I just listened to the sixth episode of Serial and I’m going to be a little judgy here.

If your municipality is so broke that people are driving on the sidewalks to avoid potholes in the street, so broke that you can’t imagine ever paying a realistic tort judgment against your police force, and so poorly managed that you claim you can’t even find disciplinary records, then you’re too broke and disorganized to have a city charter.

Three things about this:

0. East Cleveland should be demoted to township (i.e., no actual city government) status. It can’t run itself.

1. Meanwhile, I’m wondering if anyone’s considered including the State of Ohio as a co-defendant in these lawsuits, on the basis that East Cleveland is a sham on the part of the state. Sort of the same way a private business can lose “corporate shield” status if you can show that the C corporation or LLC is a bad-faith attempt to hide assets.

2. The government of “Ohio” likes things the way they are in East Cleveland though. So it won’t change.