Welcome to the Sound of Ideas Reporters Roundtable from Ideastream Public Media.

I'm Mike McIntyre.

So glad you're with us.

Trump cabinet members praised Ohio leaders on a visit to the Columbus area yesterday, in which they announced a massive crackdown on Medicaid fraud and indictments against 14 people.

Jail cameras should record what's happening behind bars, but cameras at the Cuyahoga County jail weren't working properly.

Officials knew it, and took four years to fix according to reporting from the Marshall Project, Cleveland.

Short-term housing rentals can be a neighborhood nuisance.

So Cleveland City Council is cracking down, limiting their number and increasing penalties for repeat offenders.

And it was unofficial Devo day, as the local synth punk favorites electrified the Akron Civic Wednesday.

Two lawmakers want the state to designate an official Ohio Devo Day, April 18th, commemorating the band's first Kent State University show.

Will the Rock Hall even notice?

Joining me to whip the news of the week, and whip it real good, are Ideastream reporters Matt Richmond and Gabriel Kramer Good morning guys.

One of my ... Happy Friday man.

Happy Friday to you as well.

And at Ideastream's Statehouse News Bureau in Columbus, a woman who swears that that picture of her in college shows her wearing a Devo energy dome, not a lampshade, Bureau Chief Karen Kasler.

Good morning.

Morning, Karen.

Good morning.

Good to have you with us.

It's Friday.

It wasn't a ... It was not a lampshade, right.

It was a Devo power dome.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

You can join us by emailing your thoughts, comments or questions to SOI@ideastream.org.

And let's get ready to roundtable.

Trump administration cabinet members and other federal and state officials railed against fraud of all sorts, and especially Medicaid fraud, during a press conference in Central Ohio yesterday.

Among the presenters were acting U.S.

Attorney General Todd Blanche, FBI Director Kash Patel, and Doctor Mehmet Oz, administrator for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

They announced the indictment of 14 people accused of fraud, mostly bilking Medicaid.

Karen, this idea of fraud, stealing taxpayer money, has been on the radar for weeks now.

So why the flex here from the Trump administration in Ohio?

Well, this was an interesting event because it had been billed as a press conference with Vice President J.D.

Vance talking about federal enforcement actions.

And Vance couldn't make it.

But those folks that you just mentioned did, they were joined on the stage by the Republican officeholders who are running for other Republican or other executive offices this fall.

I'm talking about Auditor Keith Faber, Secretary of State Frank Larose, Treasurer Robert Sprague and one office holder, currently attorney General Dave Yost, who, was actually speaking at the event, and they were kind of doing a mash up of all sorts of different fraud, not just Medicaid fraud, which we've been hearing a lot about because of this report in the Daily Wire about hundreds of millions of dollars in alleged Medicaid fraud with home health care providers in Ohio, the state still hasn't fully confirmed that yet.

But there was also fraud related to, Covid 19 funds and, fraud on behavioral services money and even a romance fraud.

So this was a kind of a whole amalgamation of a lot of different fraud cases.

Yeah, the bulk of it, though, being Medicaid.

And they talked a lot about that.

There was one specific case, involving behavioral health for children, essentially, saying that they needed it and not delivering it.

And there were four people arrested on that.

What was seized were bank accounts and fancy cars, that kind of thing.

Yeah.

And I think some of this is related to the things that we've been hearing about a lot about when it comes to fraud in government programs and Republicans' reaction to that.

I mean, everybody admits Republicans and Democrats that there is fraud in programs like Medicare and Medicaid.

But the question is, how do you fight that?

And of course, in Ohio, Republicans have run the state since 2011.

And so there have been some questions raised about, well, if this fraud has happened, it happened on Republicans' watch.

So how are Republicans going to fix it?

And state lawmakers have come up with some ideas.

But this whole event, I think, was really to just kind of draw attention to the fact that, there is this fraud happening and you've got these law enforcement entities that are paying attention and throwing in details like luxury cars and diamond encrusted jewelry and things like that it really kind of ups the interest in it.

But this stuff happens a lot.

It was interesting that you said that they were talking about, Republicans would be responsible if there is fraud because they're in charge.

And yet in this particular visit, it was praise for the Republican leaders of the state, because they're doing such a great job of rooting out the, the, the, the fraud.

So it seems like it's trying to counter that argument that you've been hearing from Democratic legislators that said, you know, this is under your watch.

Yeah, this is kind of a fine line that Republicans are walking here because they have been in charge.

But this also happened.

Or at least they're alleging that it happened.

And so if there's going to be blame, the blame seems to have thrown been thrown primarily on governor Mike DeWine and his former Medicaid director, Maureen Corcoran.

But then state lawmakers are also getting into this, saying that they're going to increase the penalties for Medicaid fraud and do some other things.

There's a bill that's moving very quickly in the House and Senate, because legislators are planning to go on summer break at the end of next week.

And this bill would indeed increase penalties on Medicaid fraud.

It would require electronic visit verification for home health care providers.

And one thing that was added this week, which is especially significant, I think, is that they added a provision that would ban family members for getting Medicaid payments for caregiving, and that's a big issue for family members who care for disabled Ohioans and older Ohioans.

Most of them do it without being paid.

But the ones who do get some Medicaid funding for that, because they have to do this.

They can't get jobs necessarily.

They're very concerned about what the outcome will be.

Yeah, I know several people like that, and they would love to have a job and have their their loved one be able to take care of themselves.

They can't in order to give them the kind of care they need.

There's no way they could actually work.

And so this compensates them for doing that.

The idea was to take that away.

And what we saw was a protest at the statehouse.

There were people in wheelchairs that were filling the chambers.

There's certainly a lot of angst about that particular provision.

Yeah.

And I've talked to a couple of people who are in that situation who've reached out to me.

So I'm hoping to put together a story on on their situations, because there is a real concern about this, that if the fraud is happening and, you know, again, we acknowledge that the fraud is happening.

Just the level of it is, is the question.

It seems to be happening mostly among administrators and companies rather than individuals and individuals, especially in this case, who are caring for disabled Ohioans really feel like they're being punished and they're getting their small payments cut off because of this alleged fraud that's happening, that's been kind of talked about for at least the last couple of weeks.

And you're saying there's an acknowledgment that there's Medicaid fraud.

Of course, there's going to be some in any program.

There's going to be some level of fraud.

Democrats, though, are claiming the amount of fraud that the Republicans are trying to point to.

It just isn't there.

And that this is really just a political thing.

Yeah, I don't know that there's any evidence that waste, fraud and abuse really add up to enough money that it would wipe out deficits and things like that, which you've been hearing Republicans talk about how if they got rid of waste, fraud and abuse, they could pay for all these other things and that there I don't think that there is enough evidence that supports that.

Of course, Democrats have their own ideas about what could be done to crack down on fraud in Medicaid.

And we're just going to have to wait and see with that.

But it seems unlikely that any Democratic proposals move forward, especially, like I said, some state lawmakers are getting ready to go on break.

And this Medicaid bill that's out there is likely to move before that.

I really look forward to the story you're planning to do with the actual people affected by this.

We'll certainly want to hear that.

And always, always glad to hear from anybody.

If anybody wants to reach out and tell their story, I'd love to hear from you.

How do they get in touch with you and Karen?

Well, you can email me at kkasle or my go to our website, statenews.org and my phone number's there.

So give me a call all right.

Text me whatever.

More than 100 cameras at the Cuyahoga County Jail were discovered to be malfunctioning in 2022 because they were outdated and often paused or skipped frames.

Officials knew they were glitchy, but it took four years to fix them, to update the cameras.

And Matt, this was some great reporting from Doug Livingston at the Marshall Project Cleveland.

And I want to know what exactly first of all, was wrong with the cameras.

How did it come to jail leaders' attention.

So the explanation from the county is that the, you know, these hundreds of Sony cameras were no longer were not compatible with the, with the server that was kind of collecting all the video.

So when it went from the camera to the server, you were getting like, gaps in the footage.

It would stop and start.

Yeah.

You'd have like a guard, you could see them here, and then suddenly they were here somewhere else.

Yeah.

And they said that that was a problem, you know, sort of like a problem with the way the footage was going from one place to another and the way it was being stored.

What the reporting found first was that it came to light after there was a 2021 use-of-force incident in a lawsuit, and workers in the information technology department were looking for footage from it.

And they found that there were these glitches with gaps in the in the footage.

And this was a, you know, it actually came to light and we shared in emails that were, that were gotten by the The Marshall Project, in early 2022.

And, you know, it should be noted that, like this, this period of time was when all the focus was on getting a new jail built.

And so the the county says that they didn't find the money.

The it was 200 some odd thousand dollars, $220,000, I believe.

Right around the $220,000.

Yeah.

And that they didn't find that money until, you know, late, late last year.

In the size of the county budget, couldn't find 220 grand, right?

It was clear it was.

It seems pretty clear it was not a priority to get these cameras replaced.

They were working but not working properly.

And so you weren't getting a full view.

And and during that time there were 17 incarcerated people who had died.

So the idea is, you know, you want to go back and look at that, make sure that they were checked on or that whatever whatever incidents might happen and what they're finding is an incomplete picture.

Yeah, yeah.

And I mean, there were a number of incidents from, you know, 2024, from last year where, in a couple of cases, it was people who had medical emergencies inside of cells.

So the camera didn't actually see what happened to them inside the cell.

But it did see that, that the corrections officers, you know, who were supposed to be making their rounds.

In one case, it was every 30 minutes, in the mental health unit, you know, you didn't see what they were actually doing.

You would see them arrive in the area where the cell was, and then there would be a gap, and then they would be in another part, or they would just be gone.

And so the question is, you know, it raised a question about whether they're able to hold corrections officers accountable for the way that they're, you know, kind of taking care of people who were in there and, you know, and without accountability.

And that's what some of the families are saying.

Without accountability for these officers, nothing's going to change.

We realize there's a new jail that's being built in Garfield Heights.

It's going to be state of the art.

I'm sure it'll have cameras that work.

But in the meantime, 100 Sony cameras being replaced seems like something that's essential if you're going to keep a good monitor of the jail that you have, which is going to be in use for several more years.

Yeah, I believe the plan now is for construction to be cleared in 2029.

So there is work that's going to need to go on the jail between now and then.

Residences used as short term rentals like Airbnb or Vrbo must register with the city and follow other rules instituted by Cleveland City Council this week.

And Gabe, council members have been getting plenty of complaints and neighborhoods saying these places are nuisances.

We've heard a little bit of a drumbeat about what they might do.

Monday, they finally took action.

What did they do?

So they have restrictions.

You have to register with city council to to be a new person who runs an Airbnb or a Vrbo, one of these, temporary short-term rental units.

And there are some more rules yet to follow.

And we were hearing a lot of complaints from people, you know, Councilmember Chris Harsh was talking about how, you know, if you're living in a neighborhood you don't really want to know.

You don't really want have people coming in and out.

You don't know who your neighbors are on a weekly, daily basis.

And, you know, the people change.

I mean, there could be people there for a large gathering, could be someone there for a quiet weekend, and you don't really know who's going to be next to you.

And that's what people are complaining about.

And, you know, so there are some rules that they're going to have to follow.

And if, you know, they're they kind of created this, this three strike rule where if you, as an owner of an Airbnb or a Vrbo, have three or more nuisance incidents in a year's time, they will revoke your license to run that property.

But they can take immediate action for something more serious, like a one-strike rule.

If you have, you know, and have a case of disorderly conduct, assault or weapons violations.

Okay.

And what about density?

You don't want to live in a neighborhood where everything is an Airbnb, because then all your neighbors are moving in and out, so they want to limit that.

Right?

And it's going to be tough to measure this.

Whomever is the person that's going to have to monitor this.

But, you know, the rule is no more than 10% of a residential block of a multi-unit building may be made up of short term rentals.

So Council member Jasmine Santana said that this means 3 to 6 houses per street at most.

You know, streets are different sizes.

In Cleveland, 10% can can vary, but that's kind of how they're approximate.

Approximately measuring this.

And then we're also going to talk about that.

Some people at this council session were saying this isn't necessary, that this is attacking the businesses, the people that own these Airbnbs and that there are already rules against big parties and those types of things, but this is going to be harmful to them.

Council clearly did not side with that.

Yeah, I mean, I I'm reading some of the reporting by Abbey Marshall talking to one person, speaking up and talking about how, you know, there are, you know, they house people who are here for a funeral and the whole family wants to be together at one time And, you know, it's more comfortable than a hotel.

And that might be true.

But at the same time, you're also having people who are, you know, taking advantage of these and throwing parties and getting they're coming for the Guardians game for the weekend.

And then everybody's out and you know, they're having.

So.

Exactly.

So I mean, I think, you know, for every instance of someone coming here for maybe a right reason, there's a lot more instances that council is worried about where it's the opposite.

But even still, I think to the point of council, what they're saying is, you know, this is just not how they want the neighborhoods form.

They want the neighborhoods to to be people that they know and feel comfortable with on a more regular basis.

It's great to have all kinds of new regulations and laws about every kind of thing, but you then have to enforce it.

Yeah.

And so what's the plan here?

And do they acknowledge that this is a very difficult thing to do.

They acknowledge it's a very difficult thing.

Their own force and council basically saying like we understand that this is going to be hard and they have to figure out how they're going to go about this.

But they said that this is this is a start.

This is the starting point for whatever they'll have to figure out to, you know, keep people in line because, you know, the person who spoke at council on Monday saying that, you know, this is really this is hurting us as business owners or, you know, you know, there's the they're saying like you're hurting the community.

You're forcing people to go to hotels which are often owned by, you know, whatever big brands, and you're hurting these local business owners.

But even he couldn't admit that he or he wouldn't even be upfront about whether or not he was someone who lived in the city or not.

So a lot of these properties are perhaps owned by people out of town, like a lot of the landlords.

So it's kind of like the the landlord issues and the Vrbo issues and the Airbnb issues are kind of the same about who maybe owns those properties.

Okay.

Council was busy, Matt.

It had, I think, an 11 hour marathon session.

I know Abbey was there and was like, you know, this thing's going on forever.

But in addition to the short-term rentals, they rolled back some of those new parking, requirements.

We talked about it a little bit last week, but now it's official.

Tell me just a little bit about what the changes are with parking.

Yeah.

So they they had increased prices to start at the beginning of the year, to $1.50 for the first two hours and then it would increase, up to 4:50.

And this is for, for, for downtown on the West Side for per hour.

And then there was a four hour limit.

And they instituted Saturday and enforcement, they rollback the prices and they took away the, the, the Saturday enforcement and, and changed it.

So basically, you know, you can park all weekend for free now in these in the neighborhoods, not necessarily downtown.

Downtown still has some requirement on that.

But when you talk about the neighborhoods that's not universally accepted you would think, okay, great, it's free parking.

The council member there would think that's a terrific thing.

But we hear from Councilman Austin Davis that it's not great to have, free parking on Saturday and around the West Side Market.

You want to have churn, you want to have people have to pay.

Yeah, that's that's one of the big things.

Is that because there's so many people coming through on, on Saturdays, you know, you want people having to go.

And one of the big things is if you go down on Friday night, go bar hopping and then make your way somewhere else in the night, takes you wherever you could leave your car on West 25th with these new, new rules and come pick it up Sunday night.

Not have to worry about a thing.

And that's a problem for, for, business owners.

I've actually Gabe bar hopped with you down there and you don't bring a car.

Not me, leave it at home.

But it is a smart idea that if you have enough beers on a Friday, you might want to wait till Sunday.

But no, now you have to have a plan B, and I think, Yeah, maybe this will force people to have alternate routes, which I think is is a is a the people who are who are often advocating for more walkability, more access to transit, which means fewer parking spots.

I think this is kind of that tactic of how forcing people to think about alternatives to just leaving a car park somewhere.

Another quick thought about changes downtown.

I mentioned it still is Saturday enforcement, but they had had Sunday enforcement as well.

They've lifted that you can park for free downtown on Sundays.

Yes, and there's some other changes as well.

They're going to lower the price a little bit for downtown parking.

Yeah.

It's like up to three bucks rather than four.

Right.

And they're going to bring back a way to pay with cash or coin for those who would prefer that.

And, what?

Abbey Marshall even told me is that Chris Harsh actually talked about the idea of maybe one day they'll have to.

The city will consider creating its own app to have for people to pay for parking, rather than using Park Mobile.

Yeah, I used it an hour ago.

Yeah.

People don't like that because it's it's basically registering where you are with your car with an outside agency.

There's all kinds of issues with that.

They get a small percentage of each one of the parking things as well.

I'm glad they're bringing back a way to pay with coins, because I still have a yogurt container full of quarters.

Yeah, and I don't know what else to do.

If you collected them for that moment for they're in the car for that.

They took the moment away.

I've got a washing machine.

I don't need it for that.

Yeah.

All right.

Fair.

The Ohio Supreme Court this week reinstated the murder conviction of the motorist who hit and killed a Cleveland firefighter responding to an accident on I-90 in 2022.

Leander Bissell's conviction had been overturned by the 8th Ohio District Court of Appeals after he successfully argued he didn't have an intent to kill, a requirement of a murder conviction.

But, Matt, Bissell was driving 49 miles an hour and went around a police blockad before he hit Tetrick.

What did the Supreme Court say about that in terms of intent?

Yeah, I mean, that was really interesting that they said that, you know, you don't have to say that a person meant to harm anyone.

You just have to say that they took actions that they knew were probably or they had to know would would probably hurt somebody.

And, you know, they, they saw this is really meeting meeting that that threshold.

So if you're zipping around a blockade and there's cops there and they're saying stop and you're not and you run over somebody.

Yeah, reasonably, you could assume that those actions might have resulted in that.

And therefore it meets the murder standard.

Yeah, yeah.

And this was it's got a lot of attention among for first responders because this is one of those situations.

You know, it was not that long after the accident where it was still was not kind of well, hand like the whole area was not clearly marked off.

And there were there were people weaving, going through the, the partial block of the highway.

And what they're saying is that, you know, even if it's maybe up for debate, where exactly you're, you're supposed to go, you need to be much more careful than, than this person.

Yeah.

49 miles an hour is not going to cut it.

I can understand if you're crawling through and trying to avoid debris.

And and there was footage of people doing that.

But with this man it was very different.

Okay.

Lawmakers are moving fast to put an amendment before Ohio voters that would enshrine a requirement for voters to show ID.

Current law requires photo IDs, but they want it in the Constitution.

Karen, the measure is Senate Joint Resolution 10.

They advanced it really quickly.

Yeah.

There's also House Joint Resolution 9, which is the same thing.

But that has not advanced as quickly as the Senate version.

So now the House has to take up the issue, and there has to be 3/5 support in both chambers for lawmakers to put this amendment on the ballot.

There's no need for the governor to sign it.

It goes to the ballot as soon as the House would get that 3/5 support.

Now, the question is, do they have 3/5 support?

Because there are some people who are kind of on the right hand side of things who are concerned that this amendment does not require photo ID for mail in voters.

And so they say that opens the door to voter fraud, which we know widespread voter fraud doesn't happen, is not a thing.

But there are people who are concerned that there might be that loophole there.

And lawmakers say the ones that are supporting it say that that's that's not an issue here.

And they want to go ahead and put this before voters this fall.

It seems way easier to get an amendment on the ballot if you're the legislature than it does if you're the public, doesn't it?

I mean, that's really kind of interesting, isn't it, because there are no statewide signatures, nothing like that.

So lawmakers can indeed come up with an idea and push it forward.

And what's interesting about this, too, is that this is about the third time, I think, in recent memory, that lawmakers have put an amendment on the ballot that was something that was already in state law, but it was a big election year.

In 2004, they put an amendment on to put the ban on same sex marriage into the Constitution, and then in 2022, which was a year that we were also electing a senator and governor, same as we're doing this year, there was an amendment that would ban non-citizens from voting, which was already in state law, and that was put on the ballot as well as an amendment.

So it's basically a vote driver.

Well, that's the question.

Did it really drive votes in those cases because those were big election years.

But that that's a that's a really good question.

But it certainly, adds attention to what we're going to be doing this fall anyway.

And to be clear, this involves in-person voting.

It's not Mail-In voting as well in terms of that constitutional amendment.

And and that's that's the concern from certain folks on the right who say that they feel like that would open the door to problems.

But Republicans who support this say there is room here for that to be included for photo ID to be required of Mail-In voters at some point.

So they want to go ahead.

All right.

SOI@ideastream.org is our email address.

I say that now because we're about to talk about property taxes.

And usually that gets people talking.

The Committee to Abolish Ohio Property Taxes is facing a July 1st deadline to gather enough valid signatures, put the issue before voters in November.

The number needed 413,487.

I got it, Karen, but it's written down for me.

I know you have it memorized.

Usually to get that many valid signatures, you need to almost double it.

In April, the group said it had collected about 305,000.

We'll be hearing soon what the number is, the update that we're going to get sometime today.

And then they have a big decision to make.

What do you think that decision is going to end up being?

Well, I actually have what we know at this point because they made an announcemen this morning early.

They won't tell us how many signatures they have.

But Brian Massie, who's the leader of this Committee to Abolish Ohio Property Taxes, or Ax Ohio Tax, says that they don't have 620,000 signatures.

That was his goal to submit for this fall's ballot.

So the movement to abolish property taxes is continuing to gather signatures.

And that issue of that amendment will not be on this fall's ballot or won't even they won't even try to make this fall's ballot.

They'll aim for November of 2027, and they can keep those signatures and add to them Exactly if they submitted the signatures this time and they fell short, those signatures would no longer be any good.

And so this keeps that alive, though it is worth noting that the longer you gather signatures, the more likely signatures will be invalidated.

Because people move, people die.

People are removed from the voter rolls, that sort of thing.

So this is an interesting but not entirely unexpected development.

Groups that have made the ballot with constitutional amendments in recent memory have done it typically with paid circulators, not just volunteers, and have submitted more than 700,000 signatures.

Now, there's another, separate issue on getting something on the ballot.

And that involves data centers, which is the other thing.

We get a whole lot of calls about facing the same July 1st deadline.

Where does that effort stand?

Well, I haven't gotten an update from those folks yet.

They were way behind because they only started their petition drive in April.

So it seems extremely unlikely that they would make the ballot.

They are in some counties and some places actually joining up with the abolish the property tax people to kind of have joint signing events, which is interesting because you do have some overlap there between people who support abolishing property taxes and also support banning large data centers.

But there is some legislation that may be coming, according to Speaker Matt Huffman.

He told reporters this week that he wants to see legislation on data centers and specifically addressing water use, energy use and that tax break that data centers do get for construction cost, the sales tax break, which is hugely significant.

And he wants that legislation to happen next week.

And again, lawmakers are planning to go on summer break after next week.

So this would be really fast legislation if it moves forward.

All right.

Sound of Ideas Host Stephanie Haney put together a panel discussion on the issue of data centers on Thursday's show this week.

You can find it on the SOI section of our website, the Ideastream YouTube page, or the podcast provider of your choice.

Look for that Thursday show.

Really terrific.

Covered all the bases show about property taxes.

I'm sorry, about, data centers.

And I also wanted to note, which I failed to do earlier as we talked about the jail cameras.

We'll continue that discussion Tuesday on the sound of Ideas when Drew Maziasz is filling in as the host.

And Doug Livingston from the Marshall Project is going to be on that show to talk about the cameras.

A drive to overturn the Reproductive Rights Amendment passed by voters in 2023 suffered a setback this week when Attorney General Dave Yost rejected the summary language for the amendment.

But, Karen, it's not an unusual occurrence when this happens.

Oh, no, it happens quite often.

Usually the first submission there just doesn't necessarily move forward.

And, my colleague Jo Ingles talked to one of the organizers behind that, and she said that, he told her that there was a small detail that needs to be corrected on the petition and that he plans to revise it, and they plan to resubmit this.

And this amendment would take out the abortion part of the Reproductive Rights Amendment that voters approved in 2023.

And so it would make abortion illegal, or at least allow lawmakers to pass legislation that would make it illegal.

All right.

State Senator Bill Blessing, a Cincinnati Republican, wants Ohio to run elections like California Instead of party primaries, the top two vote getters in a primary, regardless of party, would move on to face each other in the general election.

And, Karen, Blessing says polarization is driving his push for this.

But in heavily Republican Ohio, could it also mean that even it's even less of a chance for Democr Oh, sure.

And certainly you can look at the way that legislative maps have been drawn for the state House and for congressional districts and point to that, that the makeup of the House and Senate and Ohio's congressional delegation doesn't really match what we've seen when it comes to say, presidential votes.

But Bill Blessing is an interesting Republican.

He's really kind of considered a moderate, even though he definitely sides with Republicans on a lot of social issues.

But he's been trying to deal with this issue of polarization.

He he suggested even expanding the size of the state House to many, many more members, which he said would be a little bit more potentially representative of all of Ohioans.

But he's got some ideas here that certainly aren't going to move forward at this point, because, again, we're we're approaching the end of the legislative session at the end of this year.

But that's been something that he's been concerned about for quite a while.

All right.

Akron is looking to address the city's stray dog problem and overcrowding at animal shelters through a proposed agreement with Summit County Animal Control.

So let's talk about this.

Happened, by the way, is happening in many animal shelters across the region.

Akron can be our focal point now, but, let's talk about the issue.

Why are rescue groups, particularly in Akron, struggling to meet the community needs?

So it's Akron is particularly an issue saying that the Summit County Animal control shelter, 80% of its stray dog population holding, comes from Akron.

I get that Akron is the biggest, city in the county, but that's still a tremendous number.

And the city pays the shelter between $15,000 to $50,000 per y to hold the dogs.

So they say that that pays for about three days worth of a dog to stay there.

And dogs from Akron have been staying there for 500 days or more.

Wow.

So the proposal is to instead pay them annually, $1.5 million, a tremendous boost in terms of funding that they're proposing.

But they've got such a need.

I mean, these dogs are staying.

These animals are staying more than a year.

I mean, more than a year.

And they're estimated to be there really need to be there for a few days.

So yeah, this is this is a tremendous, proposal that would be a two year contract.

And it would give some special access to the local police, to the shelter.

And the local police officers have been saying things like, you know, the dogs can be particularly aggressive, and they're the ones who have to take the calls, particularly at the kind of off weird hours where you know, someone from the shelter isn't necessarily always working or is fully staffed.

So, you know, the police are having an issue with as well.

Okay.

Well, we're going to take a quick break here.

A lot of stories to discuss.

on the Sound of Ideas Reporters Roundtable in the back half of the show, including a former judge sentenced to jail time.

But first, I'm handing it over to Drew Maziasz, who's hosting next week on Monday and Tuesday for a look at what's ahead next week on The Sound of Ideas.

Hey, Mike, I'm in the host chair for Stephanie on Monday and Tuesday next week, so here's a look ahead at what's coming up on The Sound of Ideas Monday.

It's our annual summer book recommendations show Area bibliophiles will be joining us and saying what you should add to your summer reading list.

Always a popular show, we want your recommendations as well at SOI@ideastream,org or call in live when we're on the air that day.

Tuesday, we're going to talk about an increased prevalence of tick bites in the area and why that number is creeping up so high.

And we'll learn more about a Marshall Project investigation looking at broken security cameras at the Cuyahoga County Jail.

Wednesday, Stephanie is back in the host seat, and we'll talk about SAD - seasonal affective disorde and why some people are getting the summer blues this time of year.

And Thursday increased nicotine usage among young people.

Why some influencers are espousing the benefits of nicotine.

We'll separate fact from fiction that day.

And now back to you in the studio, Mike.

Thanks, Drew.

You're back with the Sound of Ideas Reporters Roundtable from Ideastream Public Media I', Ideastream Executive Editor Mike McIntyre, along with Gabriel Kramer and Matt Richmond, two of our greatest reporters here, and Karen Kasler at the Columbus Statehouse.

Thank you for staying with us.

And a reminder that if you keep up on the news and enjoy testing your knowledge, you should try our Ideastream news quiz.

It just came to my in before the show today.

I haven't had a chance to do it yet.

It publishes on Fridays and you can find it on our homepage at ideastream.org.

You then sign up for it and they can send it to your email every Friday morning.

Former First Energy executives Charles Jones and Michael Dowling have been re-indicted on state corruption charges tied to the House Bill 6 scandal, setting the stage for a new trial after a jury deadlocked earlier this year.

We wondered when Dave Yost said he was leaving, whether the new AG would seek to continue with this case.

Well, just before he leaves, we now have the answer.

Yeah.

In fact, I asked him that in our exit interview, a couple weeks ago, and he said he wanted his replacement, Andy Wilson, who's going to be the interim attorney general, to make that decision.

But yeah, we do know now that there's been a re indictment.

And Yost says that there's new facts that are here in the case.

There's 22 felony counts overall between Jones and Dowling.

And so it looks like that case will go forward.

And I think everybody expected that to go forward.

I mean it was so high profile.

And there have been so many people who've been involved in this case who have at least been in court or something.

And so for this to just be ending with a mistrial, that happened a couple weeks ago would be really, I think, kind of surprising.

And these are the state charges, but where do they fit into the overall scheme of prosecutions regarding HB 6?

Well, and that's an important point there.

These are state charges.

Dowling and Jones do face federal charges as well.

And you know, First Energy, the company has admitted in a plea deal to bribing Larry Householder, the former Republican speaker of the Ohio House, and Sam Randazzo, the late chair of the Public Utilities Commission.

Larry Householder, of course, is in federal prison for 20 years for bribery.

Matt Borges, the former chair of the Ohio Republican Party, ha been released.

He was serving a five-year sentence in that same trial with Householder.

And, so it's been a long, long process since all these arrests happened in 2020.

All right.

The Cleveland Browns, a year after signing superstar Myles Garrett to a lucrative extension and vowing he'd go directly from Cleveland to Canton when he's inevitably inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame, was traded.

They traded him to the Los Angeles Rams in return for the single season NFL's sack leader and two time Associated Press Defensive Player of the year, the Browns get an All-Pro pass rusher, a first round draft choice next year, a second rounder in 2028, a third rounder the year after that.

Immediate fan reaction was sadness and some anger.

People wanted a bigger haul, but also a realization that the deal wasn't a bad one for the Browns, for Garrett, nor for the Rams.

And of course, Gabe, not everyone felt that way.

I saw this quote from Joe Posnanski, sports columnist, been on the Sound of Ideas a number of times, on his Substack.

He said that everyone's telling him that's how he should be feeling that, you know, Myles doesn't want to be here and you got a pretty good return for it.

But he said, as a fan, he's feeling and I quote, "Bleep this bleeping team."

Yeah that's what he wrote.

Yeah I mean I'm numb to anything the Browns I mean the Browns have done nothing but disappoint me my entire life.

So like any move they make is just par for the course.

But yeah, I mean, this is I think theoretically on paper it's a big loss.

It's he's the best defensive player in the NFL.

And to lose that guy, certainly the defense is going to struggle.

But I think what it says about the team is one they were, you know, seemingly committed to having him there.

You know, season after season.

He had requested a trade last season and instead he signed a new contract.

The team.

So they had, you know, he had been seemingly committed to the team.

But there's always rumblings, oh, he wants out or he wants trading, he wants to play for a contender.

You know, for as good as he is, the Browns are still bad.

So, you know, theoretically, the Browns are probably thinking, okay, well, maybe instead of one great player, they need to find a way to get, several good players.

It's a rebuild.

I mean, you can't win a Super Bowl with the greatest defensive player on your team.

And that's basically the I got.

Yeah.

So more draft choices that they've had a couple of good years in drafts.

It seems to me that we've this is the thing we've talked about.

We don't talk much about the X's and O's of sports, but we've talked about the stadium being built in Brook Park and the whole complex there.

It seems to me that all of this is being timed.

When you get your draft choices by then, Myles Garrett will be much older.

So don't really worry about that then this new player is much younger.

You're really trying to be good by the time you open in the new facility, right?

So the commitment is rather than trying to be good in 2026, let's try to be great in 2029 or and 2030 whenever the stadium finally finds a way to finish because, you know, they've they've had this commitment to youth.

They got a younger, very good defensive end.

in Jared Verse who will play the same position as Myles Garrett.

And they got some draft picks to go with it.

So you kind of wonder as a fan their commitment to youth on the defense table.

Will there be a commitment to youth on the offensive side of the ball?

Perhaps a quarterback?

I still remember when he jumped over the entire offensive line and blocked a kick.

Yeah.

Like without touching anybody.

He just jumped.

So there are instances where it's like he won us the game almost single handedly.

But you know, they only won five games last year.

So it's only so many times you can really pull it off.

I saw some, some really bad tweets that said that they've put a bunch of traffic cameras in Los Angeles just in time for Myles Garrett to show up.

Apparently, you know, he's had some issues with his driving.

Yeah, he's getting in trouble all the time here and getting speeding tickets.

And it's an issue with the team.

You know he hasn't really been too present at practice or offseason activities with the Browns.

Like not there at all.

But immediately with the Rams he's there.

So perhaps he's a little happier.

One little side note his his fiancee, Olympic gold medalist Chloe Kim, is a Los Angeles resident.

So maybe there's a, you know, a a personal side that we can be happy for.

Myles Garrett.

So good for Myles Garrett.

Maybe good for the Browns.

Certainly good for the Rams who are trying to go all in and win it this year.

And Garrett did have a nice letter written.

It was all class.

It was classy.

It was very nice.

So we can appreciate that as well.

Very good.

Former Cuyahoga County Domestic Relations Court judge Leslie Anne Celebrezze was sentenced to 60 days in jail on Monday, four months after pleading guilty to tampering with records, a felony, by steering a case to her docket and posting an entry that made it appear that the assignment was random.

And Matt, this is again, we're talking about the Marshall Project because we talked about Doug Livingston before.

This is a Mark Puente's reporting, where he's dug into sort of her connection to a particular court appointed receiver and receiver is somebody that you bring in that kind of handles the financials of a divorce and make some rulings in those kinds of cases.

But it's a pretty lucrative deal.

Yeah.

Yeah.

They I mean, if there's a lot of asset companies and money in there, like all of these things that, you know, during the divorce have to sort of be frozen.

So, so nobody is kind of doing, shady things with them.

They'll bring in a receiver, and a receiver starts making all the decisions about how her money spent would get sold and all of that.

And you know, the the family relationship between celebrities, his family and, and marked territory goes back to her father.

And, you know, for, for years, the Marshall Project found that cases from from her court were going to him and his and his daughter.

And, you know, that resulted in like about $500,000 in fees going to him.

And they were close, a Marshall Project investigator, a photograph that they posted of an investigator, taking a picture of the two of them kissing, and she was like, that was a family kiss.

And the other side, that didn't look like that.

This an indication that there might have been a little bit more, but the idea is cases were steered to her docket.

They should be a random draw.

They weren't.

Then he is assigned and apparently, getting his fees from that which he's entitled to to make.

But he gets assigned them from that judge.

But the case goes to the judge because she made that happen and said that it was actually following the rules by making it random.

That's what the judge who sentenced her had a big problem with saying, we have to be trusted to follow the rules and to be above board on these types of things.

Yeah, yeah.

So she was the administrative judge of the Domestic Relations Court.

So when there were assignments made, it went across her desk.

And that's supposed to be random, but she could kind of put her thumb on the, on the scale.

And you know, she got in quite a bit of trouble with, with the disciplinary council, the sort of the body that oversees, lawyers conduct and judges conduct that's, part of the Ohio Supreme Court and, you know, admitted to wrongdoing.

And unlike, I think it was 15 violations of, of legal ethics and had her law license suspended and left the bench.

And so this is really just been a really, enormous downfall for, for Judge.

Celebrezze, former Judge Celebrezze.

A judge is supposed to be impartial.

So should they endorse candidates for office?

Democrats, including former Ohio Supreme Court justices, are backing a resolution urging the Ohio Supreme Court to rule that judges cannot endorse.

Karen, this resolution comes out of a recent conduct hearing by the Ohio Supreme Court.

What happened there?

Well, it was a disciplinary conduct hearing and the whole idea of justices and judicial appointees, judicial candidates endorsing candidates is kind of tough.

But we're in Ohio now, a situation where judges for appeals courts and justices for the Ohio Supreme Court do run with partisan labels, and they do run in partisan primaries.

So the argument has been that these are partizan candidates at this point.

But how do you, as a judge who is being asked to rule and be fair and follow the law and not see party?

How are you then going to be trusted to do that?

And so this is a resolution that seeks to try to get the Supreme Court to go ahead and put that out there and stop the endorsement of candidates.

But the it's just a resolution because lawmakers, the legislature can't tell the Supreme Court what to do.

So.

Right.

With the resolution, assuming it does go anywhere, would it impact party label designations on ballots which appear to have helped Republicans?

I don't think so.

I mean, I know that, the lone Democrat in statewide elected office in Ohio, Justice Jennifer Brunner, had sued over that.

And I don't think that went anywhere.

But there's a lot of concern among Democrats that those party labels have really been a problem.

Of course, Republicans have said that, hey, candidates were running in partisan primaries anyway, so why not just go ahead and put that party label on the November ballot?

So we'll see what happens this fall.

There's two seats up.

And again, Jennifer Brunner is one of them, and she is the lone Democrat in statewide elected office.

You look really excited right now, Karen.

And I think it's not just because the Guardians won a series against the Yankees.

I think it's because there's another budget in the works in the state capital, and that is the capital budget.

It isn't the general budget we spent so much time talking about last year.

This is for capital project construction infrastructure.

I know you've been digging into it because this is what you geek out on.

So tell me what's what's in that?

Well, and actually, local communities should be pretty excited about this too, because this is the budget that includes a lot of money for local projects.

Communities submit their requests for money to state lawmakers, and then lawmakers kind of agree on exactly what they're going to use that money for.

It's a $3.7 billion capital budget, $600 million for school building assistance, and then $510 million for local government projects.

And then you go down through the whole list, among those local government projects, for instance, $10 million for East Cleveland.

And you also have, yeah, a total of $346.5 million for behavioral health facilities, also some money for statewide developmental disabilities centers and a psychiatric hospital for youth.

You've got some money that goes to Ohio State and other colleges and universities around Ohio.

Money for prisons.

This is where all the money comes from to do construction and do all that kind of stuff.

It's just where the lobbyists are coming in to play.

Like, you know, they got money for this, this organization or that project, that type of thing.

This is where a lot of that comes into play.

Oh, absolutely.

And this is where local officials also come in when they submit to their state representatives and senators.

Hey, we need this to do something at, say, the Rock Hall.

You know, this is, this is the budget that they could get that money from.

And they really typically hope that they get at least something.

But you can't give everybody everything.

That's what lawmakers keep telling us.

24.1 million for the Ohio State Fair.

Does that mean there's going to be new facilities there or just upgrading of, of infrastructure?

The Ohio State Fair has been under construction for quite a while, so there's a lot of renovation going on at the Ohio State Fair.

So I'm very interested to see what the fair looks like once this is done, because that whole place has just been basically torn down and rebuilt.

So it is a big it's a big area.

It's a big fairgrounds.

All right.

In Cleveland, menacing a health care workers on the job is now a first degree misdemeanor, carrying a minimum sentence of three days in jail, a maximum of 30 days, and a $1,000 fine.

So, Matt, this is something that City Council passed this week.

In that marathon session, we talked about how prevalent is they are the attacks on health care workers?

Well, so the the CDC found, the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, found that, you know, health care workers make up 10% of the workforce and experienced 48% of the non-fatal injuries from from workplace violence.

But this this law doesn't it isn't about assaults.

This is about menacing.

So that's threats that, you know, the words that you use against, health health care workers and there's not the numbers on that are less clear here in Cleveland and nationally what the CDC says is there's been a 7% raise rise in reported harassment of health health care workers between 2018 and 2022.

Boy, a tough enough job.

And then you get the harassment on top of that.

So council is trying to react to that.

But inside council there's some discussion or disagreement on a couple of things.

One is whether the legislation was ever needed, is even needed.

And then the second is about bias against those who might then be prosecuted in this law.

So tell me about that.

Yeah.

So one of this this took a while to get through council.

And one of the big concerns that they raised was, the big systems.

University Hospitals and the Cleveland Clinic.

It's not clear that they that if you want to report an instance of a threats that you would be able to use, you know, work time to say, go and file a police report.

There are they have, you know, they said in committee that they have like special sort of classifications in their time cards for this sort of thing.

But it was it was unclear that, you know, there would really be support for workers if they wanted to go in a reported and, you know, that, Metrohealth would be the exception.

They are the ones who kind of encourage their employees to go and make these reports.

And then the second concern was that, from, from some council members, that enforcement of this law would, would fall disproportionately on black or minority patients.

Stephanie Howse Jones specifically brought that point up?

Yeah, yeah, that there would be, things that go on in a hospital room that are kind of, you say taken out of context, that people would be a heightened emotions and that there would be really difficult times and people would say things that were indelicate.

And maybe these increased penalties would would lead to more reporting of those kind of having a bad moment type incident.

And what we heard from the council president is they will be cautio and judicious.

Yeah.

Yeah.

They're they're hoping to get you know when you when you do the a police report the suspect should you should get data on the you know the demographics of of whether these these charges are being filed against.

So they, they say they're going to watch that.

There's a new way to pay for Cleveland, to pay, for Cleveland bus riders The Regional Transit Authority launched a ticketless payment model effective this week.

So how did that work?

So there's essentially two options.

There's an app that you can download EZfare, the transit app.

And then you can, load funds onto that account.

And then you get a QR code to scan every time you go on a bus or a, or a train, which kind of already exists now.

But you can now you can also purchase a, a smart card, which works the same way as an app, but you can load money onto it and scan it when you use a bus.

or a train.

What's kind of nice about this is that they're kind of lowering the price a little bit.

I mean, not lowering the price of a fare, but rather, they're putting a cap on how many times they can get scanned in a day.

So a day pass is $5, which equates to a round trip, $2.50 for a fare.

So after you've used it twice, essentially you won't be targeted again.

You can keep riding, whether it's transfers or new rides or whatever, so it's still good if you wanted to ride on day and go to various places, don't charge you past $5.

Can I bring my yogurt container full of quarters?

There.

Yeah.

Feel free.

Free?

Yeah.

There's like there's no yogurt.

No just quarters.

The yogurt's gone.

I we weren't planning to bring this up, but I wanted to mention this building that's an eye catcher conversation starter near the Kent main campus.

Where you went to school Gabe.

Yeah, it's called The Dome.

It's visible off State Route 261.

Built in 1978, sits on about an acre of land.

It's now for sale.

Are you going to buy it?

I'm not going to buy it.

You know, it's funny.

I'm at four years there.

I drove, entering from Brimfield into Kent.

You can't help but notice it.

I've never once stepped foot in there.

It's been a nightlife space for several decades.

Most recent closed, apparently.

Most recently, years after I graduated.

It billed itself as Kent's only 180-plus LGBTQ+ bar.

So.

Kind of neat.

Sad to see it go, but who knows what the future holds now it's for sale.

It's vacant.

Less than 200 grand, and I can just see that as, like, your domicile.

I put it, you know, I think it would be great to have a disco ball right at the middle.

I love it.

Tomorrow is blimp day in Akron.

Get ready for the silent air show that will circle the city and hover over every city neighborhood.

Two blimps will take off from Wingfoot Lake in Suffield Township tomorrow at 9:30 a.m.

and loop counterclockwise over the city.

Blimp day, officials hope, will become an annual tradition celebrating the city's rich history with the Goodyear Blimp and Gabe, this is really set up so people have a chance to get a good look at these blimps throughout the city.

Yeah, I mean, you never really know when it's going to be up or where it's going to be up.

And now they're dedicate themselves to being there in Akron, and they're going to have a map where they're going to rotate in the sky for half an hour and then go to another spot for how far they're going to go counterclockwise, starting in above East Akron, Goodyear Heights and Ellet, ending, at noon between University Park, South Akron and Coventry Crossing.

So if you're in Akron, look at the sky.

You'll get a chance on that morning.

I think it was last year at, Canal Park.

Canal basin Park that, the mayor gave his state of the city, there with the blimps overhead.

There were three of them, and everyone was they weren't ignoring the mayor.

But every time a blimp came by.

Yeah, everybody looking up and taking pictures.

But it really is a marvel when you see these things go by.

It just it's not just a football game.

People are entranced by this, you know.

And if you if you if you don't know what the Goodyear blimp is, you probably the sky think what is that?

Especially when there's three of them just roaming in the sky.

Like they'll be, this coming weekend, but not many things more iconic in Akron than the Goodyear blimp, LeBron James, Black Keys and Devo.

Exactly.

And we're going to delve into that in a second.

But quick if there is weather, I appreciate that, but I do have to add, if there's weather tomorrow, what happens because I hear there's thunderstorms going, if it I mean, it's Ohio, so you never know what's coming.

But yeah they'll have to to they'll have to bring the blimps down and do another day.

We'll make it a different day.

But speaking of days, Devo performed a homecoming concert Wednesday at the Akron Civic Theater.

My friend Rich said it was a journey into the past.

And our friend Dave Giffels, the Akron professor and author, called it stellar and said, it's amazing how much energy they still have.

He said their use of video is at its peak.

Those are big fans.

So are two lawmakers, one from Akron, another from Toledo, who want the state to honor the band with its own Devo day, April 18th.

That's the day the band performed its first show in 1973 at Kent State University.

You were there, right, Gabe?

I missed that show.

You missed it?

Yeah.

You were at Kent.

I was not, not even born yet.

Karen, lawmakers don't really sound like Devo types, but, the band seems interested in having a Devo day.

Come on.

You can't see these folks dancing to Whip It or Working in a Coal Mine?

Those are the only two Devo songs I know you're going to learn another one.

in just a second.

Yeah, but, yeah, I mean, that this is, the thought is that this is a band that really, made Ohio its home and Akron specifically, and so why not honor them?

All right.

Very good.

Karen, good to talk with you today, Matt and Gabe as well.

Thanks for being here.

Happy Friday.

Appreciate it.

If you missed any part of today's show, you can hear a rebroadcast tonight at nine on 89.7 WKSU.

You can find every episode of The Sound of Ideas and the Reporters Roundtable.

Wherever you get your podcast and on the Ideastream Public Media YouTube page, you can get the last word on today's topics by sending an email to SOI@ideastream.org.

I'm Mike McIntyre.

I hope you stay safe and have a great weekend.

We mentioned our local love of Devo and our last story was blimp Day in Akron before that.

But there aren't any songs by Devo about blimps.

There is, however, a blimp connection.

Devo made a video of their 1981 song Beautiful World featuring the Goodyear Blimp and its pilots a few years back.

And let me tell you, the blimp captains look cool wearing the energy domes.

Singing.