to go another route in another way because you have administration change as well, dealing with uh um other policies.

So it's gonna take some time.

I mean, and again, I always told people in the framework when was the city of Cleveland established as a city.

You're talking about 1796, 230 years prior to.

So again, tell me, you know, what is the practice of changing systems over a 230-year period?

Um that is significant, and it's a significant undertaking, and it can be done.

It's just a matter of how many people have the willingness, the desire, and the motivation to do that work.

And what you will find is literally many times there's usually only a small group of people who are trying to carry the load of our entire system.

You know, I don't know how what the extent and the measurement in the thousands of employees that we have in the city of Cleveland.

How many people understand this framework?

How many people have said, yes, I'm willing to be a part of the team to make sure this implementation implementation happens.

Um, but I can tell you, I know it's not all of us, right?

Um right now we're starting with a very small group of people, probably less than a hundred people.

I don't know here or there, but realistically, it's really probably only um less than a hundred city of Cleveland employees thus far that have a full grasp and understanding of this framework when we have to get to thousands.

And so that is the practice of working to get the thousands of employee employees with the city of Cleveland to understand this framework, to then be able to be in partnership with the Urban League and others to then put this framework into real implementation so that the system change that is needed needed, desired, and wanted can be actually um brought to realization.

You're right.

Um, and to my colleagues, the urban league was implemented to fight against racial inequality.

And um, and you guys been around for how long?

I know you mentioned the time, but you started when.

Our affiliate is 108 years old.

Right.

What do we do?

And um what do we do?

1917.

1917?

I don't know, but what are we?

Right after um the NAACP started, I think NAACP started in 1909 in Niagara, um, New York, and then some of the leaders started to deal with um so we can create our own businesses, and that um they have a history, the urban league of um fighting against judicial inequality, even sometime they step over there to battle against lynching.

So they um their history is strong.

They've been the reason why we went to the urban league because of their background of putting together businesses for African Americans and the whole nine yards and fighting for justice, equity, and and equality.

So it's good it's gonna take some time.

But look them up.

You hit your um your phone, your computer.

Uh I'm gonna ask the director to send you some background history of the urban league, because some people don't know about the urban, what they do, but I do.

I know, and I've been working with them and studying with them for a while.

Director.

Yeah, uh, to the chair to council woman, House Jones.

Um, you don't know how much that means to hear uh from this body through you uh and an acknowledgement that this work takes time because and and I'm gonna say this it's work that is different because getting lots of people on the same page takes time, and crafting your messages for various audiences to be engaged takes time, bringing people on board.

And so um I'm thankful for that appreciation, and we're in it to win it.

So we we we certainly want to be there for the long haul of doing whatever we're doing.

You guys were on board, matter of fact, pushing the Civil Rights Act in 1964 and the Voting Right Act, way before your time.

In 1965, you were there with the Urban League to um push those things.

And though the um the legislation, you know, it took some time to get it done.

And a lot of legislation is um national, local, and uh and statewide, urbanly.

If you look their background in your history, you guys have been there, but it is um you know what policy you have to manage legislation because it is constantly moving, even the Civil Rights Act as well as the voting right act is constantly moving and changing with society.

So it's gonna um take some time.

It's a heavy weight.

This this on this on there.

And I know the councilwoman um Stephanie House Jones has been making your meetings and which is good.

Can you put me down?

Councilman, I'll yield to you, Councilman Joe Jones.

Just want to get, you know, um, are we gonna do a presentation on the piece of legislation in front of us?

And and if not, uh I guess my question is uh when we talk about developing uh innovative solutions to address racial inequalities and disparities that negatively impact the public health systems, um, community outcomes and overall quality of life.

Um can you tell me what that is?

What are we attacking?

Exactly what we're attacking.

Well, do you want to yield you then I'll come up in the corner?

Five pillars commissioner Wills.

Yeah, okay.

Sure.

Sure.

Uh through the chair.

Uh so what that means is that we look at uh when we use social determinants of health to measure uh equity and to measure the work and impact that we're having on equity, it it ends up being uh a very good way to measure something that's kind of nebulous.

Um, and so when we talk about social determinants of health and those other quality of life issues, we're talking about um health and public health issues, so health disparities which are all you know well versed and well aware of uh that we do have racial health disparities uh in this country where uh black and brown populations will suffer poor health outcomes more than our white counterparts, uh depending on uh and that and that's not by um uh that's not by genetics, that is by design of systems, right?

Uh and it uh advantage and and systems.

Uh so we're looking at health and public health outcomes to measure are we seeing inequity in our city.

We're looking at health uh education outcomes, both uh uh pre-K, K through 12, college and and beyond, are we seeing differences uh in populations there?

So using those current stats.

We're not talking about doing more studies or taking you know waiting for more data.

We have all the data we need, but we can see those changes and differences in the data that we have.

So using that to our advantage to legislate where we need to to change policy where we need to change procedure if we're talking especially about internal um so health education, uh uh financial mobility and stability, so understanding uh where we see what racial disparities when it comes to our financial outcomes for residents in the city of Cleveland.

Uh we also look at um our what we the one pillar is uh social and community context, which for the racism as a public health crisis coalition, they chose to really deep dive into uh disparities within the criminal justice system.

Um and so we're looking at the outcomes that we see among Cleveland residents there over time.

And the last one is neighborhood and built environment.

So our data that we look at in terms of our how we measure uh our where we live, our neighborhoods, differences in our our neighborhoods, differences in um the environment that we live in, environmental um status, uh looking at things like transportation, looking at things like um the median price of home sales, right?

If that's going up and pricing people out, we have a we have a housing crisis, understanding things around lead, uh, you know, all of those um environmental uh so taking all of those together, and we have a working group around each of those areas with um community members, with folks who are experts in those fields here in Cleveland.

This is all very local, hyperlocalized, um, to make some recommendations and come up with um uh things that we can do in the community and things that we feel need to happen at the city level at the county level and making recommendations for change in that regard.

That's what I would say.

That's good.

Thank you.

Director to to the chair, to the councilman.

Um I've wanted commissioner to talk first because she talks about how it's been defined in your system.

And and I thought that was very important to your to your question.

On the RAFC side, external, we're looking more broadly to other systems within Cleveland.

So if you talk about the finance side, we're looking at the systems of banking and lending.

And we know redlining is something that has been a problem in our communities for years.

So again, looking at the disparities there in the areas of education, same kind of thing, where our children go to school here as opposed to other areas around, and what kind of disparities do they encounter and roadblocks?

And how do systems need to be addressed in terms of policy, frameworks, procedures that can begin to remove some of those roadblocks?

And so you have both, if you will, a broader systems perspective of what we're trying to address in terms of those disparities as well as your inter system plans for how we're trying to look at everything that the city of Cleveland here touches in its citizens, how can that be addressed as well?

You know, Councilman doing budget hearings.

You brought up in Councilmember Starr numbers how many African Americans are working at the airport.

See what I'm saying?

You brought that up.

So we'll measure that, or look you look at purchasing and procurement.

How many African Americans have contracts?

Well, they put systems in place to measure that so that we could you see what I'm saying right now.

So some of your questions that came up.

I go back and talk with commissioner about it, and then they say, All right, councilman, I'm looking at it.

Matter of fact, I have to talk with you about two um departments.

I'm not going to mention them at the table, but uh I gotta talk with you about it.

The climate well, first I want to say, Mr.

Chairman, I commend you and your leadership on tackling this issue.

Um it has been a situation that has been daunting for quite some time, and it goes all the way back to the 90s, and um, you know what I'm talking about.

Yeah, you know, I'm sorry.

Yeah and one of the things, Mr.

Chairman, that we do have the power here at the table is to control um how we get Cleveland's jobs, how do we help small contractors here in the city of Cleveland?

And we're I think here sitting at this table, our biggest problem.

We're the biggest health crisis for our city.

And the reason why we're the biggest problem sitting here is because we have sat here for quite some time, and we have a billion dollar budget, another two to three more billion dollars, talking about the school and all of our subsidiary operations, all the financial institutions in which we have money into those systems, and yet when contracts are given out, people from other cities and from other states are coming in, and even other countries and getting those contracts.

The reason why the East Side looks slummed out and broken down is because of the simple fact that we have not made the investments here at this table first to keep the money in our city, and we keep that money turning around in our city.

And this is the old saying you even heard some of our greatest leaders like Michael Max talk about how you invest in your own neighborhoods, and they become slums and broken down.

Um, the educational process, we know it has been bad in this city for quite some time, but we sit around here, we've glossed it over with all of these productions, and we're pulling the wool over the citizens' eyes when our young folks come out of school not able to read or write, unable to go on to college and get and be able to maintain their own academically.

And so we still haven't faced the problems that we got here in our own city and setting it right.

And mind you, Mr.

Chairman, uh, we used to be number six in the nation in terms of education at one time here in the city of Cleveland, and to fall so far so fast, and to be at the status that we are is absolutely embarrassing.

When it comes to Mr.

Chairman, when we talk about health disparities, I think the director eloquently stated what the issues are.

We already know the facts.

You can go on the computer and pull it all together and get that 200,000.

The issue is is how we attack it.

And then what kind of policies can we put in place to fundamentally make a change, or we're just wasting our time.

And um, and I you've heard me say before, time is precious.

And so, with the fleeting time, all of us have sitting at this table, and and that's the reason why I commend your leadership, because at least you're looking at the fundamental situation and trying to figure out how we mark that course.

But I think part of marking that course is what we do here.

Every single department, every single subsidiary, everything that does business in the city of Cleveland, we should be given extra points to to empower people who live in the city in Cleveland, look at encouraging economic development, uh empowering our young people to start and establish businesses, and it doesn't matter if you're black or white, as long as you're in the city of Cleveland, you should be able to have a certain status higher than those on the outside.

And then the city should have a program if we really want to be serious, Mr.

Chairman.

I know you've been very busy.

I'm listening to you right now.

If we're going to be serious, then we have to be serious about how we truly empower our communities economically.

And this is one of those ways.

And so I would, Mr.

Chairman, to our distinguished and honorable sister at the Urban League, who has Mrs.

Marsha McCabe, has done a great job there over the years.

I really appreciate the work that you do for us.

But this councilman sitting at the end of the table, don't want to be sitting here another 30 years later talking about the same issue.

If I be if I'm able to be here, if God gives me the strength.

But I really want to see how we can really put together a program or a policy that really can fundamentally fundamentally address the issue.

So if those five pillars are education and access to quality, then how do we get that done?

If it's economic stability, you heard some of my ideals and concepts.

If it's social and community context, then what does that mean and what does it look like?

If it's neighborhood and built environment, what does that look like?

What kind of investments that need to be invested in the African American community to truly empower our people?

And if it's dealing with health care and access and quality, um, nothing says more to me than being able to have the resources to feed my family.

And I think that economy should be one of our main focuses, uh, Mr.

Chairman, if we're going to be serious about it.

Or we'll be just like those councils, Mr.

Chairman, uh, and to the distinguished lady, we'll be just like those councils.

We talked about it, we passed some legislation, we gave some money out, we saw some reports, but then at the end of the day, the problem still continues to exist.

And as black people in this city, especially the older ones that I represent, they are turning around in their grave, given the fact that we have minorities that are in positions of authority and power, but yet our communities still stay looking the way they are.

They're very upset about it.

We talk about it over the coffee, we talk it over on tea biscuits, and we have these conversations in in in kitchen settings with older ladies and groups of older ladies in my neighborhood.

And I just want to say I commend you, Mr.

Chairman, but I want to really fundamentally have something that is really tangible, something I can touch, feel, and see uh at the end of it all.

So, with that, Mr.

Chairman, I have no unreadiness on this piece of legislation that you want to pass, but I really want to see something like that that's going to have an impact.

And with that, Mr.

Chairman, I appreciate you being gracious to me, and I yield my time back to you.

Thank you, sir.

Could you invite uh director uh my committee to some of your meetings as well?

Yes.

I'm sorry, say could you invite my colleagues to some of your meetings, like the one that a councilwoman Stephanie Tuck?

Yes.

Stephanie House Jones.

Before you uh came, we slipped and said that you get that sometime, don't you?

Yeah, director.

So um to the chair, to uh to the councilman, so appreciative of your uh thoughts and advice and counsel, which we take uh very willingly, and and we hear you.

Um we talked about how long this work takes because of how long it took to get where we are.

However, there was something critical that you said that really struck me, and that is one thing that we can do is create benchmarks, a success.

Because we won't, you know, you may not be able to get to the full um delivery that you want or the full outcome in X amount of time, but we've got to be blocked, you know, blocking and tackling and demonstrating progress towards the goal.

And I think that if we can create appropriate benchmarks along the way that show that we're making progress, that people then will be more encouraged, that things are moving.

And I'll just I would just like to share this if I may through the chair to the council.

You talked about education and our young people not being able to read and write at appropriate levels to get a job.

So one thing that the Urban League is doing is we are working in a partnership with Cuyahoga Community College.

And I I for a long time, having been a youth director when I first started at the Urban League, have had a dream about a program that's out called something like grade 13, where those young people who graduate from high school but still are not really ready to really enter into a career or go on to higher education or what have you.

And if they are below and eighth grade or ninth grade reading level, we want to put them into a program where we create additional upskilling and additional tutoring and all of those things to get them to the level of the 12th grade, and that takes time.

When you're at at eighth or ninth grade already, it takes time to get individuals to a 12th.

There's a reason why when they graduated, they weren't there.

So it's gonna take time to get them there.

But as we see those things and we can align them to programs at the Urban League, we do that, and part of our framework should be the same thing, is looking at how can we also align programs in other systems to help move those things forward.

Thank you.

You know what?

Um director, when you um you put that in Excel, and uh it will show um see you hit your you'll be hitting goals and objectivisty and part, um dependencies and milestones.

I'm looking at it in my mind right now.

You could show barriers in there as well in there, Dina.

The reason we didn't hit this dependency um or benchmark.

Here's the reason why, or if-then statement, and then we could um if there's policy for right now, the city is already when you listen to the commissioner executing on some policies as well.

They just have to, when they come back, as council member Joe Jones mentioned, show us it.

You know, um directors already by bringing in more African Americans and and cultivating them.

He could um tell the story, what they're doing, and from that is policy being implemented, but it's not connecting, they're not they have to connect it into what you're doing.

So it's already happening.

I can see it because I'm looking at it right now, but you have to put it on um I'm not telling, but um I'm very technical.

Even with music, I'm technical.

I hear quarter notes, eighth notes, four, four time, whatever the case.

I'm very technical.

So you could put it for me, I would put it in um in Excel and then show show it and show the timelines that's in there.

You you know, you you see exactly when you're looking at it, you see what I'm talking about, and then we can show it, and when we come back, uh here's our issues and concerns and lessons learned with it.

It could be real technical.

It's a story.

Any other questions?

All right, cool.

We have to get to the lead issue, and uh so ordinance number uh 229-2026 better better ordinance number 229-206 up.

I've been approved by this committee, it will go into finance committee.

All right, thank you.

But when you go there, please discuss the outcome measures and how you're going to narrate it and quarterly, you'll give it to us uh me as well as the council president, and so we can move forward um with everything.

Absolutely.

All right, thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Director.

Thank you.

You can bring your group up, we'll look at this lead um here, and um we'll move forward.

Yeah, did you guys want to get you see them?

Uh director.

I'm gonna yield chair to the vice chair for a second.

I'll talk with the director uh from the urban.

I'm gonna talk with the director from the urban lead.

I'm going to be going to yield to the um vice chair.

Councilman.

Thank you, councilman.

Uh director.

Thank you for joining us.

Um I know this was on the radar last month.

We got sidetracked, but walk us through what's happening here.

Great.

Thank you.

To the chair to the committee.

So these are the slides updated from February 9th, which I did intended to walk through at that meeting and agreed we got the news of the ODOD grant.

Took that but those slides were uploaded online as a result of my having that presentation on February 9th.

And you did see some coverage from an astute journalist who did find those slides online.

So I apologize that those got out to the public before I had the chance to present them all to you, as I will today.

So as you all know, a year and a half ago, we noted that the lead poisoning rate in Cleveland had been flat for the previous uh four to five years, um, despite the the passage of the 2019 lead safe law.

Um we noted that we were uh double uh the rate our pure cities and correlating directly with the the age of our housing stock.

Um this is what is lead poisoning in in in Cleveland, and actually the number one cause of lead poisoning in the country by quite a bit is is paint, despite the attention um that uh water gets paint is the number one cause of lead poisoning, and I did bring a sample once again today.

If you want to pass that around and just keep it in the plastic bag or wash your hands afterwards.

Um and so essentially what we found um was that the lead inspectors uh that were doing work in properties to pass the test.

Um there were conversations happening where uh property owners would clean very thoroughly the house right before the inspectors would come, and the inspectors only had to do this this exam called a clearance exam, which involved dust wipes and a visual exam and missed the an overall risk assessment and uh for the property.

And so um despite increasing numbers of inspections being done, the lead poisoning rate wasn't declining.

And so um what we presented uh year and a half ago was it's not just the number of inspections that need to be performed, but those inspections need to lead to people improving their homes, whether directly from the inspection or in anticipation of the inspection, and so window replacing, door replacing, and porch replacements are what's gonna reduce our lead poison rate in Cleveland.

But in addition to that, I think it's really important to note, and I hope we can do it more often that every single new home built is um increases the likelihood that a baby will be raised in a lead-free home in the city of Cleveland.

And so uh all the work that that you all do in building new homes uh in your in your communities is extremely important to uh helping to reduce lead poisoning.

In fact, that's the only way um cities have ever dramatically reduced their lead poisoning rates is by building new homes.

And so you can see Councilman Conwell, Councilman Harsh, the modular homework is incredibly important to babies being raised in lead-free environments in Cleveland.

Uh Councilman Jones, Council Woman House Jones, and all the new housing projects that that you all have done.

And I'm sorry, the picture of the housing didn't come through, Councilman House Jones behind you, but it's should be on the slides on the internet.

Um so as a result of all this work, the number of homes being tested has increased.

The number of homes being upgraded or improved has is increased, the number of homes demolished, so homes that are DRFs that can't really be restored to be offline, taking them offline has helped to improve lead poisoning rates.

Number of new homes as we discussed, number of children tested for lead is increased, and the number of children in lead safe homes as a result of all those metrics is is increasing.

Um our lead poisoning rate in 2025 from our preliminary data was 14.4% down from 16.8 the previous year, 18.1 the year before that, and it is the lowest rate that that we've ever had in the city of Cleveland, and it gives me hope.

Uh we do have a dashboard uh through the Ohio Department of Health that I uh try and limit myself to updating once a week, but I update every day, and the number continues to go down in 2026.

And so the question for the body before I get into um the appendix of of these exact numbers is you know, are these the correct measures for what you're seeing in your communities?

How do we measure them and and how do we improve them?

And so I do have the data for each of those metrics in the next six slides or seven slides.

Um I'm gonna sort of rush through them because this is something we spend more time in the lead safe advisory board on, which is actually Thursday of this week, so it's exciting week with Councilman Hudson representing city council on that on that body.

Um this is I'll I will pause with the number of civil tickets.

You can see that jump in in quarter four.

So um building and housing is is now doing a lot of enforcement with civil tickets for properties that don't have lead safe certificates.

Um we do have certifications all across the city.

So every blue dot represents a rental property that is actively certified with a lead safe certificate, and that number is nearly 30,000 rental units now, but we do estimate that the denominator is much larger.

In addition to lead safe certificates, as I mentioned, the the number of uh permits being pulled for windows and porches seems to be steadily increasing, and we recognize that not every property getting improved is pulling a permit, and so hopefully this is just scratching the surface on the number of properties being improved across our community.

We're gonna flip through the grant slides because we spent time on that last time.

Demolition numbers are on uh this slide, and you can see that over time.

This is the number of new homes being built, and this is the testing rate.

And now this testing rate is only looking at uh children who are at their wellness visits.

And so you can see the percentage of children tested at wellness visits continues to increase.

This is not every child in the city of Cleveland, and so that remains a gap that we have to address getting more children into these wellness visits so that they can get their their screening rate updated.

And the reason I'm going a little quickly through these slides is because I think the focus today, the asked is to propose some some changes to the 2019 lead safe law, and so that's what I plan on doing.

Okay.

So in front of you are uh some conceptual changes to the 2019 lead safe law based on the numbers I presented, the um root causes of lead poisoning, the root cause of the lead poisoning improvement in the city of Cleveland.

Um this is not uh written into legislation for any kind of vote or anything like that.

That this is ideas that have been generated through your work with the lead safe advisory board and uh most with the lead safe policy committee, the Lead Safe Cleveland Coalition Policy Committee.

Um these votes uh these concepts are being voted on by that policy committee on Wednesday.

Um and so this is just the the ideas, and we're really looking for feedback and discussion.

The goal of the the changes in the this law uh the the amendment package I'm gonna show you are to increase the relative number of higher risk rental properties that are going through our process, increase the number of rental units that improve their homes.

So we don't want to just see the homes, we actually want the work to mean that more windows are going to be replaced, more doors are gonna be replaced, more porches are replaced.

We want to decrease the number of required inspections for lower risk rental properties that have done the right thing all along.

And I'll show you what that means.

The first concept, and and this goes from lowest hanging fruit to to kind of uh hardest.

Um the first is that currently the law doesn't require a specific form to be issued with the inspection report.

I'm sorry, what was that?

It doesn't do what require a specific form to be so people can churn in whatever which way, and that adds more work for the inspectors, for the property owners for tenants, and and for our team reviewing those.

So the first suggestion is that we amend the law to say um that all the reports need to be submitted on a required.

Thank you, Mr.

Chairman to the director.

Oh, and by the way, while you're listening, I do have some samples of lead risk assessments and clearance reports as well.

And so if you want to take a look at that, I'll pass those around.

And uh one of the samples is the clearance exam, the old way we used to accept it, and you can kind of see the difference between those uh old reports and the newer reports.

Are these copies for each member?

No, they're each is individual samples, so you can just take a look.

So, number two suggestion is in the original 2019 law when a lead paint inspection risk assessment was done, showing that there's no lead in the property, you would get a 20-year certificate.

And the suggestion is that we change that to a lifetime of the property lead safe certification because you've done the work to prove there's no lead in there, either through a lead inspection risk.

Since we're passing these since we're passing these around, I'm really uh want to have a copy of these.

Mr.

Chairman, can you make a copy of the director can make or if we can make a copy of this so I can have this package?

Director?

I appreciate it.

Absolutely.

Why don't you uh see which one you like best and I'll make a copy of that?

Make a copy of all of them.

Okay.

Very good.

Okay.

Thank you.

The other thing that we would add here is that currently if you um identify lead in your property, uh, you then hire an abatement contractor to do the work after it's been scoped it out, uh, after it's been scoped out, and then you follow up with a clearance exam, which is the proper use of a clearance exam.

Um currently you would just get a two-year certificate.

What we're proposing is that is sufficient to prove that your property has been abated of lead and you should get that same uh lifetime of the property certificate.

And um, as you can see, this is something that New Jersey has adopted in the past year.

And so I say if it's good enough for New Jersey, it's good enough for us.

The third suggestion is that uh those properties in Cleveland that have gone through commercial conversions.

So whether it's a warehouse or a um former office building, once they've been gutted and rehabbed into rental apartments, essentially all the high risk components have been taken out.

And so one lead risk assessment or even a lead hazard screen uh in those properties should also grant a lifetime certificate of the property.

And that is something that affects pretty much all of our our neighborhoods in Cleveland where uh these are large multi-unit properties, and right now they're having to go every two years, even though they've been completely gutted, and a lead inspection risk assessment would cost um thousands and thousands of dollars to do.

The fourth suggestion, um now you know, this is getting into the kind of the meat of it, um, or the most increasingly difficult or controversial, would be if a property owner today has gone through the process of getting an inspection and a lead safe certificate uh twice before.

Now they're on their third cycle, so they've proven that the property hasn't had active lead hazards uh over the last six years.

Our suggestion is to grant that property a five-year certificate instead of going on for two years.

And so this really rewards the property owners who've been doing the right thing from the beginning, and it also directly tracks with the HUD guidelines regulations that say after you've done a second consecutive re-evaluation, another reevaluation is generally not needed after that.

And so this would be you've done two, two, two, it's in 2026 or 2027, and now you'll get a five-year certificate.

The fifth suggestion is specific to properties built between 1960 and 1978.

Those properties, according to HUD and according to our own internal data, tend to be extremely low risk.

And so those properties, if they're in good condition, will be able to get a seven-year uh lead safe certificate.

There aren't a whole lot of properties built between 1960 and 1978 in Cleveland.

Um, but for those properties, they should, they're lower risk and they should be treated as such.

On the point, Mr.

Chairman.

Mr.

Jones.

Yeah, I see.

All is all of this based upon the HUD guidelines?

Uh through the chair, much of it is based on the HUD guidelines.

Yep.

And and I try and supplement with our internal data and other what other jurisdictions do along the way.

Well, and Mr.

Jones, let's let's say some of these for questions, because I want you to get through your entire presentation.

Almost there.

All right.

Number six, and the last one is um pre-1960 rental properties that have found to be have a non-LED-based paint window door porch replacement.

So basically think an older property that has had all the windows replaced, all the doors replaced, and uh and a new porch or no porch would be granted a seven-year lead safe certificate.

And so this is the idea that those are the components that are the highest risk, most likely to form lead dust.

And if a property owner has done the right thing by replacing all their windows and doors and and porches, then um they should be uh treated as a lower risk property that they are.

And again, this would be on uh us to figure out how to measure that and confirm that, which would be kind of difficult, but we'll we'll work through some different proposals prior to this becoming uh out for a vote.

Um and so this is the idea of the components high risk area getting a longer interval because it's lower risk.

Um and some additional considerations uh not numbered are currently the language gives us 90 days from a date of inspection to submission to address lead hazards and submit a report.

Um working with legal aid, they feel like we're probably overinterpreting this and and property owners do have longer to actually address the lead hazard.

Um working with legal aid, they feel like we're probably overinterpreting this, and and property owners do have longer to actually address the the lead hazard, and so uh we can continue to think about that uh with you all and administratively how to give folks proper extensions to be able to address their lead hazards, and then the last one um is uh was a very hot topic, you know, in October 2024, uh with the change that we made.

Um, but the current law does state that the uh clearance exams or lead risk assessments are should be used per state and federal guidelines, and so that's what we're doing now where we recommend uh or where we require a lead risk assessment for a preventive um the routine screen rather than a clearance exam.

Um I has been passing out examples of lead risk assessments, um, and the slides uh are I think all on your laptops.

Well you know who gave me handouts on Friday.

I have some for myself and I know I interrupt.

Sorry, I just like my uh committee to go back to the process which you can narrated.

So uh I have a those don't go to the top, right?

Yeah, so there are they should I think they're all on your iPads.

On the point of the information that there's there, INES is making copies for the members.

They're reading the reflection.

And we're not voting on this today, because I want to guys.

It's quite a bit of information, Mr.

Just want to introduce the concepts and have a discussion about it.

Thank you.

Yeah, you got to do that.

Great.

So um so clearance exams per state and federal guidelines are are done after construction or home improvement is done.

And so we do accept clearance exams for a two-year certificate, but only per state and federal guidelines, whereas risk assessments are done at just as they sound there, a risk assessment of a property that has not had work on it.

Um so this is a summary slide looking at uh what those suggestions are.

And as I as I said at the beginning, we're trying to increase the the number of higher risk rental properties going through the process.

We're trying to increase the number of rental units that are making home improvements, and we're trying to incentivize property owners to to do the right thing, which includes having been doing this uh three consecutive times and also making home improvements such as new windows, doors, and porches.

Um as I mentioned, so this week I'm presenting these concepts to you for hopefully really good discussion on Wednesday.

The Lead Safe Coalition Policy Committee, which includes uh lead risk assessors and property owners and tenants and uh policy folks, uh, is taking a vote on on the set of recommendations, and then on Thursday, presenting to the these this set of recommendations to lead safe advisory board for for their feedback.

Um and so uh will we come out with three different sets of recommendations after this week?

Maybe, but ultimately you you all uh we'll get to decide, you know, and we'll we'll work together to uh to make this right.

And so I'm looking forward to uh the discussion.

You know, uh talking Friday.

Did you bring with you?

Because I'm looking, and I might ask Nikki to do it with me.

She is so bright.

Nikki Hudson, uh you know, I'm going to I said I wasn't gonna go back to school uh anymore with, but I'm gonna study, take up all the lead certification.

Rebecca, the former councilwoman Rebecca Maud.

This guy here is good with lead out.

I think you risk assessment.

Um she was champion it, and so when I met with uh the health director on Friday, I mentioned to him I'm going to start taking um classes or everything dealing with lead risk assessment, uh just get all the certifications that I can get, get immersed into it with you instead of um, you know, because Rebecca was good, she was very, very good, and I need to get you know dig down deep into it.

Okay, I'll send you a lot of it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And then we'll we'll look at the classes.

I'll talk with the um council president, you know, get us to uh um pay for the classes, and then we'll go um go together.

Is the next class when is it coming up?

Do you think they have them every every few weeks?

So I'll I'll send you the sketch.

I owe you that by the end of the day.

But yeah, it's it's well worth it.

I think Councilman Harshwood would tell you that.

It's just learning about uh how to evaluate different components in your property, learning about you know what to be too worried about and what you can do to reduce risk is is been really um enlightening.

And it also we did spend a lot of time talking about the difference between a clearance exam and a risk assessment, and I think that was helpful and helping us figure out the right path forward for for this program as well.

So when we study it so we know the way, so when you am with the other group, we're there.

You see what I'm saying?

And if you're not there then I'm there.

Because Rebecca was he handled all that.

She said, I got it, counsel me.

So you know, by me chairing it, I gotta help out with the way.

Helping the way is important.

Yeah.

All right.

Councilman.

Do we have questions?

You know I do.

I know it.

I yield to you.

Um Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Uh and good morning.

Good morning.

Um I guess my questions will start first the lead rates that we're testing for right now, are these based on five micrograms per deciliter through the chair?

Through the chair, 3.5 micrograms per decility.

3.5.

Yeah.

And what we did, which was had not ever been done before on that first graph, the line chart that goes back to 2005.

Right.

That's looking at 3.5 going all the way back instead of going, you know, looking at greater than 10 and then greater than 5 as the thresholds change.

So you can see how much our lead poisoning rate has improved over time in Cleveland.

Um but the challenge was, you know, those those four or five years where it was flat.

Yeah.

Um through the chair, I'm wondering uh I don't want to mislead anybody with data.

Um the previous lead exposure rates were all based on I mean for a while they were based on 10, I think, historically, and then they dropped down to five.

Um there you go.

So the say 2005 data, would that have been based on 10?

Would that have been based on five?

Would that have been based on three and a half?

Through the chair.

So I that's what we we this is the first time, you know, a couple years ago when we released this.

This goes back looking backwards at 3.5 the entire time.

Okay.

So through the chair, we're gonna be apples to apples.

We knew the actual number more instead of just whether or not they failed the test.

The results were were in deciliter uh programs per deciliter.

We know who had 3.5 and who had 3.6.

Correct.

Okay.

Okay.

So the and through the chair on our website, we have the actual numerical table, so you can look at um you know how many people had greater than five, greater than 10, greater than 45 over time.

Okay.

In Cleveland.

Okay.

Um that was my first question.

So we're at 3.5.

And through the chairs, 3.5 because uh federal, state, or local um who sets the 3.5 rate through the chair.

Through the chair, the uh federal.

The federal?

Yep, and then the state adopts it.

So um federal adopted theirs um, I want to say in 21, and then the state adopted that in 2023, halfway through 2023.

If I from remembering correctly.

Ohio adopted in 23.

Yeah, and that through the chair, that that uh is our action level.

So from 3.5 to 9.9, uh, we do outreach phone calls and mailings um to reach families in that level, and greater than 10 is the level where we do the in-person investigation.

Okay.

And then uh through the chair, are we tracking greater than 10 separately to see how if that rate is also falling?

Through the chair, yes, we are.

Okay, and through the uh could you get let us know how that number is looking?

Yes, it is improving as well.

I don't have the numbers memorized on the Saturday.

I would imagine 3.5 is falling, then 10 is also falling.

But it uh does speak to the amount of the work volume for the healthcare providers who have to respond to those.

I'm just curious what they're at.

Through the chair and our team as well.

And you know, fair enough.

A lot of inspections, right?

Okay.

Um the next thing I wanted to ask through the chair was I guess we're gonna go to page 15 of 34, where we talk about where we're looking at um compliance with lead risk assessment versus clearance exams.

So if I'm reading this correctly, uh in 2024, well, that's the fourth quarter.

Um, but in 2024 we had 14 clearance exams, 250 risk assessments, and then the Hodge Podge of others.

And then we switched over with that executive order to only accept risk assessments.

Uh we dropped quite a bit, and we haven't recovered to the total number of participants or submissions were now at about a little under 1,300 have been in the 1200 range for three quarters through the chair to the director.

How many unique units are we talking about at this point?

Some of those Q4 2025 could have been people that first submitted Q4 2023 and are back for their second.

Where is the data for total number of rental units that have submitted any type of clearance or risk assessment?

Through the chair, I so the number of active lease certified units is just under 30,000.

And so this doesn't include ones that have expired.

I think if I remember that there are about uh maybe 4,000 that have expired in addition to the ones that are active.

Um but I can get you the exact number.

It's on one of our dashboards.

I'm I'm I'm I don't need the exact number through the chair.

I'm not trying to go there.

I'm trying to figure out what's going to be our most effective tactic to get to the 90,000.

Yeah.

So there's 90,000 rental units in the city.

We've got 29,000 have done something.

They've got some kind of active certification.

4,000 have dropped off since their first, meaning that we've got 25,000 currently certified.

So we're still we'll round up the 30.

We're still missing 60,000.

Two out of two-thirds.

Yeah.

And so my issue through the chair to the director is going to be throughout this LRA versus clearance exam.

Um, what gets us safely to the highest number of inspected units?

I would rather have an imperfect effort uh than a uh denial of effort.

Yeah.

Um I think that if we're going to get people trying to participate in this program, trying to meet compliance with this ordinance, um, any effort is better than no effort.

And sometimes my concern is going to be if we set the bar too high, they'll make no effort, uh, which ends up accomplishing less uh of our outcome than even a flawed effort.

Through the chair, that's the big concern.

So I, you know, what we found though is as that number was going up of the any effort, um properties weren't getting better and they were still poisoning kids.

And so that's why we made the change and we so we figured yes, you know, the pace of change might be slower in terms of uh how many homes are getting inspected.

Um quarter four is a little bit of a uh misleading because that was that big rush when everybody was getting their clearance exams that created that 1200 backlog or so that that's a little misleading.

Um so you look at the overall trend and kind of see the increase to help a little bit.

But yeah, the exams weren't good enough, is what we found because property owners were being instructed to just clean in certain areas over their homes.

And so while the number of tests were going up, the lead poisoning rate was flat.

And so with this more um uh proper exam, as you know, the lead risk assessment is really meant to find potential lead hazards in a way that the clearance exam was not doing.

Uh we found that properties are now getting better, and that is reducing our lead poison rate.

So through the chair, uh a lead clearance exam has a very simple pass fail result based on well, we'll we'll save the details for later.

Um but a lead risk assessment is going to come up with a lot more nuanced uh results for a unit.

Um, through the chair, what are the standards we're being used and what are we telling landlords about the standards for how to pass a lead risk assessment?

Yeah, given that it's going to tell you you know when lead's present, even if it's not a hazard.

Right.

So yeah, that's that's why I brought these samples of these reports to kind of see what our standard is.

And so uh in general, what we're hoping or what we're seeing now from property owners and um I think when we come back in a future time we can bring some testimonials of lead risk assessors and and and property owners and tenants.

What we're seeing is now we're kind of mapping out all the potential sources of lead poisoning and giving folks a blueprint for here's what you can do to reduce uh lead hazards in your home.

Not just permanent things like abatement like window replacements, but also interim controls, and and we walk all that through in the risk assessment report that wasn't in the clearance exam.

So then let me rephrase the question.

Sure.

Um clearance exam is going to come back and say that there are no present uh imminent threats based on the dust wipe, of course, we assume there's lead in the house.

A lead risk assessment is going to come back and say, here's where the lead is, here's how much lead is in there, and whether or not there's any imminent threat based on lead dust wipes.

Yeah.

To pass with the city with a lead risk assessment requires what?

What does that lead risk assessment have to say in order for that person to get their two-year certificate?

Through the chair, thank you.

Um no active lead hazards is is basically what?

So potential hazards, yes, but like a clearance exam.

So through the chair, is that the wipes then still?

Yeah, that's part of a risk assessment you're doing wipes.

Right.

Absolutely.

So if the wipes come back clean.

Yep.

Clean enough.

Yep.

But the LRA, the X-ray guns and all that says, yeah, there's lead in this wall, that wall, the other wall.

But the wipes are clean.

They pass?

Through through the chair, yeah.

And it's not so much the walls that, as you know, that we're concerned about.

It's it's so you basically you're showing that the uh uh high risk components, so friction impact surfaces.

So where the window sash rubs against the the threshold, where the door hits the door jam.

If you're not testing that, you have to assume it's lead-based paint.

Right.

And then the lead risk assessor's job is to test to see if there's friction, to look to see if there's lead dust around.

But through through so through the through the chair, because I am or was a lead risk assessor, and I've done both risk assessments and clearance exams.

Yes.

Um I'm doing a clearance exam.

I'm taping off a section of that window sill and the window trough, and I'm I'm wiping it down and I'm shipping it off to a lab, and they're gonna tell me how much lead is on those wipes.

And that's all I do in a clearance exam.

I assume that there's lead in the component, especially if it's a wooden window.

I assume that there's lead in the component.

If I'm doing a risk assessment, I do the exact same taping and dust wipe, except I stick a radar gun up to an XRF gun up to the uh component, and I send that result back to the lab, and they tell us how much lead paint is actually in that uh component.

Both tests would come back with the exact same dust wipe result because the dust wipe is the same regardless.

Through the chair, correct.

So yeah.

So through the chair, whether I'm doing a clearance exam or a lead risk assessment, the amount of lead in the component itself, does that determine whether or not I pass as a landlord?

Through the chair, no.

Okay.

So it's just the dust wipe.

So uh well, no, it's um so you're deteriorated paint, it's the visual.

Friction impact services, yeah.

So if you're um the it's just a lot more comprehensive in the risk assessment.

And and to be clear, not everybody doing lead risk assessments in Cleveland is using an XRF gun or paint chip analysis.

And if you don't, you have to assume per the 2019 lead law that it is lead-based paint, and you have to document as such.

This is lead-based paint and you know, potential future hazard.

Yeah, through the chair, I don't know if you can complete a lead risk assessment if you don't do an XRF or paint chip uh sampling of every single surface substrate.

Through the chair per the 2019 lead law, you have to assume that it's lead-based paint if you're not testing it.

Okay.

Um through the chair to my colleagues, just so you know, a lead risk assessment and a clearance exam both start with a visual examination.

Uh the results of which should be automatic fail if the examiner finds any chipped cracked flaking, peeling, bubbling, flaking, whatever the rest of the adjectives are, any kind of deteriorated surface whatsoever at any point in the interior of the unit, a visual exam, you see one little crack, you see one little flake, that should be a fail to the unit.

And I don't believe that has changed since I was actively involved in this.

Through the chair, there's a de minimis threshold, and so it's not so if there's just one crack, it it just depends.

And then also if if you do have deteriorated paint and you do uh test it and it's not lead-based paint, that wouldn't fail either.

Um so the visual exam can well over half of all lead inspections.

You can walk into most units and say there's no way this passes visual, we're done here, I'm not even gonna pull out my my chemistry kit um because the visual fail.

Uh the problem being, through the chair to my colleagues, that some uh risk assessors and clearance examiners um are going to uh be uh employed by the landlord, not employed by the public health department, never do what's good for the landlord, not what's good for the public health, and this has been sort of the the conflict or one of the sources of conflict.

Um we want to make sure through the chair to the director as a city that we are getting to the units that need address the most.

So we're gonna spend more time on this clearance exam versus risk assessment because um the risk assessments are way more expensive, and there's far fewer people that are legally allowed to conduct them.

The clearance exam was a lower threshold in certification that created more of a workforce and the lead risk assessment is a harder threshold to accomplish, and there's four, there's fewer people that work in that field, although I hear the number is going up.

Through the chair, yeah, that would just clarify on that.

So two things you're you're right, that's how it was in 2019, and that's why it did make sense at that time to put you know the clearance exams.

Um the it is changed where there are now uh about 500 lead safe workers and uh with a 216 area code is what the state was able to send me.

Um lead safe workers or lead risk assessors?

Lead risk assessors and abatement contractors, they they they send them to me combined, that 500 have a 216 area code.

So through the chair, the next time we come back here, can we look at the number of lead risk assessors in the county?

Absolutely, yeah.

So through the chair, I I took the class in November, full full class.

Um I know that former councilwoman Moore took it in in January had a full class.

You all are going to take it and you'll find the other thing.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

40 hours you got the whole week to want to.

I didn't think that's my test.

Good.

Good job.

So and then the and then the price.

So once the incentives ended, that was $750 that you you heard about dramatically, the price dropped of the service.

And so now if you go onto websites, it's about $300 for a lead risk assessment.

Back in 2019.

No, no, for the cost of the test.

Oh, okay.

Back in 2019, it was different.

There were two different levels and it was much higher.

Right.

And but now because there are so much the supply has flooded the market, um, and and folks from you know other places are are coming in too, but lots of Cleveland residents as well have gotten this, including myself, have done this test.

And so um so that has changed.

The price and the supply have changed from 2019.

Um the next question I have, and Mr.

Chair, I don't want to take up our entire committee.

Um great.

But um uh in terms of getting money out the door for the components, because uh I I like to tell people that uh lead is not rocket surgery.

Um we know a lot about it.

We know we we know what the problems are, we know what the solutions are.

We we pretty much it's just it's uh it's an execution challenge because it's a huge social, it's everywhere.

It's it's it involves so many aspects.

In terms of getting money out the door for the component replacement, windows and doors and porches, what we all know are the primary culprits here.

Um through the chair, how much money is left in the accounts that are earmarked for component replacement that are available to people right now?

Through the chair, the lead safe coalition uh budgeted about eight million dollars this year for for home improvement.

Okay.

Which I wish it's a big increase from the the year prior.

Um then the uh City of Cleveland Department of Community Development has still has three grants from HUD, which are over 10 million dollars.

I don't I don't remember the exact amount.

So 10.

So we're looking at about 18 million if we were to the chairall that's yeah, just that's uh approximation.

Okay.

Um through the chair to the director, how much of this work is focused on easing that money out the door?

Um and and how much of the exact I see that the amendments are and uh and these don't really get into the distribution of available resources to help people accomplish the past.

Yeah, through the chair, the original law doesn't really touch how grants are spent and these suggestions don't change that part of it.

Okay.

Um so I think you know that that's obviously extremely important.

Every future grant that we get, you you have the authority to legislate how that money is spent to you know, for example, implement, make sure that no additional city restrictions go on top of the the funding sources.

So I think that you'll definitely have your chance to continue to legislate that.

So you guys have to get it out the door.

Through the chair, that's that's correct.

Oh, I don't yeah, absolutely.

Right.

But it but it's getting the money out the door.

Yeah.

Oh, I was only saying in terms of this this group of uh suggested amendments here don't have anything to do with the grant spending just because the legislation for the grant spending will come when when the money is there.

I think I just have two more questions and I'll uh uh stop hogging the mic.

Um through the chair.

Uh I think we would all agree that we want generally low thresholds for people to access money for home repairs.

We want people to be able to get new windows and new doors, and we don't want to create unnecessary barriers for people.

We want to try to make that as as fluid as possible to get into the homes.

At the same time, we are raising the threshold for achieving uh uh a lead uh a certificate from the clearance exam to the risk assessment, but then on the back end trying to make that carrot a little bit bigger by making the period of time compliance, the period of interval of what is it?

Extending the interval of the extending the interval and then doing some lifetime when they're when we've established there's no lead.

Um so I'm just uh putting this out there for for people to kick over because we're not ready to vote yet.

But uh the question I'm gonna have in my mind is are we properly balancing the uh incentives versus the uh the requirements?

Uh are the requirements too stringent on the front end to access the the the resources and um once the resources have been accessed, are we too strict on giving people their their compliance and making sure that we're because because we we should all be clear, we're still two-thirds no effort.

Citywide.

City wide.

Two-thirds of of units have still made no effort to comply with this, which means two-thirds of all units in Cleveland still sit as a very large threat to, and I'm sure they're probably I'm sure the two-thirds does not include the newest, nicest, best, cleanest you know, units are probably our older units.

Right.

Um getting that balancing act right is going to be really important.

My last question, my only last question.

Last question.

My last question.

One minute, okay, cool.

I get I can do this.

Um it was number three, uh, amendment number three, multi-unit apartment boat is built.

Commercial conversions.

Four, seven, yeah, yeah.

Um so that is still going to be with a lead risk assessment.

Through the chair, correct.

Okay.

So there's really no difference between that and anybody else that accomplishes a lead risk assessment built before 1978 that comes back like negative, right?

Well, why is that different?

The difference here is this would be a lifetime property because you've done a full gut job of of the property, and we would have to figure out you know together how to how we would certify that.

When we're going to do lifetime in amendment number two?

Yes.

So but this is a different test.

So uh number two is a combined lead inspection risk assessment.

So we're doing a surface-by-surface analysis with an XRF gun, and this would be just a uh lead risk assessment where you're looking for potential lead-based risks and you're not doing every single surface.

Okay, I guess through the chair, I'm gonna have to get caught up.

I uh my assumption was that all lead risk assessments are going to include an XRF because it's much easier than cutting the substrate out.

I mean, it's much easier than taking pain chip samples and uh lead risk assessments do if you're not going to assume that there's lead on every surface, you're gonna have to test every service.

Through the chair, if you're not gonna assume, and and that is why one of the samples I brought for lead risk assessment, they do do the XRF on just the components, but on the other lead risk assessments I show you some examples of where they're assuming.

But yeah, cutting pieces out of the wall though is a is a time consuming process, a pain in the butt.

Nobody likes doing it, and the XRF becomes the only real alternative.

So if we're if we're requiring a lead risk assessment on those conversions, they're probably using an XRF gun.

Um I'm just clarifying that if they come back clean on a lead risk assessment.

They're still going to need to be clean on the lead risk assessment.

Through the chair, of course.

Okay.

So it it's a lot of overlap, but okay.

Um Mr.

Chair, I will stop.

Uh thank you for the indulging me.

Uh Charles, appreciate it.

Thank you.

Thanks for coming.

And don't forget to uh are you going to give that to me today?

The class.

Yeah, yes.

I'm I'm I'm interested.

But I don't only want to take this class.

Okay.

I'm gonna take all the classes that get immersed since Rebecca is gone.

Yep.

And then what's going on and we move forward.

Correct.

Take all the classes.

Uh the lead risk assessment class and then R RP class, I would say would be another operation.

Renovation, right?

Yeah, yeah.

How to paint without disturbing lead-based paint.

All right.

I need to be in all of that.

Renovation repair.

I yield to you on that.

Thank you, Chairman.

Mr.

Chairman, um I'd love to join you.

Okay.

We go go to classes, Joe.

We're gonna end 40 hours a week, man.

We'll be immersed in it.

I'm good because there's so much in this area that meets uh that you don't know all the parts and pieces.

Highly recommended.

Highly recommended.

All right, okay.

Okay.

And you're gonna let me know when it starts.

Soon I can't.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

It's great.

We're gonna have a well-educated body here.

I love this stuff.

Through the chair, maybe the chair to the director.

Uh just a couple of questions off the cuff, and then I'll maybe work for the amendments one by one question.

Um just so the true is I understand that the main backstop here that's encouraging us to pursue legislative amendments.

The number of tests was going up, but the number of lead poisonings was not changing.

Correct.

Between 2019 and 2023, that's right.

And and so with that in mind, it was like, well, what are we testing for and why?

Because it's not demonstrating the improvements we needed in the population health.

Correct.

Correct.

Okay.

Yep.

Um that's gonna be compelling throughout this.

It's if we're doing more tests and it's not leading to more results, then I we need to change what we're doing or why we're doing it or how we're doing it.

Through the chair, I would appreciate it.

Through the chair, correct.

Yeah, okay.

Um to the director.

So oh, yeah, I appreciate you bringing up the number of new homes being built.

Um, this is not the main point of today.

No.

But it also does strike me that zero five-plus unit homes were built, apparently on page 21 between 2020, between 2015 and 2021.

Uh that's astonishing.

We just built no new apartments in the city for like most of a decade.

Yeah, through the chair.

So this data comes from from HUD, and we're still kind of working through exactly where the data comes from.

But I would say, you know, it's it's it's pretty striking, even if it's not a hundred percent correct, but correlations, you know, correlates uh correctly there every new apartment building uh that's going up, every new home that's being built.

Um that is such an important part of our us reducing our lead poisoning rate as long as those homes remain affordable uh for Cleveland residents.

And that's that's really important.

Of course, and a longer conversation about like what is unaffordable today may turn to affordable 15 years from now.

How do we support currently affordable?

Yeah, I mean, just all the but I I mean, as a policy matter, I do believe in all the above housing solutions, and I'm glad that that's part of the conversation here.

The on the next slide, uh 22, we discuss the goals for the number of children getting blood level testing uh at well child visits.

Why like why are 20 why is a quarter of children?

Why are a quarter of children not who are actually going to the doctor?

So we're already excluding from this population kids who aren't able or don't go to the doctor.

But why are the quarter of children who do go to the doctor not getting this test?

Yeah, thank you.

Through the chair, the lead test, the lead blood test is a routine recommended required part of the one-year-old and two-year-old wellness visit.

Um unfortunately, the way that most pediatrician offices are set up are two things were happening.

One, um a doctor might not remember to order it.

Oh, because let's say their practice is in Brexville and you have a Cleveland family going down to the Brexville practice and it's maybe not top of mind.

And the second thing is maybe they're ordering it, but you have to come back next Thursday when the lab is open and the uh the phlebotomists with the experience of uh taking blood out of a one-year-old is present.

And so there are a lot of barriers to to getting this right, and so that's why it's been incredibly important for the Lead Safe Coalition to better health partnership funded through this body from ARPA has spent uh one million dollars and implementing best practices across our city, and we're seeing those results play out right now.

So can actually let me let me ask some questions, please.

Um counseling.

The health mobile.

Yes.

Are you testing children and the communities like Glenville, Fairfax Hough, whatever the case may be?

Out of the um Health Mobile, because they're there and you have a lot of people there, and you're going to be visiting festivals and safety events, and it's children there, and with the health mobile, they're there.

Right.

So through the chair, as we've discussed a number of times with Clash colleagues, and we discussed this in February as well.

Uh our mobile unit does does not test children.

Um but what we do do is when there are large events, we bring Care Alliance, we bring Metro Health, and they have mobile testing uh that they do out in the community.

What we do do at the health department is we're working with community partners to improve the number of children that are connected to their uh pediatric wellness visits because it's not just the lead test that they're missing out when they don't have a one-year-old and a two-year-old uh routine visit.

It's uh assessment for learning disabilities, it's heightened measurement, it is all the routine vaccines like preventing measles, the flu, et cetera.

And so that that's the work that we do in the health department.

So what if they don't show up?

Let's say Carolina is well, let's say we can't make it, and you have several hundred children there, and then we miss an opportunity.

And I don't want to miss any opportunity.

Through the chair, that's why we partner with the county healthcare system, Metro Health, and Care Alliance who have been coming to those events and doing those tests.

Have they not showed up?

Have they showed up 100% of the time or what?

Through the chair, that's been our experience when when asked.

And so I know um Clash has asked a few times and not her back, and so we're gonna work together to make sure that that folks show up because we do already have healthcare systems that do this work.

And so rather than the health department creating another health care system, our recommendation is to help prop up uh the good organizations that are doing that work and bring them along.

Any I mean, that's why I'm taking up the study which not to be a doctor like you, but that's why I'm taking up the study this.

We can't miss any opportunities.

Through the chair, couldn't agree more.

That 3.2 million made me so I was so disappointed.

Yeah.

And I woke up in the middle of the night and I said, you know what, I need to take this test.

I need to start studying it, certifications to hold nine yards.

I don't like I don't like missing out on things.

No, no, no, I agree.

And so we gotta get f all festivals, everything.

You say Carollians and why come we still don't have it, because you could do contingencies.

Sometimes you you spend a time emailing them and calling them.

We should have our own as well.

What the health department?

Right.

Through the chair, we don't have primary care at the health department.

Um we don't have uh uh a lead clinic at the there are a number of things that we don't have at the the health department because we have a strong partner and neighborhood family practice and care alliance and metro health and university hospital and Cleveland Clinic doing this work, and so we're collaborating.

Part of my role and and our role, you know, together is figure out all right, what are the gaps?

What are the places where the health department needs to step in?

And so in this case, there are a number of very good organizations doing this work, and so our job is to prop them up, make sure they're there, put that pressure on them if needed.

It's usually not needed, um, so that we're all working together and we don't each have to have our own thing.

You don't want to reinvent the wheel.

Yeah.

So imagine if we hired a phlebotomist, you know, to do the one-year-old work.

What if she calls off, you know, work and he calls off, and then we don't have a backup plan.

Whereas these other systems, they they already have this work set up, and so I'd rather prop them up and go hand in hand with them than us inventing our own.

Have they ever called off?

Have our care alliance or no Care Alliance is has been there for us.

Yeah.

Under new leadership, they've been outstanding.

Okay.

Yep.

All right.

I yield back to you.

No, thank you, Chair.

That's so good to know.

Uh, and just to go back to the lead blood test real quick.

You mentioned there's a requirement at year one and then at year two.

Yes.

Is that a city ordinance or under what authority is that through the chair, that is a recommendation from the feds that the state implemented as a requirement for anybody in high-risk areas uh and and high-risk populations, so that's all of Cleveland.

Okay.

So the yeah.

Federal State requirement.

It's a state, it's a state.

Federal guidelines, state requirement.

And so the individual the doctor in Brexville really should, it means they should know about it.

Through the chair, correct.

Um are any suburbs also high-risk areas?

Yes.

Uh through the chair.

Um East Cleveland's lead poisoning rate is about twice as high as ours.

Um Cleveland Heights and Shager Heights are higher than the national average.

Lakewood is still still up there.

I don't have the exact numbers from Rise, but in our actually in our next report, we'll have some of that data as well.

But but yeah, they're all high risks.

There are some high recipients in there.

Through the chair, not to pop quizy.

More of just like for the if you're a physician practicing in Lakewood or Cleveland Heights, this sounds like it should be on your mind.

Yeah, through the chair, it's really the standard of care in Northeast Ohio, and that has been the great work of Better Health Partnership and partners to help remind everybody that this is a standard of care.

You know, we all learn medicine in different places all over the country based on national statistics.

And so part of my role as director of public health is I need you know healthcare professionals in Cleveland to know the specific health issues of Cleveland that might not exist in other parts of the country.

And not to hit this point too hard, but we do have the three premier hospitals in the region in the city of Cleveland UH Metro and the Clinic.

So everyone there should be fully operating.

Through the chair, absolutely.

And so wet our health partnership right now is sharing with those health systems, hey, you're doing great, or you're doing much worse than your peer and using that kind of peer competition to help increase our numbers.

That makes sense to me.

Um thank you.

And then through the chair, moving on to building a couple of points raised by my colleague Consman Harsh, the on the denominator of the 90,000 rental units.

Uh just from my knowledge, CMHA, where do they fit into are they rentals in this categorization?

Through the chair.

So they're uh they've got their scattered site uh section.

So all those are rental properties, and that's where that big bolus of enforcement came starting in November was that uh our team got that list uh from CMHA through a shared data agreement, and we started uh ticketing those those properties for uh the property owners yet was great.

That's and then as far as um CMHA facilities, um I I can remember never remember exact uh circumstances for their whether or not they have to be on the rental registry.

Um but the good news is that they've made uh through this body's support and federal support and state support, uh many of their facilities have turned over that they're now post-1978 facilities, and so not all, um, but they're working, they've got a plan basically property by property to get them all uh new so that they're lead-free.

That's uh that's great to understand.

It's and most Let me ask a question.

Reach out to CMHA because we met with them last year and they were supposed to give us a progress review to see where they're at.

Through the chair, I I speak to them almost every week at a minimum.

Um so when the when there is an elevated level in a scattered site, so let's say they're paying a voucher for uh Section 8 for um someone living in an apartment or a duplex in Cleveland, if there's an elevated level, the chief operating officer, Mr.

Jeffrey Wade calls me directly on my cell phone, we've got a shared data agreement, and we work through you know what the plan is for that.

So they're taking it very seriously.

And um so absolutely they'll I'm sure they would be happy to come back to and talk to you all.

Yeah, we'll we'll we'll bring them back, we'll bring them back in.

It's my understanding so my understanding is about 10,000 housing units of CMHA oversees directly, and maybe another 16 to 17,000 that they see oversee through the voucher programs.

And so I wonder if that 90,000 rental denominator is not as bad as it seems.

You know, when there's only one third of its if there's only if there's 30,000 units that are on the rental registry, but there's another 10,000 units that are CMHA that don't need to be on the registry, it sounds like and they're doing pretty good.

But then I I do wonder if where the voucher-based housing lives.

Like if is is half of our rental registry CMHA vouchers if if they're having that many folks?

Through the chair, I don't think so.

Um but but um but yeah, it's an interesting question.

I mean part of the challenge with that 90,000, even as a denominator is not all that reliable.

We don't have we don't know what we don't know.

Okay.

Um just like with the smoke shop question, how many smoke shops are there?

We don't we didn't know until they started getting permits and that sort of thing.

Um and so there is a a larger universe out there of rental units that we're not a no no no.

Yeah, that director Martin O'Toole and her team are working on getting more and more rental properties fixed.

And that's and you can see that through the civil ticket graph that just kind of takes off.

It through the chair that that makes it mostly what I and I, you know, the US Census has estimates about how many rentals versus owner accurate housing words that are here.

So that it seems like a fair number to start with.

Just understanding the the dynamics there.

And and it might be worth if you can get the data to us about how many of the 30,000 are CMHA voucher.

I mean, it just would be interesting to because if there if there's another 15,000 or so units we can add to the 30 from CMHA vouchers, then or my data may be wrong.

It just let's let's explore this.

Where I'm really going with this is the owner-occupied and the absence of the other half of the city's housing units from this conversation.

Yeah.

That I think in my community, a lot of our apartments are either CMHA or new built apartments.

Um a lot of the older housing units are owner-occupied homes.

And you know, there's no point of sale for lead here.

There's no I'm not sure actually what best practices would be for owner occupied, but surely there's some sort of something we could do for the other half of the city.

Yeah.

Where where are we on that and why is the coalition not pushing that harder?

Yeah, the so th nationally and and locally the rental properties are much higher risk for for lead poisoning.

Um and that really has most to do with structural racism and and poverty um being associated with with rental uh units, but um uh occupied uh owner-occupied units occasionally do um can cause that.

Um we we see it much less often with our group of lead hazard control orders that we do, and so we're we're mostly dealing with rental properties when we're going in to do the investigation.

Um but it's it's absolutely important to think of and um point of sale inspections is a good idea.

I think us getting better at spending our resources is gonna be a big part of that as well, but um the rental properties are the highest risk for our residents.

It through the chair.

It it wouldn't surprise me, of course, to understand rental units are but there are so many you know multi-generational old housing units where there's been no inspection and no love given to these homes across the city, you know, not just in my community.

And and you mentioned your lead hazard control orders disproportionately seem to indicate their rentals with lead, but I assume that's also the same.

Anecdotally, yeah.

Well, yeah, I I have to guess you're also checking mostly rentals too, though, right?

Like, how often do you get into tell me?

Yeah, so sorry about that.

Um so that's uh when I talk about inspections in that case, I'm talking about the uh elevated blood level level investigations.

And so our our team that's following up on a lead poisoning case are most often dealing with property managers.

Aaron Powell, that's that's a great data point that you have through the chair, you have data about the blood content in these homes for 75% of children and only the proportion of kids who are actually going to the doctors.

But you know, that's something at least makes sense.

Right.

Okay.

Um I I would just love and encourage um us as a council, every policy-making body that you've interacted with to think through why are we not doing anything interacting whatsoever with half of the housing stock in this city seems important to me.

Um the uh I'm so I'm just gonna run through these amendments real quick through the chair.

Okay.

I'm sorry that you don't have consistent forms.

I'm I I look forward to voting for consistent forms for your team.

That's that seems exhausting.

Uh if you tell me more.

Um through the chair, most use the same the form that we put on the website, but it's not required at this point.

Makes sense.

The and then just to clarify, really again, building on my colleague Consman Harsh's point here in amendment number two when you do risk assessments.

Do these risk assessments require the use of an XRF gun?

Through the chair, so this the accommodation-led inspection risk led-based paint inspection risk assessment, which we call a Lira L-I-R-A, that does require XRF gun.

Okay.

So that today would get you a 20-year certificate if you prove that there's no lead in the home.

And what this amendment would say is it would be a lifetime of the property certificate.

That well, that makes sense because there's not through the chair, correct me if I'm wrong, Director, there's no better way.

If you're using XRF guns, I mean, like what else could you do?

There's no science left to tap at this point.

Through the chair, the old fashioned way, as as councilman Harsh mentioned, is the uh pain chip uh sample sending you actually have to cut like uh square centimeter square paint and send it to the lab off of the chair.

You all know this better than me, is that more reliable than the use of the radar guys?

It's the same.

Oh, okay.

Yeah, I mean it's yeah, through the chair, the XRF gun is great.

Fair encourage that, yeah.

And then through the chair, the uh again, it's I'm glad my colleague Consman Harsh brought up this distinction for amendment three in the multi-unit conversions, that is a slightly lower um scientific testing.

But the assumption is because these are such deep guts, we don't need to use.

I mean, and let me ask through the chair why why not require the same level of inspection.

I mean through the chair, it's a great thing.

And just to put it out there, these are commercial flips, there's money involved.

They can check.

Yeah, there it's through the chair.

So let's think about like there's in Broadway, there's a school um that was converted into apartments that would qualify for this as a gut job to do a lira on a property like that that might have, I think I don't know, 80 units or so that probably cost like 10 to 20,000 dollars and going surface by surface to uh inspect for for lead.

And so certainly we could make that a requirement, um, but it's it's probably um not the best use of resources.

It's just a lower risk property, and we haven't seen any lead poisonings from those types of properties that have been gutted like that.

Oh, okay, yeah, that's that's a good point.

You have you have research on this.

My my thought would be more of like it hues resources, right?

Because the developers' resources who then pass on 20,000 to amortize it over 30 years.

Yeah.

And it would just I mean, you're right.

But I appreciate that.

Yeah.

Umendment four regarding the five.

Well, you kept interrupting me, my chair.

I didn't interrupt you idea, yeah.

Yeah, like three, four times.

It's all all I'll say is uh this is good.

This is a good because you know, we'll have this discussion now, and then we'll it'll save us time later.

Where um when we're the the goal is to avoid testing without reducing lead poison, or while still the goal is to avoid a scenario that we were facing where we our testing was increasing, but our lead poisonings were not.

So the chair, correct.

And and then for amendment four is our assumption that testing like our re whose resources are used up by having access testing.

It's not the city's resources, it's the chairs testing.

Yeah, for the most part, it's the it's the property owners.

Um it is it does use our time as well because our team is reviewing each of these applications.

That's good.

We get about a hundred, a little bit more than a hundred applications a week right now for lead risk assessments, and uh and it takes a lot of time, and I I would rather our team spend more time on the properties that are higher risk.

And so uh for amendment four, this is a property that's gone through the ringer three separate times, and we think that property is a lower risk property, and and the HUD guidelines back that up.

It's and I I hear the concern about my time.

I guess I'll uh we'll talk more after this, but that's helpful to understand.

Thank you, Director.

Okay, you go.

No, no, no.

It's uh there's other others in the room.

Others in the room.

Councilman Hudson will ask some of the questions you were thinking about.

If you want to get it five, let's go right ahead.

No.

Okay, I yield.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

You did you did um ask at least one of the questions that I was gonna ask.

But um through the chair, um to the to the director.

Um I know we have spoken about um testing out of the vans.

Um I uh I I just wanted to ask, is a phlebotomist uh is a licensed phlebotomist required to do the finger prick test for uh lead lead risk?

Um through the chair, I'm on I'm not sure the exact credentials required to do the point of care test.

It's a great question.

Okay, and um just just to you know fill everybody in.

Um it is you know, my experience, you know, I have two kids, and um you you know, at the one and two-year-old uh well check visit, uh, your your child gets the finger prick test, at least at least my kids did in the doctor's office.

And then um unfortunately, my son had a positive uh fingerprint test, and then we were referred to the hospital to get an actual blood draw.

Um and then you know, thank God it it was it was negative.

Um but I I've shared, I think, with you and and others here that I was actually hesitant to to take him for for the blood draw.

Um and it's because you know, when you're when you have a a young child, um you know you have to hold them down to have their blood.

And so it's it's traumatic.

Um just like you know, getting vaccinations, but this is a little bit more than um getting a vaccination.

So I I understand um, you know, the the difference between getting a fingerprint test and then the actual blood draw.

Um but it is very important to to do both.

And uh, you know, and I I did end up following up.

I live in an old home.

Um, but um, you know, the the thought that my home um could be making my children sick was was was horrifying.

Um but I think that we need to test our kids however wherever possible.

And so I you know, through through the chair, um I appreciate the advocacy of groups like Clash and Councilman Conwell.

Maybe they're not making their well child visits, but maybe this will introduce them into taking that step to making those well child visits.

Um it's um it's just just another touch um for for our kids.

And I think it is important with um with our old housing stock and how um how dire this situation is in Cleveland that we try to reach as many kids as possible um in every manner possible.

So I just wanted to to share that.

I know you and I have spoken about that before.

Um and um I I do know uh that uh through the chair that um owner occupied homes are receiving money from um um led remediation grants.

Do you have an idea what percentage is being directed of that money um public private or or or both um what percentage is being directed towards owner-occupied homes versus um rental properties?

Through the chair, I I don't know the percentage uh either from the coalition or um from community development, but I can ask to see if that is a number that they track.

I imagine it is.

The other additional resource since just to remember that that opportunity to elevate this is if you're our homeowner in Ohio and you go through um lead abatement in your and your home, you can get up to 40,000 in tax abatement uh this year with the the Ohio budget was 10,000, now it's 40,000.

And the Ohio folks tell me that Cleveland um tends not to take advantage of that, Cleveland residents, and so it's a thank you for opportunity to elevate that that is an opportunity for people.

I don't I can imagine it's challenging to go through and file your taxes and submit all that, but um it's a resource that's available that other parts of Ohio utilize for owner-occupied.

Thank you for sharing that.

Um and I, you know, and I do appreciate through the chair um the the idea and the intent behind these amendments in and focusing on the um the properties that have the greatest need um for lead remediation.

Um are you are you making a similar effort to um I know my colleague um colleagues have mentioned the effort to get money out the door and actually address um the cause of uh the lead poisoning.

Are you making a similar effort to look at what we need to do in order to get the money out the door, replace the windows, replace the doors, um, you know replace people's front porches, back porches.

Yeah, through the chair.

Um I you heard the the mayor uh acknowledge um you know how it uh higher priority this is for for him for the administration to fix home repair that is government funded coming out of the Department of Community Development.

And so right now it's all hands on deck uh for for them to figure out how to get that money out the door for the the hot grant um work.

The health department is here to support.

We certainly have the list of properties that we know have poisoned children and can poison children, and so that's our role in this space of getting them as many properties as they can to get the money out the door faster.

Okay, thank you.

And in a similar vein, do you do you have data on um the percentage of rental properties versus owner-occupied properties that are poisoning children in Cleveland?

Through the chair, I I don't.

I I just have the anecdotes from our team that goes out and they say most of the time they're they're addressing property owners and and rental properties.

Okay.

Thank you.

Um I'm I'll yield.

I I had another question, but I can't think of it right now.

So director.

That means nothing you mean when you say get money out the door.

You gotta quantify that.

You know, you see what I'm saying?

Every quarter give us a progress review on how much money you get out the door, who was denied, and those kind of things will help us out.

Yeah.

Well, it's uh there's a slide in in there that I present to the Led Safe Advisory Board, but I yeah, I'm with you.

And um, as you know, that's the Department of Community Development, and so um I'm gonna uh let them you know present once they they have something to present of the changes they've made to address their home repair.

Yeah, they need to change the money.

The restrictions are also so visible.

You know, the whole system, the structure, correct.

And then get the money out the door.

Correct.

What whatever numbers did you looking at.

Yeah.

See, that's where I'm at.

Um council member Joe Jones.

Thank you, Mr.

Chairman.

First, I I want to say um uh to the director that I think that you are doing a good job.

You you got so much work.

I mean, I didn't realize this how um uh how engaging your job is as a director uh until I uh had a chance to take a look at some other things, and part of that was looking um at um our budget and um just being able to see all these balls that you have up in the air.

So, Mr.

Chairman, I'd like to first start out by just putting this on the radar screen.

Um I know that we've talked to great lengths and deals about the issue of lead poisoning in the city of Cleveland, going all the way back to when Mike White was mayor of the city of Cleveland in the 8990 period of time when lead had become an issue that was passed from then governor, well mayor Bonovich over to then Mayor Michael White, and the city received an enormous amount of money to try to uh deal with the lead issue in those days.

I think it was in the the ordeal of some like 30, 40, 50 million dollar grants.

And um, and I think that at some point we were unable, like we were this time, to really um uh distribute those resources where they needed to go to fundamentally deal with the lab problem in the city of Cleveland.

So, Mr.

Chairman, when it comes to um a funding source in pituity, um I would suggest, Mr.

Chairman, um that we look at maybe the Cleveland Foundation as a possibility of setting funds uh that's as a possibility um of setting a significant amount of money to the side uh so that they can uh bring other partners to the table to really help us have a funding source uh that can continue to deal with the lab poison issue year in and year out.

And I don't know if the director has that.

I see you're asking him.

So uh if the director would like to talk about that, I I would certainly uh would want to know.

Through the chair famously in in 2019, I think you you were there.

Um the philanthropy, you were there, philanthropy um pitched in and raised uh and and this body uh contributed uh about 15 million dollars to that as well, and so um their critique has been that even that money outside of government hasn't been spent quick enough.

And it it just goes to show how challenging it is to implement home repair programs and funding because I would say that contractors are um used to doing work without all of the stipulations and requirements from government and barriers, right?

And so you know they'll come in there, do the work and get out, whereas unfortunately these funding, even without the additional restrictions that we put on, you've got to go in there and do you know all the uh accounting that eventually it has to be audit proof, and so um that is work that's happening from philanthropy, including Cleveland Foundation, United Way, Mount Sinai, uh Enterprise, and and so many other partners.

I so Mr.

Chairman, on the on the concept of perpetuity, um are those funds set in perpetuity?

Through the chair, they're they're not.

Um but in conversations with funders, they've said spend our money so that you can ask for more money.

Mr.

Chairman, I would suggest on the point of perpetuity that um we have these uh programs established and set up because uh the problems that unfortunately we've had is that once the issue is hot now uh it get cold.

And we've had 20 some years, Mr.

Chairman, uh, to the directive where we lost a lot of time.

And and because of it, um it has had a we don't even know because we haven't even measured it, but I I would presume a profound impact uh on citizens living in the city of Cleveland.

So my suggestion is to set up some kind of funding, Mr.

Chairman, uh in perpetuity where those funds are sitting in the bank account, accruing resources, um partners can also invest into those funds, and then we can create a system, Mr.

Chairman, that for decade in, a decade out, we will always have funding you know available to to to deal with this issue.

And so, Mr.

Chairman, if we would turn to the page, Mr.

Chairman, of the presentation, because that's where I want to kind of like focus for just a bit.

And I think I don't have a page for this one.

I do.

Page 13, or it could be page 12, where it talks about, and that's where I'm giving you kudos to watch these numbers as they go down.

How do we measure how do we get to and what was used here to tell us that we're successful with these number drops?

Yeah, and through the chair, um it's not that we're successful, it's the number is going down, um, but we're still very high, and so we know that.

So this is a uh a metric that you're looking at on the screen right now that shows the percentage of children under the age of five or under the age of six, so between one and five tested that have a level in their blood of lead greater than 3.5 micrograms per deciliter.

So basically, the percentage of children tested in Cleveland that have lead in their blood in 2025 was 14 and a half percent.

That same number in 2005 was 52 percent.

And so while there has been progress, um we won't be we won't consider ourselves successful until that number is zero.

I see.

So how did we measure it just based upon volunteer then, Mr.

Chairman?

No, through the chairman.

How do the metrics come about?

Yeah.

How did that so the Ohio Department of Health uh tracks this with us?

So it's it's based on all of the children between one and five who get a blood test during routine visits with their pediatrician.

I see.

Um I'm gonna ask a a series of questions, Mr.

Chairman.

Um, and you may have some of that information now, but if we could note that, Mr.

Chairman, if our people could request for the information, because this would help me, Mr.

Chairman, to the director, uh, determine a um uh a thought that I have in my in my mind to uh uh uh be of assistance in this and and give it some thorough thought uh so that uh Mr.

Chairman when we sit here, hopefully if it's God's will, or whoever the next counsel who sits here, um, will have something that's measurable uh in a way in which we can determine if we're effective or not.

Um what is the percentage of homes in the city that has been led tested?

Uh through the chair, uh the number of homes that have been lead tested uh on one metric, you could say a third of rental properties or a quarter of rental properties of total properties, we we we don't know.

So we don't know.

Yeah.

Right.

That's probably the easiest answer.

Thank you.

So so we're we're really shooting in the dark, even with all the money that we have right now.

If we don't know, if we first of all, Mr.

Chairman, when we look at the patient, we have to be able to determine where the where the um uh where the problem is.

Um where is the bleeding coming from?

So it's it's we have a lot of data that we've never had before, and so I wouldn't say we're shooting in the dark.

So if you look behind you, this is a slide showing every property that has an active lead safe certificate.

Um if you look at this map here on slide 23, this is a map of every uh residence where a child has tested positive for lead in their blood.

And so um I think when we showed this map uh a couple years ago, um folks that always assume that lead poisoning it only only happens on the east side of Cleveland, and we hear that a lot, and so it's important for for this map.

That's the cost of some.

Exactly.

And so this map has helped to uh turn down a lot of those uh can you know preconceived notions because you can see Cadell and Clark Fulton really light up.

And where, Mr.

Chairman, did we get this data from?

Uh this is from the Cleveland Department of Public Health.

Okay, sir.

So so Mr.

Chairman, the the question that I asked earlier, because this is important because I'm gonna bring it back again, is what is the percentage of homes in the city of Cleveland that has been lead tested?

And we don't have that.

We don't know.

Through the chair, I can't give you an exact percentage, but um I can we can go back and look how many.

And Mr.

Chairman, let me just make sure I'm clear.

This is as I go down these lines of question.

This is no no looking at you and what you're doing.

Understood.

Um so I don't want you to, Mr.

Chairman, look at it as uh something that is more defensive response.

Um because I saw these last couple of slides.

Um I want to get really deep down in here again, as you have heard me said, Mr.

Chairman to the director, that the time I spend, I want to make sure is is worth the while.

So through the chair, um if if someone if a property owner does an inspection on their home, that doesn't necessarily come to the city.

The the laws uh the federal level that that has to stay with the property for the lifetime of the property.

And Mr.

Chairman this would be this would be like one of those things we we have all this money so for me Mr.

Chairman it would be first of all fundamentally putting together a program that tries to go straight in for the target.

And and um and that will help me as a legislator Mr.

Chairman really fundamentally begin the proposition of really diagnosing what the issue is.

Now I've sat here Mr.

Chairman at this table with health directors your your previous health director and I didn't like her tone about how to deal with how to really fundamentally deal with this issue that I actually brought up to the table and brought it back to the forefront of the citizens of the city of Cleveland making a debate here at one of our um discussions on our budget and at the time when the situation Mr.

Chairman was brought up I says we what is the condition and situation and the same question I'm asking you and then what I was told with a flippeted response from then that director was that lead is everywhere.

There's nothing we can do about it.

It's on this table it's on this floor it's in the soil what do you want and that was the response and so when I asked the question here how many homes have we inspected here in the city of Cleveland and have identified it those that's that's a serious question for me.

And so I don't know how we go about doing that but I think that that's the first thing that you know if you could if we don't have that information then we should figure away Mr Chairman and I don't want to waste too much time on this but we should figure away on what are we assessing and and and how far do we have to go it Mr.

Chairman gives me an ideal on what the finances would take to do that.

So through the chair we we do have that analysis so thanks to the property survey that that you all funded a few years ago I know that in 2022 there are about 40,000 properties that are uh C D or F that were built before 1940 so I don't need a full lead risk assessment to tell you that each of those properties is a as a lead hazard and so just pricing out those homes plus you know some B properties we've got about a hundred thousand homes that have lead-based paint in Cleveland 100,000 per home that's 10 billion dollars the the the problem we're looking at so we have done that that analysis and and that so it takes me back Mr.

Chairman to the first question of pituity in terms of having a fund that will be available to continue to deal with this issue from one generation to the next so Mr.

Chairman I would presume this assessment that you're talking about with this report was that the report that was done by a group of volunteers or was it totally done by the Department of Housing?

Well through through the chair that was yeah Department of Building Housing working with this body worth working with the Western Reserve land conservancy but uh a number of other efforts have been done showing the the extent of lead hazards uh in the in the city um the point is that unlike what you've heard in the past it this is fixable and so we just got to start we just got to do the work and the work is happening right now and we we can't give up and and Mr.

Chairman um because I know that you do have some programs that are available but if you could request Mr.

Chairman gotcha.

Hold on Mr.

Chairman request for information a list of lead abatement programs in the city of Cleveland I know that we have that listing can we make can we get a listing of all of the programs that the city offer in terms of lead abatement Mr.

Chairman can we get a list of all the bet lead abatement programs that your partners I presume you have a number of partners that you're working with the various different programs that they have to the chair correctly and then Mr.

Chairman are you are you going to get to this I can get the list again I got you.

And would you be able to give it to him tonight?

Yes.

At 7 p.m it doesn't I won't rush the chair Mr.

Chairman I thank you sir I appreciate you expeditiously making sure that the the directory I won't I won't rush the director I know that he's busy I stated it earlier I I'm impressed with the work that he does.

So whenever he has it available is it's not really a rush rush but really like to get it within hopefully within 30 days if all possible any of this information.

Thank you.

Water safety because that was another issue I brought up and uh I had the the chairman get flippity with me on the issue of uh and I will bring it out when a chairman is not acting right or our director or commissioner.

And I will bring it out when they're doing a good job too, Mr.

Chairman.

But water safety is significant.

And so here's Mr.

Chairman, something that I'd like to know about because apparently I don't know all the facts.

I've asked for the information, I've still at this point have not yet gotten that information, but we could request this information through you as the chairman.

Um there are lead pipes moving into people's homes.

Okay, yeah.

And so they're getting uh contaminated, Mr.

Chairman, and poison our citizens are being poisoned, our children are being poisoned, our people are being poisoned and didn't even know it just by drinking water.

Do you know for a fact?

Through the chair, that's not correct.

That's not correct.

Is that a fact?

No, that you know that for a fact.

Through the chair, we know for a fact that children, families are not being poisoned by by water in the city of Cleveland.

Okay.

It's it's by the way.

But Mr.

Chairman, if water is moving through the gotta ask the poor number, yes.

Well, I got this from the water department.

That's the reason why I requested.

I got this from one of the inspectors.

So so, Mr.

Chairman, I wouldn't be sitting here saying this if an inspector didn't give me this information.

Now I'm not gonna say who he is, but what I will say this, Mr.

Chairman, is I want to make sure I'm hearing this clearly.

You're saying to me that uh if we have lead pipes that transfer water, they're perfectly safe.

Through the chair, we're replacing all the lead pipes.

But wait a minute, that's not the question.

That Mr.

Chairman, that's not the question.

You have to let me fix the phone.

The question is, Mr.

Chairman.

I don't mind.

Mr.

Chairman, I am going through the chairman.

Mr.

Chairman, what I'm asking is the question, and then Mr.

Chairman, I don't mind if we have some extra opinions after it.

Uh but the question I'm asking is a yes and no.

Yes.

So when people are drinking the water with lead pipes, they are being contaminated.

Through through the chair, no, they are not being contaminated.

The water is safe in Cleveland, the water is treated.

What happened in Flint, Michigan?

And this is important because this goes back to structural racism.

What happened in Flint, Michigan is the city manager at the time chose the cheaper water source from the Flint River compared to the fancy expensive water from Detroit municipality.

And as a result, that water was more corrosive out of Flint River and that corroded the lead pipes, causing a cluster of lead poisonings in Flint, Michigan.

Flint, Michigan's lead poisoning rate at that time was five percent.

Cleveland's at that time was 20%, right?

But as a result, because it was in the water, everybody got scared across the country, and $15 billion was raised.

Meanwhile, lead point paint has been poisoning our children in Cleveland and elsewhere in the country at four times that rate, right?

But we didn't get $15 billion, right?

Because when you hear about water as, you know, someone reading the paper, you're like, oh no, this could happen to me.

But paint, you think, oh, that can only happen to them, right?

And so that's why this is so important to me, and that I always try and discuss the water issue, because I don't want folks to think they need to buy a bottle of water in the city of Cleveland because they're worried about lead.

I do want them to pay attention to what their windows look like.

The who, I'm sorry.

To anybody, my my community in Cleveland, our residents, our neighbors, right?

I do want them to pay attention to the paint.

And so what I find that when I'm in the community, I'm I I get worried because I see people with bottled water when you know, and and and they're maybe not noticing that there's tripping and peeling paint in their windows in their window sash that's causing lead dust everywhere.

And so that's why this is so important to me.

Right.

So that we have to do that.

I just want to make sure I'm clear then.

If if we don't have a problem, Mr.

Chairman, to the director, sir of lead pipes potentially harming our citizens, why are we replacing them?

Through the chair, I don't say that they the potential isn't there.

So some future city manager or mayor could say, you know what, forget Cleveland water, we're gonna go with a cheaper water supply, and that cheaper water supply corrodes our existing lead pipes, then we would have lead poisoning from the water.

That's just not the case now, but the case is now is that that map behind you that all that is from lead paint.

And and listen, Mr.

Chairman, to a director, it is my job to sit and ask you tough questions because I wouldn't have to be.

I love talking about this.

So so the reason why I asked that question is because again, an inspector talked to me about this.

And so, and so one of the things is sitting here at this table, I don't want to get check mark on two or three issues we know is causing it, but then here we have an issue here that is fundamentally causing it.

And and we have no ideal about.

So if you're telling me here today that's not an issue, um, you know, I get it.

Um but how many, Mr.

Chairman, would be the question I would ask, and how if we could get this information.

Um how how many citizens are impacted with lead pipes going to their homes uh and water being distributed to it?

And if you know, if you don't know, if we could get that information information, Mr.

Chairman, so I can get a grasp and understand that.

With the Chair Cleveland Water has some good information on their website about where all those lead pipes are, they're getting all replaced, but I can send that along to you, absolutely.

Right.

But I do want you to when you go talk to your residents, it's important for folks to know that in Cleveland and the number one cause of lead poisoning in the country by far is paint, paint dust.

That's it.

But but you know what is a risk when you have uh old gas stations that we raised, correct?

Some of the property that we raised, um dry cleaners, and then they the children, or we track the um the particles into our homes.

Correct, yeah.

Gasoline, you know, lead the gasoline was in lead was in gasoline, and it was a huge problem.

It was in there, I mean you saw the numbers back in 2005.

I don't go back before that, but it would have been like you know, all of us before that.

So Mr.

Chairman, we we have these reports.

I've had a chance to take a look at some of these reports, and I have a question on it, you may already know.

The lead inspection and risk assessment report that was taken, I presume by um So Councilman, we have one more minute you're gonna have to yield to Can I be put back on?

Because I've been waiting here patiently since nine o'clock.

And um Do you mind if you if you finish counseling show?

Not the heat of the council.

I can ask the questions and you can get the answers to me, Mr.

Chairman.

It doesn't matter, you can put it in writing.

Because you keep going.

And that won't take long to ask the questions and have our staff collect the information later for the sake of time.

Okay.

So so, Mr.

Chairman, this because I want to know, because I'm gonna be going to the classes with you, Mr.

Chairman, as soon as you set them up, all of them.

All right, want to know how long does these inspections take to do a lead inspection of a house?

Do we know?

Through the chair, a couple one to two hours.

Okay, so about two hours.

Okay.

So what kind of and and we can ask these questions and then you because I'm gonna shoot through it because I'm gonna because I appreciate the the the committee's time that's been here all morning long, and I know that many members have other things to do.

So the next question is what are we doing in terms of public awareness campaigns?

And if you could put something together in writing, let me know that because that's really important because I represent my people when I sit here at this table, I want to make sure that I know who's doing what.

Resources and support programs, what is available?

Um, because after I looked at your inspection reports that you have in front of me here and took the time to do that, um, it seems that it could be a really inexpensive endeavor.

I calculated off of just one of your reports about maybe close to $8,000 worth of work.

Yeah.

And that was on the low end.

And so what I would like to know is what resources are available.

Okay.

And what are the average costs to rehabilitating homes uh with led led with which are contaminated that you articulated uh what is that average cost?

Do we know what the average cost is?

If it's roughly if you have it off top of your hand, through the chair through the projects that the LED safe coalition has been doing, I I think they uh said that uh 25,000 for some of the smaller projects is the average cost.

For smaller projects, 25,000, Mr.

Chairman.

That's why we're talking about as well.

We're talking about putting together funding source and perpetuity to help citizens that may not have that 25,000.

You know what councilman, they have the money, the funding, they have different funding pods.

That's not the issue, it's the funding.

He says you getting it out the door.

Yep.

It's getting out the door.

It's both of it.

Right.

It's all of it.

Without 3.2 million and close to 4 million, it was million dollar problems.

Yeah.

The next question, Mr.

Chairman, is lead screening.

Um if there's a breakdown of all the different types of programs that we have available on lead screening, um, and then how those programs are fundamentally measured.

Also, Mr.

Chairman, um, our councilwoman, uh the distinguished gentlelady, uh Nikki Hudson talked about her child being led tested.

And one of the things I brought here again to the director at that particular time who kind of shot it off was that how do we really fundamentally determine where we have our problems of lead?

And the suggestion I made at the time was that our young folks mandatory to some degree get lead tested.

Um we can look at this however we want to look at it, but if we have a situation we should handle like we do all situations, find out what the root of the problem is and solve it.

Yep.

Interagency partnerships.

Um who are all your partners that work with you in the city of Cleveland throughout this nation that helps us as it relates to lead poisoning?

And the next question I would have, Mr.

Chairman, is who all who are all of those partners?

And then also, Mr.

Chairman, how many inspectors do we have actually fundamentally working on that in terms of their partnership as well as the contractors that fundamentally do the work?

In addition to that.

The next question would be what are those laboratories that are being used to uh to test the lead situation.

What are the laboratories that are fundamentally being used when our contractors do the work and send it in?

Who are they and where are they located?

And as we we talk about issues of uh racism in the system, I'm hoping that we have some um companies that are out of the city of Cleveland, Mr.

Chairman, because that's how we deal with fundamental racism is by empowering the people who live in the city of Cleveland will have an opportunity to participate.

So I'd like to know where these locations are, who these partners and where these partners are fundamentally located.

Thank you.

Um then um Yeah, my two way.

You talked about on your piece data sharing information.

So I'd like to sit down with you and understand a little bit more about that because that's a little bit more in depth.

I can't really ask a question to get the information.

I really have to fundamentally sit down with you.

Okay.

Um as related to data sharing.

Council McKay, I'll put you back on.

Um I'm almost finished.

All right.

Programs, evaluations.

Um how do you evaluate these programs in terms of their success?

Because I looked at these these pieces here that you have in place.

I want to ask the first question uh about what was the percentage it kind of like gave me a roller coaster thought.

And so, how do we evaluate our programs, efficiency and effectiveness?

And this, Mr.

Chairman, I will yield this back to you, but if you're gonna have me sitting here, I'm gonna ask the questions.

And I appreciate you being so great as a chairman and giving me the time.

So I just want to say on behalf of the Citizens of War One, thank you, Mr.

Chairman.

You know what?

You you're my friend.

Thank you.

And I'm fish.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilman.

Um Councilmember Um Shaw.

Thank you, Chair.

Um I I'll try to make it quick.

I I just had a couple questions.

Um Director, through the chair, you'll forgive me as I'm new.

Um, wanted to just understand, you know, we're talking a lot about testing children.

Um what does the landscape look like for testing children and other facilities like child care facilities such as daycare centers?

Does the department um actually get involved in any of that?

My understanding through my brief conversation with Councilman Harsh is that the state handles a lot of the licensure.

But I wonder if you could just um briefly explain what are we doing in terms of uh oversight with child care facility in the city of Cleveland.

Through the chair, and that allows me to thank one of the funders who I neglected to mention earlier, our largest funder is Cleveland Clinic Foundation gave 52 million dollars to to this cause.

And they've felt the same frustration on getting money out the door.

And so one of the things that uh they have worked with Enterprise and Lead Safe Coalition and starting point on is they have done uh basically full abatement and a number of daycares.

Um I think they're up to 20 daycares that they've done in the last uh few months, including a ribbon cutting down old Brooklyn.

Um so that's been great because for every one daycare you're talking about you know, a dozen kids uh protected.

But these are all I I like to focus on the homes uh and the apartments because and the daycares and the buildings, because when you test and fix at that level, it's further upstream, and then the child never uh gets poisoned.

And so that that's been the focus of of the health department is you know, on that upstream level, in addition to the work we're doing on collaboration for kid testing.

That makes sense.

So just to understand does the health department actually go out and test the daycare centers?

No.

No, we're not.

Is it right now a requirement for daycare centers or child care facilities in the city of Cleveland when they open up or as part of their operations to have uh clearance or assessment?

I don't through the chair, I don't think it's not a Cleveland law to do that.

We do do inspections uh as part of like a health and wellness inspection to look for um uh basically um just the quality of the of the apartment, our nurses do that on our division of health, uh, but it's not a lead risk assessment.

So I'm not sure what the state requires in that sense.

But I can look that up.

No, I appreciate that, Director.

And um, yeah, I guess my my understanding for daycare, right?

It's it can start as young as what, like less than six months old, all the way up to you know, five, six years old before they go into pre-K.

Um why it do we know for a fact that children aren't being poisoned through daycare centers or like they're not eating?

I mean, they got windows too.

I that's a big issue.

Uh facilities.

Through the chair, any time we get uh um elevated blood level greater than 10.

Our team does the investigation to find the source of lead poisoning.

And I don't recall that we've had a recent um so source of my time of of a daycare.

Um but I don't know historically if that has happened in the past.

Okay.

And um through the chair to the director, are we have we considered or looking at the the mobile health units?

I know there's this conversation about the utility of you know how much we captured and maybe I can understand maybe not having that at um be done through through our partner.

Have we encouraged them to go out and do the testing at the daycare facilities where we already have a captured pool of children where we can then trace back, okay, if not the daycare, then we have already the address, it's a warm handoff um wanted to just understand what the thought process has been behind that.

Yeah, through the chair, it's uh it's a great question.

I think one of the challenges with going to a group of kids when their caregivers or parents aren't there is to consent to be able to do testing.

I see.

Um so it's not something that we've specifically done, but um, but that that's definitely it's an interesting idea to explore.

Uh that makes sense about the consent.

I mean, in terms of advanced notice, getting consent beforehand, um, I could imagine the number of ways we can work that out.

Yeah um to me, just increasing the number of children being tested would give us more warmer leads um through the chair to the director.

I just wanted to kind of understand what that thought process was on how do we increase the number of children being tested.

I I know in your um presentation you said that number is increasing.

Well, through the chair, the specific metric of number of percentage of kids being tested at their wellness visit is increasing, and the number year to year of total children being tested is roughly flat.

Now, if you look at that compared to our declining birth rate, you could assume that our testing rate is cr increasing, but it would be an assumption, and so you know what they say about that.

So it's definitely something where we need to get more kids into wellness care so that more kids are being tested.

Okay.

And and and more homes being tested so that they you know never even need to worry about their blood test, right?

No, thank you.

I yield chair, thank you.

Thank you very much.

Um let us know about these classes later on.

I will, yeah.

Rebecca used to, and then also Tina's gonna give us you know we can understand the classes, but the systems that they're going through in the different groups that they're mentioning.

Um councilwoman, then we can get up to power on that.

And uh I just decided not to um Rebecca used to run a G up class to champion what we're doing right now.

They kept the light shining on the lead issue, and she wanted to um champion it on C City Council, but she's not here now, so therefore um we just have to study it to move it forward.

Thank you.

And saying that the health arts committee is adjourned.

Thank you.

Thanks, Committee.

Thank you, and then the