(upbeat music) - [Announcer] COVID-19 cases are on the rise again in Ohio.

The Center for Disease Control reverse course on mass this week.

And Ohio Governor Mike DeWine says Ohioans have no appetite for another mask mandate.

The bribery investigation that came out of the passage of House Bill 6 looks to become a major issue in the primary challenge to Governor Mike DeWine.

And the race to fill Marcia Fudge in seat in Congress reaches the home stretch as two of the 13 candidates, Nina Turner and Shontel Brown battle on the airways and on the campaign trail.

Ideas is next.

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(upbeat music) (upbeat music) - Hello, and welcome to Ideas.

I'm Glenn Forbes, in this week for Mike McIntyre.

Thanks for joining us.

The Delta variant is driving cases of COVID-19 upward again, including in Ohio, that forced the CDC to reverse course.

And again, recommend masks for vaccinated people indoors.

But Governor DeWine says he is unlikely to implement those recommendations.

A political rival seeking to unseat Governor DeWine seizes on the bribery investigation launched out of the passage of House Bill 6.

And the race to fill Marcia Fudge's seat in Congress reaches the home stretch.

We'll talk about that and much more ahead on the Reporters Round Table.

Joining me this week are Ideastream Public Media senior reporter, Nick Castele, Statehouse News Bureau chief Karen Kasler and WKSU reporter Kabir Bhatia.

Let's get started.

Karen, let's start with you.

Governor Mike DeWine interesting choice of words.

He says he doesn't think Ohioans have much appetite for another mask mandate.

How does he look to be handling this recommendation from the CDC other than those comments?

- Well, it's not just that Ohio doesn't really have a appetite for mask mandates.

I mean, there wasn't a whole big appetite for mask mandates when we had them ask mandate.

That mass mandate was lifted in May.

And you might remember that stat that you just talked about, 50 cases per 100,000 residents.

That was the threshold that DeWine used in saying he would lift the mass mandate that had been in place for almost a year if Ohio got to that point.

He lifted it before Ohio got to that point, we actually hit that point in June and he lifted it in May.

But he was also facing a challenge from the state legislature.

They had passed a bill and his administration did not challenge it, and none of the health groups and hospital systems that were opposed to it challenged it.

This bill would allow for state lawmakers to override the governor's health orders.

He knew that was coming, he lifted the mass mandate in May and the cases did indeed drop.

But then of course the Delta variant is now in place.

And the CDC, like you said, has recommended indoor mask use in counties with high rates of transmission.

For Northeast Ohio, that is Medina, Loraine, Erie, Huron, Richland and Ashland.

It also includes a lot of Southwest Ohio, includes some of Northwest Ohio.

And the question is of course, whether people will actually take that recommendation from the CDC, and also whether businesses in those areas will go ahead and reintroduce mask mandates on their own.

There's a real question about whether business groups will do that and will take that recommendation without any sort of a state order.

And of course, that bill that I mentioned before really doesn't give local county boards a whole lot of authority to do these kinds of mass mandates either.

- Karen, you know, when this started back in March of 2020, Governor DeWine was proactive, he was seen as being out in front of this problem.

It doesn't seem like, you know, he's certainly still trying to come up with some ideas for vaccination and incentives and things of that nature, but it doesn't seem like he has made any indication that he's going to go back to, we talked about the masking or the lockdowns or anything like that, you mentioned the legislature, we mentioned the primary challenge in terms of HB6, which we'll get to in a little bit, how much of this seems like more of a political response to you as opposed to a year and a half ago?

- Well, certainly you have to look at the fact that DeWine who has not officially announced that he's running for reelection, but he said he's gonna run for reelection.

He has two opponents, a former Congressman Jim Renacci and central Ohio business and farm owner Joe Blystone, both of whom have said that masks are going to be a big part of their campaign.

And DeWine has, I think, read the room when it comes to how mass mandates are viewed in many parts of the state, especially parts of the state that are dominated by Republicans.

And so he's been leaning on the idea of people making that choice to wear masks and also leaning on people to make the choice to get vaccinated.

And his Ohio Department of Health has been out there with the message of getting vaccinated.

So you're not hearing from him, not hearing those daily press conferences that we spent most of last year doing.

You're now hearing from his health experts who are doing an occasional news conferences really pleading with people, showing them the numbers and saying vaccinations work and now masks work, and urging people to go forward with those things.

But those are only recommendations, there's no order in place, and there's likely not to be an order in place to either do any sort of a statewide vaccine mandate.

In fact, DeWine signed a bill that said that the state can not, that the public colleges and universities and schools can not mandate any vaccine that does not have full FDA approval, which of course means the COVID vaccine.

But this idea of mask mandates I think is off the table as well.

- Yeah, well said.

And you certainly mentioned that school is upcoming, a lot of questions there.

We're gonna talk about that in just a little bit.

Kabir Bhatia from WKSU wanted to get you in this conversation of course as well.

Local communities right now, what are you hearing from Summit County health, Star County, anything you may be hearing from the health department officials down there and any high incidents areas that you're aware of on your beat?

Well, you cover a lot of stuff, but you know what I mean, Kabir go for it.

- I know exactly what you mean.

There are definitely some high incidents areas pockets, and a lot of them seem to be either more rural areas or, and it's been a while since I've checked in with the health department specifically, but there was a time when it was really hitting areas that had a lot of congregant living, sort of like North Hill in Akron.

I think that as vaccine has rolled out, though that they've really been able to tackle places like that.

It is hitting more rural areas.

As far as hospitalizations, you were mentioning that a second ago.

The hospitalizations seem to be the people who are unvaccinated, whereas cases of course can include people who are vaccinated, but happened to catch one of the variants.

And in those cases, as we keep hearing, the symptoms aren't as severe, there's a much better chance of survival, there's a much lower chance you'll need to be hospitalized if you've been vaccinated and you still somehow pick up one of these variants.

So the main concerns now are the schools, it seems, and parents saying, well, "Can we do online school?"

"Are my kids gonna have to be masked?"

"My child is a certain age, or has a disability, they can't get vaccinated."

Those are the big questions as Karen also pointed out that are really facing people, because schools are a perfect storm when it comes to a rapid spread of this disease if they don't keep an eye on things.

- And the key is, we've discussed, these are recommendations and not mandates.

We've seen guidance from the Ohio Department of Health regarding schools, the Ohio Education Association has come out and said, "We know what works."

So it worked last year in terms of masking and improve ventilation.

Kabir, districts now coming up with their own guidelines, Akron public schools saying, "Everyone must mask when inside or on buses."

Take us through that decision and what you know.

- Well, that's right in line with the CDC's recommendation, you know, a little bit stronger of course, because everyone's required at least the start of this school year to have the masks.

You can take them off when you're outdoors, of course, the buses they're going to be having that.

A lot of the school districts, it seems that whether in school it's required or not, the buses, they're going to be a little bit more strengthened.

The buses, I don't think had to, of course get cleaned as much, the kids sit much closer together and they're really chatting.

Whereas in school you're whole looking forward, hopefully, at the teacher and not turned and talking to your friend.

They're also, in Akron, gonna limit the class sizes down to 24.

And, you know, class sizes are always a big problem.

Some parents might be hearing 24 and thinking, "Wow, that's a lot."

Or, "Wow, that's very small for a class."

But in Akron they said they're gonna do that to not just manage the spread and be able to keep distancing, but also because, you know, class sizes just in general are good.

Even if you take Corona out of the equation.

As for sports, everyone's still waiting to hear exactly what the recommendations are going to be from the Athletic Association.

Currently I know a lot of the schools, Akron especially, they won't allow spectators at practices.

And I know at the end of last year, a lot of schools were still having, the stands were very empty, or they would only allow home spectators to show up.

So the athletic part of this picture remains to be seen between now and when school starts in about a month.

- Wanna bring in an Ideastream senior reporter, Nick Castele here, he's been patiently waiting his turn, a lot to get through there Nick, obviously.

Now we look at this kind of at a, not only at a federal level, but here kind of how it impacts us in Cleveland.

US Department of Veteran Affairs issuing a ruling this week that all medical staff who work directly with patients must be vaccinated, of course, that would include the Louis Stokes Cleveland VA Medical Center here.

It will be the first medical, they'll be the first medical personnel locally who must be vaccinated.

President Biden late yesterday did not issue a mask mandate for federal workers, but didn't say anyone who is not vaccinated must wear masks and be tested.

Obviously anything that affects federal employees in Washington, trickles down to federal employees, and of course the VA staff here in Cleveland, Nick.

- Oh yeah, I mean, the federal government is a major employer in the Cleveland area, not just at the VA, but in downtown Cleveland, in the Celebrezze Building.

The defense department has a large financial office here, the Defense Finance and Accounting Service, that's some 22, 2300 employees.

And so, you know, these new rules are going to, you know, have an impact on people who go to work here in the Cleveland area as well.

(upbeat music) - The House Bill 6 bribery investigation is already becoming a major issue in the primary challenge to Governor Mike DeWine's reelection.

Karen, Governor DeWine says this week that Randazzo's previous work with FirstEnergy was well known, but not everyone agreeing with that sentiment.

- Yeah, this was a press conference that DeWine did about a hazing on college campuses, but it was the first time he had been out in public in front of reporters since FirstEnergy admitted to that plea deal, and agreed to pay that $230 million fine.

So naturally reporters wanted to know about his thoughts on that FirstEnergy plea deal, and specifically on this connection to Sam Randazzo.

And in that FirstEnergy plea deal, FirstEnergy admitted to paying a $4.3 million bribe to Randazzo before he became the PUCO chair.

And so DeWine was asked, "Did you know about this payment?"

And what was interesting in his answers, and he said this not once, but several times that everyone knew Randazzo worked for FirstEnergy.

And my Statehouse News Bureau colleague Andy Chow has done a lot more reporting on this than I have, and so I asked him, "Did you that?"

And he said, no, he didn't really think that that was common knowledge.

He started asking others if they knew that.

In fact, he asked two members of the committee that heard the House Bill 6 bill, the Nuclear Bailout Law, and those to Casey Weinstein, a Democrat from Hudson and Nino Vitale or Republican from Medina both of them said they didn't know that San Randazzo had worked for FirstEnergy.

Randazza did not talk about his work with FirstEnergy.

He was asked about whether he represented anybody who had been before the PUCO, and he said he didn't.

I mean, so it's interesting that DeWine said this not once but several times that this was all well known, when in our reporting, it really wasn't as well known.

I mean, even Randazzo's resume when he applied to be the chair of the PUCO didn't mention that he had worked for FirstEnergy.

And that payment there, that was the question that now Democrats are asking, "Who knew about that payment, and when did DeWine know about it?"

DeWine says he didn't know about it when it happened.

He knew about it before Randazzo actually resigned, which was after his house was raided.

And so now you've got Democrats saying that the staff members who knew about this should resign or DeWine should fire them.

And still this lingering question of who knew what, when.

- When we look at this from the lens of the Republican primary former Congressman Jim Renacci, Joe Blystone, obviously this primary challenge started because of DeWine's response to the pandemic and mass mandates and the lockdown and things like that.

That's kind of where the primary took hold.

But now the former Congressman Jim Renacci is kind of seizing on this to call for an investigation.

There's a lot of talk out there even from, you know, beyond the primary, with a Democrat like Nan Whaley who's running for governor on that side.

This phrase of the most corrupt state in the country is taking hold, and just kind of that idea of corruption in Ohio.

So Karen, DeWine kind of has to, in the primary, has to kind of fight this on two fronts now.

- Yeah, and Renacci did this press conference at the Medina county courthouse.

He is the Medina county Republican Party chair.

And it was a small group of people, mostly supporters who were there.

But one person who was at this press conference, and I was watching on Facebook, is Henry Gomez, former plain dealer, I think, a former Buzzfeed, now with NBC News, he asked him specifically, "You keep bringing this up and putting so much attention on this issue.

Well, if you're not the nominee and the Democrats use this and it costs Republicans the governor's office, what about that?"

And he says, "This is about Ohio, it's about making things right, it isn't about political parties."

Which is really kind of laughable when you think about, that we're talking about a primary and the primary challenger.

- It's always about political parties, right?

(both laughing) - It's a nice thing to say, but let's serious.

But it really is giving Democrats who already had this fodder, they already had been talking about a culture of corruption going back to 2018 and even before that, it never really got the traction, whether it will get the traction this time that you've got even a Republican candidate talking about this, remains to be seen.

But certainly there are a lot of questions about what happened to get House Bill 6 passed and who benefited, and what kind of a pay to play scheme as federal prosecutors say this was, was really going on here.

As you mentioned, Larry Householder, the former house speaker and now former state representative has said he's innocent.

Also Ohio Republican Party chair, Matt Borges has said he's innocent.

And then two of the other people charged in this have pleaded guilty along with a nonprofit 501C3 group.

And then the lobbyists Neil Clark took his life, died by suicide.

So this whole case is waiting for the final result of this is going to be an exercise of just a lot of speculation.

And as more information comes out, it potentially even fuels more speculation.

- Kabir, I wanted to get the view from down in Akron, of course, FirstEnergy are based in Akron.

There's been a lot of kind of shakeups and reshuffling of some of the executive staff since this story broken, also Governor DeWine saying, he's gonna donate money back to, he's going to donate back to charities any money received from FirstEnergy.

Just your view on this from covering that area so well.

- Well, the news when it came out with HBC, as the news has come out, I guess, 'cause it's been over a year now that we've been living with this, and more and more comes out, the FirstEnergy company itself, you know, they had a earnings call, I think right after this latest round of indictments and everything came out, and the acting CEO who, you know, was not at the helm, of course, when all of this happened, he apologized for it.

Of course they are going to be paying fines and that sort of thing, the company as well.

And the fact that FirstEnergy is based in Akron.

I mean, we pay a little bit more attention to it, it's one of the biggest employers in this region.

And a lot of people are not wondering, you know, "When am I gonna see some of that money coming back to me with my utility bill?"

As far as DeWine paying back the money, he did say it's about $100,000 he's gonna be paying back in donations, and he's giving that to charity.

(upbeat music) - Voters in Ohio's 11th Congressional District will vote Tuesday in a primary, the first step towards selecting the person to take the seat held previously by Marcia Fudge, now secretary of Housing and Urban Development.

We've talked about this before on this program, Nick, certainly the framing of this is, Bernie Sanders and Nina Turner, right, versus Joe Biden slash Hillary Clinton and Shontel Brown.

That's how this kind of started, that's the framing of this race.

Is that really how the constituency at though?

- Yeah, probably not in such stark terms.

And I think, at least, Nina Turner's campaign I think is not really liked having that framing applied to the race because Turner of course does have a political history in Ohio that goes back before Bernie Sanders presidential runs.

I mean, she was a Cleveland City Council woman, of course, in the state Senate as well, as well as a statewide candidate for secretary of state in 2014.

And, you know, Shontel brown has her own, you know, political history here in Northeast Ohio as a Cuyahoga County Council woman, and now as the chair of the county Democratic Party.

But of course, you know, that's where their money is coming from.

I mean, they are certainly the candidates who have raised the most money and, you know, there is this sort of national divide or debate within the Democratic Party that is playing itself out within this race.

We will have Senator Bernie Sanders coming to Northeast Ohio today I believe in this weekend for Nina Turner.

Congressman Jim Clyburn, I believe, will be in town as well for Shontel Brown.

There are a number of other national figures who will be making appearances as well.

And I think certainly anybody with a TV screen or a mailbox knows about this race at this point.

I don't even live in the district, and I've been getting some mailers.

So, you know, this is gonna be very closely watched nationally as well.

- So while the Brown campaign is obviously trying to highlight some things that Nina Turner has said about President Biden in the past, and what voting for President Biden would be like, I noticed in Nina Turner's commercials, she is making it a point to show that picture of her with Barack Obama saying, "Well, Nina Turner was also an Obama delegate twice."

And trying to maybe take some of the sting out of that, but she went, you know, pretty heavy for Bernie Sanders, but she's still trying to say, "Hey, I was an Obama delegate twice, here I have this nice picture with him.

I'm still, you know, a Democrat you can trust essentially."

- Right, I think that, that is, I think that illustrates the way that this sort of stark, you know, painting everything in very stark colors here maybe doesn't capture the full nuances of these candidates and their backgrounds.

And of course, this is a special Election in the beginning of August, real question about which voters are going to show up and vote?

What is turnout going to look like?

This is not a, you know, this is not sort of a regularly scheduled election in a midterm year or a presidential year where you can expect higher turnout, it's an off year election.

For voters in Cleveland, which is a big part of this district, there's gonna be a mayor's race primarily the following month, September 14th.

And so, you know, it remains to be seen just how many people are going to show up and vote certainly with all the money being spent on this race in TV ads and mailers, you think it's, you know, raise people's attention and maybe that will translate into turnout.

- It may not be comfortable being an ads maker.

But I mean, again, a lot of attention, a lot of money, I think a lot of people do know about this race, but I mean, turnout 30, 40% is that high?

- I'm trying to remember what, I know that the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections did try to make a projection of turnout, and now I don't want to misspeak because I can't remember the number off the top of my head, but I do remember that it wasn't above 50%.

- Right.

- I can say that.

So yeah, I mean, and another thing too, is that there hasn't really been a ton of polling of this race.

Nina Turner's campaign came out with a poll earlier on that showed her really far and away the candidate with the most support.

Shontel Brown's campaign had a more recent poll, I believe also showing Turner in the lead, but showing that that lead was much smaller.

And so I think there's a sense that this race has tightened.

- We should certainly mention some of the other Democrats running as well, but there are two Republicans, Laverne Jones Gore, I believe who's ran for this seat a couple of times.

But in terms of that Democrat field, is there any sense that, you know, Jeff Johnson or somebody else could take away some votes from either candidate?

Could the other Democrats kind of affect this race?

- You know, I don't know to what degree they might, you know, play as spoilers, so to speak, and in whose campaign that might benefit, because you do have some people who are known in Cleveland politics.

Jeff Johnson, like you mentioned, a former Cleveland City Councilman man, a former state lawmaker as well.

Shirley Smith and John Barnes also a former state lawmakers.

So I mean, they are people who are known in the political world here in Cleveland, now they are not attracting the money and attention that that Turner and Brown are, and so I think there's a general sense that the two of them are the top two contenders here, but, you know, there are plenty of other names out there and there will be lots of names on the ballot as well for people to choose from.

- And we should also mention this week, Shontel brown facing a potential ethics probe, you know, there's questions about, and I just heard her actually on Morning Edition answering some of those questions from Amy Eddings about a contract given out, the Turner campaigns says given out to her boyfriend.

Shontel Brown, you know, denies really that her fiance had anything to do with that contract.

And of course on council, you've got to, it's not just one person voting for a contract, the whole body has to vote.

But interesting that she could be facing a potential ethics pro here.

- Well, and this goes back to, you know, Cuyahoga County Council awarding a contracts to a construction firm that has a historic and familial ties to Brown's a fiance who is the principal in a separate different construction firm that she says has not gotten, you know, money from Cuyahoga County Council contracts of that sort.

And what Brown has said is that, you know, her fiance does not have an ownership stake in this company that has gotten all of these contracts from Cuyahoga County Council.

And so she's pointing out that the business relationships are not as blurred as people might wanna portray them.

I know that the Turner campaign has highlighted this though in an ad that ends with a jail door slamming closed, which the brown campaign was not very pleased with as you might imagine.

So I think that just illustrates just how tense and nasty you might say this race has gotten.

- The city of Cleveland aims to restart its curbside recycling program by the end of 2021.

The city halted the program in the spring of 2020 when its contract with a recycler expired.

It has been a fascinating debate here, Ideastream senior reporter, Nick Castele.

This is happening as mayor Frank Jackson is leaving office.

Is this an issue that you expect the candidates to talk more about?

And what can you tell us kind of about the background here and also this new wrinkle, I guess, the opt-in program in the city of Cleveland?

- Yeah, I mean, I think some mayoral candidates, might want to point to the recycling program as an example of a city hall that is kind of a running a ground here.

I mean, you know, the idea that people were putting out their recycling in the blue bins, knowing that it was just going to the landfill.

I mean, just the futility of that, I think gives any candidate a great metaphor to run on if they wanna be a change candidate.

You know, one of the realities is that, because of changes in the recycling market last year, the city said that they were no longer making money selling recyclables, but they were actually losing money trying to find places for their cycling to go.

And so, because of that, they decided to basically discontinue the program.

Now, after a consulting study, they're bringing it back on, what's going to be a much smaller scale with an opt-in program.

I think the idea is that you will have only the people who are most interested in recycling, who will be a part of it, and so that might bring down the contamination rate.

Cleveland says that it has a pretty high rate of contamination as much as 60% if not more of the recycling was just full of stuff that you couldn't recycle.

I think some people thought, "Hey, I'll just, when in doubt, throw it in the bin and they can figure it out."

- Yes, they call it aspirational recycling.

- Aspirational recycling.

- They just throw it in.

Maybe they can recycle it.

- Maybe I can recycle this trash, and so, you know, that meant that it was just increasing the cost for the city.

And so, in opt-in program, it's gonna be smaller, and maybe that will mean it's easier for the city to manage.

- I'm Glenn Forbes, thanks watching.

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