Support for the statewide broadcast of the state of Ohio comes from medical mutuel, providing more than 1.4 million Ohioans peace of mind with a selection of health insurance plans online at med mutual dot com slash Ohio by the law offices of Porter Wright, Morris and Arthur LLP.

Now with eight locations across the country, Porter Wright is a legal partner with a new perspective to the business community.

More at Porter Wright dot com and from the Ohio Education Association representing 124,000 members who work to inspire their students to think creatively and experience the joy of learning online.

At OHEA.ORG.

The governor who signed the six week abortion ban speaks out on what he wants lawmakers to do on abortion next and what he doesn't want.

High prices and more customers are making this a very lean time for Ohio's food banks.

And the first fall Ohio State Fair in three years is underway.

That's all this week in the state of Ohio.

Welcome to the state of Ohio.

I'm Karen Kasler.

We got 217 yes votes of ships.

Bill House has passed it We start with some news about the Intel computer chip manufacturing plant planned for central Ohio a week after a groundbreaking ceremony was supposed to have happened.

The US Senate and House have passed the Chips and Science Act, which puts $52 billion in federal investment into chipmaking in the United States.

A measure that Intel and Ohio officials said was critical for the project to go from a $20 billion plant to a $100 billion facility and the largest on Earth Both Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown and Republican Senator Rob Portman voted for the CHIPS Act.

But a third of Ohio's 12 Republican congressmen voted against it.

Jim Jordan, Warren Davidson, Brad Wenstrup and Bob Latta.

Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger said in a statement.

I congratulate Congress on voting to approve funding for the CHIPS Act.

This is a critical step to support the entire US semiconductor industry and to help ensure continued American leadership in semiconductor manufacturing and R&D.

Congress has done its part, and now we are going to do ours.

I'm excited to put shovels in the ground as Intel moves full speed ahead to start building in Ohio.

The two major party candidates running to replace Portman had thoughts.

Republican J.D.

Vance said in a statement.

It is impossible for our modern economy to function without access to high quality computer chips.

With the passage of the CHIPS Act.

The Senate took an important step to ensure these products are made in America by American workers.

There's so much more we must do to ensure Ohio leads the way in this crucial industry.

And when I'm in the Senate, we'll get it done.

Democrat Tim Ryan took to the House floor with an impassioned speech rebuilding the manufacturing base, good paying jobs, union construction, our competing China national security Come on, let's do this.

Let's do it together.

But we have a small group of people who have hijacked the Republican Party.

And the leadership in this House, on the Republican side, is more concerned with defeating Democrats than doing something that's best for the United States of America.

The bill now heads to President Biden, who also pushed for Congress to pass it.

Governor Mike DeWine says his fellow Republican state lawmakers have work to do when they return this fall on making Ohio law clear on abortion.

Now that the US Supreme Court has ruled states have the power to regulate it, but DeWine says there are some ideas that are off the table for him.

The Republican governor who's running for reelection was asked about the situation regarding state law and abortion after he opened the Ohio State Fair this week.

DeWine signed the law creating the ban on abortion after fetal cardiac activity is detected just a few months after he took office in 2019 and it went into effect after the US Supreme Court overturned Roe versus Wade.

DeWine said there should be hearings featuring medical experts and others to clarify by state law on medical exceptions.

But while some Republicans have taken a cue from Justice Clarence Thomas in suggesting reviews or changes in laws and decisions on contraception and same sex marriage, DeWine said he is not among them.

Somehow this discussion just got off the rails a little bit.

I mean, the discussion about contraception, for example, that's just absurd.

No one is in the right mind is going to go try to have the state be involved in contraception decision.

You know that the issue we've got even into marriage now, you know these.

This is not going to change what we have today in regard to that area.

So we ought to confine it to what we're talking about, which is abortion.

Because when you talk about abortion, you're talking about a human life, when you're talking about those other things.

That's not what we're talking about.

So, you know, I'm not we're not going to have any kind of change in contraception law.

We're not going to have any kind of change in regard to marriage, for heaven's sake.

It's not going to happen.

That's not what we should be talking about when it comes to the current law, though, I think regardless of how you feel about abortion, there's a lot of confusion about what you can do and what kind of guidance from doctors.

Look, I think I think you make a very good point.

And again, this is one of the things that happens when reality hits and now the states actually do have to make these decisions.

And so no longer are they something in the future, but it's something now.

And every state has got to go through this.

This is not unique to Ohio.

These issues that have been raised in Ohio are issues that every state has to look at.

So one of the things we always want is laws that give guidance to people and give notice to people.

And so, again, that's something that we have we have to look at I am sure that there will be even more people come forward and more discussion about that.

But wherever we land, it needs to be able to inform doctors.

It needs to be able to inform moms and Ohio citizens of what, you know, what that what that law is.

But many supporters of abortion rights as well as marriage equality are not reassured by DeWine's comments, including Senate Assistant Minority Leader Nikki Antonio, who is also up for reelection and is unopposed in next week's primary.

The women in this state and in this country have been lied to repeatedly of recent times, for sure.

Starting with Supreme Court justices in their confirmation hearings who lied about whether or not Roe was settled law.

We heard that.

We've heard a lot of things.

And so, with all due respect, it does not give me any comfort to hear the governor say these words when his legislators, his GOP legislators have already introduced legislation or are talking about legislation to ban contraception that already has occurred, that conversations already happen.

It is off the rails.

I agree with him there in any discussion then about suddenly nullifying my or anyone else's marriage is outrageous.

However, it doesn't give me any comfort to hear the governor say at this point that it's not going to happen.

Now, you and some other Democrats had been looking at a constitutional amendment that would protect access to abortion and birth control.

Tell me.

It was only a month ago that you were really discussing that maybe almost two months ago at this point.

Where is that now?

Where does that stand?

So so I'm glad you asked that because I want to I want to clarify legislators have a lane.

And the lane is we introduced the the resolution in both the House and the Senate to do those very things to embed into the Constitution, both access to all reproductive health care, including abortion and contraception.

Now, we know that hasn't gone anywhere and it's not a surprise to us and a GOP majority legislature that we don't know that it's going to go somewhere.

I do, frankly, want to have hearings.

I want to have the discussion about this, because just from the conversation you and I are having right now, there's a lot of misinformation, a lot of misunderstanding.

About what is and is not possible in the state of Ohio even right now.

So I think it would be very informative and helpful to have the conversation.

So we'll push for hearings on that resolution as far as a constitutional amendment.

I want to be real clear, while legislators can be the catalyst and and really encourage that activity to happen, it is the part of citizens because their citizens initiatives to bring something like that forward.

And certainly the four legislators that have worked on the resolution are strongly encouraging those advocates, activists and people in the state who are very, very interested in having that discussion.

We're encouraging that to to occur.

I have no idea I can't tell you.

You know, we're days before a primary right now, an additional primary in a very confusing election cycle.

I just don't know.

You know, I'm also a pragmatist pragmatically when that's even going to be possible.

To to have folks really create a plan.

I don't know that it's something that's going to happen in our immediate future.

But certainly people, as you've said, they've told you they're interested.

We've certainly heard from folks.

I a woman came up to me last night at a word club, meaning and talked about what can she do?

When can we do this?

So people are definitely looking for anything to make change in Ohio.

But I think it's it's a long process and how that will happen.

A citizen initiated constitutional amendment in Ohio is time consuming and expensive.

In 2015 backers spent 21 and a half million dollars and failed to pass an amendment to legalize recreational and medical marijuana sales and use and set up ten sites where marijuana could be grown.

After an amendment language is reviewed and approved by the state attorney general and the state ballot board supporters need to gather 6% of the number of ballots cast in the last election for governor for half of the state's 88 counties which right now is 265,775.

The deadline to make this year's ballot was a few weeks ago.

Ohio's food banks are starving for money.

It's not new that food banks struggle to serve customers.

But with soaring food prices and more people coming to their doors, the shelves are alarmingly empty.

As evident at the Mid-Ohio Food Bank, south of Columbus.

The state is sitting on a big pile of cash.

The latest Office of Budget and Management Monthly Financial Report shows a surplus of 5.6.

$7 billion, though as much as three and a half billion dollars is earmarked toward the capital budget to avoid issuing bonds and road improvements and tax incentives related to the central Ohio intel deal.

When OPM director Kim Monex was on this show earlier in July, I asked her if food banks might benefit from that surplus.

And she said the DeWine administration, in her words, will continue to have an ongoing dialog with the General Assembly.

I asked Governor Mike DeWine about whether he has any plans to move some money toward the food banks.

I was in Salem yesterday.

I was handed a letter.

I haven't read it yet, but it's on my desk in regard to food banks.

We're certainly looking at that.

And again, we know that we are seeing people come to food banks today.

And food banks tell us is that there are people coming to food banks that have never in their life before come to food banks.

And the thought that they might be going to a food bank or something, that they never crossed their mind.

But they are making that decision and so we're we're seeing people who are doing that every day.

So it's imperative that we make sure there is food in the food banks.

And it's also imperative that we make sure that they have the infrastructure to do what they did, what they need to do.

Look, was one of the first things we did during the pandemic when all the volunteers of food banks went away because they were staying home, which is what they needed to do.

We sent in the National Guard.

So it's been a priority of this administration.

We don't have anything to announce today, but we're in the process of assessing exactly where the food banks are.

Rose Frank is the director of the Second Harvest Food Bank of Southeast Ohio.

The area of the state with the highest levels of poverty I would say that our food bank has really struggled for for many, many years as a small, under-resourced food bank in an area where there are a lot of really generous people, but where we just don't see the same kind of wealth, we still we don't see the same kind of retail presence.

And so we rely much more on state and federal commodities to meet the need.

And we're in an area that has historically seen really high rates of poverty, really high rates of food insecurity.

And so I think the struggle is not necessarily new to us, but the last several months have been the hardest that we have seen in years and years.

In years.

And so we're contending with just extreme uptick in demand.

We've seen a 60% increase in demand for food across our network since the start of the year.

And just a simultaneous drop in food supplies available.

So we have a very, very severe food shortage on our hands right now.

That has led to making really difficult decisions.

And when I look at the unemployment rates over the last month, Athens County, the unemployment rate is 5.9%.

That's tied for fourth highest in the state with Lorain County.

50% higher than the state's overall rate of 3.9%.

Now, some areas are doing better than others.

But this really speaks to the problem that Athens County and southeast Ohio has been having You have higher unemployment and there's more need for care, fewer job opportunities, fewer opportunities for living wage work right now to, you know, we have a lot of folks who are struggling to put gas in their car.

And we live in an area where you have to travel quite a distance to get anywhere, to get to work, to get your kids to school.

Or to summer camp.

You know, all those things really put a strain even on working families.

And I think more and more, all of us are feeling that pressure, but especially families who are who are Low-Income, they just reach a breaking point.

The other thing I would say is we serve about 25% about 25% of the overall group of folks that we serve are older adults or seniors.

And those are people who are living on a fixed income where food is 30% higher than it was for.

Gas prices are so high.

You know, the math just doesn't work that you can be receiving the same amount of money every month.

But seeing prices skyrocket and not need to ask for extra help, not need to find somewhere to to help you out in the communications that I've seen and I guess Governor Mike DeWine got a letter from food banks asking for help and specifically referencing that you do have older customers that are of a concern there, but also first time customers.

You're having more people who this is the first time they've sought out helpful food bank before.

That's right.

Right.

When I look at our data from the start of the year till now, it's about 20% of the overall people we serve that are first time customers to a food bank.

And I think that kind of speaks to a misconception that some people have, that most people are using food banks or food pantries as a regular source of food.

But what we know from the data is that most folks really only come to a food bank or a food pantry when they absolutely have to write, when they've already kind of exhausted every other option available to them.

And so, you know, what I struggle with so much is thinking about if the place that you go is a last resort, right?

Nobody wants to come to us for food.

If we can't be available, then, you know, where do people go and that's when hunger is not just like a risk factor or something abstract, but hunger becomes very real.

You know, one of the choices that we've had to make as a food bank over the last several months is to scale back services.

So we have ended most of our direct distributions in the community.

These would be events where we would bring our trucks directly into communities across that ten county territory.

We serve sort of hundreds of people at a time We just don't have the food to do that anymore.

And there were folks who definitely would look every couple of months.

We might be in their county, we might be in their area.

And they would really be able to kind of stock up and it would help them stabilize and to not be able to be there.

We know that that's very real for families.

That's going to have a real impact.

One of the changes have you had to make have you had to try to get more donations, though?

You even referenced in the beginning that this is an area of the state that really doesn't have the money to give.

What are the things that you had to do and change?

I've been looking under every stone possible to try to bring more resources, resources into the food bank.

We have been working with a variety of different funders and partners to try to find resources to purchase food, a food banks like our small rural food banks.

We typically would purchase almost no food in a given year, a very, very small percent simply because we don't have the resources to do so.

All of our resources go just to pay our laborers and keep our lights on.

So we have been trying to find some small, small amounts of money to purchase just so we can keep some food on ourselves and try to keep those pantry supplied.

But food prices are so astronomical.

The small amounts of money that we've been able to piece together are just bringing in so little food.

So we'll continue to to do that.

But it's just not it's not a sustainable option for us in the long term.

The other thing I would say is that we support a network of about 70 food pantries across the Territory so that's 70 pantries that are really often kind of the boots on the ground where people go in their communities, in their village, in their neighborhood to get food.

And those pantries really are the ones who, you know, see the trickle down effect of this the most.

So when they access our on our online ordering platform to find food to, to, to bring in to those pantries, they just see so few options.

And so they then have to make really difficult decisions, you know, do they scale back the number of people that they can serve?

Do they give people less food?

That's certainly something that we've seen pantries having to do.

So a Again, this is it's not abstract.

I think it's really very real for for people who need to rely on these services.

When I asked Governor Mike DeWine about the request from food banks for more assistance, he acknowledged he got a letter about the need and he said, quote, It's imperative that we make sure that there is food in the food banks.

And it's also imperative that we make sure that they have the infrastructure to do what they need to do.

And he said while this is a priority, he didn't have anything to announce to reporters who were there talking to him.

But, quote, We're in the process of assessing exactly where the food banks are.

So what would you tell him about where your food bank is right now and how long you can be in this circumstance?

How long can you wait before a decision is made?

Well, first, I would say that's really heartening to hear that the governor is hearing.

Our request is taking the request seriously.

But I would say we are absolutely in a crisis situation.

If you come in into the warehouse and see our facility at the Southeast Ohio Food Bank, our racks are empty and unless something changes very soon, we're going to have to continue to scale back services.

There's going to continue just to be less food available across southeast Ohio.

And so I would urge the governor to, you know, really take serious that request and recognize how important the work we do is to thriving communities, to a strong economy, to kids learning and doing well in school.

It's really important.

And when it comes to school, we do have school starting in less than a month.

And so are you having to compete at all with schools that are also trying to get food together and sometimes access the same sources that you're accessing?

I would say.

Yeah.

I mean, I really try not to think about it in that way.

But I would say that this is definitely going to be a common struggle among all of us who are really trying to feed people in the community.

And make sure that kids and families have what they need.

I worry about it, and I really think everybody should be worried about it.

You know, if whether you are somebody who needs to visit a pantry to get food for your family, or maybe those are just your employees or your neighbors or the the your kid's classmates.

You know, there is a ripple effect across communities when families can't get enough to eat.

And so it's something we should all care about.

And and look, to address collectively.

The Ohio Association of Food Bank says in April and May of this year, Ohio food banks and pantries served 1,778,644 people.

That's a 26% increase over the same period last year.

Nearly a quarter of those were people over 65 and more than a third were children.

But in those two months, the food banks distributed £43,949,815 of food that was 7.9% less than they shared the same time last year.

Three to one.

Welcome.

And finally, we return to the Ohio State Fair.

Because of the threat of rain, opening ceremonies were moved indoors Wednesday morning to Kasich Hall, named for a governor who wasn't a fan of the tradition of spending the night at the fair.

Governor Mike DeWine said that morning that it was still to be determined if he would stay at the fair.

That tradition goes back to the late Republican Governor Jim Rotes in the 1980s.

DeWine announced after the fair closed on Wednesday night that yes, he and some of his grandkids did stay at the fair.

The 2022 state fair is the first one that's fully open to all since 2019.

The 2020 fair was canceled for COVID and last year was limited to just four H and livestock exhibitors without the more than 900,000 people who attend the fair each year.

The Fair's bottom line suffered.

But general manager Virgil Strickler said it's back on firmer financial footing now.

And a reminder, the primary for the Ohio House and Senate is Tuesday, August 2nd.

Turnout is expected to be less than half of the 20.8% of voters who cast ballots in the May primary.

And turnout could be in the single digits.

We'll have more on that next week.

But that's it for this week for my colleagues at the Statehouse News Bureau of Ohio Public Radio and Television.

Thanks for watching.

Please check out our Web site at State News dot org and follow us and the show on Facebook and Twitter And please join us again next time for the state of Ohio.

We close with more images from the Ohio State Fair and sound from the all Ohio State Fair Band support for the statewide broadcast of the state of Ohio comes from medical mutuel, providing more than 1.4 million Ohioans peace of mind with a selection of health insurance plans online at ADMET Mutual dot com slash Ohio by the law offices of Porter White Maurice and Arthur LLP.

Now with eight locations across the country, Porter Right is a legal partner with a new perspective to the business community.

More at Porter right dot com and from the Ohio Education Association representing 124,000 members who work to inspire their students to think creatively and experience the joy of learning online at OHEA.org.