Clevelandurbannews.com, Ohio's Black digital news leader

COLUMBUS-Ohio-State Sen. Nina Turner (D-25) and state Rep. Sandra Williams (D-11) stood with Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson (pictured) and a few of his Republican state legislative friends during a press conference yesterday at the Statehouse in Columbus on the mayor's controversial Cleveland schools education plan but would not pledge full support for it.

AKRON, Ohio-Debra Adams Simmons, the first Black female editor of the Cleveland Plain Dealer Newspaper, was among 22 Akron and Cleveland area journalists recognized at a Women in Journalism Luncheon sponsored by the Akron Press Club and the League of Women Voters Akron Area on Sat. that featured nationally known journalist Connie Schultz as the keynote speaker with her doting husband, U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown(D-OH), in attendance. (Editor's note: Read the names of the other 21 recipients of recognition for journalistic excellence at the end of this article).

Held at the Fairlawn Country Club in Akron, a city some 35 miles south of Cleveland, Oh., the event was billed as a celebration of womanhood and a reminder of the force that women journalists bring to the literary and media forums.

CLEVELAND, Ohio-U.S. Rep. Marcia L. Fudge (D-OH), a Warrensville Hts Democrat whose 11th Congressional District includes inner city communities of Cleveland and Akron, and 14th Congressional District Rep. Steven LaTourette (R-OH), a Republican, announced today that they are co-sponsoring a bi-partisan federal foreclosure relief bill for the demolition of abandoned and foreclosed homes in major metropolitan cities where the foreclosure crisis has had its greatest impact.

During a press conference held a block from the vacant garage on Cleveland's east side where 19- year old Latasha Jackson and her one-year old daughter Chaniya Wynn were found murdered last month by an estranged boyfriend after an AMBER Alert twice faltered, Fudge and LaTourette said that they were introducing the bill dubbed The Restore Our Neighborhood Act of 2012 with the City of Cleveland in mind.

CLEVELAND, Ohio-A bold education plan proposed by Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson (pictured) and Republican Gov. John Kasich that has angered Cleveland teachers and calls for merit pay, the elimination of seniority and tenure in teacher layoffs, and for a Cleveland schools operating levy with a provision for some of the monies to be allocated for charter schools is not sitting well with Black leaders and some parents, though the Cleveland Plain Dealer Newspaper is pushing it through editorials under the guise of educational reform.

CLEVELAND, Ohio-The Kentucky State University Concert Choir (pictured) will perform on Sun., March 18 at 4 pm at Antioch Baptist Church, 8869 Cedar Rd in Cleveland, telephone number 216-421-1516.

Under the direction of Dr. Carl Smith, a KSU professor of music emeritus, the choir tours annually and is nationally known.

Located in Frankfort Ky, the state's capital, KSU is an accredited university that caters to Black students and is Kentucky's only majority Black publicly funded university.