By Kevin Aldridge
The Cincinnati Enquirer

BOND HILL - More than 150 people packed the Bond Hill Recreation Center Thursday night to express frustration with the rash of violent killings on Cincinnati's streets and offer their solutions.

Residents called for more accountability from police and other city-funded organizations that receive millions of taxpayer dollars for crime prevention programs. Some blasted City Council for voting Wednesday to reject the $100,000 "Black-on-Black Crime Initiative" proposed by the city's four African-American council members.

"We've got to get away from this 'Fab Four' deal, five white councilmen versus four blacks," said Glenn Givens Sr., of Kennedy Heights, who ran unsuccessfully for city council in November.

Derrick Blassingame, 17, of Avondale said he was "astonished" that council voted down the initiative. Blassingame's brother Cortez, 27, was killed on Christmas Eve 2002 in Northside.

"You can give Kroger $10 million for a garage, but you can't give $100,000 to save lives," he said.

Victoria Straughn, of the activist group Concerned Citizens for Justice, said she was "glad that what was proposed did not pass."

"When these white corporations come to you, they don't come asking for pennies," she said. "They come asking for millions of dollars and we should, too."

The meeting, jointly hosted by the city's Neighborhoods and Health, Small Business and Employment committees, was held in the same neighborhood where the city's 74th and 75th homicides of 2003 took place.

Council members in attendance said they wanted to hear solutions from residents and they got an earful during the three-hour meeting.

"Give another organization and program a chance," said Charles Houston, who runs the Community Business Service, an employment group that helps ex-offenders. "Other people have ideas that can be supported."

Patricia Carson, a member of Endless Mothers Pain for Today's Youth, said, "there is a wealth of knowledge within the families of the victims" that city leaders have not yet tapped

"We know what leads to the deaths," she said. "When are you going to come to us?"

Councilman Sam Malone, former president of the Bond Hill Community Council, said the city needs to find a way to galvanize the different community and individual efforts.

"We can't get so locked into a program that the program comes before the community," Vice Mayor Alicia Reece said. "If a program works them I'm going to stick with it. If it doesn't work, get rid of it and give me something else."

Reece said a motion would be introduced soon to reinstate the city's gang unit.

E-mail kaldridge@enquirer.com