The Cincinnati Business Committee still is needed to staff and fund many of the ideas to help solve the city's racial problem, members of the elite business group insist. say.

        Several of those members spoke out last week, trying to counter the suggestion that they have not done enough since race riots in the city's streets last month.

Cox

        “We are not being silent,” said CBC vice chairman Phillip Cox, president of Cox Financial Corp. “We understand that the most inappropriate thing we could do now would be to jump out there with an answer when we have not yet defined the problem .... We want to be part of the solution, but we can't be the total solution.

        “At the end of the day, who do they think is going to staff and fund this (race relations) group?” he added.

        The comments came the day after Cincinnati Mayor Charlie Luken appointed three chairmen of a new race-relations commission, called Cincinnati Community Action Now, or Cincinnati CAN.

        So far, there are no members of the CBC on the new commission. That in itself is a departure for the organization of chief executives, which has driven responses to most of the city's significant community efforts for years.

        Mr. Cox has been outspoken in chiding the local corporate community to avoid token responses to the race relations effort. On Wednesday, he said the group is “working feverishly” to help. And its years of contributions to the Cincinnati Public Schools and downtown development should not be ignored, he said.

        But the CBC is determined to not impose its own plans on those of the larger community. And CMC can't solve the city's festering racial problems on its own, he said.

        “We're committed to being part of the solution, but we're not committed to sway people with our might and power and say that we've got all the answers,” he said.
       

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