Reply #8: Slavic Village in Cleveland, Ohio is getting "Katrina-ed"

[Kolesar]

More than half the homes are in foreclosure. People have been murdered defending the neighborhood from gangs of looters. Homes are being ripped apart with the appliances, plumbing and wiring ripped from the walls. What is going to be left is "about a third of the homes" with the remaining homeowners who cannot afford to sell in a plunging real estate market. There is no budget to demolish the worst-ravaged homes.

The neighborhood is a hundred year relic of modest homes near the mills. There are not too many jobs there anymore--certainly not the high paying jobs.

The big city, the anchor of our region, is going to lose thousands more in population and have one more seriously blighted neighborhood. Slavic Village used to have a certain charm. Not any more.

And all of that because a pro-banking, Republican, Ohio government overturned laws the city passed to protect mortgage-buying consumers. There were other factors, but that was the major factor in the last few years that led to this crisis.

This stuff keeps me up nights.