Chris will: ​

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1. Protect women’s and family health and promoting a woman’s right to choose. Women’s health in Ohio faces a significant setback because of the Supreme Court decision in Dobbs vs. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. After the Court overturned the landmark Roe v. Wade decision, Ohio legislators passed a bill criminalizing any abortion after 6 weeks, with no exclusions for incest or rape. Chris Ronayne believes that it is a woman’s right to choose what happens with their own body and will continue to fight for women’s right to choose, for access to safe reproductive services, and to protect women’s health. Chris is committed to doing everything possible to protect the rights, privacy, and health of all residents of Cuyahoga County.

 

As County Executive, Chris will continue to fight for equality, access, and reproductive protection. He will:

 

• Assemble a Women’s Health Action Team, including medical professionals, reproductive health experts, and those with lived experience.

• Introduce legislation to County Council to prohibit the use of County government resources or funds to assist or cooperate with any investigation into abortion care.

• Ensure that abortion care is included in insurance coverage for all County government employees.

• Institute a travel reimbursement policy for employees who must travel to receive healthcare services that are not available or are restricted within 150 miles of Cuyahoga County.

• Convene partners across the county to ensure that all Cuyahoga County residents have the necessary funds needed to travel to and receive abortion services unavailable in Ohio.

• Support an amendment to the Ohio constitution to protect a woman’s right to choose.

 

2. Expand housing and improving community development. Having a safe, affordable place to live is the foundation of family well-being, from health and educational outcomes to economic self-sufficiency. But too many residents of Cuyahoga County live in substandard housing, in unsafe overcrowded conditions, and with housing costs that eat into their monthly budgets to the extent that there is little left over for other necessities. This problem affects renters and homeowners alike, and is a concern heard in all parts of the County.

 

Furthermore, dilapidated housing and abandoned properties dot our landscape, dragging down property values and leading to disinvestment, crime, and the circle of poverty. We’ve made progress in addressing this issue over the past decade, but our progress is uneven, and abandoned homes still burden homeowners that are seeking to create better futures for themselves and their children.

 

Chris knows that the solution to this problem goes beyond pledging an arbitrary number of “new” homes to be created. The true indicator of progress takes into account the “health” of individual blocks, neighborhoods, and communities. Building a new home next to a derelict building only does so much to improve community outcomes. That’s why as County Executive, Chris would take a community approach and evaluate our successes on the neighborhood level. It goes beyond housing, but housing is the foundation.

 

• Protect long-time senior homeowners from rising property taxes by expanding eligibility for the homestead exemption and increasing its value. Chris will lobby state lawmakers to amend the state’s homestead laws and protect homeowners.

 

• Give communities the tools and the power to redevelop vacant and abandoned parcels by supporting the expansion of Community Land Trusts. Chris believes that decisions that affect local communities are best made at the grass roots. That’s why he will use funds to build and support new and existing Community Land Trusts to build new homes in neighborhoods across the County. With partners, Chris will oversee the disposition of properties to the land trusts and the County will assist with redevelopment.

 

• Create a “Community Well-being Indicator” survey to map disparities countywide. Chris will instruct his administration to develop indicators of well-being that track the number of substandard buildings, the number and type of environmental hazards, child health indicators such as asthma and high blood-lead levels, structural fires, traffic injuries, housing affordability, and others. Chris will then use this data to inform where and what investments to make in neighborhoods across the County.

 

• Develop a five-year affordable housing and neighborhood preservation plan. As president of University Circle Inc. Chris oversaw community development efforts, including the construction and renovation of 2,500 homes. Over 30% of housing in University Circle is qualified as affordable. As County Executive, Chris will obtain commitments from developers, nonprofits, banks, and foundations to expand access to affordable housing by building, renovating, and financing thousands of homes so our private and public housing stock is safe, healthy, and up to standards. Chris will increase opportunities for homeownership by expanding access to down payment assistance, by creating new loan products for families with good incomes but poor credit, and extending funds for home repairs and accessibility improvements.

 

• Create a Department of Housing and Community development. The department will develop financing programs to assist with the development of new housing, including a revolving loan fund that is replenished by interest payment and development fees. The Department will support CMHA, local CDCs and nonprofit housing providers and increase supports for Community Land Trusts to preserve and build affordable housing. The department will further work with communities in Cuyahoga County to initiate supportive housing programs for persons with disabilities, lead-free housing, flexible zoning needs, and middle-market housing opportunities.

 

• Combat homelessness by creating new supportive housing beds and preventing evictions. Supportive housing allows those suffering with mental illness or substance abuse to get off the streets and into safe shelter. Only by adding new beds that meet our County’s needs can we get unhoused individuals off the street and into safe housing. Chris will also combat family homelessness by creating an eviction diversion program, which provides mediation between a tenant and landlord before and eviction can be served and provides the opportunity for the tenant to access services and avoid homelessness.

 

2. Improve health and human services.We must improve the delivery, efficiency, and reach of social services. Cuyahoga County is the key provider of health and human services for thousands of vulnerable children, seniors, people with disabilities, and adults in need of health and mental health services. Taxpayers fund health and human services levies that generate $279 million annually. But this levy is already falling behind our true need. Chris can’t and won’t raise property taxes, therefore more effective delivery is needed to better reach our residents. We must reduce response times, better use response teams, increase neighborhood-based services and more to make sure every health and human services has maximum impact on people in need.  Chris will:

 

• Address conditions at the Cuyahoga County Juvenile Court, Detention Center and the Edna Jane Hunter Center. Residents of Cuyahoga County are tired of reading stories of deplorable conditions at these facilities, in which troubled youth are placed in the care of the County. Chris will ensure that funding and staffing for the Detention Center matches the actual need, based on population. Chris will also develop a solution for youth awaiting foster care placements by finding appropriate space for them with the proper resources, rather than the current system in which youth are staying, sometimes for days, at the Edna Jane Hunter Center office building. Chris is committed to finding solutions and fixing these unacceptable conditions. As County Executive, Chris will:

 

• Institute a streamlined hiring process for new DCFS case workers and social workers that doesn’t cut corners but does expedite the hiring of new, highly trained staff.

• Initiate emergency contract renegotiations with juvenile placement agencies to increase placements of at-risk children.

• Provide a retention bonus for frontline DCFS workers in an effort to stem further resignations and a hiring bonus to increase applicants for open positions.

• Assign an onsite law enforcement presence at the DCFS headquarters for the protection of workers and children.

• Convene a Child Placement Crisis Committee including the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services, local and national juvenile behavioral care agencies, AFSCME union representatives, and university partners to develop long term solutions.

 

• Establish a new Community Health Impact Fund to address geographic and racial health disparities in Cuyahoga County. In Cuyahoga County, those living in low-income, high-poverty neighborhoods experience higher rates of asthma, high blood pressure, and diabetes than those living in other parts of the County. A study by the Cuyahoga Health Improvement Partnership found that life expectancy in some high-poverty neighborhoods was 20 years less than that in the County’s wealthiest areas. Citywide, life expectancy for white residents is six years higher than that for Black residents. And three times as many Black babies die in Cuyahoga than the number of white infant deaths.

 

In order to address these shameful disparities, Chris Ronayne is proposing that the County’s largest non-profit hospitals contribute to a new Community Health Impact Fund (CHEF). University Hospitals and the Cleveland Clinic own a combined $3.2 billion in tax-exempt property countywide as of 2018, according to Ideastream Public Media. If that property were taxable, it would contribute about $112 million annually to support schools, parks, health and human services and local government.

 

In order to improve health equity for Cuyahoga County residents, Ronayne is proposing a Payment in Lieu of Taxes (PILOT) proposal to fund a new Community Health Impact Fund. Nonprofit entities that own more than $750 million in property in Cuyahoga County would be asked to contribute to the fund at 35% of their property’s value which could generate up to $39 million each year. Funds will be used to address disparities across the county and to support cities that are home to these hospital facilities. The Community Health Improvement Fund will support healthcare access and transportation, wellness programs, and mental and physical health services.

 

• Conduct an operational audit of Health and Human Services so the service system properly protects vulnerable children, seniors, and families. Chris will order an audit—verified by an external team—that will report on response times, families and individuals served, outcomes, and return on investment to determine where service gaps lie, how to most efficiently target funds, improve efficiency, and understand barriers that families and individuals face to self-sufficiency.

 

• Overcome health inequities and support access to affordable care. Studies suggest that there are enough health providers and services in Cuyahoga County, but that these resources are under-utilized. Chris will dedicate resources for education and outreach, to ensure that pregnant mothers get the pre-natal care they need, that working parents get care after suffering a workplace injury, that children have access to pediatric care, and that seniors have the transportation and other resources they need to stay healthy and strong.

 

• Ensure that basic needs like nutrition, housing, and health care are met. Establish new neighborhood-based service delivery model that allows residents to access services in local communities, rather than having to access them in a central location.

 

• Bring back the County Ombudsman to help clients obtain needed county and community services. County residents need an Ombudsman to help them receive County services and navigate county programs. A centralized support center will better serve all residents.

 

• Provide increased work supports for families seeking self-sufficiency. Many residents lose their benefits because of their inability to meet work requirements, or are never accepted in the first place. As a result, only 15% of residents in deep poverty receive cash benefits, a rate that has been on the decline. The County can do more to support families seeking work by providing supports such as child care, transportation, or income supports that allow an individual to participate in job training.

 

• Improve child protective services by conducting a thorough review of all policies and procedures, caseloads, response times, and outcomes. Chris will prioritize the hiring of caseworkers to address unsafe caseloads and worker burnout. And new communication protocols will be established between local and county police and the County Department of Children and Family Services to ensure that at-risk children are reported and protected.

 

• Build an “Age in Place County,” improving the lives of older adults with the nutrition, senior services, housing, transportation and outreach they need. As County Executive, Chris will develop a plan that will prepare our County for 2030, when 30% of our population will be 60 or older and a quarter of these residents will need support in order to pay for basic necessities.

 

• Cut rising addiction and drug related deaths by expanding accessible addiction treatment, walk-in clinics, and affordable mental and physical health services. Chris will continue to support MetroHealth’s Project DAWN, which distributes life-saving Naloxone, and the NaloxBoxes program, which are installed at public buildings, homeless shelters, hunger centers, rehabilitation centers and other locations.

 

• Increase access to jobs and services.

  • Ensure access to accessible public transportation, a lifeline for those who do not have cars but still need to get to work, school, shopping, or health care. We must bring together a strong enough coalition to fight for increased state and federal transit funding, provide more transit for workers, add circulators in the inner ring communities, and ensure our roads and bridges are safe.

  • Establish a new Office of Mobility and Transportation Safety that will focus on the “last mile” between housing and transit or employment and transit, so not every household needs access to one or more automobiles. Chris will direct the Planning and Public Works Departments to designate and design safe bike routes to employment centers and near major transportation corridors, including a network of “bicycle highways” that are separated from auto traffic. Develop a plan to reduce traffic fatalities by better protecting pedestrians and cyclists from automobile traffic. Cuyahoga County can be known as the best networked trail community in the nation.

  • Create safe streets countywide. Our streets are designed in a way that puts our residents and children in danger when they are simply trying to cross the street. Chris will develop a plan to improve traffic safety in our neighborhoods, to ensure that all travelers can arrive safely at their destination.