The government shutdown is threatening to deprive needy Ohioans of food benefits.

State and local officials are scrambling to lessen the blow.

And Democrats have reached an unexpected deal with majority Republicans on New Ohio congressional district maps.

Ideas is next.

Hello and welcome to ideas.

I'm Mike McIntyre.

People say Halloween is a frightening day, but fear this year doesn't come in the form of a scary movie or spooky costume.

With the government shutdown entering its second month, the prospect of people going hungry is real.

An unexpected congressional district map deal has won the support of Democrats on the Ohio Redistricting Commission.

It gives Republicans a slightly better but not slam dunk dominant chance of adding to their majority in Ohio.

A proposed charter amendment in Summit County, which voters will decide Tuesday, would limit the growth of the county share of property taxes to 3%.

It provided inspiration for Ohio lawmakers.

And don't forget to set your clocks back an hour before going to bed Saturday.

Daylight saving time is over.

Joining me to discuss these stories and more from Ideas and public media reporter is Gabriel Kramer and Connor Morris in Columbus Statehouse news Bureau chief Karen Kasler.

Let's get ready to round table Food benefits for the needy are expected to run out November 1st as the federal government shutdown continues.

Governor DeWine announced a $25 million stopgap for Ohioans yesterday.

Summit County is increasing food bank cash, and Cuyahoga officials are announcing a plan of action Friday.

Karen, let's talk about the emergency dollars.

It's 25 million, which is a large amount, though there are a number of other states, Louisiana being one, that have freed up 150 million for their states.

But where is the where are the dollars coming from?

Well, these are coming from federal Temporary Aid Needy Families or Tana funds.

These are funds that are allocated to state to spend in different ways.

And so these are funds that have not yet been spent.

And so under pressure from not only the concern for Ohioans who are going to lose their Snap benefits at the federal government, shutdown doesn't end by later today, essentially.

And also, some Democrats who had said that the state should kick in rainy day fund money to try to do something.

The state is using some of those federal funds, $7 million to give to food banks around the state, and also $18 million in emergency relief benefits, which will go to people who are at or below 50% of the federal poverty level who have kids.

Okay.

That is a very, very needy group.

What Snap takes care of is a much broader group.

So when we look at this, you might say, well, great, Ohio wrote in and now people won't go hungry during this time, but they will.

This is literally, a very small percentage of what's needed.

Yeah.

And even when we spoke with governor Mike DeWine yesterday as he arrived for the redistricting commission meeting, which we'll get to in a moment, he we all kind of gathered outside that meeting to ask him about this order, because he had just issued it, and he said, this is not a substitute for Snap, and not every family is going to get these additional funds.

But he felt like this was something the state could do to really target people who are really going to be in need when those funds become unavailable, when they don't get those funds replenished, starting tomorrow, if the federal government shutdown continues and this is not just a state effort, obviously Snap is federal money.

The state determines who's eligible for it.

It's not just a state effort to try to close the gap in the short term and hopefully not long term.

Connor.

We saw in Summit County that they've made some moves as well.

Yeah, they approved an additional quarter million dollars on Monday to go to the Akron Canton Regional Food Bank.

You know, it's more than 77,000 folks.

Or 13% of Summit County residents are on snap.

And and this is in addition to, like, what they generally normally, give to the food bank, they have like another 3 or $24,000 contract or so that they, they give them money as well.

And during other parts of the year.

And then we're also seeing just some donations going up for election campaigns going on.

We're seeing local influencers who are donating money to to the food bank as well, and matching dollars and things like that.

So there's some kindhearted folks that are stepping up as well.

I think the key on that is finding who is who are the people that are in need.

You know, it's like I could go and buy a meal for somebody, today downtown.

Are they the ones they're in need?

I want to make sure that people who are getting those Snap benefits are the ones that are.

You know, I would think individuals want to make sure that they're the ones getting it.

That's a whole mechanism.

That's why the whole system is set up.

Exactly.

I mean, I lost my wallet this week.

I mean, you could buy me lunch if you want to keep it.

That is not the same thing is, you know, there are folks who are receiving this, this government benefit, you know, year in and year out, year in and year out.

You wonder too.

Oh, go ahead, Karen, I was just going to say the chances of finding somebody who is receiving Snap benefits is pretty high, though, when you consider that it's 1.4 million Ohioans who receive about $264 million in food benefits from Snap eased from Snap each month.

And so here you got $25 million seeking to try to plug a hole that's $264 million big.

I mean, that really puts pressure on food banks, which were already under pressure because of increased demand.

So this is potentially going to be a serious problem coming forward.

And the big question, and Gabe, is what gets what's being done about that in Cuyahoga County?

We haven't heard yet, but there's a scheduled meeting today, where we should get some information.

Right.

So representatives from Cuyahoga County Executive Chris Roney and Congresswoman Shantell Brown, Cleveland Mayor Justin Bieber holding a press conference later today.

But this comes after last week where they had come together and anticipate this happening and held a press conference last week where Rooney and all these representatives said, we're calling on the state to step in.

They did step in, maybe not as much as they were anticipating, because I want to say step in fully, but in Cuyahoga County, that's 190,000 people who are receiving Snap benefits every month.

And like the Connors point, you've seen these people say, oh, we're going to donate more to the food bank as we would have.

And and I think that's the route people want to take because the county had said to us, we're going to partner with social services and food banks to try to try to, you know, fill those gaps.

And the resources they had last week were just not nearly enough to fill those gaps.

Maybe the 25 million will help.

Maybe these extra donations to the food bank will help.

But we'll see what they have to say.

Today at 11 and last week when they called for help, they said the state has a rainy day fund.

It's raining.

And they were calling for $100 million.

As Karen mentioned, it's 25 million.

Senator Kent Smith, the Democrat from Euclid, called it.

Crumbs from the table of opulence.

Here's his quote.

He said it's a nice attempt to say they did something to ease their guilty conscience, for continuing to advocate for the wealthy in the state and do nothing for those that are struggling.

Sure.

Thank you, but not nearly enough.

Well, and that generated there was an amendment in the House and Senate, amendments to try to move that rainy day fund money over.

And because governor DeWine has said that he can't do anything with the rainy day fund specifically, it has to come through the legislature.

And so there were some really passionate debates in the House and Senate this week on exactly what could be done here.

And Democrats really saying this is it is raining.

This is the time to try to use some of that record $4 billion in the state's rainy day fund, while Republicans said, well, Democrats, you need to call your colleagues in Washington and get them to come to the table and end the shutdown.

So it really took a bit of a political tone there, which is, of course, what you would expect on the House and Senate floor.

But there were some emotional arguments made as well.

Gabe, and also in talking to people about it this week, people were saying, you know, maybe the state will step in.

Maybe if the first is one stop and are supposed to come in to people, maybe the state will decide something on Friday, which is today, which is essentially what they did late yesterday.

So I think a lot of people were critical of why wait, why?

You know, we had known a week ago that this was probably going to happen.

Why not step in now or want to step in sooner?

And I think that is part of the criticism of people kind of using this hunger as a political tool.

Maybe it was over the hope that the stalemate would end, at the federal level and the shutdown would stop.

As we mentioned, the record is 34 days where 31 now.

So we're on the precipice of, of precedent.

The Ohio Redistricting Commission reached an unexpected bipartisan deal on a new congressional map.

So well, let's let's talk about the maps.

What does it do?

Well, I would first like to say that I actually suggested this exact scenario last month twice on this show that indeed there could be a bipartisan bill that could come through the Ohio Redistricting Commission if Democrats felt like if they went to the legislature, which is the next step where they don't need any Democratic votes to pass a map, if Democrats worried that the map could get worse.

And I think that's that's pretty much what happened here.

What happens is we have a ten Republican, five Democrat delegation right now, and this map would change.

Two of those districts, the one around Toledo and the one around, Cincinnati to tip more toward Republicans, but also make the one around Akron a little bit more toward Democrats.

So a potentially puts Marcy Kaptur and Greg Landsman, who are in Toledo and Cincinnati, respectively, puts them a little bit more in danger of losing those seats.

But then Amelia Sykes in Akron, she has a little bit more of, of a backing there from Democrats.

So that that was that's what the map seeks to do, apparently.

Now, of course, all of this is going to happen next year where there could be different candidates and who knows what the climate will be like.

But that's the way the map looks, right?

And I do want to give you credit.

You did say on this show this could happen, although I don't think that would qualify as expected to happen.

No.

Oh absolutely not.

I think that was a I was considering that is a fairly remote possibility because I think a lot of folks were watching this tick down.

I mean, today is the deadline for the map to be passed with bipartisan support, or it goes to the legislature.

And it just we didn't have a meeting until last week.

We had not seen a Republican map until yesterday.

So it really looked unlikely that there was going to be a deal.

And yet here we go Wednesday night and Democrats strike a deal with Republicans.

And we're in this process now.

And I'll tell you, the activists, the people who have come down here to advocate for a more evenly split map, these people are very, very upset by this.

Next Tuesday is Election day.

Voters in Northeast Ohio will be voting on a variety of issues, including several Cleveland City Council races.

Who the next mayor of Cleveland Heights and East Cleveland will be.

And some school levies.

It's an off year.

Election officials at the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections say mail in voting has been high in Cuyahoga County, but in-person voting numbers are low.

And Gabe, you wrote an actually an essay about this yesterday as well.

It's called The Cut, and we put it in our newsletter.

You can find it on our website.

Regardless of whether we have people sending in mail in ballots, turnout is probably going to be dismal.

It has been really laughingly low in particularly Cleveland.

Yes.

You know, in in Cleveland, the primary election two months ago, where the city is going to an elected mayor, 7% of registered voters turned out to vote, 7% of registered voters.

So that's out of all citizens.

So those who bothered to register, then only 7% of them voted.

So if you have a group of ten people, it's none of them are voting, right?

I mean, like that's how low these numbers are.

And that's reflective of some suburbs, including East Cleveland in the primary, where turnout was relatively high of more than 20% was Cleveland Heights, who is also going through a mayoral election as well.

So these numbers are low in Cuyahoga County as of Tuesday morning, the county had 3500.

A little bit, a little bit more than that, a little bit more than 3500 people voting early.

And what the board had told me was that in Cuyahoga County, out of 88 counties, Cuyahoga was in 10th place in terms of people showing up early to vote.

But like in the mail, in voting, it was by and large in the first place.

As far as people turning up to vote early.

Interesting.

So you can vote early.

You can vote at your polls on Election Day, provided you're registered and have all that.

It may add.

Early voting ends on Sunday, so you can't vote early on Monday.

If you want to vote, you have to show up on Tuesday to your polling place or early to the board elections between now and Sunday, and the new Board of Elections at, Well, it used to be 1801.

Superior was the Plain Dealer address.

I think they're calling it 18.

Oh, something else superior.

But it's an 18th in superior.

Yes.

And it's a huge building.

Now they're saying, we've got this facility.

You can.

And you did a tour of this.

You there's a line.

The line is going to be inside.

Yeah.

Wouldn't it be great if there was a line.

It's, it's a it's a nice building.

I can't imagine them having too much of a line this election.

The last mayoral election, which was 20, 21, you had a little bit more than 20% people show up to turnout again, a mayor election, the highest ranking person in the city.

And most people overwhelmingly did not show up to that election.

And it was the first time Cleveland had a new mayor in 16 years.

So I have to imagine turnout is not going to be nearly like that.

But as the new Board of Elections in downtown Cleveland, it moved from Euclid Avenue to Superior Avenue.

Brand new.

Nice building, plenty of parking, more than double the parking spots available with the ability to expand to more parking spots.

And you used to see people line up around the corner, at the old location.

It won't happen one, because people probably won't show up at two if they needed to.

There's plenty of space inside for queuing up and having a long, winding Cedar Point style line.

Okay, and just to be clear, I can tell you it's not brand new.

It's just that we took care of it.

Well, I know building more than a decade ago, corner there's 60 northeast Ohio school districts that have Levy is on the ballot in November.

It's something you've been reporting on.

So let's talk about some of the interesting ones you're going to keep an eye on.

Yeah.

So we're watching a couple of districts that have seen failures recently Parma Elyria and Streetsboro.

They're looking for operating levies.

Parma specifically.

They've you know seen failures for a long time now since at least like 2011, 2011 I think is when they're that they last had an operating levy.

That was successful.

And we're looking at a couple bond issues as well, that were unsuccessful in the last election.

So those generally go to, to fund, you know, school facilities.

The idea though, for these, those three that I mentioned that have not had operating levies approved in a little bit, the idea is that if you look at their forecast of, you know, what, where their budgets going, you know, if things don't look very good in 3 or 4 years time, and if you don't have, you know, if you're just not in the green for three years, then the state could basically, look at taking control of your school district.

And that's what folks are really trying to avoid.

Could be some serious cuts down the road.

We've seen some districts that have, you know, moved to closed schools.

They've they've cut some teachers as well.

That hasn't happened at those three districts, as far as I can tell so far.

But and also generally, in this last spring election, it did give some hope to public school advocates because, the levies were more successful during that election.

Prior to that, in the years prior, levies have not been very successful, especially when they're looking for new taxes because of, you know, property tax increases, because of this historic property values being the highest that they've really ever been, in Ohio.

And so that's really, caused a lot of consternation for property owners.

One thing I wanted to go back to when we talked about voter turnout game, which was interesting to me.

Most of the races in Cleveland City Council are uncontested.

So usually when that happens, you can coast.

But a number of the people, as we've reported as having Marshall as reported, are running pretty hard because they see it as a way to try to get people, at least to the polls.

It's it's the civic engagement.

I mean, there's more to the election than the city council.

And I think even if you're a city council person, you've won your seat already or you're, you know, you're going to win your seat already.

You still want people to be involved and engaged in this process.

So you saw, council member Jasmine Santana, council member Kevin Bishop, council president Blaine Griffin actually campaigning, not campaigning, but going around asking people to show up to the polls.

But it's also a way, I think, for these people to engage with their these new neighborhoods.

At the representing we're seeing a redistricting.

So these council, you know, council seats are redrawn.

So you have neighborhoods you didn't have before.

So it's a way for people to kind of engage and let them know who they are.

Summit County residents will vote Tuesday on a property tax charter amendment limiting property taxes by capping annual growth at 3%.

It was the inspiration for one of the statewide initiatives aimed at providing property tax relief.

Karen, it hasn't happened yet in Summit County, but how did this inspire state lawmakers?

Well, basically, there's two bills that just passed the House that are waiting to pass the Senate that deal with property taxes.

The one that I think this one is really connected to most closely is a bill that would, it was talked about to eliminate what's called inside millage, which is the first 1% of a property tax, a property, a home's property tax value that can be increased without voters.

And so it's a it's very complicated.

But the whole idea was to try to stop those unwanted tax increases.

And that bill again is passed the House.

It's, waiting to go through the Senate.

And so that I think, is the one that's most closely connected to what Sonoma County is doing, which is a really interesting idea, capping property tax growth at 3%.

And there have been a couple of proposals at the at the state House to talk about capping that growth and trying to, you know, push down on that so that homeowners don't see these huge spikes.

And when we look at issue two, in Summit County, the county executive is in favor of it.

It would seem that if you tell people, we're going to give you a way to limit the increase of property taxes, or at least how much the county will take from it, it would seem like that's going to be a pretty popular measure.

sure.

But there is an impact of that.

I mean, when you start talking about that.

And of course, that's the overall question of do you want to lower your property taxes?

But what is that going to mean for the entities that benefit from this?

And so that's been the question all along.

And I think, you know, you've got these Clovelly or.

Yeah, cloverleaf schools in Medina County.

They're I think doing something similar to try to, you know, come forward with ideas on how we want to lower property taxes.

We want to lower these bills for people.

So that they can keep what they have and don't have to be fearful of voters coming back and saying, we don't want to pass anything.

But like I just said before, property tax levies, those passage rates in local communities are declining, people are getting frustrated, and people are really concerned about how they're going to pay for their property taxes, which of course fund schools, libraries, zoos, law enforcement, all that.

Yeah, that in your corner you talk to the school officials and they're like, okay, we understand that it's a burden that people are feeling.

But on the other hand, if we limit taxes or if we in some cases and we mentioned this a number of times with the grassroots effort to eliminate property taxes, the schools are going to be hurt.

It's death by a thousand cuts in some ways, because, you know, they're seeing some schools are seeing a reduction in state funds and federal funds right now.

So this amount that they receive from this unvetted portion, it sometimes is not that big.

It whenever, there's an increase in property taxes.

Still though, it all adds up and and yeah, it actually could significantly affect some schools.

And yeah it's Karen mentioned some school districts are saying, well, we'll actually, you know, we'll get rid of a tax or two if it means that people might be willing to approve things down the road.

Cleveland businessman Bobby George was charged in Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court Monday with attempted strangulation.

Cleveland prosecutors in August of 2024 had accused him of kidnaping, attempted murder, rape, felonious assault and strangulation.

He entered a not guilty plea on Thursday morning, though his lawyer said he's likely to plead guilty in this case.

Connor.

I'm sorry.

Gabe.

George comes from a family who's involved in numerous businesses in northeast Ohio.

And and some, of the reason that the local prosecutor has not been on this case is because that family has contributed to his campaign.

So we have an outside prosecutor taking more than a year.

And after all of this, I mean, these are really incredibly serious charges.

And the charge now is still serious, but it's a felony.

Five.

It's not an attempted murder that you would think could be a long prison sentence.

Right.

So Bobby George, prominent businessman, owns several very popular businesses, in Cleveland, Owens Town Hall in Ohio City.

That seems to be the most prominent one.

Barley House, downtown.

Also another restaurant downtown called rebel.

But, you know, this is a person who also had a lot of, I guess, dramatic instances in the past.

There was an instance with him where he got into a spat online.

During the at the, at the height of the pandemic.

Yeah.

Where, people thought that he was using racist language, racist behavior in the back and forth online.

So his defense attorney, Kevin Pelosi, is saying that because he is this prominent figure, because he is kind of well known around town.

The prosecutors rushed to provide this charge to this, to this degree and is saying that because the charge and there being much lower than that, that it's telling of what really happened is what they're saying.

When we talk about the charges in this case, the lawyer for Bobby George says, listen, this is a clear indication of what I said.

Months and months ago, more than a year ago, which is just classically overcharge.

They blame it on the fact that the Georgia's a very outspoken.

Yeah.

That they have conservative points of view that this was basically a targeted, charging when you get down to a felony.

Five.

This is one of those things where you said he's going to plead guilty to it, but the whole, and Bobby George himself said, this will not affect me nor my business.

I've heard a lot of people that are upset about that.

But the question is, was it an overcharge?

If you've now ended up with an independent prosecutor and one felony five charge, you still got, I mean, you're getting charged with something.

I mean, something bad clearly happened at that.

At that.

That was a determination.

Of the court.

So yes, I understand that, you know, they are confident that the business won't get affected.

I know a lot of people personally who have said that they are boycotting all of these businesses.

But they remain open, and this has been a 14 month process.

Thus far.

So I think it's it's hard for me to say.

Exactly right.

You know, what was right, what was wrong.

But, you know, this person did get charged and and further to the point of the, of his attorney, the woman that they, who had been accusing so that they had, been okay with what?

How it ended up, how it ended up turning out.

Okay.

He's got a pretrial hearing on November 10th, so we'll keep an eye on that case by then.

Prepare to fall back this weekend as we set our clocks back an hour early Sunday morning.

It means more light earlier in the day, but darkness creeping in earlier in the evening.

According to one researcher at Northeast Ohio Medical University, switching from daylight saving time to standard time can have negative impacts on the body.

So, this though we all consider the good one, right?

We get an extra hour, to do whatever we were doing Friday and Saturday night.

We.

You mean you guess you're already planning it?

It's like next hour, but the the darkness, I don't know, they're saying it's better for me to lose the darkness.

What's going on here?

Well, they're saying it's better to have light in the morning.

Oh, it's not dark when you as dark when you wake up.

But.

Yeah.

So it's going to get darker sooner in the evenings.

I'm not a fan of the system in general of taking an hour away and giving it back.

It just seems, you know, it's don't like it.

So would you rather have permanent daylight saving time rather than permanent darkness?

Just.

Sorry, I forgot about, you know, I forgot who I was talking to you.

I've been going.

That.

Happy Halloween to all of you.

Yeah.

It's, it is interesting because you, Saturday night, I'm going to a goulash party.

Friend of mine.

We boil goulash.

It's a goulash.

And this is a boil.

A cauldron of goulash in the back.

Great.

And then you eat that about midnight.

And now we've got, you know, an extra hour to digest before.

Nice.

Okay.

Like a perpetual stew kind of thing.

Exactly.

Happy Halloween.

Turns out modern celebrations are a little more family friendly than the antics that used to take place in Cleveland.

Horse drawn carriages on rooftops.

leading livestock into church steeples.

That's one of my favorites.

Vandalia ism, arson, settling scores with rivals, Gabe Connor.

They go far beyond egging or toilet papering somebody's house.

You saw that story, wasn't it?

I love her.

Yeah, well, stealing fences, obstructing railroad tracks and putting carriages, tracks.

Oh my gosh.

Yeah, well, I think the craziest one is putting carriages on rooftops.

Imagine, you know, you wake up one in your cars on your roof.

That's crazy.

Yeah, yeah.

There's a picture in her carriage.

Yeah.

That has several horse drawn carriages placed on the rooftop of a business.

It was a Halloween parade, but they didn't put the horses up.

There was another picture of three little kids.

Like pulling the stuff off of a house.

And it looked to me, it looked like a stage picture, but.

But the three of them are basically, ha ha.

We're going to get rid of your stuff so that the poor, lady that walks out is going to take a six foot fall.

I hope EMT is on standby.

Yeah, sounds like an old fashioned.

This sounds like an old fashioned version of The Purge or something like that.

So real quick, I know you're dressed a little bit today with your festive shirt, but what's your plan for Halloween tonight?

Well, I had a bold costume that I, I did earlier this week that I'm probably going to do.

I was Carl from Aqua Teen Hunger Force from the Adult Swim channel.

The probably very obscure.

I don't understand a thing you just said.

No, no, no, no.

He's there.

Grumpy neighbor stuff.

Yeah, I get it.

Awesome.

Monday on the Sound of Ideas on 89 seven.

Wksu a look at the response to the food assistance crisis in Tuscarawas County.

Plus, host Stephanie Haney, also a lawyer licensed by the Ohio Bar, kicks off her new series, law of the land, with a look at the rights young people have online.

I'm Mike McIntyre.

Thank you for watching and stay safe.