i heard Governor Ted Strickland deliver an address at the City Club of Cleveland last Friday, July 11, 2008 over NPR. i was running late so i couldn't keep listening to it, but i thought it was wonderful and it almost brought some tears to my eyes. the same tears that came when my plane landed safely on Ohio soil from Alaska this past may.
sorry to get so sentimental on y'all. anyhow here is the full text of said speech. i encourage you to read it all, though it may take a while. the end is the best part:
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Sometimes people ask me what I like to do in my spare time. And I�ll tell you, one of the things I like to do is read newspapers. Lately I�ve been seeing some interesting descriptions of Ohio�s economy.
A Philadelphia Inquirer reporter thinks we�re �battered and depressed� with a �deepening sense of despair.�
The Wall Street Journal has already printed Ohio�s obituary. Two weeks ago they ran a column with the headline: �The Self-Inflicted Economic Death of Ohio.�
A newspaper in England, The Observer, sent a writer here all the way from London. Listen to what he came up with when he wrote about northern Ohio:
�Fierce Arctic winds blow across the great lakes from Canada and make for hard living most of the year. Only the prospect of full employment, a home, good schools and everything else the American dream promises made life tolerable in this harsh country. But now the fires of industry are cold and this vast region of the Midwest faces a long and bleak economic winter.�
Now, before I pass out some tissues so that we can all have a good cry, let me say something to those who have a distorted view of the great state of Ohio and the great city of Cleveland: You�re wrong.
Ohio has too many strengths, too many successes, too much talent, too noble a history to reach such erroneous conclusions based on superficial observations.
And I�ll tell you, we�re building on our strengths. Brick by brick, we�re bolstering our infrastructure and supporting development in our local communities. Student by student, we�re assembling a skilled workforce with limitless potential. Company by company, we�re building on a foundation of traditional industries and emerging cutting-edge technologies. Through targeted investments, we�re renewing and advancing Ohio.
Look, I�m not saying we don�t have real challenges. There�s no question we face serious, structural economic challenges in Ohio today. And frankly, everything we�re trying to accomplish must be done in the midst of a national economy that has hit Ohioans squarely in the pocketbook.
Last year the nation endured the sharpest rise in inflation in 17 years.
Across the country, foreclosures were up 75 percent in 2007 above the already high levels of the year before. Take a walk down the average street, anywhere in America today � by the time you�ve gone halfway down the block, odds are you�ve passed multiple houses with past-due mortgages.
When 2007 began, a barrel of oil was 50 dollars. Before the year was out, it was 100. And now it�s 140.
The struggle to make ends meet intensifies for every one of us. Wages are losing the race against inflation � with �real� wages having declined for American workers every month since October.
Of course the burden falls hardest on those who have lost jobs � and this national economic downturn has spared few families.
This isn�t just a state problem or a regional problem. The nation as whole actually lost jobs in January. Then lost more jobs in February, and in March, and in April, and in May, and in June.
May�s jump in unemployment was the largest in 22 years.
I�ve often said that if you want to understand this country just come to Ohio. The people, the places, the life of Ohio offer a bit of almost everything you�ll find in America. And I think that�s one of the greatest things about living here.
But a big, diverse American state like Ohio must face the challenges of the American economy.
In a time of shifting consumer demand, we�ve seen the doors shuttered on Ohio plants that for generations built products of the highest quality. In a time of corporate consolidations, we�ve seen Ohio jobs shipped away and chipped away.
It�s tempting to look for a quick fix to help the Ohio economy out of this national slump. But this isn�t the time to stick some chewing gum in the crack and hope it holds.
We have an opportunity here to make a long term commitment, a commitment to strengthening Ohio and reclaiming the Ohio prosperity that has defined this state since its earliest days.
That�s why we passed a jobs stimulus package that will dedicate $1.57 billion dollars to creating jobs and laying the foundation for future economic growth.
That�s why we�ve made a historic commitment to education � from pre-schools to graduate schools to workforce training, we�ve increased funding and access and made it easier for Ohioans to gain skills to fill positions in high demand career fields.
That�s why we passed an energy bill that will protect jobs by ensuring the availability of reliable electric service while preventing the kind of devastating overnight increases in electricity prices � increases of more than 70 percent � that some states have endured.
And the new law requires expanded use of advanced energy technology � giving us a greener source of power and the potential to see dramatic job gains making the tools necessary to harvest the next generation of energy. What�s more, we�ll create a major new market for Ohio agricultural products � a source of economic vitality for Ohio for two centuries now.
But as we take action, we must also answer this charge against us. This charge that we�re battered, depressed, and in decline. Have we really fallen so far behind that we can never catch-up?
Now there are a lot of folks who love to talk up the fast growing South. They�re the Sun Belt, where everything is new, warm and vibrant. We�re cast as the Rust Belt, old, cold, corroded, and headed for the scrap pile.
It�s interesting to see what the experts have to say.
The Federal Reserve Bank here in Cleveland has put out a number of reports in the last few years with heady titles like �The Long-Run Determinants of State Income Growth.�
Their economists found that the South has outpaced the rate of growth in the rest of the country, and they wondered how the rest of the country could produce similar results.
But here�s something in their research that I found really interesting. If you look back over the last 70 years, you�ll see that Mississippi has grown at an amazingly fast rate. Using constant dollars, their per capita income actually grew more than 1100 percent over 70 years.
By any measure, that is an impressive rate of growth. For comparison, over the same period Midwest states like Ohio, Michigan, and Illinois saw their per capita income rise by about 500 percent.
But here�s something that kind of gets overlooked in the celebration of the Sunbelt�s growth.
When you look at where Mississippi started, before all that income growth, you see that their per capita income was dead last among the states during the 1930s.
And today, after more than 1100 percent growth, Mississippi�s per capita income ranks�dead last.
So even as Federal Reserve research celebrates growth in the South, the bottom line is that those states grew the fastest because they were the farthest behind to begin with.
We�re not going to match the growth rate of states that have far fewer assets. That�s a fact. But we can be � and we are � bigger and stronger and more prosperous.
You know, foxtail weeds grow pretty fast. Those weeds can double in size in just a few days. A mighty oak tree can�t match that. But which would you rather be?
The power of perception is at work here. If self pity did any good, I would be all for it. But a negative self image undercuts a community�s morale, and it undercuts a community�s prospects. It�s a self fulfilling prophesy � why should investors go where people have given up on themselves?
You know the old line, �A lie will go round the world while the truth is pulling on its boots.� Well it seems to me just about every bad thing folks feel about Ohio gets shouted through a bullhorn while every good thing is whispered. And this matters in everything we do.
So let�s take a lesson from a model city, a model metropolitan area. A place we should emulate and aspire to replicate.
This is a place with a lower cost of living than cities like Phoenix or Orlando or Seattle or even Mexico City, it�s cost of living is even lower than towns like Danville, Virginia.
It a place with a higher household income than Tampa or Albuquerque or Pittsburgh.
It has a higher percentage of people in the �creative class� than Portland or Indianapolis or Honolulu, and more people employed in the arts than Houston or Milwaukee or Miami.
It�s rated a more sustainable city than Atlanta or Charlotte or Jacksonville.
It�s rated more literate than � get this � New York City, Philadelphia, Chicago, or Los Angeles.
The quality of life is rated higher than Minneapolis or St. Louis or Rome or Hong Kong or Rio de Janeiro.
The place I just described�is Cleveland, Ohio.
Cleveland is an incredible place to live. How lucky you all are to be from Cleveland. I know you don�t hear that everyday, but you should.
Some of you may have heard of the chef Anthony Bourdain. Bourdain has written best-selling cookbooks and hosts a television show. In each episode he travels to a new city to profile the place and its food.
A friend suggested he bring his show to Cleveland. Bourdain was reluctant because he didn�t think Cleveland was interesting enough for him.
And then he came here.
These are the words Bourdain now uses to describe Cleveland: �Incredibly beautiful,� �gorgeous,� �very, very exciting.� This is a person who has traveled all across the country and all across the world. In Cleveland he found an �exhilarating� city � and the restaurants are good too.
Still, Bourdain was a little thrown by what he heard about Cleveland while he was here.
He said, �In the first ten minutes people tend to tell you everything they don�t like about the city, but then they tell you how much they love it.�
The writer and Cleveland native Charles Michener has made a very similar observation. There was an interesting story in The Plain Dealer last weekend on Michener and the book he�s writing about Cleveland called The Hidden City.
Michener has worked as an editor at Newsweek and The New Yorker, he�s lived in New York, Japan, Germany, and England, and yet he marvels at Cleveland � at the Cleveland Orchestra that ranks among the world�s finest, at the Cleveland Museum of Art, at the new life springing up in the Euclid Corridor.
For all its wonders though, Michener says people here have an �ingrained modesty� about Cleveland �that can easily trip into self-denigration.�
I think we�re all justified in spreading the good word about Cleveland � and doing that without 10 minutes of qualifiers or an abundance of modesty.
And the same is true when we talk about Ohio.
Because we need to remember that the words we�ve been called � battered and bleak, depressed and despairing � those are powerful words, but they�re not true.
Let me tell you some things that are true.
If your products are sought-after across the world, then you will thrive in the long run.
Now there is one state � only one state � in the country whose exports have grown every year for the last 10 years. That�s Ohio.
A low cost of living means a more economically sustainable life for people. It means being able to provide for yourself and your family. It means lower costs for businesses trying to attract a talented workforce.
The cost of living in our state is the second lowest in the Midwest, and the second lowest among large states. That�s Ohio.
If there�s anything the modern economy has shown us, it�s that everyday it gets easier and easier for any company to locate anywhere. We are in competition with states and nations for almost all new development we are seeking.
So, we have to make Ohio attractive to businesses. And when the tax reforms in place now are fully implemented, Ohio will be one of only two states in the nation without a general tax on corporate profits and without a general tax on tangible personal property. That�s Ohio.
Site Selection magazine looks at business expansion and relocation plans across the country. They count every single major investment in new facilities in every state, and when they do that they award their �Governor�s Cup� to the state that has attracted the most. For the last two years, the same state has won the award. That�s Ohio.
We have a wonderful opportunity now in Ohio to build from these strengths, and we will. Let me say just a few words about four sectors of the economy that really illustrate Ohio�s incredible potential.
These are the four sectors we�ve targeted for a state investment in our jobs stimulus plan because these are all areas in which Ohio is a national leader, and where there is a window of opportunity for us to advance development and lay claim to being an international leader.
With our incomparable universities, hospitals, and health science companies, Ohioans have developed the Kidney dialysis machine, the MRI, the first antihistamine and countless other great medical advances. Ohio leads the nation in the growth of venture capital investments in the biosciences and is host to one in every five clinical trials in the U.S.
You�ve all seen firsthand the impact of Rainbow Children�s Hospital and The Cleveland Clinic, both ranked among the nation�s finest.
The quality of our medical facilities in Cleveland and in Ohio is simply incomparable.
In the U.S. News and World Report rankings, Ohio leads the nation with four of the country�s top 15 children�s hospitals. Rainbow�s Neo-Natal Care unit is the second ranked facility of its kind in the U.S.
The Cleveland Clinic meanwhile has spun off two dozen startup companies in the last decade and averages 200 inventions each year.
Last year we made the largest grant in the history of Ohio�s Third Frontier program to assist the Cleveland Clinic in launching the Global Cardiovascular Innovation Center. The center is a research incubator that will create hundreds of jobs as it conducts life-saving research.
Experts have concluded that with our manufacturing base, our location, and our university research teams, Ohio is among the top two states for potential new jobs in renewable energy.
Demand for advanced energy worldwide is soaring. Wind turbine installations have doubled in the last three years and solar installations were up 62 percent last year.
One study has estimated that more than 2,000 Ohio companies make component parts that could be utilized in advanced energy.
And, we�re already seeing new energy companies come to Ohio.
IBC Solar, one of the leading solar manufacturers in Germany, has committed to establishing its U.S. headquarters here in Cleveland.
In logistics, the Ohio advantage is enormous. Within 600 miles of Ohio is the majority of the U.S. population, the majority of U.S. manufacturing facilities, and the vast majority of U.S. corporate headquarters. Because of our central location, there is no state better suited than Ohio for logistics and distribution centers and the jobs they bring.
And the fourth area we�re investing in is bio-based products. Ohio is first in the country in the advanced polymer industry. By accelerating the shift from petroleum-based plastic to corn and other bio-based plastics, we will create jobs and strengthen the market for Ohio�s agricultural products.
I think Ohio is �the state of perfect balance,� and I see that everyday as I travel across our great state. There is a quality of life here that cannot be matched, there is opportunity here to pursue your dreams.
Let�s not shy away from making that known. In fact, today I�m calling upon you to lift us up � tell the world what Cleveland has to offer, tell the world what Ohio has to offer. It�s time to celebrate our strengths and tell our story.
There�s an old movie some of you may remember called �The Misfits,� starring Clark Gable � a native of Harrison County, by the way.
In the final scene, the characters played by Marilyn Monroe and Gable are in despair, not sure what will come next for them.
Monroe turns to Gable and asks: �How do you find your way back home?�
And he responds: �Just head for that big star, straight on�It�ll take us right home.�
These four industries � biomedicine, advanced energy, logistics, and bio-based products � are all stars in our sky, and they will take us to a more prosperous home.
In fact, Ohio�s constellation is far, far larger than that � but we have to look up to see it.
We have an economy the size of a major country�s � an economy that has always provided for its people.
But we can give our economy a boost by recognizing more than our difficulties; we can give our economy a boost by seeing what we have and remembering what we�re capable of.
Because it�s time to look up again.
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booyah grandma! thanks Ted.
byeness
