Breakfast with Lucas County Commissioner Pete Gerken

By Fletcher Word
Sojourner’s Truth Editor

“I’m a guy doing a job, running against a guy looking for a job,” said Lucas County Commissioner Pete Gerken at a breakfast meeting in late March organized by Sylvester Gould and Johnetta McCollough, who are members of the Gerken re-election committee.

 “I’m here to listen, take suggestions and learn something,” Gerken told the breakfast guests. “This is an opportunity and I need to learn what I am missing.”

The breakfast, held at Pam’s Corner, included Priscilla Brown, an entrepreneur specializing in construction supplies; Tracee Perryman, executive director of Center of Hope Family Services; Richard Mitchell, attorney; Rev. William James, pastor of St. James the Armory; Roderick Colbert, a boxing gym operator; Robert Smith, executive director of the African American Legacy Project; Earl Stevens, retired teacher and instructor at Penta; McCollough, executive director of TASC of Northwest Ohio; Donnetta Carter, travel agent and social worker; Tina Butts of T-Bonds .

Gerken reminded the guests of his background in elected office, particularly of his time on Toledo City Council when, in 1998, Council, with Gerken taking the lead, passed the living wage ordinance. “It took one and a half years to do that,” he recalled. “And I’m more proud of that than anything else.”

These days, the two most pressing issues facing Lucas County, said Gerken, are a broken criminal justice system and the water distribution problem.

“We need to get going on building the new jail because of the inhumane conditions,” he said. “But we need to reform the system ahead of that. Jack Ford, my mentor, sat me down once and said to me ‘if you build the jail bigger and not smaller, I’m going to be watching you.’

“Seventy percent [of the prisoners] are mentally ill or addicted to something – they don’t need to be there,” said Gerken of the present inmate population.

Asked by Mitchell about the water system, Gerken replied: “we are in trouble – we are going to have to make some hard decisions with our partners on the water situation.”
 

Gerken noted that suburban towns, weary of dealing with the City of Toledo and buying water from its supply, “are contemplating creating their own water systems – that will be a policy mistake that will take 50 years to correct.

“We have to regionalize the water system; we have to fix the distrust between the city and communities or your water bill will triple; we have to bring everyone in as investors and not just as customers,” said Gerken.

Others at the breakfast table mentioned their concerns about major issues facing their community. Butts, a bail bondsman, spoke of the pressing issue of juvenile crime. McCollough spoke of the problems facing adolescents and adults re-entering society after incarceration. Colbert touched on the subject of the prevalence of drugs among adolescents, particular prescription drugs.

“We are not social workers by degree, but we all are social workers,” said Brown, addressing the fact that those in the African-American community have to possess a heightened awareness of the need for such social services around the clock.

Stevens voiced his concern for increasing the opportunities for vocational training such as Penta offers but has generally not been as available to students since Macomber High closed years ago.

“We have to give these kids an opportunity to develop skills and do something else besides either going to college OR doing drugs.”

Pastor James emphasized the need the basic necessities of life such as food, the type of assistance his church and congregation focus on.

Perryman, whose Center of Hope agency operates a Fatherhood Initiative program, spoke of the fact that those organizations providing services should not have to operate in a vacuum and pretend that “you are going to meet everyone’s needs.” She praised Gerken for his vision over the years and his assistance in helping community programs such as hers.

Gerken, a Democrat and long-time union official, was appointed to Toledo City Council in 1996, won election to Council in his own right twice and has held the commissioner’s office since 2005. He is being challenged in November’s general election by former Toledo Mayor Mike Bell, who is running as a Republican.

Copyright © 2015 by [The Sojourner's Truth]. All rights reserved.
Revised: 08/16/18 14:12:44 -0700.

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