Cleveland City Hall ignores own promises to share RNC permit applications

By Mark Naymik, Plain Dealer City Hall has reneged on a promise.

For three weeks now, the city has ignored written and verbal public records requests from cleveland.com for copies of permit applications from people who want to use streets, sidewalks and parks during the Republican National Convention that runs from July 18 to 21.

This is confounding because top-level officials in the administration of Mayor Frank Jackson had agreed to share the permits on a weekly basis.

The city arranged a conference call for me in mid-April with a representative of the law department and with Valarie McCall, the city's chief of government and international affairs and Jackson's point person on RNC matters. During the call, McCall assured me that the city would be forthcoming with permit information. She also said she saw no reason why the city couldn't provide the information every week.

The city delivered one time.

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