{"id":2446,"date":"2021-09-02T11:49:14","date_gmt":"2021-09-02T11:49:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/?p=2446"},"modified":"2021-09-02T11:49:14","modified_gmt":"2021-09-02T11:49:14","slug":"larry-sykes-working-to-reclaim-his-council-seat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/2021\/09\/02\/larry-sykes-working-to-reclaim-his-council-seat\/","title":{"rendered":"Larry Sykes: Working to Reclaim His Council Seat"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
Larry Sykes<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

By Fletcher Word
\nSojourner\u2019s Truth Editor<\/p>\n

After more than a year of living in a legal limbo, waiting for the federal government to decide whether to pursue a prosecution for a variety of charges, including conspiracy, Councilman Larry Sykes \u2013 whose resignation from City Council was forced due to the pending charges \u2013 has decided that his turn has come again.<\/p>\n

Sykes is once again on the ballot for an at-large City Council seat, a position he first won in 2013. A retired banker, he certainly brings a wealth of experience to the task. He spent\u00a0years on the Toledo Board of Education before winning election to City Council and, over the years, has served on dozens of boards in the community, most notably Lucas Metropolitan Housing Authority, Metroparks, United Way, Cordelia Martin and Planned Parenthood. More recently, he served on the boards of Lucas County Children Services, St. Vincent Mercy and the University of Toledo African American Community Advisory Committee.<\/p>\n

In the midst of his legal troubles, why would Sykes take on such a public challenge and run again?<\/p>\n

He answers that question with a question of his own.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy wouldn\u2019t I?\u201d he replies. \u201cI\u2019m not term limited. I still have a lot to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

He has, in fact, spent a lifetime doing a lot, he reminds his listener.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll the good work I\u2019ve done in my life \u2013 with TPS, for example \u2013 establishing scholarships, increasing enrollment and graduation rates, hiring two Black superintendents \u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

Thereafter, while on city council for the seven years before he was removed, Sykes led the charge on several key issues.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere were the 40 homes in Oakwood that those women were going to lose,\u201d he mentions. Sykes noted that he met with the housing development residents who were having trouble negotiating the buy out of their homes.<\/p>\n

\u201cI met with them and the banks; they were able to buy the houses outright,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

In addition, he mentions the police reform measures that he advocates for and helped pass: Abolishing the \u201cno knock\u201d practice, eliminating chokeholds, requiring body cameras and requiring officers to report fellow officers for violations against the public.<\/p>\n

He was a face of Council in its quest to pass a lead ordinance \u2013 \u201cthe first in Ohio,\u201d he notes. And he also took a stand against the vaping industry that was starting to push its products into families and schools. Council here was the first in Ohio to put limits on what the industry could peddle \u2013 passing an ordinance to end the sale of flavored vaping products.<\/p>\n

Top on Sykes\u2019 to do list, should he get re-elected, is the city\u2019s gun violence crisis \u2013 61 such deaths in 2020 (a 62 percent increase over the previous year) and 2021 is on pace to surpass the 2020 total.<\/p>\n

Recently Sykes collaborated with several other community members to host a forum on gun violence. \u201cWe invited the mayor, JoJuan Armour, the police chief, the fire chief \u2026 and no one came,\u201d he says of the Kent Branch Library session.<\/p>\n

As Sykes, the city council candidate sees it, the way to solve the rampant homicide problem is to get everyone involved \u2013 the whole community. \u201cGo to TPS, to LMH, the court system, the unions \u2026 , look at kids who are delinquent, who are truants. Track those kids, put them in a diversionary program.<\/p>\n

\u201cBlack men \u2013 \u00a0get them to wake up, to clean up, to stand up \u2013 you know who the shooters are. The community has to take responsibility. Parents do you know where your children are?\u201d<\/p>\n

Also of great concern for the candidate is the City\u2019s intentions for the $180 million funds coming for the Toledo Recovery Plan through the federal American Rescue Plan Act. The city has held a number of community conversations to solicit input on the best ways to invest the funds but Sykes fears that such discussions are not particularly well intentioned, that city administrators have presented limited choices to the citizens for their input.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t need that money to go to parks and roads,\u201d he says, noting that such items are already sufficiently budgeted for with funds on hand.<\/p>\n

He suggests that social services should receive the lion\u2019s share of the funds \u2013 \u201csocial services with a history of success.\u201d<\/p>\n

As an example, he cites the success that Pathway\u2019s Avis Files has had in the past five years with her Brothers United program \u2013 designed to bring guidance and a path forward to young fathers.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can sustain such a program for the next 20 years and changes lives,\u201d he adds.<\/p>\n

Given his record of working for the Toledo area in a number of platforms over the years, Sykes believes he has earned the consideration of voters in this September 14 primary and the November general election to put him back in the seat that he was so unceremoniously stripped of more than a year ago \u2013 well before he had a chance to defend himself before a panel of his peers \u2013 presumed guilty rather than innocent as the law requires.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve served this community though some tough times. I\u2019ve always been responsive, been open, been approachable. I hope voters know my commitment to this community and elect me again.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Fletcher Word Sojourner\u2019s Truth Editor After more than a year of living in a legal limbo, waiting for the federal government to decide whether to pursue a prosecution for a variety of charges, including conspiracy, Councilman Larry Sykes \u2013 whose resignation from City Council was forced due to the pending charges \u2013 has decided […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"wf_post_folders":[23],"class_list":["post-2446","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cover_story"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2446","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2446"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2446\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2448,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2446\/revisions\/2448"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2446"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2446"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2446"},{"taxonomy":"wf_post_folders","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/wf_post_folders?post=2446"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}