John Cranley has decided that corporate law just isn't for him.

        The Cincinnati councilman and Harvard Law School graduate left his job as an associate at Taft, Stettinius & Hollister last week “on very good terms.”

        He will take a position at the University of Cincinnati College of Law.

        He will teach part-time, including a class this fall on election law — a hot topic in the aftermath of Bush v. Gore and the continuing debate about campaign finance reform.

        But he will also work in development and administration, increasing opportunities for students to become summer law clerks.

        And he expects to have a role in the creation of an Institute for Urban Justice, a think tank that Dean Joseph P. Tomain wants to launch partly in response to last April's riots.

        City Council in Cincinnati is a part-time job that has always attracted a good number of lawyers.

        But it's rare for a council member to hold a job also in the public sector — let alone one as high profile as Mr. Cranley's.

        Despite his political role as a centrist Democrat, the new job may allow Mr. Cranley — a St. Xavier High School and Harvard Divinity School graduate — to show his closeted liberal streak.

        He hopes to get law students involved in solving social problems, and to set up a “great debates” series on issues such as the death penalty and the drug war.

        “I've always felt called to social justice issues,” he said. “The thing you realize as an elected official, though, is that there's only a finite amount of resources to cure all these social ills.”

        Veto vexation: Mayor Charlie Luken has yet to use the veto powers he inherited when he became “strong mayor” last December. He doesn't even own a big red veto stamp.

        But there's some ambiguity in the new charter about what the mayor can veto.

        He can veto an ordinance, certainly. But what about some of the other ways council does business, through motions, resolutions and reports?

        Councilman Pat DeWine has come up with a solution that would allow the mayor to veto resolutions if they set a binding policy, but not if they recognize, for example, the Hoxworth blood drive.

        He's also proposing a sort of “reverse veto” in which the mayor could approve or disapprove of reports from the city manager, but City Council could veto a decision to disapprove a report by a six-vote majority.

        Truck tales: The Luverne Co., a South Dakota maker of fire engines, has sued the city for refusing delivery of four fire trucks that the city says are defective.

        Among the city's complaints contained in 17 pages of defects was one a fire truck that was too tall to fit in the firehouse for which it was intended.

        Luverne's solution: Let some air out of the tires.

        Overheard: “You can compare us to Los Angeles after Rodney King. People are still going to L.A. They're still performing in L.A. No one's boycotting L.A.”

        — Vice Mayor Alicia Reece, explaining why she thinks Cincinnati's national reputation isn't fair.

        Elsewhere: John F. Deatrick, the city's transportation director who's leaving for Washington, D.C., will be paid $125,000 a year as that city's deputy director of transportation, the Washington Post reports.
        City Hall reporter Gregory Korte can be reached at 768-8391 or gkorte@enquirer.com.

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