Making an In-Person Public Comment at An Upcoming Council Meeting

Council welcomes public comments at each regularly scheduled Monday evening Council meeting. 

If you are interested in speaking at a Cleveland City Council, please read the revised rules and procedures for public comments and fill out the online form below. 

Submitting a Registration to Speak

Anyone who is interested in addressing Cleveland City Council at a public meeting must register with City Council prior to that meeting.

Registrations may be submitted:

  • By using the online form below
  • In person at Cleveland City Hall, Room 220, 601 Lakeside Avenue NE. Paper forms are available to register.
  • By downloading this form, filling it out, and emailing it to publiccomment@clevelandcitycouncil.gov or dropping it off at Council offices.

Registration Periods

Registrations will ONLY be accepted between Noon on Wednesday and 2:00 pm on the same day as a regularly scheduled Monday evening Council Meeting.

Council allows no more than 10 people to comment at its regularly scheduled Monday night meetings. Registration will close as soon as the first 10 people sign up. Each registrant will be allotted 3 minutes to speak.

Registrations will only be accepted for making comments at the next regular meeting; registrations for any future meeting will not be accepted until the Wednesday before the meeting. Early, incomplete, or false registrations will be rejected.

Notice of Registration

If your registration is successful, you will be notified by email or phone.

Accommodations

If you need assistance due to a language barrier or disability, please let us know at least three (3) days in advance by going here to make a request.

Attending Council Meetings

Cleveland City Council meetings are held in the Council Chamber on the second floor of Cleveland City Hall, 601 Lakeside Avenue, East.

Visitors may park for free at the upper lot behind City Hall after 5:00 pm on days when Council is meeting.

Public Record

Please remember that all registration information and public comments are public records and can be subject to public record requests.

Decorum

Cleveland City Council must maintain orderly, efficient, and productive meetings to ensure the important business of city government is completed. Council has developed a set of rules and procedures that allow the public to be heard in a fair and orderly manner. These rules and procedures apply to all speakers, and Council does not discriminate based on the speaker's identity or viewpoint or the content of the speech. Please read Council's revised rules and procedures for public comments before you register and before you appear before City Council.

Please note: Anyone attending a Cleveland City Council meeting is prohibited from engaging in any action or behavior that substantially interrupts, delays, or disturbs the due conduct of the proceedings of the Council; such conduct includes but is not limited to: handclapping, stomping of feet, whistling, making other loud noises, yelling, or similar demonstrations.  Any person who violates any of the above may be immediately removed from the Council Chamber.

Rules for Speakers
  • Speakers may not yield their time to other speakers.
  • Speakers shall only address the topic they registered to speak about.
  • Speakers' comments shall not be frivolous or repetitive.
  • Speakers shall not use language that is obscene or likely to produce imminent unlawful action. 
  • Speakers shall address all comments to the presiding officer.
Prohibited Items
  • Signs, posters, banners, placards, or similar items
  • Food and drink

 

To sign up to comment in person or online, please scroll down.

Make a Comment In Person at a Council Meeting

To sign up to speak during the registration period (Noon Wednesday through 2:00 pm Monday before Council Meetings) click this button.

You will be notified by email or phone if you are one of the ten people who will speak.


Make a Comment Online

If you would rather submit your comments in writing, please fill out the form below. 

Written public comments will be published on this page and delivered to all Councilmembers before the next full Council Meeting after they have been submitted.


Public Comments

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JazzNEO is a LIE because 54% of its current broadcast content is produced outside Northeast Ohio!
Dear City Council Members,

My name is Tom Orange, and I was the WCSB Jazz Director for 9 years before CSU and IdeaScheme Corporate Media pulled the broadcast plug in their secret hostile takeover that silenced the voices of our student-run community.

In truth, close scrutiny reveals that 54% of JazzNEO’s broadcast content is produced outside Northeast Ohio.

Check the schedule:
https://www.ideastream.org/schedule/jazzneo#weekly-schedule

JazzNEO’s only locally-produced shows are the ones hosted by Dee Perry, Dan Polletta and John Simna, plus Live from the Bop Stop.

That’s only 78 hours, or 46% of the 168 hour programming week.

The remaining 90 hours are all nationally-syndicated shows produced outside Ohio.

How does this benefit CSU, its students, our former WCSB listening community, or Greater Cleveland generally?

Doesn’t it make their branding as “JazzNEO” a total lie when the majority of its shows come from outside NEO?

I have emailed Kevin Martin this information, but I humbly request the City Council hold Mr. Martin’s feet to the fire and call him before your distinguished body to let him answer these and other questions in person before you.

Sincerely,
Tom Orange, PhD
XCSB Jazz Director 10/3/2025 - present
WCSB loyal listener since the early 1980s
CSU student, Summer 1986 and Fall 1988
CSU English Department Adjunct Faculty, 2010-2012
WCSB Member/Programmer 2010-2017, 2020-2025
WCSB Faculty Advisor 2011-2013
WCSB Jazz Director 2013-2017, 2020-2025
WCSB Automation Team Member 2023-2025
Tom Orange
Ideastream Takeover of WCSB
With the 89.3 takeover, Ideastream has failed to provide a platform for the vast array of communities and cultures represented in Cleveland. Washed away for corporate advertising and the guise of representation through jazz. Jazz is great, but so many cultures, genres, races, religions, and communities were represented before this takeover. It is heartbreaking that WCSB was taken over without any meaningful alternative provided to the hardworking staff at WCSB. No substitute, no alternatives, just erasure. It is an injustice to the city and the people who connect with the city and the arts therein through public broadcasting like this.
Anthony Liotta
WCSB
WCSB run by students is an important part of the fabric of community in Cleveland. It helps us stay connected to each other as well as this place we call home. The way that this change was made shows that ideastream and csu administration have no respect for the community that depends on this resource and the decades of hard work by so many people that make it possible. Once when I was out of state and someone heard I was from Cleveland they said “Cleveland has great radio right?” We’re known for our unique radio offerings in Cleveland and the rumors are true! That’s why so many people are heartbroken by this rash decision— it feels like our cultural fabric has been ripped apart. It feels like just another layer of gentrification that is watering down the flavor that makes Cleveland the special place we know and love. Please return WCSB to the student run organization that started it and that has run it for 50 years.
Molly Murray
Takeover of WCSB
I have witnessed an incredible force of nature, in observing and supporting the student run radio station for over 15 years. I can’t imagine it being gone. This entire act of greed and insensitivity is heartbreaking and horrific, AND it has entirely shifted my perspective on Ideastream, its people and goals. CSU has betrayed its students and the community.

The station needs to be returned to those that have given so much, freely, and with an immense commitment to our city.

I stand with the students!
DO THE RIGHT THING!!!
Bonita Hudson
WCSB 89.3's Hostile Takeover by Ideastream Ideastream
Please take any action available to save this beloved, relevant, and diverse resource. Our city is being deprived,not enriched by this gross injustice.
Jason Parks
The takeover of WCSB
I think it is an absolutely travesty that the Cleveland State radio station was taken over by Ideastream. It's ironic that the name is 'Idea' -stream ...but their only idea seems to be to shut down one of the oldest forms of open idea sharing and community building - the local radio station. I assume that CSU found it much more financially rewarding to get paid by Ideastream to take it over - but as I think State and local education should be FOR THE PUBLIC, I also think that a radio station with 50 years of history and loyal listeners deserves better than this. By the way, I should note that I am a Jazz fan. This isn't about the type of music for me ...it's about what it means for our community.
John Fischer
CSU transfer of wcsb to Ideastream
wcsb needs to be returned to campus-based broadcasting of alternative programming. The police-facilitated hostile Ideastream/ CSU-brokered takeover of wcsb should be an invalid move at public educational institutions. Our schools should be all about the students, without which there'd be no budget. Hostile takeovers of any campus entity accompanied by their necessary partner in crime, the nondisclosure agreement (CSU & Ideastream had one in the wcsb hand-off) should be statutarily prohibited at public schools.

The improperly authorized hand-off of wcsb has impoverished culture in world rock n roll capitol Cleveland, OH. wcsb was one of the very few radio stations in town remaining true to Cleveland's rock n roll roots. Rock n roll in all its forms from r&b to industrial is music of the people. wcsb presented it as such, giving the worthier non-capitalized, non-commercial bands airings.

Students, former students and selected community members were passionate about their volunteer programming on wcsb. And the radio station generated many on-campus jobs, as well as providing career-useful training.

The CSU president indicated in a recent interview that the new Ideastream/ CSU partnership gives her a seat on Ideastram's board. Well, Ideastream was already looking out for students; it was available for internships. CSU can now further guide Ideastream, something with nebulous reward to a university as a whole that should be focused on higher education as a whole. The CSU president mentioned Ideastream in the wcsb hand-off promised on-air spots promoting CSU. As Cleveland's only large public university, CSU does not have an exposure problem. As a non-prof entity, it is allowed additional free public service exposure at many, many local media outlets.

The improper giveaway of Cleveland cultural stalwart wcsb is one of the biggest disgraces in Cleveland history.
Laura Peskin
WCSB
I am shocked and angered by the takeover of WCSB airwaves by Ideastream. WCSB has been a cultural icon for Cleveland and its change to generic programming hurts Cleveland and the region. College radio is a historical and important creative outlet for students that is under threat now more than ever. That two local organizations would conspire to remove some of the best college radio programming for nothing in return is reprehensible.
Brad Odhner
WCSB
The closure of WCSB is something that cannot be met with anything but a fight. It is not only as an advocate for a deep believer in free and uncensored expression that I’m writing this today — it is as a lifelong devotee to historical preservation. To close the doors on WCSB is to close the doors on 49 years of Cleveland history, culture, and student voices. I served as Program Director from 2023-2025, and 40 years before that my father served as PD too. In an era where corporate homogeny rules, legacy of college radio is not something we as a collective can afford to lose.

During my time on the executive staff, I watched four full-time students pour their hearts into something many regard today as a ‘lost art’. Between rigorous internal reforms and public outreach, I saw a station limping from the aftermath of Covid reborn into everything it used to be and more. It’s disgraceful that the same year WCSB was voted the area’s #1 college station by Scene magazine, everything we worked for would come crumbling down for money grabs and expansionism.

I can’t stress enough how much WCSB means to our student members. It’s not just another public station; to us and so many beyond the walls of that familiar 4th floor, it was (and will remain) a creative incubator for voice and community. WCSB lives and breathes. And in it, we did too.
Cord Keeper
WCSB
Hello, I am a former DJ and former Promotions Director for WCSB (2007-2012) and a longtime listener before and after that, and I just want to say
that WCSB has meant a
lot to me and to the
Cleveland community for years. To see it just snatched away from the students/community like
that is a true atrocity. WCSB offered not only unique opportunities for students, it offered a diverse set of cultural, alternative, and fringe programming you can't find anywhere else. A staple of the Cleveland airwaves, handed over for some ad spots and a chairman seat. Its just bad business and shows what the station, students and community means to the university. Please pass this emergency measure and help save nearly 50 years of Cleveland culture!
Katie Wallace