Mark Oprea

2 weeks ago | clevescene.com | Mark Oprea

Cleveland Heights Mayor Kahlil Seren, after remaining silent for a week after reports surfaced that his wife, Natalie McDaniel, made a series of antisemitic remarks in person and in text messages, finally broke his silence. In a 15-minute recorded video Seren posted on his Facebook account on Wednesday, days after a civil rights complaint was filed by a former employee, the mayor wrote off the flurry of comments allegedly made in the past year as mere misunderstandings.

2 weeks ago | clevescene.com | Mark Oprea

It’s somewhat tricky to pinpoint when Cleveland’s first Pride celebration occurred – sources hint at 1972 or 1973 – but it’s not difficult to discern the why. There were the riots at the Stonewall Inn in New York City. Nixon had refused to include gay folks in federal anti-discrimination laws. Waves of demonstration were popping up around the country in response. Locally, in September 1972, civil rights backers stood outside a gay bar on Euclid Avenue to lead a Gay Pride March to Public Square.

2 weeks ago | clevescene.com | Mark Oprea

Cleveland’s parks have gotten slightly better since last year—well, at least according to a heap of data. ParkScore, the Trust for Public Land’s annual rating of the 100 most-populated U.S. cities and their parks, ranked Cleveland number 30 on its rankings this year, according to the updated list released this week, up one spot from the 2024 ParkScore list. Cleveland earned 62 points out of a possible 100 on the ParkScore Report.

2 weeks ago | clevescene.com | Mark Oprea

Cleveland drywallers, a part of International Union of Painters and Allied Trades Local 505, have initiated a strike in search of better pay and benefits, several sources confirmed with Scene on Tuesday. A number of workers specializing in drywall jobs around the city are bound to vote on new bargaining agreements this week, a spokesperson for AVM Group, a drywallers contractor group based in Tremont, told Scene. The strike began officially on May 1.

2 weeks ago | clevescene.com | Mark Oprea

The complaints surrounding the behavior of Cleveland Heights Mayor Kahlil Seren and his so-called First Lady, Natalie McDaniel, continue. And have now shifted into legal territory. Last week, a complaint made to the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission accused McDaniel of making a string of racial and antisemitic remarks both in person and via text message involving a number of Jewish city workers and constituents going back to last April.