- (Mike) Ohioans are rolling up their sleeves in bigger numbers this week for COVID-19 vaccines.

It appears the vax-a-million lottery strategy is working.

The United States house creates a commission to investigate the January 6th riot.

Two local Republicans voted for the probe though the vast majority of their colleagues did not.

There is an issue getting bipartisan support in Columbus though, reforming Ohio's cash bail system.

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- Hello and welcome to Ideas.

I'm Mike McIntyre.

Thanks for joining us.

Ohio is getting a big response from its vaccine lottery plan.

People are signing up in huge numbers and more of them are rolling up their sleeves to get vaccinated.

A condition for entry into the vax-a-million lottery.

The first million dollar winner will be chosen next week.

There's no shortage of big plans to remake Northeast Ohio from Cleveland's airport to the lakefront.

But can leaders move those plans ahead and also ensure that all neighborhoods benefit?

And an effort to overhaul Ohio's cash bail system is generating bipartisan support in Columbus.

We'll talk about those stories and more this week with idea stream health reporter Lisa Ryan, multimedia journalist, Gabe Kramer and Ohio public radio statehouse news bureau chief Karen Kasler.

Let's get ready to round table.

Karen, our listeners were all over this last week when they were writing in via email and on Twitter saying, how is it possible that the state could manage to determine who on the voter rolls was vaccinated given healthcare privacy laws, all kinds of questions about the process of this and sure enough a couple of days later the state made a big change.

You've got to, you've got to opt in yourself get on this website, give them permission.

- Right, and my colleague, Andy Cao, my statehouse news bureau colleague, Andy Cao, had a lot of those questions as well.

And it, it, I think that those questions were part of the reason why the shift was made to go from the voter database which is where governor Mike DeWine had said that the names would be drawn from to an opt in situation.

So opt in implies, of course, that you do agree to have your name announced on live television.

And there's also some other things the the website apparently allows for your name to be used and your likeness to be used in ads and on billboards and that sort of thing.

But moving it to a website on its own that the Ohio lottery is now involved in makes it easier to ensure that people who want to be private can stay private.

They don't need to enter the vax-a-million drawing.

But people who want the chance to do it have that opportunity right there.

And also I think gives people a little bit of security that I know I'm registered because I did it myself.

I don't have to assume that the state has me registered because I'm a registered voter or whatever.

And this also allows people who are not registered voters which you should be, but if you're not a registered voter to get in and have your opportunity to, to possibly win - Got a message from Rick who says, who exactly is eligible for the lottery?

So, Lisa, it's vaccinated people, but you just have to have started the vaccination process, right?

- Yes.

And you have to be 18 years or older to be part of that million dollar lottery and an Ohio resident as well.

So if you're younger than 18 and you've been vaccinated you can sign up for that scholarship that you mentioned as well.

So there'll be drawing that starting next week.

But yeah, if you're an Ohio resident, 18 years and up you are eligible if you've been vaccinated.

- So the question is then - (Karen) And I understand too one other thing I want to add in here because we do have some part-time Ohio residents, people who go to Florida and maybe people who don't live here full-time.

As I understand that it's full-time Ohio residents.

So that potentially moves people who are only part-time residents out so - And the question then though is how does the state know that you're vaccinated?

So that was the big problem with the voter database and how would they take that and, you know, somehow get another database and do some cross checking and figure it out.

Now, when you sign up for this the state can then take a look at your medical records.

You're basically allowing them to say, okay I'm going to check to see if you're vaccinated.

- Yeah, and I've talked with the state about how they're keeping track of this vaccination records.

And they are just trying to keep track of people as they do sign up they collect this demographic information.

So, ideally, you know, I did a story kind of jumping ahead about people losing their COVID vaccination cards.

So it's, it's kind of the same process of they have you in this statewide system so that if you lose your card or that they can, you know check to make sure that you are vaccinated, all of that information is in one place.

- Karen.

- Yeah.

And the vaccine drawing while the announcement is made on Wednesday.

So next Wednesday will be the live announcement at 7:29 pm.

When you watch the lottery numbers be drawn - And when they say my name.

- When they say your name, yes Mike.

The actual drawing though for the vax-a-million prize, as well as the scholarships as I understand it will be done on Monday.

So there can be an opportunity to do some vetting to make sure that people have been vaccinated.

And if the person who won was not vaccinated then the state can move down the list because several names are drawn.

So there's a winner and an alternate.

And so if it turns out that the winner is not qualified then the state can move down the list.

And so by Wednesday, the person when Mike's name is announced, we will know that this is a person who's been vaccinated full-time resident, all that.

- They might actually draw it on Monday and say McIntyre now.

And then they pull another one.

You kind of worry about that too.

You know, it it's apparently it has worked Gabe, when we we talked to the Ohio department of health actually put out a press release and then talk to them after the fact vaccine distribution is up 28% after this announcement was made.

what do you hear from people?

Is there, is there some thought that, okay lottery then maybe it'll sort of push me over the, the, the the fence that I've been sitting on.

- Absolutely, I mean, I think about my peers and the people I talked to who are definitely, I think Mike DeWine said in one of his press conferences, this is this may seem like an unusual pass.

He, he, he used the word unusual but unusual path to get people vaccinated.

But in the last year, everything has been unusual so why not go ahead with something like that.

But certainly people are talking about it.

People are buzzing, but I think just the idea of some kind of incentive program seems to be working.

We've seen this on programs.

We talked about previously, you know, a shot and a beer come to a breweries and Buffalo providing a beer if you come get the shot.

Krispy Kreme is giving you free donuts if you provide your vaccination card.

Actually market garden brewery here in Cleveland is doing 10 cent beers if you bring your vaccination card.

So some kind of incentive program is getting people excited to, you know want to get the vaccine and have, you know a way to be rewarded for it.

- There's still gonna be a lot of people though Lisa that aren't going to be vaccinated.

We're, we're looking at some statistics that talk about how red states, for example more people are vaccinated there than in blue states.

- (Lisa) Oh yeah.

And Ohio has been trailing behind this entire time.

We have a lower vaccination rate per capita than a lot of our neighboring states.

So the fact that it was, you know a lower rate and then it was also declining the last few weeks was significant and now it's increasing.

So I think it's really interesting and I think that as we go forward it will be interesting to look at who did potentially get that shot because of this million dollar lottery.

It will be interesting to see if that convinced anyone.

I think the thought is though, that there are people who are on the fence that this might be able to sway but there might also be people who just absolutely will not get it, million dollar lottery or not.

They're just, they're just really never going to get it.

And I'm not sure that this program or any of these incentive programs are designed for them.

Think this is more designed for the people who are just kind of hesitant and need that extra push.

- And I mentioned that the rates are higher in some red states than some blue states and all of that kind of stuff.

You know, Ohio was given a lot of credit early on with stumping for, and getting out the vaccine.

One thing that really struck me though, is that the idea of herd immunity in Ohio and many people agree including some local experts that were interviewed.

This was something that APM research lab put together.

We wouldn't have herd immunity until November.

Michigan is supposed to have it in October or September actually.

And we were supposed to be way ahead of Michigan.

Remember we were talking about all the problems with Michigan and will the cases come here and it's really a hotspot.

And yet we're seeing that we're falling behind peers like that.

- So it's really interesting when I talk with public health officials about what herd immunity actually means and like what this elusive percentages that will bring us to herd immunity actually is.

And I think that that's where a lot of the questions come in, you know, what is this magical number?

People want to know what that number is of the vaccinations in the state.

And I think some of it, actually when I talked to these public health officials is people who have been infected with COVID-19 and that's a percentage of people who factor into this herd immunity.

So I look at Michigan and kind of wonder if maybe because they had that large outbreak if maybe that's why, and those variants as well also lead to some questions about, you know when would we reach herd immunity because you know some of the people might've been infected but not with that new variant so they might potentially become infected again.

So, so it's, it's a big question about like what is that elusive number.

- (Mike) Karen?

- Yeah.

And when you discuss the idea of red states versus blue states and the vaccination rates here, Ohio Ohio kind of led the way here on vaccination prizes and this, this shottery that's happening here to try to get people to enter the shot lottery.

Two other states have now followed suit in New York and Maryland.

Both of those are blue states.

And it's interesting.

Now they're doing a different kind of lottery.

New York has a chance to win as much as $5 million.

Maryland has 40 days of grand prize drawings of $400,000.

So it's interesting to see what other states have come up with, but obviously the criticism that Ohio got initially from some people about offering this as an incentive was something that struck a nerve in other states.

And so you've got Republican governor of Maryland, Larry Hogan who is actually leading a blue state, he's on board.

And now Andrew Cuomo in New York a very blue state on board as well.

- Let's move on to talk a little bit about Ohio's plans to drop pandemic health orders.

That's June 2nd, the mask mandate would go then to this is what the governor had said a while back but the centers for disease control and prevention late last week announced revised mask guidance for the vaccinated That led DeWine to provide an update for Ohio and here he is.

- The CDC recommendations made it clear that businesses will be able to choose for themselves whether they continue to require a mask in their premises.

- Okay, so now it's up to them.

So what let's back up and say, what exactly did the CDC say?

- So essentially, if you are vaccinated, you don't necessarily have to wear a mask in a lot of situations, indoor and out.

They do recommend that you still wear a mask in situations like healthcare facilities, public transportation and also businesses that require you to wear a mask.

You should be wearing masks there.

So that's what the CDC is recommending.

Governor DeWine kind of added to that and is recommending that schools also follow that until June 2nd, and then they can kind of make that decision on their own.

I find it interesting.

I'm curious what you guys have seen, but as a vaccinated person, I haven't really noticed any difference.

Like I walk into a business, I still wear a mask and I haven't really noticed all that many people not wearing masks, but it'll be interesting to see what happens after June 2nd.

Maybe businesses are just kind of waiting until that date - And Karen, so the, the governor then tweaked basically what Ohio's rules are as we mentioned, but there's no chance though that Ohio would go now the state officials would go and try to police bars or other places like that because how do you, how do you find out if somebody is vaccinated, you can't tell by looking.

- Right.

And they've already announced that the enforcement the compliance enforcement that was going on throughout this pandemic on mass and social distancing and that stuff is, is over.

There's just an assumption here that people who are vaccinated can go without masks and people who are not vaccinated will still wear them.

And there's no way to verify either way.

But I think what is interesting to watch now is the mask mandates that are local and mask mandates that are in businesses.

Some of them are already starting to fall.

There are several places that have already announced that they're not going to have mask mandates but other places have said they will even though the CDC has said that people without people who have been vaccinated, don't have to wear masks.

Even though that's out there.

Some businesses are saying we're keeping the mask mandate.

But I mean here at the state house, for instance where mass compliance has been scattershot at best especially on the floors of the house and the Senate the building dropped the mask mandate this week and said that they're going with that guidance.

And so I know locally, for instance, the city of Columbus is talking about asking for the mask mandate there to be removed.

So I think by June 2nd, you're going to see a lot of these things fall.

And the ones that remain though are going to be primarily businesses that are going to say, we want to do this.

We want to continue to do this for right now.

- There is one way to verify and that is everybody got a vaccination card and it has a little signature on it and you put it in your wallet and then it gets all frayed on the edges cause it's too big.

Lisa, you looked into a little bit about this are the vaccination cards something that people will be using in the future?

What happens if you lose your vaccination card?

I know you did some Q and A on this.

- Yeah.

So in terms of losing the vaccination card you can get a replacement.

They say that going to your vaccine provider is is the best option, but if not then go to your local health department and they should have a record and they'll be able to get you a new card.

I haven't known of anyone like any business to announce that they're going to like check those vaccination cards.

But I think that certain places are, you know you're supposed to show proof at the NFL draft if you wanted to get into that certain section.

So you had to show your cards.

So it'll be interesting to see whether that becomes more of a thing.

I haven't had to show mine yet, though.

- You were at the NFL draft Gabe - (Gabe) I was at the NFL draft, and there was a special section where to get into that special section, you could, you needed to provide that vaccination card.

And that was to where you have to roam around without your mask.

And that was actually the portion of the draft where you got selected to be even closer to the stage.

So if you wanted to get that kind of access you had to have been vaccinated.

And I was in a barbershop a few weeks ago and they were talking about how, you know, they were saying, in order to get into the draft you need to have this vaccination card.

And there was that feeling that this might become somewhat of a normal.

And I've read that that might be something that cruise lines or other travel agencies are requiring.

If you want to get into some resort, there might be some possibility down the road that you're going to need that vaccination card - Right now, it's kind of an honor system.

Like you go somewhere and they say, hey why don't you come on over?

Everybody has been vaccinated.

And you're kind of counting on the fact that everybody has when maybe everybody hasn't been.

- Absolutely, I was in an Uber a few weeks ago and you know me and my buddy, we were both vaccinated.

We were wearing our mask, it is required to wear masks still in a ride share program.

The driver was, told us he was vaccinated and he was wearing his mask.

And we all still kind of agreed to keep our masks on because the Uber driver said, people will lie about it.

People will bend the truth and say they're vaccinated when really they're not.

So that, that honor system is really something that you're taking your own personal chance on.

So if you go to a restaurant or a bar or wherever business you go to that's not requiring these things.

That's, that's up to you.

- Good point.

Karen, what about vaccine passports?

And the idea that, you know that some lawmakers were worried that it would become someone would try to make it state law that you had to you had to be vaccinated and you had to have show some proof of that in some places that probably likely is not the case but there might be some businesses that have requirements and some people are saying, well that basically is a vaccine passport.

- Yeah.

And there are some bills that have been introduced that would ban vaccine passports that would ban businesses from doing any sort of incentives, like a a beer for a vaccine card or a free donut or whatever.

So it's interesting when you've got so many Republicans and Republicans dominate the legislature here, that the the trying to make rules for private industry that would require for instance, like cruise lines and other entities requiring a proof of vaccine.

Well, the legislature moving to try to stop that is really interesting because, you know, again these are private businesses that want to make these rules potentially, or wanna offer these incentives.

And there's some moves in the legislature to try to stop that.

- The United States House of Representatives voted Wednesday to establish an independent bipartisan commission to investigate the riot at the Capitol on January 6.

Just 35 Republicans in the house voted to approve the investigation including two from Northeast Ohio, representatives Anthony Gonzalez and Dave Joyce.

Karen, already, we've talked about Anthony Gonzalez being at odds with his party because he voted for, earlier, for impeachment.

What about this now?

Does this put both Dave Joyce and Anthony Gonzalez into the very hyper partisan cross hairs of the Republican party?

- I certainly would think it would.

I mean, we, I, I the Strongsville GOP just had an event last weekend that featured a lot of hyper partisan and, and certainly the more conservative more right wing end of the party talking about things that they were concerned about.

It was deemed the Ohio political summit and some of the speakers were Josh Mandel who's running for US Senate, Joe Blystone who is a candidate for governor.

And these are people who have some pretty far right ideas that they were presenting.

But one thing about the Strongsville GOP is that it did invite everybody who was potentially a candidate, including Anthony Gonzales.

Though it had asked Anthony Gonzalez to resign for his vote for impeachment earlier this year.

So I can imagine that there are groups that certainly who've already were looking at Gonzalez as being somebody that they disagreed with.

And so this only adds to that.

I think Dave Joyce in here is very interesting.

You know, there there's some I saw some speculation about maybe Joyce is concerned and worried about, as the state redraws the congressional district maps, maybe that could have played a role here in his vote because Ohio is losing a congressional seat and so that changes the whole landscape of Ohio's maps.

But of course, you know, there are people 35 Republicans believed that this is a vote that they wanted to take here.

They believe that a commission to investigate what happened in the insurrection on January 6th is appropriate especially since this is a bipartisan commission.

And so those are the two Ohioans that chose to join the other 33 in voting for it.

- Gabe, what we're talking about is an investigation of a breach of the capital, one in which police officers were, were beaten in some cases, one died after the fact.

It's, it's calling for an investigation.

On the other side, you have Jim Jordan the Congressman from Ohio who voted against it and he described it as impeachment 3.0.

So it's just an interesting dichotomy here that this is being seen, not as an investigation but as an attack on the former president.

- Yeah.

And that's, and the former president is even continuing to comment on these things.

It's, it's one of these things where it almost feels you know, like there's an actual there's actually for once in a long time agreement amongst the left and the right to come together on something.

But there are still some on the outside edge who want to make this a, a, an aspect of politics and an aspect with the election, which, you know the election is it's been over for months now.

- Overhauling the state's cash bail system is getting bipartisan support in Columbus, a rarity.

It's estimated that 60% of people in jail are there because they cannot post bail.

But the proposal introduced in the Senate and soon to be introduced in the house does not actually eliminate cash bail.

- Right.

It caps it at 25% of a person's monthly net income.

And so that's a step toward eliminating cash bail but the sponsors of the bill and other groups, I mean and this is one of these issues that goes across party lines, because you've got conservative groups like the Buckeye Institute and liberal groups like the ACLU that have said, we need to do this.

So the goal is to try to get to something that still puts in place, some sort of incentive for people to return for their court action but also keeps the option of keeping people behind bars who need to be.

But it recognizes that people who are in jail, especially on non-violent or non-violent charges who have been arrested for outstanding warrants, those sorts of things, that so many terrible things can happen to them if they can't afford the bail just to get out.

I mean they can lose their jobs.

They can lose custody of their kids.

All of these things are a big part of this discussion.

And so this is the biggest bipartisan effort I think I've seen to try to move toward this.

And it comes at the same time as Ohio Supreme court chief justice, Maureen O'Connor, has talked about how 28 courts in the state of Ohio, 28 counties that have both municipal courts and county courts.

They will be using a uniform bail system starting on July 1st, where cash is not going to be the first option.

And she's asking them to really consider other options besides cash bail.

So this is a, a really potential move here toward dealing with this issue and helping people who are in jail who have not been convicted of anything but just don't have the money to bail themselves out.

- Clevelanders got a look this week at a proposal to remake Cleveland Hopkins international airport.

The phased in plan envisions a bigger terminal, new concourses and a connection to interstate 71.

Lisa, one part of this left out, figured out is how to pay for this per flight fee, perhaps by passengers.

- You know, yeah.

So when they talk about how to pay for it, they talked about asking the airlines to front some of that money after they kind of rebound from pandemic issues.

They've obviously had a loss of profits.

But from my perspective, I don't think that the airlines are going to spend that money.

I think that they are going to put it in the customer's lap and that could make the tickets go up.

It could make people less likely to fly out of Cleveland.

So that'll be interesting to see if if it has a noticeable impact on ticket prices.

- We had, we have a whole terminal there that has been closed down when we lost the United hub so I wonder Gabe when you look at this the idea is we want to have, you know, be a player in terms of the airport, but you need the airlines first.

You need the hubs too.

- Yeah.

I mean, the fact that we had, well, the fact that the airport had an entire terminal that just can't be used, says a lot about the foresight to know where things were headed.

So this time around, I think the airport wants to make sure that they are prepared for, to have some kind of ability to adjust if things changed on the road.

- The Cleveland Browns are the driving force behind a new lakefront development plan for the city.

The vision calls for connecting downtown to the lakefront by extending the grassy downtown mall over the tracks and the shore way.

When you look at it Gabe this is one of those sort of dream scenarios.

- (Gabe) I think it's fair for Clevelanders to be skeptical.

I mean, we've seen plans like this time and time again but I think it's exciting still.

You think about a green space downtown, a pedestrian bridge to Cleveland Brown stadium and the north shore, and then, you know, more development, more business along the lake.

I think all those things are like you said dream scenarios, but I think it's a little bit I'll believe it when I see it type thing.

- Yeah, it's been a long time that we've been talking about how to take advantage of the lake but there's also the issue Lisa that some council members have brought up, which is if we spend all this money to develop downtown and make it grassy and glossy and nice.

What about the needs of neighborhoods that might be forgotten?

- Yeah, absolutely.

And I think that when you look at access to the lake it could be a health issue as well, you know access to the lake and to nature in general improves the health impacts of the people who live there.

So it's nice to see this, but I also feel like certain neighborhoods might be forgotten in that.

We're seeing a lot of development on the west side and in downtown, but where's that same development, where's that same access on the east side?

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

Tune in to the sound of ideas on 90.3 WCPN Monday as idea stream reporter Justin Glanville shares his reporting on all of those we buy houses signs on utility poles and Cleveland neighborhoods.

He tagged along with one resident whose mission is to tear the signs down.

I'm Mike McIntyre.

Thanks for watching and stay safe.

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