Ohio Economists Split on Progressiveness of EV Fees

Electric car being charged

A group of Ohio economists disagree over moves by the state and the country as a whole toward electric vehicles and whether government investment in electric vehicle infrastructure is cost-effective.

Nearly half of the 19 economists at Ohio colleges and universities surveyed by Scioto Analysis said the state’s current $200 annual fee for registering electric vehicles is progressive, while a little more than half believed spending tax dollars on EV infrastructure is likely to be more cost-effective than providing the same amount in tax credits.

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Lieutenant Governor Jon Husted: Ohio Has Seen Decrease in Domestic Opioid Production and Distribution

Thursday, the Republican National Committee hosted a Zoom press call with Lieutenant Governor Jon Husted and congressional nominee Max Miller (OH-07) to discuss border security, the fentanyl crisis, and crime.

In speaking with Tricia McLaughlin Communications Director for Governor Mike DeWine and Husted, “The domestic supply of opioids from over prescribing pharma companies both production and distribution have largely ceased.”

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DeWine, Vance Say No to Ohio Debate Commission Debates

Republican candidates for Ohio governor and U.S. Senate each have declined to participate in debates scheduled by the Ohio Debate Commission for next month in Akron.

Gov. Mike DeWine and Senate candidate J.D. Vance turned down the invitation by the ODC for the Oct. 10 and 12 debates with Democratic candidates Nan Whaley and Tim Ryan, respectively, the commission announced Wednesday.

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Ohio Senator Portman Urges Additional Ukraine Funding to Prosecute War Crimes

U.S. Senator Rob Portman (R-OH) this week urged allocation of additional funding to support Ukraine as it prepares to prosecute alleged war crimes committed by Russian military personnel. 

The senator said his view of the need for more aid was informed through discussions he and Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) had with Prosecutor General Andriy Kostin on Wednesday concerning how America can help its ally to pursue war-crime cases against enemy soldiers. Portman and Durbin co-chair the Senate Ukraine Caucus. 

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Commentary: Ohio Senate Race Turning on Biden Energy Policies

Until Wednesday, there was a routine at the White House.

The national average for a gallon of gasoline would drop, and the president’s staff would publicly celebrate the dip as more evidence that the decision to tap the strategic petroleum reserve was helping the everyday American. And while gas was not, and is still not, cheap, the downward streak was undeniable. It lasted 99 consecutive days.

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Hold on Ohio Abortion Restriction to Last at Least Two More Weeks

Hamilton County Court of Common Pleas Judge Christian Jenkins (D) this week indicated he will extend his hold on a significant Ohio abortion-restricting law for two additional weeks. 

Jenkins’s decision prolongs the effect of a decision he made last week to obstruct the Heartbeat Act’s implementation, with the initial freeze to last two weeks. The state General Assembly passed and Governor Mike DeWine (R) signed the bill (SB 23) in 2019. The legislation, which prohibits aborting unborn children who have detectable heartbeats, could not take effect until this year after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion nationwide. 

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Owner of Historic Mall Struggles to Bring Property Up to Code Before Court Date

Central Ohio’s oldest mall faces demolition if it cannot be brought back up to code, owing to two years’ worth of accumulating citations and warnings by City Code Enforcement and a judge declaring it a public nuisance.

“The owner is working on improvements,” mall manager Nihal Weerasinghe told The Ohio Star. “He is committed to uplift the mall by the end of the year.”

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Parents Threaten Ohio School District with Federal Lawsuit After School Says It May Hide Gender Conversations Between Students and Staff

Parents of students in Hilliard City Schools are threatening to sue in federal court if the district fails to provide adequate answers by October 17 to several questions parents have about school policies.

Parents want to know if they will be made aware of gender and sex-related conversations between students and school staff. They also want to know if there is political activism going on inside Hilliard schools stirred up by an LGBTQ+ organization.

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Ohio Debate Commission Director Donated to Democrats, Including Tim Ryan, Records Show

The leader of a “nonpartisan” group that schedules political debates in Ohio, including for the U.S. Senate race, has donated to Democratic candidates like Rep. Tim Ryan, according to federal records.

Jill Miller Zimon is executive director of the Ohio Debate Commission, a 501(c)(3) charity composed of “civic and media organizations” that hosts debates in the Buckeye State. But Zimon, a former Democratic U.S. House candidate in 2016 and 2014, contributed over $13,000 to Democratic causes and candidates between 2006 and 2018, records show.

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Ohio State Board of Education Considers Resolution Against Gender Ideology

Ohio’s State Board of Education on Tuesday heard public comment on a proposed resolution treating biological sex as an “objective, scientific fact” and opposing school policies that seek to blur the lines on this subject.

Board member Brendan Shea (District 5) introduced the measure, which balks at regulations recently proposed by President Joe Biden. If finalized, the federal Department of Education rules would effectively force schools to call gender-dysphoric K-12 students by their preferred names and pronouns rather than their given names and biological pronouns. They would also require school athletic programs to assign children to teams based on avowed gender identity rather than physiological sex. 

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Commentary: Ohio Issue 1 ‘Strikes a Balance Between the Competing Interests Behind the Granting of Bail’

On November 8, 2022, Ohio voters will have the opportunity to amend the Ohio Constitution in a way that supports and promotes public safety. Issue 1, the “Ohio Determining Bail Amount Based on Public Safety Amendment” will add the following language to the Constitution: “When determining the amount of bail, the court shall consider public safety, including the seriousness of the offense, and a person’s criminal record, the likelihood a person will return to court, and any other factor the general assembly may prescribe.” The proposed amendment strikes a balance between the competing interests behind the granting of bail: preserving the accused’s presumption of innocence against the community’s need for public safety.

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Seven Midwest States Enter Hydrogen Coalition

Seven Midwest states entered a coalition to pursue clean hydrogen development as an alternative to gas and diesel fuel.

The governors of Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, and Wisconsin signed onto the Midwest Hydrogen Coalition. The coalition will accelerate clean hydrogen development, from production and supply chain to distribution in agriculture, manufacturing, transportation, and other industries.

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Left Compares Republicans to Nazis in Wake of Trump Ohio Appearance

In the two days following former President Donald Trump’s appearance in Youngstown, Ohio on Saturday in support of Republican Senate candidate J.D. Vance, numerous high-profile leftist commentators suggested attendees gave Trump the Nazi salute when they pointed their index fingers outward in solidarity during his speech.

The gesture doesn’t very closely resemble the Sieg Heil gesture that German fascists made to signal adherence to Adolph Hitler in the 1930s and 40s, in which saluters held all their right-hand fingers side-by-side. Progressive pundits nonetheless exclaimed, with varied degrees of self-assurance, that Trump supporters were adverting to either Naziism or the conspiracy-trafficking QAnon movement or both.

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Parent-Teacher Tensions Run High over Lack of Mental Health Transparency from Mentor School Educators

Mentor Schools is withholding mental health information about transgender or transitioning students from parents.

An Ohio school board meeting on Tuesday, September 13th raised concern in parents over an e-mail which went out to teachers in the district informing them that they are not required to inform parents if a student, 11 years old or older, who is transgender or transitioning asks to use a different name or pronoun.

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In Ohio, Trump Says Vance, Other Republicans Will Rescue America from Democrats’ ‘Mayhem and Despair’

Former President Donald Trump addressed a packed rally at the Covelli Centre in Youngstown this weekend, reprehending Joe Biden, Tim Ryan and other Democrats for economically crushing working Buckeye Staters with unrelenting inflation. 

Trump further laid into the leftists who control Congress and the White House for advancing policies that exacerbate illegal immigration and impress anti-American civic and historical narratives upon K-12 students. He urged listeners to back Republican Senate candidate J.D. Vance as well as GOP U.S. House candidates to reverse these trends. He showed particular ehtusuasm for the reelection of U.S. Representative Jim Jordan, a Republican who represents the north-central and western Fourth District. 

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Ohio Police Union Warns of ‘Ongoing Problem’ Democrat Senate Candidate Tim Ryan Has with Law Enforcement

The Columbus, Ohio, police union president criticized Democrat Rep. Tim Ryan, who is running for U.S. Senate against Republican J.D. Vance, as being “unsafe” for the state and having an “ongoing problem” with police officers. 

“Given Tim Ryan’s track record of calling police officers the new Jim Crow and voting to eliminate qualified immunity, it’s not [a] surprise that this is the way he carries himself around law enforcement,” Columbus Fraternal Order of Police President Jeff Simpson told The Daily Mail on Friday. 

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Ohio Senate Poll Shows Vance’s Lead Grows over Ryan

Republican J.D. Vance’s lead over Democratic Rep. Tim Ryan grew up to 4 points in Ohio’s Senate race 53 days out from Election Day, according to a new survey from Emerson College Polling and The Hill released Friday, in a bad sign for Democrats’ hopes of taking the Senate.

Vance held a 44% to 40% lead in polling conducted by Emerson College and The Hill in Ohio’s race for U.S. Senate. He previously led Ryan by three points, 45% to 42%, according to Emerson College’s polling in August.

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Packed House Shows for Renacci’s Kick Off to Pro-MAGA Forum Series in Medina

Former Ohio Republican congressman and current Chairman of American Greatness PAC Jim Renacci held his first in a series of pro-MAGA (Make America Great Again) forums at the Thirsty Cowboy in Medina, Ohio.

“Last night, 11 conservatives from different niches talked about uniting the conservative base and forwarding MAGA policies. I think it’s the start of something great. American Greatness can be achieved,” Renacci posted on Facebook following the meeting.

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Ohio Companies Can Get Reimbursed for Apprenticeships

Ohio businesses can get up to $25,000 from the state to cover the costs of apprenticeship training dating back to 2020, according to the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services.

The money comes from a federal grant the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services received in 2020 to expand apprenticeships, Gov. Mike DeWine announced recently as part of National Workforce Development month.

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Democrat Judge Temporarily Blocks Ohio Heartbeat Abortion Ban

A Hamilton County judge temporarily halted Ohio’s ban on abortions once a fetal heartbeat has been detected, a law that has been in effect since the U.S. Supreme Court returned the issue of abortion to the individual states.

Common Pleas Court Judge Christian Jenkins, a Democrat, paused Ohio’s Heartbeat Act (SB 23) Wednesday for 14 days with a temporary restraining order.

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Concerned Parents Flood Hillard City School Board Meeting over Staff-Worn LGBTQ ‘I’m Here’ Badges

Hilliard City Schools met for a board meeting on Monday to discuss a policy regarding release time for religious instruction. However, the meeting was flooded with concerned parents over a different issue. The LGBTQ badges.

These badges were implemented at the beginning of the school year and were distributed by the teachers union National Education Association (NEA) and its local affiliate, Hilliard Education Association (HEA). They provided a badge to any teacher who requested one. According to Lisa Chaffee, director for Ohio Parents Rights and Education, “The school district did not give permission for these badges. Rather, the Union president with the HEA, Linna Jordan, did it on her own volition.” Several unsuccessful attempts were made to contact Jordan for a comment.

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Ohio Supreme Court Strikes Down Law Stopping Picketing at Homes, Private Businesses

Public officials are not immune from picketing connected to a labor dispute at their homes or private workplaces after a divided Ohio Supreme Court struck down a law that prohibited encouraging “targeted picketing.”

The law made organizing picketing at a private residence and business an unfair labor practice, but in a 4-3 decision the Supreme Court said that violated the First Amendment right of free speech.

Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor and Justices Michael P. Donnelly, Melody Stewart and Jennifer Brunner all joined the majority.

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Hamilton County Judge Temporarily Halts Ohio Abortion Restriction

Hamilton County Common Pleas Court Judge Christian A. Jenkins this week imposed a two-week suspension on the Ohio law banning abortions for women whose unborn children have detectable heartbeats. 

Effectively, the statute, known as the “Heartbeat Law,” generally prohibits terminating pregnancies that have gone on for longer than six weeks. Governor Mike DeWine (R) signed the legislation in 2019 but agencies could not enforce it until this year after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision which legalized abortion nationwide. 

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Candidate for Cuyahoga County Executive Backs Noncitizen Voting

Chris Ronayne, the Democratic candidate for Cuyahoga County executive, said in a public forum this week that he would support Ohio’s municipalities allowing noncitizens to vote in local elections.

The former Cleveland city administrator and former president of University Circle, Inc., a community-development corporation, explained to attendees at the Global Cleveland panel discussion at Jukebox that he believed cities can use their home-rule powers to adopt that election policy.

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Ohio Senate Candidate Ryan: ‘Kill and Confront’ GOP’s MAGA Wing

On Tuesday, speaking to Joe Scarborough and his “Morning Joe” panel on MSNBC, Ohio Democratic Senate candidate Tim Ryan made a dramatic statement regarding how he wants to deal with members of the Republican Party he regards as “extremist.” 

“We’ve got to kill and confront that movement,” Ryan said of a group he termed “the extremists that we’re dealing with every single day,” strongly implying he meant supporters of former President Donald Trump, or the “Make America Great Again” [MAGA] movement. The candidate, a who represents Ohio’s 13th District in the U.S. House of Representatives, faces attorney, author and venture capitalist J.D. Vance — an outspoken MAGA candidate — in the November election. 

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Republican Ohio Lawmakers Unveil New Website for Regulatory Transparency

Two Ohio Republican state lawmakers on Tuesday unveiled the new Cut Red Tape Ohio website, which they say will serve to make the state’s regulatory process more transparent. 

The site, developed in consultation with business leaders and the legislature’s Joint Committee on Agency Rule Review (JCARR), came about via Senate Bill 9 which instructs state agencies to end three of every 10 state regulations over the next three years. State Senator Theresa Gavarone (R-Bowling Green) and state Representative Jamie Callender (R-Concord), respectively chair and vice chair of JCARR, announced the site’s arrival online. 

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Ohio Teachers Permitted Right to Concealed Carry in the Classroom

House Bill 99 went into effect on Monday, allowing Ohio teachers to carry firearms into their classrooms.

State Representative Thomas Hall (R-Madison Twp.) spearheaded the measure, which focuses on school gun and safety training. “We are doing something to help protect the lives of our children and staff at schools here in Ohio,” Hall said during the bill’s signing ceremony in June.

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Buckeye Institute Cautiously Lauds Ohio’s Credit Rating Rise, Warns Ongoing Discipline Will Be Crucial

Ohio Governor Mike DeWine’s announcement last week that Fitch Ratings upgraded the state’s credit rating from AA+ to AAA elicited both praise and caution from the Columbus-based Buckeye Institute.

Greg Lawson, research fellow at the center-right think tank, called the budgetary management to which state officials ascribed Fitch’s decision on Ohio’s long-term issuer default rating (IDR) “a mixed bag.” (The state has also seen its general-obligation bond rating rise from AA+ to AAA, its appropriation-backed bonds move to AA+ from AA, the Ohio School District Credit Enhancement Program Rating go to AA+ from AA and the Ohio Department of Transportation’s Portsmouth Bypass project obligations rating move to A+ from AA-.) 

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Counties in Ohio, Tennessee, Arizona, Pennsylvania, Minnesota and More Flooded with Requests for 2020 Election Records as Mandatory Preservation Window Expires

With the recent expiration of the federally mandated 2-year window for preservation of 2020 presidential election records, counties across the country have been inundated with public records requests from Americans concerned about election integrity.

During his “Moment of Truth Summit” last month spotlighting 2020 presidential election irregularities, MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell exhorted “every single person in the country” to ask for cast vote records from the election from their local county clerk’s office. His website links to the Ordros Analytics, Inc., website, which provides templates of public records requests for cast vote records.

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New Columbus Police Chief Announces Major Changes for Issuing Warrants

Columbus Police Chief Elaine Bryant on Thursday issued a policy change regarding the serving of warrants during nighttime. 

According to the chief’s message to sworn personnel, any pre-planned warrants to be served for misdemeanors or nonviolent felonies between the hours of 11 p.m. and 6 a.m. must have the prior authorization of an officer ranked as a lieutenant or higher. Bryant described as “pre-planned” any arrest warrant serving as the “sole reason” an officer travels to an address. She wrote that the new policy excepts SWAT teams and other tactical units. 

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Biden in Ohio: ‘Bury’ the ‘Rust Belt’

Speaking on Friday at the groundbreaking of Intel’s new semiconductor factory in Licking County, Ohio, President Joe Biden said that “it’s time to bury the label ‘rust belt…’” when describing the region in which he stood.

The ‘rust belt’ is a term often used to denote an area extending from western New York through the midwest that saw heavy industrial activity from the late 19th century to the mid-20th century, particularly concerning steel production and automobile manufacturing. The region suffered significant economic decline by the late 20th century and many communities therein have struggled since.

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Cincinnati Ranked in the Top Five Places to Retire in the United States: Report

One Ohio city ranks in the top five of best places to retire in the nation, and four others rank among the best of the nation’s largest cities, according to a new report from WalletHub, a personal finance website.

Cincinnati ranked third – behind only Charleston, South Carolina and Orlando – in the report that compared the retiree-friendliness of more than 180 cities using 46 metrics, such as cost of living to retired taxpayers to the state’s health infrastructure.

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Ohio GOP Chair Paduchik Holds Onto Job for Now

Ohio Republican Party (ORP) Chairman Bob Paduchik will hold onto his job until at least January, the party having decided on Friday at their meeting in the Columbus suburbs to refrain from voting on its officers until next year. 

The question of whether the ORP could legitimately defer its executive-board elections until its January gathering has been a controversial one. This week, the national law firm Thompson Hine issued a legal opinion stating that, because the Ohio Revised Code requires the “members-elect” of both parties’ state committees to vote on their officers, those elections had to take place on September 9. The assessment reasoned that because those elected in August to serve on the committee would be sworn in at the autumn meeting, none would remain members-elect in January.

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Oberlin College Pays Out Millions After Launching Defamation Campaign Against Bakery

Oberlin College in Oberlin, Ohio, announced Thursday that it will pay a local bakery $36.59 million after a legal defamation battle.

The lawsuit began in 2016, when Allyn Gibson Jr. accused a black student of stealing a bottle of wine from Gibson’s Bakery, causing the college to launch a defamation campaign which included the vice president of the college calling the bakery racist. The Ohio Supreme Court declined the college’s appeal of a court’s previous judgment, causing the college to decide Thursday to pay the bakery.

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New Legal Opinion Says Ohio GOP Must Proceed with Leadership Elections

A new legal opinion from the national law firm Thompson Hine says Ohio Republican Party (ORP) chairman candidate Bryan Williams and his supporters are correct to insist that new leadership elections must take place at their organization’s meeting on Friday near Columbus.

Members of the ORP’s State Central Committee (SCC) will meet at the Nationwide Hotel and Conference Center in Lewis Center Friday morning for a party reorganization pursuant to the election of new members last month. A notice of the meeting, which members of the general public may attend, indicated, “Business will include swearing in all qualified members.” 

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Trump Endorses DeWine for Re-Election as Ohio Governor

Former President Donald Trump this week endorsed Ohio Republican Governor Mike DeWine’s reelection bid against Democratic former Dayton Mayor Nan Whaley. 

“… We have an outstanding person running, Mike DeWine, who quietly, but professionally and patriotically, goes about doing his job, and really well,” the former chief executive said in a statement. “Running alongside his very talented and loyal Lieutenant Governor, Jon Husted, Ohio has been in strong hands with the Economy ‘roaring,’ especially in the four years that I was President.”

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Ohio Secretary of State Supports Voter Fraud Prosecution for Four More People Who Allegedly Voted Twice

Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose has referred four additional people for prosecution after his office found evidence that appears to show they voted in two states.

His office partnered with officials in Iowa, Missouri, Nevada and Oregon to find individuals who allegedly voted in another state, then cast an illegal second ballot in Ohio in the 2020 election, LaRose announced Wednesday.

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Buckeye Institute Report Offers Solutions to Ohio Students’ Learning Loss

Responding to major learning loss suffered by Ohio students as a result of the school closures following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Columbus-based Buckeye Institute recommended policy solutions this week to help students regain what the education system did not provide. 

On March 30, 2020, Republican Governor Mike DeWine ordered all in-person K-12 schooling closed throughout the state for the remainder of that school year. Students instead participated in “virtual classrooms” wherein they would watch their teachers’ instructions online. During the 2020-21 school year, many school districts continued to keep school buildings closed at least part-time. 

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Trump to Hold Mid-September Ohio Rally with J.D. Vance

Former President Donald Trump announced on Tuesday he will hold a rally with Republican Ohio Senate candidate J.D. Vance at the Covelli Centre at 229 East Front Street in Youngstown in the afternoon and evening of Saturday, September 17.

Trump’s arrival on behalf of Vance, who the ex-president strongly endorsed in the primary, comes as the candidate maintains a slight polling lead against Democratic opponent Tim Ryan, a congressman representing the Buckeye State’s 13th District. An August Emerson College survey showed Vance, an attorney, venture capitalist and author, with the support of 45 percent of Ohio voters while Ryan had the support of 42 percent. Another poll from the Trafalgar Group later that month showed the Republican with a four-point lead. 

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Ohio Pushing More Money into Jail Renovations, Buildings

Ohio plans to spend an additional $51 million to renovate and build jails across the state in an effort, Gov. Mike DeWine says, to create environments that reduce recidivism.

The money comes on top of $45 million the state handed out a year ago to six local jails for major construction projects. Also, another $5 million went to smaller projects at six other sites.

“Our continued investment in Ohio’s local jails is a public safety investment that benefits everyone involved,” DeWine said. “This funding will go a long way toward creating safer and more secure jails for Ohio’s communities.”

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Abortion Supporters Sue to Restore Full Access in Ohio

Abortion provider Planned Parenthood and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Ohio filed litigation in the Hamilton County Court of Common Pleas on Friday to kill Senate Bill 23, the Ohio law banning abortion after the unborn child has a detectable heartbeat. 

Lawmakers passed and Republican Governor Mike DeWine signed that statute in 2019, though it only took effect this year after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision. Although the high court refused to uphold that ruling’s stipulation that the federal Constitution bestows right to terminate a pregnancy — while mentioning neither pregnancy nor abortion — the abortion advocates argue that the Ohio Constitution — also silent on abortion — still grants that right.

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Ahead of Forum Series, Renacci Sees Opportunities for Conservative Ascendancy in Ohio

Former Ohio Republican Congressman Jim Renacci has a hopeful outlook for conservatism in the Buckeye-State, though he expects progress to require serious toil and soul-searching as well as new leadership.

Renacci, who represented the 16th U.S. House District southwest of Cleveland and now chairs American Greatness PAC, spoke with The Ohio Star recently about the forum series his organization is commencing on September 15 in the Akron area and about other upcoming milestones for Ohio’s center-right movement.

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Back Pay for 29 Workers Recovered from Akron Employer

The U.S. Department of Labor has recovered $67,294 in unpaid wages for 29 workers after Akron, Ohio, based employer McNeil and NRM Inc. failed to pay them for two and a half months this year.

“Workers cannot be expected to bear the burden of the employer’s financial issues which, in this case, left them wondering if or when they would be paid,” Matthew Utley, director of the Wage and Hour Division District in Columbus, said in a statement, adding, “Any worker not getting paid should contact the Wage and Hour Division immediately.”

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