(bright music) - The Ohio ballot board makes a key decision on the new redistricting overhaul amendment proposal.

The Ohio Senate passes resolutions in opposition to state issues one and two as early voting gets underway.

And the bill to thwart the people's budget vote in Cleveland stalls in the next Ohio House.

"Ideas" is next.

(pensive orchestral music) Hello and welcome to "Ideas."

I'm Andrew Meyer in for Mike McIntyre.

Thanks for joining us.

As the early voting period opened this week, the Ohio Senate passed two resolutions: 215, which expresses the Senate's opposition to the Abortion Rights Amendment, and Resolution 216 that opposes the marijuana issue, both passed along party lines.

The redistricting overhaul plan for the 2024 ballot cleared another hurdle this week.

Organizers will move forward with collecting petition signatures.

Cleveland voters will have their say on a people's budget amendment, a state law to thwart the issue has stalled.

And this weekend offers an appetizer to next spring's total eclipse, but only if the weather cooperates.

Joining me this week from Ideastream Public Media, Supervising Producer for Newscast, Glenn Forbes and health reporter Stephen Langel.

In Columbus, State House News Bureau Chief, Karen Kasler.

Let's get ready to round table.

Early voting started this week for the November election where issues on abortion rights and legalized marijuana will be decided.

As the early voting period opened this week, the Ohio Senate passed two resolutions opposing both measures.

Karen, because the Senate's passage of the resolutions now opens the door for lawmakers to actively campaign on the issues, can you explain how this works?

- Yeah, the Senate passed these two resolutions, and it's interesting, I'm trying to figure out exactly why.

And we ask Senate President Matt Huffman after session, what was the history of that?

What was the need for that?

And, I mean, the idea that they needed to pass this so lawmakers could go out and campaign on this, well, I mean, we know where most lawmakers stand on both of these issues, and it was pretty clear in these votes where they stand in these issues.

The question is whether state resources can be used now in those campaigns against those two issues.

Because again, the resolutions to officially oppose issues one and two did pass in the Senate.

So I'm trying to get an answer on that, but it's, Huffman was basically saying we just wanted to get our comments in the record.

We wanted to get us all on the record on how we feel about this.

But once, like I said, I mean, it's pretty clear how they feel about this.

And I mean even Governor Mike DeWine has come out with an ad against issue one.

So it's pretty clear how everybody falls on this.

When it came to the August special election, that was put on the ballot by lawmakers, so they could be more, I guess, public about their views.

Their votes were in the record on how they felt about August's issue one.

But like I said, the issues one and two here, I think is pretty clear where lawmakers stand.

- [Andrew] Stephen?

- Yeah, I was just gonna say, it certainly does seem suspect when we have a special election just on this issue.

And I can imagine there's a lot of conversation from lawmakers, House, Senate, and so forth about exactly how they felt.

Also, I imagine they don't hurt for the opportunity to be able to make their feelings known to various outlets whenever they're discussing the issue.

So, I do wonder.

- [Andrew] Karen?

Yeah go ahead.

- Well, and also the Ohio Republican Party had an event, a Get Out the Vote event last weekend that I was at that featured office holders who were speaking against issue one.

So I mean, it's really kind of confusing why this was necessary, but it certainly gave folks on both sides of this the opportunity to explain why they support or oppose issues one and two.

- I gotta throw you a softball, Karen.

Is it unusual for lawmakers, state leaders, to be so upfront about their stance on a ballot issue?

(laughing) I told you it was a softball.

- No, it is not.

I think it's been pretty clear, at least in this year, where everybody stood in August on that was the amendment that would've raised the voter approval threshold for future amendments.

It was pretty clear where everybody stood on that.

On issues one and two, which of course is the amendment for abortion and reproductive rights, and the law on legalized marijuana, I think it's pretty clear where a lot of people stand.

The only question is on issue two, there seems to be a little bit more movement among some people on whether they support or oppose issue two.

On issue one, I think it's pretty clear along party lines where everybody's falling.

- Let's talk a little bit about what this means for turnout.

I mean, we're talking about an election cycle where there's not significant statewide candidates running.

Usually you see turnout plummet, but we saw the contrary in August, a special election that really wasn't even supposed to happen in the first place.

What's the buzz in terms of what people are expecting for turnout come November?

- Well, it looks like the early voting numbers are keeping pace with the early voting turnout in August, which again, in August, it was 38.5% voter turnout, which sounds really terrible, and it is.

But for an August special election that wasn't even planned until it was put on the ballot in May, that's a pretty good turnout.

And so this is an odd year election, meaning that there are no statewide candidates, like you just said, there's a lot of local candidates, a lot of local issues.

So local communities can see turnout here.

But statewide, it's not expected to be a big turnout.

But these two issues are so highly talked about.

There's national attention on Ohio.

I was just on a call yesterday with NPR talking about what they wanna do in terms of coverage of what's happening in Ohio, specifically on these issues.

I think the turnout's gonna be pretty good.

And the reason perhaps you're not seeing lines at polling locations, the early voting centers in Ohio right now is because, typically, November elections are better staffed than August elections.

So there's more people, more room for people to come in to those early voting centers and vote.

So they don't have to stand outside in lines.

- What we find on November 7th, is that likely to be the last word on both the issue one and issue two, on abortion rights and on recreational marijuana?

- No, it's not.

- And in fact, we have state lawmakers that are already laying it down saying, you know, "This may not be the end of it if we don't like the way it goes."

- Yeah.

I'm gonna put up a story today about, again, Senate president Matt Huffman talking about that if issue two, the legalizing marijuana issue passes, that it's gonna come before lawmakers for some changes.

And issue one, which is a constitutional amendment, so you'd think that would be the last word, Huffman has said in the past that if that passes, there would be another constitutional amendment that would be put forward to basically repeal issue one.

So this is not going to be the last word on either of those issues.

- [Andrew] Stephen?

- Well, sure.

I was wondering if you could speak to that particular discussion in that, what does it say about the fact that if the populace, if the voters repeatedly say one thing and then lawmakers say, "Okay.

Well we're still gonna go the opposite direction."

Or try to do so by repeatedly coming back to the same issue, whether it be abortion rights or legalizing marijuana.

What are your thoughts on that?

- Well, I'll just say that voters overwhelmingly approved two constitutional amendments in 2015 and 2018 on redrawing district maps for the Ohio House and Senate and Congress and set some rules.

And arguably, those rules weren't followed, according to the Ohio Supreme Court, all last year.

All those maps that the Ohio Redistricting Commission put forward, the Ohio Supreme Court said were unconstitutionally gerrymandered.

So you have that situation already out there.

And you know, what you're saying here is what, for instance, the folks who are backing the legalized marijuana issue are saying, that they think it's gonna pass so overwhelmingly that lawmakers wouldn't dare touch it.

I wouldn't say that that's possibly the case.

I mean, like I said, there are some lawmakers who are concerned about some of the things in issue two and they plan to make some changes, which they can, because that's a law and not a constitutional amendment.

(pensive orchestral music) - Supporters of an overhaul of the process for drawing legislative maps in Ohio will soon begin circulating petitions for signatures.

The aim of the proposed amendment is to remove politicians from the map-making process.

Karen, the decision that is one issue and not several is considered a win.

How so?

- Well, let me just go back to our previous segment just for one minute here, because we get texts all the time from important people who are listening to the show.

And there is a state senator who is listening who wanted to tell everybody that those two resolutions, supporting issues one and two, they do allow for the use of state resources to oppose issues one and two.

So I wanted to put that out there, that that does indeed allow for state lawmakers to use state resources to officially oppose issues one and two.

- [Andrew] Nice to know we're not having this conversation in a vacuum.

- Absolutely not.

So when it comes to next year's ballot, we're already talking again.

Election season never ends.

We're talking about next year's ballot.

This ballot issue amendment headed for the 2024 ballot, if indeed the group can get the signatures they need, would create a citizens' commission, 15 members who would draw maps for Ohio House and Senate and Congress, and take that power away from the Ohio Redistricting Commission.

And so this week the ballot board decided that is one single amendment, one single issue.

If they had decided it was more than one, then that would mean that the group would have to gather 413,000 signatures over and over.

Like if there were two issues that it broke it up into, they would have to gather, what is that, what's 413,000 times two?

Whatever that is.

I don't do math.

- [Andrew] I'm a reporter.

(laughing) Math is bad.

- [Stephen] Math for journalists.

- I guess I was, I think a little bit surprised that it was this quick and it just went through without any sort of real discussion over whether it should be more than one issue.

Because what we saw when the ballot board was coming up with language for the ballot that we're gonna see in November, especially on issue one, there was contentious debate over the wording that was used.

But this time they're just deciding whether it's one issue or two.

It's one issue, that means one set of signatures being gathered to put that on the ballot.

- Unanimously, it was backed by the ballot board, all Republican, majority Republican.

Not all Republican, majority Republican.

Last quick question on this, Karen, where does Republican Secretary of State, Frank LaRose, stand on all this?

He is running for the US Senate next year, after all.

- Well and he's also a member of the Ohio Redistricting Commission.

So that does make a difference in terms of his role in drawing the maps right now, which has been highly criticized of course.

But I think it's pretty clear that most Republicans are very concerned about, most Republican lawmakers, are very concerned about removing that power from the Ohio Redistricting Commission and putting it into the hands of a citizens commission.

Because, well, frankly, Republicans have benefited from the current redistricting system.

And so to take it into a system where it would be a 15 member commission of Republicans, Democrats, and Independents, that might be different.

And it was one of the reasons back when we talked about issue one in August, that amendment that would require 60% voter approval for future amendments, redistricting was one of the things that was brought up as a reason to vote against that.

Or to vote for that, to vote for that higher threshold.

(pensive orchestral music) - In Ohio Senate bill that threatened to thwart a Cleveland Charter Amendment vote on a so-called people's budget, is dead.

Ohio House speaker Jason Stephens says, "SB 158 will not be voted on by the House before the election.

The Charter Amendment was seeking to put 2%, is seeking to put 2% of the Cleveland budget aside as a people's budget and give residents control on how the money is spent.

Based on this year's budget, 2% would amount to around $14 million."

Glenn, Speaker Stephens pretty firmly closed the door when asked if the bill could come back after the elections.

- Yeah, and you know, that's kind of the guiding philosophy or the guiding principle in Ohio.

I mean, how many times have we heard Governor Mike DeWine say, "Ohio is a home rule state?"

I mean, he says it all the time.

I think there are some out there who feel like, you know, maybe that could increase a little bit.

But that is still the guiding principle in Ohio here.

And even elected officials in Cleveland, mayor Justin Bibb, among others who are against this people's budget proposal that would put it into a charter amendment, they say, well, we're not in favor of this state move by Jerry Cirino outta Kirtland either, because we feel like, you know, the people should have the control, the people should be able to manage, if they want to have an election, that's great.

Basically, they don't want Columbus telling them what to do in their cities.

And it's a similar refrain we hear throughout politics, right?

We don't want Washington to tell us what to do, you know, things like that.

So, not entirely surprising.

I do wonder what the impetus was for Jerry Cirino to, if he's one of those state senators listening, I'd love to know.

But, you know, and to other state senators who may be listening, I don't know.

How do their constituents feel about state resources going toward these issues, talking about state issue one and two, to go back to that real quick, because state resources, after all, are taxpayer resources.

So, you know, it all kind of ties together with this idea that it does kind of go back to home rule.

And it does go back to the idea that a lot of people are nervous when Columbus, or Washington, or any other sort of a bigger government entity, I'll say, is kind of trying to interfere with local issues.

- So, Karen, we're talking about Cirino here, Senator Cirino, and this is the second high profile setback for legislation that he's been pushing.

What's the bigger plan here?

You know, Glenn was talking a little bit about wondering what, crawling into the mind of Jerry Cirino, if you will.

- Well, I've talked to Jerry Cirino a couple times about this and some other things, and I know on this particular issue, yes, he doesn't represent Cleveland, but he said that this issue of citizen budgeting was something that he could see possibly happening all around the state, and that's why he was concerned about it.

I'll be interested to talk to him about this now and to find out where he goes from here.

But yeah, he's been upfront on a lot of issues that have been seen as somewhat controversial.

I mean, you talk about the big one that would overhaul business at colleges and universities, public colleges and universities in Ohio, and really eliminate most mandatory diversity and inclusion training and some of these other things that he's proposed.

You know, he's definitely out there, out front on a lot of these big issues.

- [Andrew] Glenn?

- I should note, Andrew, that city council doesn't want to give up their power either, right?

I mean, Blaine Griffin, president of Cleveland City Council has come out firmly against this.

Interestingly, mayor Justin Bibb was for the proposal when it was going to be a pilot program.

What he said was, I don't want this to be a charter amendment in the city's charter because, you know, we don't know how this is gonna go.

So if there is a concern that a lot of these, that this could create some sort of groundswell of, you know, people's budgeting issues in city, I do think there's gonna be city councils, and certainly heads of city councils that push back on that.

But it will be interesting to kind of see that the push and pull if that does happen.

- Stephen, one more quick word on this.

- Well, sure, just the fact that, you know, when you have very different political ideals and beliefs between Columbus and Cleveland, it certainly makes sense that a local city would not want the capital to have a perspective, or have that kind of input when they disagree on so much.

- But that's the story of a lot of things.

I mean, when you start talking about home rule, what does home rule really mean when you've got the legislature which is dominated by Republicans who represent mostly rural and suburban areas?

When you've got Democrats who are in the urban areas, who are in the deep minority.

And the question of what is home rule and what is not is it's all of that has come into play over the last definitely the almost 20 years that I've been here.

- [Andrew] Absolutely.

(pensive orchestral music) - Summit County executive, Ilene Shapiro, held center stage in Akron yesterday as she delivered her annual state of the county.

And her pronouncement was that the state of the county is strong because the people are strong.

Glenn?

(laughing) I think- - That's one of those things you'll hear in a state of a county address, right?

State of the city.

State of the state.

"We're strong, state of the people are strong."

- Exactly.

So I think one of the big takeaways, though, needs to be that, where that strength is driven by investments in public safety.

- Yeah, it goes back to that issue we were just talking about with the Canton Mayoral race.

That is the prevailing issue.

I mean, safety in the economy, I mean, are there really any other issues that are top of mind?

For some people, sure.

But for the majority, safety in the economy continue to be of top mind.

So in Summit County now, there is a push to streamline all of these dispatch operations for the Summit County Sheriff.

There's a $25 million center in Talmage.

Ilene Shapiro says, right now it's Talmage, Stow, Fairlawn, Cuyahoga Falls, but other municipal, other jurisdictions in the county are welcome to join.

Akron's Dispatchers also working in this center.

They're working independently, but they're working in this center.

They're going to use this space.

So again, it's this idea that you've heard also in the city of Cleveland, and you've heard Governor Mike DeWine promote this idea that we can make up for some of these personnel shortfalls with better technology, right?

We can streamline things, we can use analysis, we can do targeting.

You know, there's a push to use technology, obviously, not only to help the people who are there and to help the personnel that are in place, but also to make up maybe for some of the shortfalls that I spoke of.

- So the tradition in Summit County with the state of the county, which is presented by the Akron Press Club, is that the county executives delivers their state of the county.

But then there is time for questions from the audience.

And Glenn, it seems like Shapiro may have saved the best for last.

Next year is election time for county executive.

And actually there were a number of questions from the audience about Ilene Shapiro's future.

- Yes, and she answered those and said she does intend to run again.

Good for her, 76 years old.

I was talking a bit with you, Andrew, before the show about this.

She seems to have the support, right?

She seems to have as much support as she can, right?

From both sides.

Nobody's ever gonna please everybody.

But this idea that she has been a good, strong leader for Summit County.

And at 76 years old, she still wants to do it.

So good for her, I suppose.

- So stay tuned for next year's election for a third term.

It's a very strong democratic county.

She ran essentially unopposed in the last election.

We'll see what plays out over the year to come.

(pensive orchestral music) - For a third week in a row, the high school football game scheduled between Euclid High School and its opponent is being impacted by changes made out of safety concerns.

Euclid will play Friday night at Heights High School.

Yesterday, the Cleveland Heights University Heights district determined the general public will not be allowed at the game.

Glenn, do we have anything more on why the district decided to restrict access to the game tonight against Heights?

- Yeah, we continue to hear that students are involved in fighting, and violence, and other violations.

And I gotta tell you, this is really a shame as somebody who's been to a lot of high school football games for leisure, for work.

I mean, these are supposed to be great, you know, community events.

I will say this though.

You know, the Senate League here in Cleveland, they've played on Friday afternoon for years, partially because of these concerns.

Also every single week, Andrew, I see fights in NFL stadiums.

I mean, there is just something about getting people together, these football games.

And when you're talking about the, at the professional level, I think alcohol certainly may play a role in some of these fights.

But, you know, we as a society, and we as sports fans have some issues to address here.

But in terms of, you know, this particular high school game, they are allowing four guests per player, cheerleader, or marching band members.

Also Heights High or Euclid students who are guests must have their student ID to enter.

So they're trying to, what they're trying to do, essentially is put some controls in, make sure that there aren't people who are there to cause trouble, right?

They're trying to keep them out.

So they're putting some of these measures in to try and, you know, keep some of the people who wish to do harm out of the stadium.

There's also gonna be no entry after halftime, things of that nature.

So what we continue to hear is that there are a lot of fights involved in these, outside of these games, I should say.

And they're just trying to put a little more control on it, while the games can go on, while the players can play that, you know, the players work hard, the band works hard, the cheerleaders work hard.

They deserve this chance to go out there.

Hey, you know, one of the issues was homecoming with Euclid and Senior Night and things like that.

So it's a tough situation, but they're, what they're trying to do is put more of these controls in to make sure that there are, they can reduce at least the chances of these incidents.

- Ohio State High School Athletic Association has not been shy in weighing in on controversial topics in the past.

Have we heard anything from them concerning these continuing cancellations?

- Yeah, not at this particular juncture.

Although, you know, you would think that eventually there will be some sort of message, you know, about this.

They did, Euclid fortunately was able to bring in a team from Michigan last week after Solen basically said, "Hey, you know, we're not gonna come.

We have these, we have some concerns about this."

So it may be an issue where we do need more involvement, but at the same time, there are, there's trust in these cities to put some of these measures in, but also maybe to increase some of their security along with these measures to kind of keep some of the people who wish to do harm out of the facility.

(pensive orchestral music) - Masks are back for visitors at Cleveland Clinic Hospitals.

The clinic issued a release this week requesting visitors and caregivers wear masks.

Masks are back for visitors at Cleveland Clinic Hospitals.

The clinic issued a release this week requesting visitors and caregivers wear a mask as they enter respiratory virus season.

Stephen, is COVID the main driver here, or is something else at play?

- No, it doesn't appear to be, it seems as if it's more of a concern about the cumulative impact of several of these respiratory viruses as winter approaches.

The flu, RSV, which is a respiratory infection that affects babies and the elderly, as well as COVID-19.

But for all of these, at this point, they say that it really causes mild sickness for the most part.

It's really for more vulnerable populations.

Again, babies, the elderly, and those with compromised immune systems, it can lead to serious illness or death.

So it's a much more a precautionary.

- So, this isn't just main campus, this is system-wide for clinic?

- It is.

It is system-wide for the clinic, but at this point, both University Hospital, Metro Health say they don't have plans to change their masking policies.

- And then finally, we haven't heard yet from UH, from MetroHealth, from anybody else in whether they're gonna follow suit.

What do you think they're gonna be looking for at this point?

- Well, I think they're probably going to be looking for trends in terms of the trends of hospitalizations.

And hospitalizations with severe symptoms when it comes to things such as COVID-19.

But as well, you know, the respiratory illness, the RSV, and the flu.

So if they see a jump in trends in terms of people who are severely, you know, ill from this, then they might change.

But at this point it seems like this is more of a year to year maintenance, an annual issue of these respiratory illnesses coming by, and less of an emergency situation.

(pensive orchestral music) - This weekend, we'll bring the warmup event to next spring's Big Total Eclipse.

On Saturday, parts of the United States will be in the path of a partial or annular eclipse.

The partial eclipse will begin in Ohio on Saturday morning, around 11:45.

But rain is in the forecast.

Western states will see what's known as a ring of fire, where the moon almost, but not quite, covers the sun.

Now, next April, Northeast Ohio will have a front row seat to a total eclipse.

And school districts are already eyeing the date as a day off from school outta concerns over traffic.

A big portion of the WKSU listening area will be in the path of totality for this rare event.

It won't happen again for 75 years.

Guys, we're expecting an influx of tourists, lunar tourists, eclipse tourists coming.

Stephen, have you already rented out your extra spare rooms in your house?

- No, but I was just gonna say, I cannot wait to hear "Total Eclipse of the Heart" by Bonnie Tyler on repeat because if we're gonna have a total eclipse and you don't do that, well, you're just selling the whole community short.

- Stephen's swinging for the fences here on his round table.

I like it.

- [Stephen] I have to say.

(pensive orchestral music) - Monday on the "Sound of Ideas" on 89.7 WKSU, we'll hear the mayoral candidate forum held this week in Canton.

Voters will pick the next mayor in November.

The candidates William Sherer II and Roy Scott DePew went to high school together.

And despite their differences, the debate was a friendly affair.

I'm Andrew Meyer in for Mike McIntyre.

Thanks for watching, and stay safe.

(bright music)