From The Metro Desk of Cleveland Urban News.Com

COLUMBUS, Ohio- On Sunday, Democratic Cuyahoga County Executive and former FBI agent and prior Lakewood mayor Ed FitzGerald (pictured) received the official endorsement from the Ohio State Council of Machinists that represents 30,000 workers and retirees in Ohio in his bid to unseat Republican Gov John Kasich in the 2014 gubernatorial race.

But can he generate enough love and support needed from rural and Appalachia voters and from Ohio Democratic Black elected officials in greater Cleveland and his own county to perpetuate his dream into a reality?

"The Ohio State Council of Machinists is proud to announce its endorsement for Ed FitzGerald running to be Ohio's next governor," said  Ohio State Council of Machinists President T. Dean Wright, Jr. in a press release to

Cleveland Urban News.Com, Ohio's most read online Black newspaper. "Since

announcing our support for him  years ago, Ed FitzGerald has proven us right by making government work for middle class families. Ed is clearly the right choice forworkers in Ohio, and we look forward to supporting him."

In response, FitzGerald said that he is pleased with the endorsement.

"I'm honored to have such strong and early support from the Ohio State Council of Machinists. This historic organization has represented Ohio workers with the highest honor, and I hope to do the same as their governor," said FitzGerald. "In the coming months I look forward to working with them to find the best ways to help to protect workers in Ohio. I am deeply appreciative of their longstanding support throughout my years in public service."

From serving as an FBI agent on the Organized Crime Task Force, assistant

Cuyahoga County prosecutor, Lakewood mayor, the county executive of Ohio's largest county, a county that is roughly 29 percent Black, includes Cleveland and is a Democratic stronghold FitzGerald, 43, brags that he has "brought down corrupt public officials, cleaned up government, and fought to make government work for the middle class."

The moderately young Democrat that his party hopes will bring a fresh perspective to next year's statewide office races has announced and not yet announced endorsements from practically every powerful Democratic elected official in Ohio, though Kasich has his ear in Cleveland's Black political community and has a relationship with some powerful Black leaders.

Some Black elected officials of the majority Black city like him, and he has partnered with Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson, up for a third term this year,  on educational reform issues and the successful passage last year of the Cleveland schools tax levy.

By Kathy Wray Coleman, editor-in-chief,  Cleveland Urban News.Com and The Kathy Wray Coleman Online News Blog.Com, Ohio's No 1 and No 2 online Black news venues

Reach Cleveland Urban News.Com by email at editor@clevelandurbannews.com and by phone at 216-659-0473

CLEVELAND,Ohio- The Imperial Women and other community activists groups will vote on Thursday, May 16, 2013 on whether to picket the home of Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson in response to harassment of Black women and community activists by his predominantly White police force as to free speech rallies on issues of public concern and because police and the Jackson administration have failed to implement the 27 recommendations issued by the mayor's three-member commission formed around the murders of 11 Black women on Imperial Avenue in Cleveland.

The meeting is open to community activists only and will be held at 7504 Cedar Ave in Cleveland. For more information contact The Imperial Women at 216-659-0473.

Two other pickets at the mayor's home in the city's Central Neighborhood, both held in the last four years, dealt with the Imperial Avenue Murders, murders undertaken at the home of convicted serial killer Anthony Sowell on the city's largely Black east side.

Activists are upset also because the mayor sent blond, blue-eyed Seventh District Police Station cops to harass and intimidate Black women and community activists at a rally scheduled for Monday, May 11 to seek help from the Cleveland NAACP. Activists want the Civil Rights organization to stand for jobs, and against the gunning down of unarmed Blacks Malissa Williams, and Timothy Russell, foreclosure fraud, judicial impropriety and the abduction, rape and murders of women across racial lines.

At the  rally on Cleveland's east side on Monday cops from the Seventh District Police Station threatened activists and the children of Black women raped and murdered in Cleveland that were there to rally. Specifically, they pulled their cars over without reasonable suspension as required by law, ran licence plates and harassed them, including a daughter of Christine Malone.

Malone, 45, was found raped and murdered in an open field on Cleveland's east side in late March after Fourth District police allegedly told family members to find her on their own and to call after they located her. Her killer is still at large and police have arrested no suspects in the case.

By Kathy Wray Coleman, editor-in-chief,  Cleveland Urban News.Com and The Kathy Wray Coleman Online News Blog.Com, Ohio's No 1 and No 2 online Black news venues

Reach Cleveland Urban News.Com by email at editor@clevelandurbannews.com and by phone at 216-659-0473

Pictured above is Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson, who is seeking a third four year term as mayor this year.(Editor's Note: There is no city charter limitation on how many terms a Cleveland mayor or city council member can serve. They can serve indefinitely)

CLEVELAND, Ohio- The Imperial Women, The Oppressed People's Nation, Stop Targeting Ohio's Poor, Ohio Family Rights and other community activists group said that they will reschedule a picket of the Cleveland NAACP set for yesterday after NAACP officials secretly changed from the regular monthly meeting location at The University Circle United Methodist Church in Cleveland. The unusual change came at the last minute and Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson sent blond, blue -eyed, White male cops  from the Seventh District Police Station to intimidate Black women, community activists and Black raped and murdered victims families that were among those that showed up to rally.

The activists want a meeting with Cleveland NAACP President Rev. Hilton Smith, regular committee meetings, and for the group to stand for jobs, and against the gunning down of unarmed Blacks Malissa Williams, and Timothy Russell, foreclosure fraud, judicial impropriety and the abduction, rape and murders of women across racial lines.

About 40 activists were there. Nobody was arrested.

Activist Genevieve Mitchell, now also a privileged member of the Cleveland NAACP Legal Redress Committee who skipped the rally to join big wigs of the group elsewhere, told activists later that night that NAACP officials and its executive board, among other chosen few, met somewhere on Superior Ave. and East 105th St.

Some dues paying NAACP members, including activists that organized the rally, were kept out of the loop on the secret new meeting place, typical anti-free speech and dictatorial behavior by leaders of the Civil Rights organization that former longtime organization president George Forbes, also a former Cleveland City Council president and general counsel for the Call and Post Newspaper, made so famous.

The Imperial Women, the organizing group of the rally, say that the police harassment includes pulling their cars over as they were leaving the rally without the reasonable suspension required by case law and running their license plates while ignoring Whites that were at the church for a concert, and alleged threats of unconstitutional and otherwise illegal arrest.

One policeman set in the church parking lot and racially profiled the licensed plates of mostly, if not all, Blacks, compliments of a Black mayor who has no Blacks in the ranks of his top brass .

They say that Jackson and the police he sent to harass them allegedly violated their First Amendment rights and that organizers of the rally pulled back so that activists and victims families would not get gunned down with 137 bullets like Williams and Russell, both of whom were shot dead by police late last year following a car chase from downtown Cleveland that ended in neighboring East Cleveland.

"The police approached me and said are you Angelique Malone and then he harassed me, ran my license plates and said we should not be protesting," a daughter of Christine Malone told Cleveland Urban News.Com Monday after what was supposed to be a rally in front of the church.

Malone, 45, was found raped and murdered in an open field on Cleveland's east side in late March after Fourth District police allegedly told family members to find her own their on and to call after they located her.

The cocky White policeean also prowled the church premises where the rally was to be held as if they were on a hunt of Blacks, women and innocent community activists, activists say.

Malone left eight children and several of them met to picket with activists at yesterday's scheduled  rally .

Activists said that they will meet later this week to decide the next move, which might include a third picket by The Imperial Women at the home of Mayor Jackson.

Two other pickets, both held in the last four years, dealt with the Imperial Avenue Murders of 11 Black women at the home of convicted serial killer Anthony Sowell .

They say that the potential upcoming picket of the mayor's home is partly because of  the failure of police and the Jackson administration to implement the 27 recommendations relative to  three-member commission that the mayor formed around the Imperial Avenue tragedy in response to out cries by community activists.

Activists said also that they have not ruled out a picket at the work place of Smith, who is vice president of Turner Construction Inc., if he continues to fail to meet with them as dues paying NAACP members as promised, and if he keeps advising the NAACP legal redress committee not to have any meetings.

By Kathy Wray Coleman, editor-in-chief,  Cleveland Urban News.Com and The Kathy Wray Coleman Online News Blog.Com, Ohio's No 1 and No 2 online Black news venues

Reach Cleveland Urban News.Com by email at editor@clevelandurbannews.com and by phone at 216-659-0473

CLEVELAND, Ohio- The Imperial Women, The Oppressed People's Nation, The Carl Stokes Brigade, Ohio Family Rights, Stop Targeting Ohio's Poor and other community activists groups will rally with victims family members at 7 pm on Monday, May 13, 2013 in front of the church where the regular Cleveland NAACP meeting will be held  at University Circle United Methodist Church at 1919 E. 107th St. at the corner of E. 107th St and Chester Ave. in Cleveland.

Activists seek a repeatedly promised meeting with Cleveland NAACP President The Rev. Hilton Smith and the organization's legal redress committee, which hasn't met as a group all year though NAACP officials have taken dues money from its members, including community activists.

The concerns they raise address deadly shootings by Cleveland police of unarmed people including 137 bullets victims Malissa Williams and Tim Russell, Cuyahoga County foreclosure fraud, jobs, and judicial impropriety. They are also upset at the manner in  which abduction, rape and murder of Black women such as Christine Malone, who was raped and murdered in March on Cleveland's largely Black east side, and other women are handled by Cleveland police and the top brass of The Cleveland Police Department.

Some 80 community activists met with Cleveland NAACP Legal Redress Committee Chairman Una Keenon, a retired East Cleveland Municipal Court judge, and Ohio ACLU Legal Director James Hardiman at a community forum on Feb 4 and then  attended the regular Cleveland NAACP meeting held in March. Activist groups represented at both meetings include The Imperial Women, Stop Targeting Ohio's Poor, The Cleveland African American Museum, The Oppressed People's Nation, Organize Ohio, The Northeast Ohio Poor People's Economic Human Rights Campaign, The Cleveland Chapter of the New Black Panther Party, The Cleveland Black Contractors Group, The People's Forum, The Greater Cleveland Immigrant Support Network, Peace in the Hood, Ohio Family Rights, The National Organization for Parental Equality, The Carl Stokes Brigade and Black on Black Crime Inc.

CLEVELAND, Ohio- The Imperial Women and other community activists groups will hold a rally at 5:30 pm on Saturday, May 11, 2013 on  East 123rd and Imperial Ave. in Cleveland to remember the 11 Black women (pictured below) raped and murdered on the street at the home of convicted serial killer Anthony Sowell and to call attention to the need for more focus to be paid to find Black and other minority women that are abducted, raped and murdered. The rally will also call for police to find the assailants that raped and murdered Christine Malone 45, and Jazmine Trotter, 20, (both pictured below) in March of this year. They too are Black women. For more information contact The Imperial Women at 216-659-0473. (For directions take downtown Cleveland to Kinsman Ave. Take Kinsman to E. 123rd St and turn left. Go three blocks to Imperial Ave.)

Speakers include the Malone family, Black elected officials including Cleveland Ward 6 Councilwoman Mamie Mitchell, and community activists. Other affiliated grassroots groups include The Oppressed People's Nation, The Carl Stokes Brigade, Ohio Family Rights, Stop Targeting Ohio's Poor, The Cleveland Chapter of The New Black Panther Party, The Cleveland African-American Museum and Black on Black Crime Inc. (Editor's Note: A CNN report by Anderson Cooper relative to the abduction of Amanda Berry, Gina DeJesus and Michelle Knight, and other data show that African-American women and other minority women are less likely to be found because police and other authorities pay less attention to them as missing persons).

Eleven  Black women were strangled and murdered on Imperial Avenue on Cleveland's predominantly Black east side, unprecedented murders that rocked the largely Black city of some 400,000 people. Six were murdered after Convicted Serial Killer Anthony Sowell, 52, was captured in 2008 and then released from custody, Cleveland city officials admit. Their remains were uncovered beginning on Oct 29, 2009 and Sowell, who was convicted of 82 of 83 counts including multiple counts of aggravated murder, sits on death row as his 2011 convictions are on appeal before the Ohio Eighth District Court of Appeals. Family members of the victims say their missing persons reports were ignored by Cleveland police.