Speaker 1: You want to be an American idiot.
Speaker 2: Flow me back on seven hunderd w O.
Speaker 1: I'm so following a surge in dangerous street takeovers, and
Speaker 1: I'd say they're pretty dangerous mainly for the people participating,
Speaker 1: but nonetheless can't have that Cincinnati moving to an act
Speaker 1: strict or local stricter local penalties. We're talking like one
Speaker 1: to two thousand dollars and five six months vehicle impoundment.
Speaker 1: And this is on the heels of Ohio House Bill
Speaker 1: fifty six that has codified stunt driving as illegal racing
Speaker 1: and makes it a felony to flee police. So on,
Speaker 1: this will be voting on this soon as a council member.
Speaker 1: Jeff Kramerton on the Scott Flonan Show, Jeff, welcome back,
Speaker 1: Hey Ben.
Speaker 3: Good to be here.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So before I get into the street racing thing, which
Speaker 1: is the big sexy topic, the less sexy topic, of course,
Speaker 1: the Cincinnati's income tax. Like after ha puer Vaal mayor
Speaker 1: pure Val kind of punted on the timeline he wanted
Speaker 1: to propose in the first two monster in a state
Speaker 1: of the city and on maybe three months with nothing
Speaker 1: and now he's saying this may not happen at all
Speaker 1: this year, and this would be the earnings tack we're
Speaker 1: taught tax we're talking about in this the Cincinnati and
Speaker 1: I think you said back in maybe earlier this month
Speaker 1: that there's a plan to unveil maybe a proposal the
Speaker 1: mayor saying it's not going to happen. Are you guys
Speaker 1: on the same page, because you're the chair of budget
Speaker 1: and finance? So what a spring is?
Speaker 2: Spring? Is this spring? Next spring? Three springs from now?
Speaker 2: What are we talking about?
Speaker 3: Yeah? I am, I am. You know, no, I'd like
Speaker 3: to talk about tax increases, but there is in need.
Speaker 3: I think there's growing consensus that there is in need.
Speaker 3: There's never a good time to raise taxes or even
Speaker 3: talk about it, but the problem is getting worse and worse.
Speaker 3: So I have always been a strong advocate for going going,
Speaker 3: taking this to the voters, letting them decide. You know,
Speaker 3: we we talked about doing this in twenty twenty, which
Speaker 3: was a presidential year, and there's the thought that all
Speaker 3: of the message will get drowned down the presidential year
Speaker 3: and the year after that, we were running councils, running
Speaker 3: the mayor's running, and we don't be talking about taxes
Speaker 3: who we're running and now this year there's concerns about
Speaker 3: the economy. So there's just never there's never a good time.
Speaker 3: The budget gets worse and worse, the streams get worse
Speaker 3: on basic city services. So I still hope that we
Speaker 3: can take this to the voters, make the case, let
Speaker 3: them decide.
Speaker 1: Well, the net profit tax and for businesses down something
Speaker 1: and they like, like by a third, the finance director
Speaker 1: said so in December. And if the economic foundation is
Speaker 1: that shaky, why is income tax the right move rather
Speaker 1: than deeper cuts?
Speaker 2: Or is this is this what a death spire looks like?
Speaker 3: Jeff, I mean, we've we've again this, This conversation is
Speaker 3: continued now for twenty years. In the Sea Cincinnati. Alternative
Speaker 3: is when the economy is booming, our earning stack is
Speaker 3: very high, and people say, you know, we don't we
Speaker 3: don't need it this year. So when and when is
Speaker 3: the right time the economy is shaky, our earning stack
Speaker 3: is down, that's putting you know, more stream on basic
Speaker 3: city services. So when you have this difficult conversation is
Speaker 3: the question, Yeah.
Speaker 1: No one wants to have that. Of course, earnings tax,
Speaker 1: income tax, you know you're taking more out of my way,
Speaker 1: and still Cincinnati is low compared to all the other
Speaker 1: big size cities or medium sizes for that matter, in
Speaker 1: the state of Ohio. So we're still since I think
Speaker 1: I gets lost in the mix herees, we're still not
Speaker 1: taxing at the rate of other cities like Columbus, Cleveland,
Speaker 1: Toledo and others.
Speaker 3: All of our pier cities in Ohio are two point
Speaker 3: five percent. We're at one point eight percent. To put
Speaker 3: that in real dollars, if the city was at two
Speaker 3: point five percent, which no one's suggesting that, but if
Speaker 3: we were, there'd be an extra two hundred million dollars
Speaker 3: a year. So you understand that why there is a
Speaker 3: strain on basic city services when we're that far below,
Speaker 3: When our rate is that far below the cities, we
Speaker 3: could have a very modest increase still be far below
Speaker 3: any other highest cities and be able to provide more
Speaker 3: basic city services, which we know people want.
Speaker 1: Futures Commission, I believe the reports at point one five percent,
Speaker 1: which is like, as you said, a modest increase, would
Speaker 1: that bridge the gap?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean that's about the number we're talking about.
Speaker 3: Is a point one five is it point two those
Speaker 3: are numbers that have been discussed. If you're going to
Speaker 3: raise taxes, you're going to be able to pay for
Speaker 3: the things you promise you don't want to be race
Speaker 3: taxes and not having fixed the problem. So that's where
Speaker 3: the conversation has been around those in the amounts of
Speaker 3: the discuss All.
Speaker 1: Right, Jeff cramerding this ties into quality of life issues.
Speaker 1: You know you did a residence survey, not too happy
Speaker 1: about potholes and other issues. We see this street takeover
Speaker 1: thing happened time to time. Of course, we saw what
Speaker 1: happened on opening day. Not a street take over unless
Speaker 1: you make it a human street takeover with gunshots being fired.
Speaker 1: But back in on New Year's Eve, I think last
Speaker 1: year you had traffic stop downtown with the banks for
Speaker 1: street race. We had thirty nine people arrested, sixty five
Speaker 1: cars and pounded at Woodward earlier last month. And so
Speaker 1: people see that and it's just another reason to go, oh,
Speaker 1: I'm not going to downtown Cincinnati or make creating business
Speaker 1: down there, or maybe I want to move out. Those
Speaker 1: are real concerns for people, not saying it's happening in
Speaker 1: big numbers, but it's.
Speaker 2: A quality of life issue.
Speaker 1: So the woodward thing that's already illegal under existing law,
Speaker 1: what would this ordinance do that's being proposed incurring by
Speaker 1: the way, in Ohio Bill fifty six, that isn't already allowed.
Speaker 2: What what else do they make illegal about this?
Speaker 3: Well, we're gonna be discussing a lot of options. I mean,
Speaker 3: the one that I think is most interesting is in
Speaker 3: pounding cars for up to six months, So you know,
Speaker 3: you're taking the vehicle that was you know, part of
Speaker 3: this crime, they're pounding it for six months. During the
Speaker 3: last street takeover, fifty three cars were towed. You know,
Speaker 3: we did get some towing t's, but you know, extending
Speaker 3: that to six months be much more of a deterrent. Obviously,
Speaker 3: cars are the focus of this to there's a lot
Speaker 3: of conversation around that this morning in council.
Speaker 1: Okay, so you keep the car for six months. What
Speaker 1: if it's you know, my kid borrowed the car and
Speaker 1: they're they're sitting there watching the street, right, so they
Speaker 1: weren't participating, or maybe they took off because they got scared.
Speaker 1: I got to get to work the next morning.
Speaker 3: But then, yeah, I know, I mean, this is this
Speaker 3: is a very serious crime. So I mean, you have
Speaker 3: to be responsible for your vehicle. Somebody's taking your car
Speaker 3: to you to to commit a crime of this magnitude,
Speaker 3: I think you have to be held responsible. I mean,
Speaker 3: this is you know, this is dangerous. We know what
Speaker 3: these street takeovers. A lot of people are coming from
Speaker 3: outside the city of Cincinnati, which raises a lot of issues.
Speaker 3: And you know, I think people are frustrated. To me,
Speaker 3: this is breaking the wall for the for the sake
Speaker 3: of breaking the lall. I mean me, I don't think
Speaker 3: going donuts is that fun. I think people are just
Speaker 3: intentionally violating the wall just to get a high up
Speaker 3: for that, and that's very frustrating. And says something about
Speaker 3: the site.
Speaker 2: Well hold on, it is all those stops.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna interrupt you there at Jeff Grammonting, did you
Speaker 1: just say doing donuts isn't fun.
Speaker 3: For me a little bit while at sixteen, but I've
Speaker 3: sorted out grown it. I would hope, hope most of them.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Jeff, donuts are just all fun. I just it
Speaker 1: just depends where you're doing the donuts. Fair enough, Okay,
Speaker 1: donuts our hell a lot of fun. But yeah, you
Speaker 1: should be setting intersections down to do it, No, of
Speaker 1: course not. I know you're proposing the six month vehicle empowerment.
Speaker 1: This is kind of based on Louisville and the last month.
Speaker 1: The person who is proposing this down there in the
Speaker 1: Commonwealth is Beverly Chester Burton. She was on my show
Speaker 1: a little while ago and she's proposed us before.
Speaker 2: This time around.
Speaker 1: You're talking thirty days in jail for the first one
Speaker 1: second one they take your car and they're gonna crush
Speaker 1: it or maybe even resell it. Now that concerns me
Speaker 1: when it comes to civil asset forfeiture because we've seen
Speaker 1: this with money, people carrying cash and going almost be
Speaker 1: drug money even though they can't prove it.
Speaker 2: They keep the money anyway.
Speaker 1: Same with the cars, police and well, in this case,
Speaker 1: places like CPD that need the money. If they can
Speaker 1: resell the car, that's incentive for them to seize your car,
Speaker 1: and they drop that threshold because it's about money. I
Speaker 1: got a problem with that as a libertarian, going I
Speaker 1: don't know if the government should be taking your assets
Speaker 1: or something like this, you know, maybe season it for
Speaker 1: six months or holding on to it, say we're gonna
Speaker 1: park it here.
Speaker 2: I guess that makes.
Speaker 1: Sense, but now you've incentivize them taking your stuff that
Speaker 1: I dis agree with.
Speaker 3: This morning when we're I mean, we're gonna look at
Speaker 3: what Louis has done. We're talking about the impowments. We
Speaker 3: of course want to deter this, make sure this crime
Speaker 3: does not happen, make sure these criminals do not come
Speaker 3: to Cincinnati, SETI and balancing that with the constitutional requirements
Speaker 3: to make sure that we can port with the law.
Speaker 3: So it's gonna be a conversation. You know, I've talked
Speaker 3: to my colleague. This is what's on the table. There
Speaker 3: has been some discussion, you know, this is this really
Speaker 3: gonna turre? Is this serious enough? Talking about our partners,
Speaker 3: the judges of the county. So finding the right balance
Speaker 3: to what will stop this but still not be over
Speaker 3: the top and violate the constitution.
Speaker 1: All right, So you seize the car for six months
Speaker 1: to hold on to it. I think that sends a
Speaker 1: pretty strong message myself, as it's not gonna be tolerated.
Speaker 1: You get your property back in six months, and I
Speaker 1: guess you're gonna have to hoof it wherever you're going. Now,
Speaker 1: there's some as I mentioned, you know, if it's a
Speaker 1: kid borrowing a parent's car. And is that for a
Speaker 1: first defense Jeff Or this would be from right from
Speaker 1: the jump.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think, I mean, I mean right now, it's
Speaker 3: a rosen motion. It's right from the jump. Of course,
Speaker 3: of people can always provide mitigating circumstances as part of
Speaker 3: the criminal process, but it's you know, you know, if
Speaker 3: you're of course, if you go to court and you're
Speaker 3: found not guilty, because you know your your your vehicle
Speaker 3: could get released. Uh So there's got to be safety
Speaker 3: mechanisms built in, and that'll be part of the conversation.
Speaker 1: Are these people are actively engaged in doing the donuts
Speaker 1: in the street takeover? What about people are sitting there,
Speaker 1: maybe videoing it or just sitting on their car because
Speaker 1: they're blocked at an intersection. Is this everybody who was
Speaker 1: caught in that intersection, just the participants that are caught
Speaker 1: on video.
Speaker 3: This notion just applies to the participants. Spectating is already
Speaker 3: h a crime according to Ohio state law. So if
Speaker 3: you're spectating, you're watching these criminal acts there, you know
Speaker 3: it is a misdemeanor. It's a minor crime, but that
Speaker 3: is a crime right now, Okay.
Speaker 1: That way, it seems a little but wiggle room there' say, hey, look,
Speaker 1: you know what I got blocked in?
Speaker 2: What am I going to do?
Speaker 1: I got my phone out, started recording. I guess I'm
Speaker 1: a participant, but I didn't know this was happening. I
Speaker 1: suppose there's some wiggle room there, But how often have
Speaker 1: they caught the participants in.
Speaker 3: These The Sincinnati Police Department did a excellent job with
Speaker 3: the last street takeover where there was I think forty
Speaker 3: arrests and fifty five vehicles impounded. So it was just
Speaker 3: a tremendous job. I mean, I you know, with people
Speaker 3: driving through the streets in this reckless manner, I mean
Speaker 3: it's I can't imagine how difficult it is to you know,
Speaker 3: block those cars and arrest them, get the drivers out
Speaker 3: all a safe manner without a dangeroum office from the pullbox?
Speaker 3: Who you get that many cars with a testament to
Speaker 3: the Cincinnati Police.
Speaker 1: Department, Yeah, you had thirty nine people arrested in sixty
Speaker 1: five cars I believe impounded. And what happened at Woodward
Speaker 1: the last month and I saw that went wow, that
Speaker 1: that sends a really strong message. Also concerned with those
Speaker 1: who are out of town, how do you separate that
Speaker 1: do you know? I mean, technically, what's out of ten
Speaker 1: on somebody from I don't know, kid from Westchester or
Speaker 1: Loveland or I don't know, Hyde Park or something else.
Speaker 1: You know, how do you how do you determine what's
Speaker 1: the city of Cincinnati?
Speaker 3: Well, I think, well, I mean, yeah, the last time
Speaker 3: we have people from as far as way is at
Speaker 3: least we have cars from as far away as New
Speaker 3: York and Texas. Which is why the empowerment part of
Speaker 3: this motion is important because at least some of the
Speaker 3: offenders last time had a relatively small bond of thousand dollars.
Speaker 3: So if you're from out of state, are just going
Speaker 3: to come and you know, pay your bond money, get
Speaker 3: your car and be off the road and never come back.
Speaker 3: I think that's the possibility. So that's the reason the
Speaker 3: empowerment part of this is important.
Speaker 1: Uh, these things target and these are all organized on
Speaker 1: social media. Obviously with the NOKA location is going to
Speaker 1: be announced at the last minute. Does this legislation, Jeff kramerding,
Speaker 1: include any tools that target organizers or promoters or just
Speaker 1: address the participants. What about those people who may have
Speaker 1: organized and then may be the same person we don't know,
Speaker 1: but if you put this up on your social feed
Speaker 1: and we find out who you are, could you wind
Speaker 1: up getting in trouble for organizing?
Speaker 3: Yeah, that goes into constitutional issues. Obviously there's First Amendment issues,
Speaker 3: But are you organizing a criminal act? I think that's
Speaker 3: part of the question. So the motion talks about the empowerment.
Speaker 3: The motion also talks about anything else from a policy
Speaker 3: perspective that city Council can do. So we're talking about
Speaker 3: that with our law department. Of course, we want to
Speaker 3: hear from the police who were there again, who did
Speaker 3: a great job, to see what they're seeing, what they're hearing,
Speaker 3: and what can be done to prevent this and make
Speaker 3: sure it doesn't happen again, all right?
Speaker 1: Council Member jeffkramitting on the show on seven hundred wwfellow
Speaker 1: A member Mark Jefferies, who's on the show often proposing
Speaker 1: an ordinance aimed at specifically discouraging out of town participants
Speaker 1: by having these peneties for street takeovers, talking vehicle impoundment
Speaker 1: for the first defense up to six months, saying that
Speaker 1: you know this has worked in Louisville, and that's even
Speaker 1: more extreme. They talking about actually destroying your car and level,
Speaker 1: so don't do it there. Spectators are targeted. And we
Speaker 1: have House Bill fifty six that's being enhanced stunt driving
Speaker 1: definition there says stunt driving which is donuts, burnout, drifting, wheelies, racing,
Speaker 1: that whole thing. It's illegal felony fleeing now it's now
Speaker 1: fell into wil felony of wilful aid police if you're
Speaker 1: participating in a street takeover, and accountability for participants all
Speaker 1: in there as well, and you could see how Cincinnati's
Speaker 1: builds off of the existing Ohio law. Finally, Jef Kramer
Speaker 1: doing thirty nine people arrested back last month in the
Speaker 1: street takeover roundup.
Speaker 2: What happened to their cases? What are the judges order?
Speaker 2: What were the decisions?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean some of the bonds were very low
Speaker 3: from my opinion, especially with the nature of the crime
Speaker 3: and the transient nature. I mean, these people were out
Speaker 3: of town. So you know, I think we're talking about
Speaker 3: how to deter this and do more penalties on the
Speaker 3: place as part of it, and certainly tracking all these
Speaker 3: crimes and developing a better partnership with our with our
Speaker 3: county judges. Important. We've talked a lot and then productive
Speaker 3: conversations about data when it comes to any crime, what
Speaker 3: is working, what is an effective deterrent, and how the
Speaker 3: city can we do that. When we had the problems
Speaker 3: over the last summer, the city actually put up money
Speaker 3: with it with our judges said, you know, you know
Speaker 3: we need data and we help you pay for get
Speaker 3: systems someplace so we get better data. So I think
Speaker 3: that there is a need there across the board, and
Speaker 3: it's something we continue to work on and need to
Speaker 3: work on.
Speaker 2: Are the judges hands tied? Is that the problem?
Speaker 1: You can only punish these folks so much, and does
Speaker 1: this legislation give it more teeth than you know? Taking
Speaker 1: our car away of us is a big one. But
Speaker 1: I guess what I'm saying is we know, Jeff, that
Speaker 1: the laws out there where our judges are not tough
Speaker 1: on recidivism, which means repeat criminals, especially the violent felony types.
Speaker 1: It just they'll released down their own recognizance and by
Speaker 1: the time they cross the threshold from from the court
Speaker 1: to the street, they're committing crimes all over again, and
Speaker 1: judges are just too damn lax.
Speaker 2: Is that part of the problem or this?
Speaker 3: I think that the problem is if you look at
Speaker 3: it in isolation, the penalty might not match the crime.
Speaker 3: I mean, we were joking about donuts, and if you say, oh,
Speaker 3: a person was in doing donuts at three o'clock in
Speaker 3: the school park, you know, you're, okay, that's not that's
Speaker 3: not the worst crime. But then if you look at
Speaker 3: this in totality, what's going on in one hundred people
Speaker 3: driving recklessly down the highway sit unwull blacked in an
Speaker 3: organized manner, that becomes a much more serious. That's the
Speaker 3: reason that we need to increase the penalty. That three
Speaker 3: from these takeovers are so dangerous.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but are we going to have judges to go, well,
Speaker 1: you know what, I think it's punishing these poor young
Speaker 1: victims even though they're engaged in crime here and I'm
Speaker 1: just not We're not going to seize their car. We're
Speaker 1: just going to let them out. I mean, you can
Speaker 1: make all the laws you want, the judges aren't doing
Speaker 1: their part. It's pretty worthless, isn't it.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: No, I think that I think that we do from
Speaker 3: the city's perspective, we do need data, We do need tracking.
Speaker 3: That data should be available with public and me available
Speaker 3: to the citizens. And if there's a problem, and a
Speaker 3: judge is not meeting community expectations, they should be voted out.
Speaker 3: And I think that that data and that tracking is
Speaker 3: part of that.
Speaker 1: All right, he is a council member, Jeff cramerting on
Speaker 1: the Scott's Loan. She'll be voting on this street tagover issue.
Speaker 1: And hopefully that's all the information you need to Maybe not,
Speaker 1: because I know a lot of my listeners are out
Speaker 1: there doing the street takeovers. I got to be honest
Speaker 1: with you. I disagree with a lot of my listeners
Speaker 1: are street tag over people. I'm sure. Hey, Jeff all
Speaker 1: the best man. Thanks for jumping on the shows. Mary,
Speaker 1: I appreciate you always.
Speaker 3: Pleasure.
Speaker 2: Take care. There you go.
Speaker 1: We got a news update coming in a just minutes
Speaker 1: here on the Big one seven hundred WLW, and we'll
Speaker 1: follow what's happening, of course in Iran right now. And
Speaker 1: the countdown is out, the countdown because the doomsday clock
Speaker 1: is running here. If you believe for his word what
Speaker 1: Trump said at eight o'clock tonight, the big boom goes
Speaker 1: off and we wipe the whole country out. We'll see
Speaker 1: what that looks like. If indeed that's what happens. We
Speaker 1: don't know what point. The only thing I'm concerned about
Speaker 1: it first of all, judges not doing what they're supposed
Speaker 1: to do. The second thing, of course, is civilized at forfeitsure,
Speaker 1: which I have a problem with because we've seen jurisdictions
Speaker 1: that have been given the tools going, hey, we got
Speaker 1: to stop the flow of drugs. Okay, well see you
Speaker 1: can seize money now. Great, So now they're just seizing
Speaker 1: people's money even though they can't prove its side to drugs,
Speaker 1: and they just get to keep it. And that happens
Speaker 1: at CBG, it happens all over the place. I just
Speaker 1: hope that this doesn't become that as the city looks
Speaker 1: for new revenue. Maybe now we'll take your car and
Speaker 1: sell it. That could be coming next, although with this
Speaker 1: version of it that's not the case for sure. So
Speaker 1: it's just a left by eye sloany here. This is
Speaker 1: seven hundred WL