(upbeat music) - [Mike] The pandemic appears to be loosening its grip on Ohio as case numbers continue to drop and vaccination ramps up.

Pandemic politics persist.

The legislature voted to strip the governor of the power to issue health orders.

Mike DeWine has vowed to veto the bill.

And a renewed push for a tough anti-hazing law, after the death of a Bowling Green State University student.

Ideas, is next.

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

I'm Mike McIntyre, ideastream's executive editor.

Thanks for joining us.

Ohio is inching closer to the benchmark set by governor Mike DeWine to lift pandemic health orders.

We're at 155 cases per 100,000 residents.

We need to get down to 50 cases per 100,000 and hold there for two weeks for the orders to be canceled.

But slow progress isn't enough for DeWine's fellow Republicans in the legislature.

The house and senate approved a measure to limit the governor's authority to issue such orders.

DeWine said yesterday, he'll veto it.

And Republicans say they have the votes to override his veto.

Pandemic politics isn't going anywhere soon.

Meanwhile, appointments for vaccinations are becoming easier to get as the state prepares to open mass vaccination sites including one at Cleveland State University's Wolstein Center, set to open Wednesday and delivering 6,000 doses a day.

Can we also vaccinate against senseless fraternity hazing on college campuses?

A 20 year old Bowling Green State University student is dead after such an incident.

And efforts to toughen penalties for hazing in Ohio has new momentum.

Joining me to discuss those stories and other news of the week, Marlene Harris-Taylor ideastream's managing producer for health, news reporter, Taylor Haggerty, and our Ohio public radio Statehouse News Bureau chief, Karen Kasler.

Let's get ready to round table.

We've been living under state mandated pandemic restrictions for a year now and it sure feels now like the end is in sight.

And that's just not me saying that.

A new poll from CNN found that 77% of Americans are feeling optimistic and say the worst of the pandemic is now behind us.

Governor DeWine updated the state's response to the pandemic yesterday and said we're making progress toward the benchmark he set last week to lift health orders.

- Last week, we were a little below 180 cases per 100,000 in that two week period for the whole state of Ohio.

As of today, it's gone from that little bit below 180 to 155.

That is great progress.

Now this is a highly elevated level.

It's above what the CDC says is high incidence level but, the data is certainly trending in the right direction.

- Karen interesting.

It's going in the right direction but the governor said something there that's key.

It's still a highly elevated level.

We're not talking about a number that is comfortable.

There was a time when if we heard 155 cases per 100,000 residents, we were thinking, "Oh my gosh, this is horrible."

It's just that it got so bad since then.

This does though show that we're trending in the right direction.

- Yeah, and when you start looking at the trends overall, we had a couple of days, three days where we had rising case numbers and now they're starting to fall again.

The two week average case count per 100,000 people, which is the metric that the governor is using to talk about when orders might be lifted, right now it's at 155 and he wants to get it at 50 per 100,000 people before those orders are lifted.

And he is saying that this is doable, but that we're not done with this yet.

This week's map has 22 counties that are still listed in orange and the rest are listed in red.

And that's a change.

There were 11 orange counties last week, 76 red counties.

Only one county is yellow, which is the lowest level.

So for the state to really start getting to that 50 cases per 100,000 people, more counties have to start getting back down to those orange and yellow levels.

And so he says, it's doable with mask wearing, social distancing, hand-washing.

All the things that we've been talking about for now a year, but it's not over yet.

And I think there's a complacency potentially with the vaccine.

Now three vaccines in place.

People over 50 can get the vaccine, a larger number of people with health conditions can get the vaccine.

So there may be a feeling that we're at the end here.

Well, we're not at the end.

We're closer to the end, but not at the end.

- People over 50.

So I can say that at least one person in this conversation would qualify under that measure.

I don't know about anybody else but at least one of us.

- Are you talking about me Mike?

- No, I'm talking about me?

So I guess it's two now.

I know Taylor doesn't I know that for sure.

Let's ask you though Marlene, about the idea that the mandates may be lifted.

And one of the mandates is the idea of wearing masks.

And a lot of people are saying, "Listen, let's ride this out.

Let's keep the mask going because it's working."

If the state lifts the mask mandate, does that mean that the local communities wouldn't necessarily have them?

I know your team did some reporting on that this week.

- Yeah.

Anna Huntsman reached out to two health leaders, one in Cuyahoga County, one in Summit County and said, "Hey, what would you do if the state lifted the mask mandate?"

And they both have the same answer, which is they would look at the situation on the ground, in their own county and then make that decision independently.

But in reality, that's gonna be pretty difficult, I think, if the state lifts it for the counties then to put in their own mask mandates, for people to follow them.

'Cause if you think about it, this has really been a optimistic week.

Hasn't it Mike?

- [Mike] It has.

- I don't know if it was the sunshine or the warm temperatures, or just the fact that we're hearing about the vaccines coming in and there's this feeling of sort of euphoria.

We're getting there.

We're getting there.

So then if these counties come back and say, "Hey, hold up, wait a minute.

We've got it.

We still have some bad conditions on the ground here."

I don't know how much weight that's gonna carry.

- There also is the idea that we are now getting vaccines.

I know a lot of people for a long time were trying to access an appointment, couldn't do so.

This week it became a lot easier.

A lot of people I know told me, "Hey, I got on that mass vaccination site, and I was good in a minute or my hospital finally put me on the MyChart and I'm able to get in.

Some people are having three and four appointments.

They got to cancel some now.

- Yeah, things are opening up.

- So that's good.

That is good news but the question is whether that is enough the idea that people are vaccinated.

We're talking about all these variants that have been coming as well.

I just wonder if there's a point where you lift mandates, people are vaccinated and maybe perhaps there's too much complacency.

- I worry about that too, Mike because we're hearing from a national leaders like Dr. Anthony Fauci.

We're hearing from local folks.

Even the governor emphasized this yesterday in his press conference that, we're not at the end of the road.

We still need to wear masks.

- There's a couple of other good news things, Karen, that the governor talked about in his briefing yesterday.

Let's touch on those quickly.

He said that there will be some loosened restrictions including those for spring high school athletes.

They won't have to quarantine as strongly as perhaps in previous seasons.

- Yeah, they're not required to quarantine if they had an incidental exposure to COVID in the classroom.

They'll still be able to participate in sports as long as they don't have symptoms and they follow the appropriate guidance.

And so that's really kind of a big deal because as more kids are going back to school, there are more cases that are showing up and you getting more reports of people who are coming together for the first time in a long time, and this is happening.

Though he's now saying that he's less concerned because we have a lot more sports activities that are happening outside spring sports or our outside events.

And so next week, he'll start to have some more information about that.

Festivals, parades, graduations, prompts, all those things.

He's gonna talk about those in his press conference which is coming up on Thursday of next week.

He's skipping his Monday or Tuesday one.

He's been doing one on Monday rather than on Tuesday because the legislature has been meeting.

So only one press conference next week, which also some people might think is maybe a sign that things are slowing down a little bit.

You mentioned yesterday, that was his 150th press conference.

And I remember doing a whole bunch of those, anchoring those for our public radio and television stations early on in the pandemic.

I believe Andy and I anchored 57 of them.

So there's a feeling that maybe some of this is getting better, but like you just said, the concern about the variants and how they might hit.

Some of them are more potentially dangerous and contagious.

And also still some lingering concern about vaccine hesitancy among some populations and making sure that people have the opportunity to get those vaccinations, especially with the mass vaccination site coming next week at the Wolstein Center in Cleveland.

You've got 15 vaccination sites that are gonna be set up around the state.

Four mobile vaccination sites that are coming to different areas.

So, bring the vaccine to where people live, I think is one of the goals that governor's trying to do.

- And for those of us who need a fried Snickers bar, county fairs are gonna happen.

(Marlene and Karen laughing) - Yeah, this is big deal.

Last year, the governor vetoed three bills last year and one of them specifically dealt with county fairs and their operation.

And so this is kind of good news for maybe state lawmakers that might wanna be proposing this bill again.

But the governor says that county fairs could go forward.

All of this is predicated on the belief and the guidance that says that as we get toward the summer, which is when most county fairs are happening, then things will be better, more people will be vaccinated, we'll be approaching herd immunity.

But the question of course will be, what will be the rules for county fairs.

And certainly that's another thing that I think we're waiting to hear some more guidance from the governor on.

But, he had to make that announcement now.

So County fairs could start their planning because these things don't happen overnight.

And for a fair to happen in June, July or August, you've got to start planning it right now.

- Let's talk about the City of Cleveland.

Playgrounds and pools have been closed for a year.

Our Justin Glanville did a story on that where a number of other communities were able to open their playgrounds and Cleveland still no hoops at the basketball courts and no playground equipment available to children.

Well that's about to change pretty soon, parks are going to reopen as well as swim pools too.

Taylor, where does the city come in on gatherings and parks or larger events like festivals now?

What's the timeline here?

- So officials are still kind of considering whether to issue permits for larger summertime events and festivals.

We heard this conversation a lot last year around this time too, about whether or not festivals would be permitted in the summer.

And a lot of it just kinda depends, like Marlene was saying earlier, on the situation on the ground and what things look like locally before they can definitively say either way.

But like you said, they will be opening the parks.

There'll be basketball courts and spring sports as well.

So, there will be some opportunities for folks to kinda gather and spend time with one another.

- I know early on we were all concerned about sanitizing equipment.

And now that seems less important obviously.

It's now the spread via aerosol by our breadth, and that's why the masks are in place.

So it seems as though could be safe, but there would Marlene, still need to be some social distancing involved, perhaps some masking.

That's gonna be a difficult task to do to make sure that people are adhering to that.

Does the city have some ideas about what rules it'll put in place?

- Yeah, they do.

They mentioned that, that exact thing, Mike, in their press conference, that there will be particularly we're talking about the pools that will be opened up.

They'll open the pools up, but they plan to shut them down like once every hour for about 15 minutes to sanitize the pools and there'll be social distancing in the pools.

But like you, I was thinking, how are you gonna keep kids socially distance in the pool when they're in there playing?

And the same thing on playgrounds.

They're opening up the playgrounds again.

And they're gonna put the nets back out at the playgrounds and famously they went around and took down the nets last year.

But how do you do that on a basketball court?

Keep people socially distance.

So I think that the intent is there to try to do this in the right way.

And I applaud them for saying that we still have to keep these measures in place.

Again, I think that the execution is going to be difficult.

But I think it's a wonderful thing to let the kids get outside.

Let the kids play.

I know it's welcome news to parents.

(dramatic classical music) - Republicans in the legislature want to limit the governor's power to issue health mandates.

The Republicans in the Ohio House and Senate voted and passed a bill that would limit the governor's authority to implement health orders.

Governor said, he'll veto the bill.

Karen, do the Republicans have votes to override a governor's veto?

- They definitely do in the Senate.

It passed with 25 yes votes in the Senate.

It only needs 20 yes votes to override the governor's veto.

It passed with 60, I'm sorry, 57 votes in the house but there were some Republicans who are absent.

So the question is, will the house have the 60 votes needed to override veto?

And Senate President Matt Huffman says absolutely.

House speaker Bob Dupp said that he thinks the votes are there.

What's interesting I thought was on the vote in the house on this bill, which again would take away some of the governor's power on executive orders by putting the legislature into the process and saying that a vote of the house and senate could rescind a governor's order immediately.

The day he issues it, the house and senate could vote to override that and take that order away.

And it also gives some more power to local governments if they have concerns about an order that's been issued.

And in that vote, all Democrats voted against this bill but three Republicans voted against it including Nino Vitale, Republican of Urbana in Western Ohio.

He is one of the governor's harshest critics, been calling him a dictator, all these sorts of things.

He put out a statement to my colleague Andy Chow saying, that he agreed with the idea, but he thinks the bill has gone unconstitutional because of the way that the legislature would override an executive order with a concurrent resolution which he says that can't be done.

And so I think it's interesting that there's a little bit of a push and pull among three Republican lawmakers against their own party voting against this bill because they're concerned about the process and what might happen here.

But I think this really does potentially set up a showdown between DeWine and Republicans in the legislature.

(dramatic music) - The first mass vaccination site in Ohio is set to open next week.

6,000 doses a day will be administered at Cleveland State University's Wolstein Center and online reservations for those shots seem to go smoothly this week.

Karen, have we solved the logistical problem in regards to vaccines?

What is the feeling now in this state?

- Not among people I know.

When the the state open up vaccinations to people over 50, that brings a whole new flood of people and a flood of people who have been waiting for a while who wanna get this vaccine.

And so, there were some struggles for people that I know who were trying to find where they could get the vaccine.

They were looking for appointments.

You go to the state's website and it does show you by zip code where you can get the vaccine in your area, but you still have to go to those individual websites.

Like you just said, some people had already done that and they were getting shut out.

Some of these websites were overloaded pretty quickly.

And so the idea of a one-stop shop where you can just plug in your zip code at the time and day that you wanna get the shot, and it makes an appointment for you.

That's not the way that the system is working.

I think it's an improvement over what the system looked like before, but still, it takes a little bit of a time commitment to try to find out where the vaccine is being offered and then to try to plug yourself into that schedule.

Now with these mass vaccination clinics, like I said there's 15 across the state, there's also the one that is being operated with help FERMA in Cleveland.

And then those four mobile clinics, as well as all the pharmacies and other providers, it's gonna open up dramatically.

And so by the time we see another age group become eligible I think there's going to be more potential vaccine available.

But right now it's still a little bit of a contest.

It's still trying to figure out exactly where I can go.

And how far do I wanna drive?

And do I wanna go to a mass clinic like for instance here in Columbus, at Ohio state at the shot and scene setter?

Or do I wanna go to a pharmacy?

Is there even that opportunity?

So it's a bit of a struggle there I think for a lot of people but it's gonna open up as more vaccine becomes available.

- Yeah, and if I might just jump in here, one of the things that caught my attention during the press conference from DeWine earlier this week when he announced the expansion to include people 50 to 59 in age, was that he was hearing from providers and from health officials that there were still vaccines leftover at the end of the week.

So it's not there aren't vaccines available in every situation, there are people who still have them at the end of the week.

It's just getting them to the people that need them.

(dramatic classical music) - President Joe Biden's cabinet continues to take shape.

The Senate this week confirmed Warrensville Heights Congresswoman Marcia Fudge to lead the department of housing and urban development.

Fudge becomes the first woman in decades to run HUD and the second black woman in history to lead the department.

And Karen the Senate vote was fairly bi-partisan for Marcia Fudge.

- Yeah, and I don't think that's a huge surprise.

Even Rob Portman, Ohio's Republican U.S.

Senator has said that he supported her, that he'd worked with her on legislation.

So I think that this is one of the votes that has gone through that's been a bi-partisan and seemingly noncontroversial, even though at the beginning, Marcia Fudge had said that she had wanted a different role.

She had actually wanted to had the department of agriculture and ended up with housing and urban development but has been campaigning and saying very strongly that she wants this.

And so that of course firmly opens up her congressional seat to the contest that is currently going on among very many Democrats.

And I think even a couple of Republicans who wanna take her seat because she has been one of the most popular in terms of the numbers of the margins of victory that she scores when she runs for office of any member of congress in Ohio.

And so it certainly opens up an opportunity that really wasn't there for especially Democrats who would like to take that district, including most notably, possibly former state Senator Nina Turner, but there are other.

- Shontel Brown who heads the Democratic Party in Cuyahoga County chairs that.

A whole lot of as you said, a whole list of other folks.

Jeff Johnson, a former city council member and candidate for mayor, a bunch of people.

Marlene, Marcia Fudge has a pretty ambitious agenda agenda.

And people in Cleveland by the way, are excited about the fact that she's in that position.

They think that that may benefit housing in Cleveland et cetera, but she's got some real big ideas.

One of which is to increase the availability of home ownership for Americans and particularly families of color.

- Yeah.

This is a really key role because we know the importance that housing plays to people's health.

There's been some outstanding reporting done over the years from our own reporters and some other local Cleveland reporters about lead poisoning, for example.

And we know the living in a sick house literally can make you sick.

So it's very important that the housing stock is improved in Cleveland.

And as you said, people are excited that she's in this role.

And one of the things that I think is amazing, Mike, is that she's coming into this role at a time where she has the wind at her back because Congress just approved this huge bill.

And there's a lot of money in there for housing.

So it's one thing to have the ideas of what you wanna change.

It's another thing to have the ideas when you got a bunch of money that you can work with to bring about this change.

(dramatic classical music) - Bowling Green State University students, Stone Foltz, who is 20 years old, died March 7th after an alleged hazing incident while pledging the Pi Kappa Alpha fraternity.

There's now renewed momentum for toughening penalties for hazing and coordinated support from the president of Ohio universities.

Karen, this bill as mentioned has been brought forth before.

Surprised it didn't pass, but this time it really has a focus on hazing.

There was a lot of support behind it, including Ohio professor, president of Ohio universities.

- Yeah, and the reason many people will point to is, why it didn't pass before is the previous bill also included a language about bullying in K through 12 schools.

And so there was some real questions about how that would be dealt with in the law.

So this time, this only focuses on hazing and expands the definition of hazing to include the forced consumption of alcohol or drugs.

And it would also increase the criminal penalties for hazing.

Right now it's only a fourth degree misdemeanor which is a very, very low misdemeanors like not paying a parking ticket.

And under this law that would increase to a second degree misdemeanor and the third degree felony for hazing involving drugs or alcohol.

So this is really an attempt to crack down specifically on the terrible thing that happened to both Colin Wyant and now Stone Foltz.

And that happened to other people around the country.

I mean these terrible stories, you hear them unfortunately every year about students who are hazing and joining after pledging a fraternity or sorority.

And these are the kinds of things that happen.

In the case at Bowling Green, Stone Foltz was a pledge at Pi Kappa Alpha, international known as PIKE.

He was in an off-campus event where it said that he consumed a copious amount of alcohol.

He was dropped off at his apartment by members of the fraternity.

And next morning, he was found dead by his roommates.

These are terrible stories.

And this is exactly the kinda thing that could propel this bill to go forward without that other, what some people viewed as a side issue of bullying in K through 12 schools, though that's still a serious problem.

And trying to find a way to address that I think is really critical too because there are plenty of parents and kids who will tell you that bullying in high school or even lower than that, is really very serious and should not be ignored.

- It's scary, Marlene.

I've got a 20 year old BGSU student myself.

And you have a college age young man as well.

- Yeah, I have a son who's headed off to college next September.

Hopefully, fingers crossed, Mike.

- [Mike] I think he's got a pretty good shot.

- But it's such a sad story.

And I have to say Mike, that I am member of a sorority.

I'm a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority, historically African-American female sorority.

And I pledged at Ohio state.

They had a chapter many years ago.

Same a sorority that Kamala Harris is a member of.

And this is something that the national leadership and the councils of sororities and fraternities have been trying to regulate for years.

I know my own sorority and all of them have had rules in place for years saying hazing is outlawed, it's not allowed by students, but the undergraduate students continue to perpetuate it anyway, even though they've been told by their national councils not to do it.

It has become a thing of lore, if you will, to be able to tell stories that you've gone through this hazing.

And I think, unfortunately, that it is gonna take something like a law to once and for all stamp out this terrible, terrible scourge that happens on college campuses.

I agree with the email about universities turning a blind eye to drinking 'cause we know the binge drinking happens.

We know the terrible health effects of binge drinking.

I know that most schools do try to regulate it on campus.

Is not allowed in dorms.

Is not allowed in on-campus parties.

How do you regulate it off campus?

I'm not sure.

- It's a good question.

Taylor, you did some reporting on that this week hazing and curbing that behavior as a priority for local university leaders.

- Yeah, I attended a press conference from Penn State University where president Todd Dichen talked a little bit about what they're doing to kind of address this issue.

He voiced his support for the new proposed legislation to kinda cut down on it and provide that criminal aspect.

But he also said that's just one tool that they have.

They have to rely on other things like frequently communicating with leaders of different student organizations and just making sure the student body is kind of aware of the risks of hazing.

And to know that the university doesn't support it.

He said that this proposal might bring about those conversations with kind of renewed enthusiasm, I guess, to kind of make sure that you're having that conversation regularly.

And it's not just something that's kinda wrote and contained in the orientation, but something that you bring up more frequently than that to make sure that everyone knows that it's not okay.

- And that's going to wrap up our show.

Coming up Monday on The Sound of Ideas, we'll bring you the third in a series of community conversations on the consent decree put together by the United Way of Greater Cleveland and the Cleveland branch of the NAACP.

I'm Mike McIntyre.

Thanks for watching and stay safe.

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