Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson names Reverend Grady Stevenson interim director of the city's Community Relations Board to replace now Ward 6 Councilman Blaine Griffin, and Stephenson rallied against violence against Black women ....Councilman Zack Reed, a mayoral candidate seeking to unseat Jackson this year, said Stephenson is Griffin's "right hand man"....By Kathy Wray Coleman of www.clevelandurbannews.com and www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, Ohio's Black digital news leader
The Reverend Grady Stevenson, the new interim director of the Community Relations Board for the city of Cleveland whom Mayor Frank Jackson named to replace Blaine Griffin, who, on May 15, replaced the retiring Mamie Mitchell on city council
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| Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson |
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| Cleveland Ward 2 Councilman Zack Reed |
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| Former Cleveland Ward 6 Councilwoman Mamie Mitchell, who retired from city council on May 15 and recommended her replacement, Blaine Griffin, formerly the director of the Community Relations Board for the city |
By Kathy Wray Coleman, editor-in-chief
CLEVELAND URBAN NEWS.COM- Cleveland, Ohio- Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson has named the Rev. Grady Stevenson, pastor of Damascus Road Ministries in Cleveland, as interim director of the city's Community Relations Board to replace Blaine Griffin, who was appointed last week to city council in Ward 6 to replace the retiring Mamie Mitchell.
Griffin had held the job since 2006 and took a $25,000 pay cut from his $105,000 a-year salary to join the 17-member largely White Cleveland City Council.
A request for comment of Stevenson's exact salary was met with opposition by the human resource department, a ranking employee there saying 'do a public records request,' and then rudely transferring the phone call to an operator.
A married father of young children who leads the Damacus Road Ministries Church of God and Christ at 99th and Harvard Avenue on the largely Black city's majority Black east side, Stevenson is also a community activist who has rallied with local Black clergy against neighborhood violence, including violence against Black women.
He was formerly the project coordinator for the faith-based youth outreach crisis intervention venue for the city.
Neither Stevenson nor mayoral spokesman Dan Williams could be reached for comment.
Cleveland Ward 2 Councilman Zack Reed would not comment pro or con on the appointment of Stephenson, saying only that he is Griffin's "right hand man."
"I have no comment," said Reed, who is currently a in a political brawl with the three-term Mayor Jackson as he fights to seek to unseat him in this year's mayoral election, among a crowded field of a host of other possible mayoral candidates, including Ward 10 Councilman Jeff Johnson, and former East Cleveland mayor Eric Brewer.
" He [Mayor Jackson] can appoint whoever he wants too," said a perturbed Reed.
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