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East Side group protests bank's closing
YOUNGSTOWN — A small group stood outside the National City Bank branch today at the McGuffey Plaza on the city’s East Side to protest the bank’s closing.
The branch is shutting down at 2 p.m. Oct. 9.
“We have nothing on this side of town,” said Adele Luckey of Bennington Avenue on the East Side. “I have a car and can drive to another bank. I’m standing for other people who don’t have cars. They’re going to have to get on a bus to go to a bank. It’s a big inconvenience. Nobody cares about this side of town.”
Gloria Drake of Scioto Street on the East Side said the bank closing is going to be hard on seniors in the neighborhood.
The closest National City Bank branches for those on the East Side are in Campbell and downtown Youngstown.
The bank is closing because of a decline in business, said Youngstown Councilman DeMaine Kitchen, D-2nd. The plaza is in his ward.
Those protesting the closing of the bank branch also criticized the condition of McGuffey Plaza. The plaza is almost vacant with only about seven businesses operating. One of those businesses is a post office that the U.S. Postal Service is considering closing.
“The condition of this plaza is deplorable,” Drake said.
For the complete story, read Saturday’s Vindicator or Vindy.com
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Comments
The McGuffey Plaza is coming to the end of its ability to generate cash for the Cafaro Corporation . The East Side is doomed to further decay unless industry is attracted to provide jobs .
The east side was a beautiful neighborhood at one time. People wanted to move there. What happened?
I know I have used that bank's ATM over the past few years and I had to keep a open eye to make sure I wasn't robbed.
Campbell and the east side was a nice place about twenty years ago. When the mills closed in the 70’s it was the beginning of the end. Just look at the roads and the houses in that area. It's very sad what has happened to the city.
Chief have you been to Campbell lately?? There are still a lot of nice neighborhood's in that city, you have rundown homes in ALL city's. Even in God's citys (poland, canfield, boardman)
Who wants to go to the war zone to go to a bank or shop? you kidding me?? good call ncb.
Dont' blame the banks, the Cafaro owned mall, the post office or any businesses. Blame the east side residents. What do they get for their lifestyle, closed banks, malls and businesses. Businesses have to make a profit to survive, dirty word, profit, and they won't profit in a crime infested, unemployed ghetto. The east side wasn't always a ghetto, it was one a beautiful, safe, prosperous, desireable place to live.
It is sad that once beautiful neighborhood's are reduced to basically slums, you will find a nice, kepted up house, someone that still takes pride in there yard and house few and far in between. Mainly by the older generation.
Some people just don't get it. They protest banks foreclosing homes, they protest banks closing doors, they criticize banks for making money, criticize them for losing money, criticize them for not paying much interest on deposits or criticize them for raising interest rates on loans....
It's like they believe businesses are there for the sole purposes of serving them and them alone.
Well see, it's a good thing the WRTA levy passed!
Why doesn't the city just sell the entire east side as a land fill and buy garbage from other cities. They'd make a mint.
There's nothing else useful left to do with it.
Grow shrimp.
Produce something or suffer this fate.
The government can't print money for you anymore.
The citizens need to take ownership of their neighborhoods! You tolerate the crime and the unkept properties, but want everyone else to fix the problem.
Let's see-
What is the common group responsible for the decline and destruction of (every) side of Y'town?
Maybe ACORN will put up a bank because the residents do not have cars. (or cars with insurance and a valid license)
Welfare provides them (at the taxpayers' expense) free cars, free car repairs, free rides to work, S.S.I, medicaid, welfare, child support, free breakfast and lunch for you school kids, free medical and dental, etc. Do you want us to chew your food too? Maybe we should provide you with surrogate mothers to carry and deliver your illeg. chil'ren so you won't have to bother.
It is good to see that many of us are beginning to take notice. ACORN is here in the name of the MVOC, which is a new community organizing group funded by the Wean Foundation. Although I think the idea of grassroots rallying for better community is nobel, I am beginning to worry that these nonprofits have been infiltrated by alarming agendas. For example: the MVOC's approach to the landlord problem (disclosure, I was a landlord, doesn't work in YTown) was to aggressively go after a large investor. Many of the real estate investors in the Valley, know that the targeting of RE investors has been a major cause of the problems with property today. Simply put, the tenants are never held responsible for legally what they call "possession". Why, because there are more of them and policticians want votes. The city has been targeting investors for 40 years, look at the report card, more blight and abandon properties. If tenants were held to their leases, there would be a dramatic change. Just look at section 8 housing, a tenent won't dare damage the property, they know they will lose their rent subsidy.
Secondly, the MVOC's approach to whipping up a community to shut down a business for what they decide is the reason for crime in the neighborhood, is very scary to many capitalist thinkers out here. This store, although I too would never patronize it, was targeted with out due process. In other words, the community says, thugs buy liquor from this store and do bad things, the business is to blame so vote down their liquor license. So the thinking is because you sell booze you are to blame for the crime problem in the area, wow.
Look, I know people who are a part of MVOC, and many mean well. I would hope they take this as constructive observation and public debate. Lastly, what would the great industrialist Wean say about how his money is being used?
Back to the Eastside, my company has proven that the valley can grow shrimp and produce a cash crop. Many families in the Valley right now are enjoying local shrimp for feedback, none have died yet,lol.
I want to thank many good people in the eastside, who have helped me and watched out for me late at nite when I fed the shrimp for the three month growing season. John, Art, and McCoy, God bless you for helping me to prove that the eastside and the Valley can be at the forefront in the "Blue Revolution". And that land in YTown can be valuable again if we make it produce. Many a nite, we drank a beer and discussed how the land in the eastside is so beautiful and that we need to change our people to stop waiting for a handout but fish for themselves.
For those of you who have never seen the good side of that part of town, let me discribe it. In the mist of the mature woods, and a few abandoned houses, I had deer walk up to me, I heard and seen the gobble of the wild turkey. In the stream, I've seen nature at it's best, small fish, frogs, crayfish, snakes and even a beaver.
If I were a young man today, I would buy inexpensive land on the eastside and farm (aquaculture).