CLEVELAND, Ohio-Former Cleveland City Councilman Zack Reed announced on Monday that he will make a second bid for mayor, joining a growing list of people who hope to replace four-term Democratic Black mayor Frank Jackson, if Jackson decides not to seek a historic fifth term this year, which sources say is unlikely.
Reed made the much anticipated announcement via video and by a way of a press release, an announcement that comes hardly two a weeks after he resigned from his job with Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose.
He is the second person to make such an announcement, and behind newcomer Justin Bibb, 34, also a mayoral hopeful, among others who want to lead the majority Black major American city of some 385,000 residents.
Reed said poverty and community revitalization are key aspects of his campaign and that when he was a city council member he "fought to tackle poverty only to have leadership get in the way."
The former councilman said community safety, expanding small businesses, and reducing the infant mortality rates are also crucial to rebuilding the city, and that addressing backlash from the coronavirus pandemic would be his priority too, if he is elected mayor.
"Our neighborhoods must be safe. We have a skyrocketed infant mortality rate and a pandemic we must get under control," Reed said.
The infant mortality rate in Cuyahoga County, the state's second largest of 88 counties and of which includes Cleveland, is nearly four times higher for Black babies in comparison to their White counterparts, and for every White baby who has died in Cleveland nearly six Black babies have died.
Then an east side councilman, Reed lost a non-partisan mayoral runoff to Jackson in 2017, getting 40 percent of the vote.
A Black Democrat, he had worked as a minority affairs coordinator for LaRose since 2019 after foregoing a reelection bid for his council seat in 2017 in hopes of unseating Jackson.
In a statement issued after Reed resigned two weeks ago to run for mayor, Ohio's secretary of state said Reed was an asset to his office.
"We’ll miss having him out in the field where he helped boost voter engagement and strengthened minority businesses," LaRose said in a farewell statement, "but I know his heart is in Cleveland and I wish him nothing but the best.”
Reed served for 16 years on city council, representing Ward 2 prior to his run for mayor four years ago, a largely Black east side ward that includes the Mount Pleasant, Union-Miles and Mill Creek Falls neighborhoods.
Elections for mayor and city council are held simultaneously in the same year, which keeps most of the city legislators on the 17- member city council from giving up a relatively safe council seat for a possible, and often unlikely, mayoral win.
During his 2017 bid for mayor Reed's campaign theme was "Safety First," where he pushed a progressive agenda, including more police on the streets to deal with heightened crime in inner city neighborhoods, improvements to Cleveland schools that the city mayor controls per state law, economic development, and better city services.
Others purportedly running for mayor include state Sen. Sandra Williams, former congressman Dennis Kucinich, Cleveland City Council President Kevin Kelley, Robert Kilo, and Edwin's entrepreneur Brandon Chrostowski.
Like Reed and Bibb, all of them are Democrats but Kilo, a Republican.
The top two primary winners will advance to the Nov. 2 general election.
Currently, all 17 city council seats are held by Democrats, and the city's last three mayors, including Mayor Jackson, have also been Democrats.
Clevelandurbannews.com and Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, the most read Black digital newspaper in Ohio and in the Midwest, and the most read independent digital news in Ohio. Tel: (216) 659-0473. Email: editor@clevelandurbannews.com. We interviewed former president Barack Obama one-on-one when he was campaigning for president. As to the Obama interview. CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE AT CLEVELAND URBAN NEWS.COM, OHIO'S LEADER IN BLACK DIGITAL NEWS.
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