Historic Train Restoration and Girls Football

This episode is brought to you by Google Chrome. You think you know a browser, but Gemini and Chrome, that's new. They can help you with practically anything on the web, like restoring a vintage motorcycle from a fifty page restoration block, or finally break down that long article you've had opened for weeks. Gemini and Chrome is here for it. Ready to make anything online makes sense? There's no place like Chrome. Check responses set up required compatibility and availability varies eighteen plus . Sometimes I just don't understand Mike DeWine. He pulled out his Vito pen very late last night to do something dramatic. Why wouldn't you do that when everybody's paying attention? We're paying attention. It's first up on today in Ohio. It's the news discussion podcast from cleveland. com and the Plain Dealer. I'm Chris Quinn here with Lisa Garvin, Courtney Astoffee and Laura Johnston, and Lisa , Mike DeWine did wield the Vito pen in a very good way, brushing back the rushed legislation by lawmakers that are pandering to nonsense. What did he do? So late last night, DeW ine vetoed House Bill four hundred and seventy two, which would have required a photo ID for people who vote by mail or absentee voting. He said that it wouldn't discourage fraud, it doesn't add security, and it creates an added significant burden for male in voters . He says it's really all burdened for so little benefit. And this does not, by the way, affect a November ballot question that would require a photo ID for in person voting . We talked about this when they passed it and how onerous it was going to be on senior citizens. There's a whole lot of people who are pretty aged and frail and they love mail in voting because it's hard for them to get to the polls and to navigate schools and things like that . And there's no fraud there. There never was. There isn't there, won't be . And yet they put this in because they're pandering to Donald Trump and his SAVE Act and oh my gosh, we have to have photo ID's it was a solution in search of a problem I.' Andm really impressed that Mike DeWine slapped it down. He said, We have really good voting. We don't have a problem and we always know who wins on election night . Why mess with it? Exactly. And you know, when he signed the in person voter ID law a couple years ago, he warned lawmakers then he says, I'm sorry, this matter is settled. I don't expect to see any changes in Ohio voting procedures from now on. Yeah, our legislature is so out of touch with the people and they keep doing things like this. And I'm just impressed that he did. He vetoed something else we'll talk about tomorrow having to do with the submetering, but I don't know why he didn't do it in the daytime. He should get a lot of attention for this and it rolls across after nine . What are you thinking governor? You're listening to today in Ohio . The problem with being the company that funded the biggest bribery case in Ohio history is that no one believes you say or has the least bit of sympathy for you pretty much ever again . Is it possible, Courtney, that those s entiments were in play when the public utilities folks rejected First Energy's request for more time to fix power outages? Well, we all kind of know First Energy's reputation in our state's downright radioactive. I've got to think that matters whenever the company asks folks to take its word on something, but in this case the Puko kept the focus focus on service. They decide a customer shouldn't have to accept longer and more frequent outages because First Energy has struggled to meet the reliability standards that are already on the books. For CEI customers, First Energy wanted to increase the average reconnection time during power outages from one hundred and thirty five minutes to one hundred and fifty minutes. Ohio Edison Toledo Edison also sought more time, but Puku on Wednesday said no, no, thank you. First Energy was arguing that reliability has worsened because you know, despite their investments in the grid, they pointed to things like heavier rainfall, aging infrastructure, and trees falling outside their designated trimming zones , but we heard a whole bunch of backlash on that kind of argument. Customers, consumer advocates, local governments, and elected officials push back here. We even heard from Cleveland, Lakewood, and Barberton. They all oppose this request and they said many outages in their borders stem from equipment failures and other issues that are within the company's control here . And consumer advocates argue that customers have already pumped more than a billion dollars into reliability improvements and shouldn't get weaker standards in return . Like anybody who listens to this podcast knows what a low opinion we have of first energy. They are just one of the scummiest companies out there. I can't believe Crane's Cleveland Business is hosting a forum to help them rebuild their reputation at the Union club. What are they thinking? I wish they'd be disbanded and we'd get a new company that would have a greater level of responsibility . That said, though, when we first talked about this, I actually think they deserve approval on this because climate change, as we've talked about repeatedly, has created far more intense storms, and it does create more outages. I think there should have been kind of a partnering of okay, we'll give you more time, but we want to see the money you're investing to fortify the system at the same time. I don't think a utility can stave off big outages anymore. We're getting incredibly powerful storms that tear apart power lines and all of our power lines for the most part are above ground . You know, if you look at Lakewood's arguments here, I'd like to zoom in on what that city was saying. It told Puko that thirty three of its first energy outages came from line failures, equipment failures, or human error by the company. So they're pinning a lot of these back directly on things that are in first energy's control . And Lakewood also told us another twelve of their outages were due to trees that were within the company's maintenance fear that the company was to keep trims. So the cities are saying a lot of this does fall on first energy . I agree. Look, they after the big outage, what year was that? When the whole half the country went dark, was that twenty ten ? I don't know. No, no, it was way before that. It's like zero three or four. Okay . You saw first energy out trimming trees regularly after that. I hardly ever see 'em now. I mean, and I've got power lines in my neighborhood where there are trees in them, in a big way again. And I haven't seen them in a long time whereas they had been regular after that outage. So I agree with everything Lakewood and the others say , but I also think you have to acknowledge we are dealing with a very different storm situation . We talk about it all the time. I mean, we get multiple times a year the kind of storm that when we were kids, we might see every four or five years . And how as a utility can you meet these deadlines that were set in a day when you did not have that? You know, on First Energies , you know, side of this , they are they are accepting this response. They don't really have a choice here, but they said they'll, you know, keep going under the existing standard . Yes, they have to. And I look, I'm glad the PUCO stands up to First Energy once in a while since they were so corrupted by First Energy for those years . But I do think we need to be reasonable when we're dealing with things like this . You're listening to today in Ohio . State Senator Jerry Sereno, as we all know, was the author of infamous SP one , which we have described as an effort to turn Ohio colleges into right wing training centers . His claim is he wants to stamp out wokeness . Whatever , what nonsense was he pedaling this week, Laura as so called proof of the bill's success and what do the people actually in higher education say the real impact has been basically his proof is that this is a success is that what people feared , he says has not come to pass. However, I think that's pretty hard to judge when it's been one year. It's not like you're just gonna transfer out of your university because of this happening. But there was a ninety five point seven percent faculty retention rate in twenty twenty five, twenty twenty six at Ohio Universities. That was a little higher than previous years. Like in twenty twenty two, it was ninety three point seven percent. Student enrollment is up about six percent in the past year. Not statistically significant , but Serena said, hey, universities are complying with the law. There's been some resistance to ending programs that promote DEI . It is a little wait wait wait though. Let's go back to the numbers. Okay . It is patently ridiculous to look at the numbers of the most recent school year and say it's proof there's been no damage as you know you have a high school student, you start planning where you're going to go to college years before you get there. So the kids that enrolled last year had been in the pipeline for the longest time . This law went into effect last year. That wouldn't have affected the pipeline going into last year. It's utter nonsense to trot that out. What it tells me is he knows he's in trouble. He knows he's done damage and he's falsely trying to say there's no problem here. Somebody who's confident of law wouldn't need to come out with nonsense like this to say it's proof. They would just let things ride. The fact that he's coming out with this, he's blinking because this is going to harm the colleges in Ohio. What do the people who work in them say? Well, they're saying this is not this is not good. They're looking at places where kids are already feeling like they don't have free speech. Cleveland State students said in a lawsuit over the loss of their radio station that that was because of SB one. At Ohio State University, they can't chalk anymore or write their opin ions on campus sidewalks. This is college. This is when you're experimenting with your opinion and you're thinking big and you have passionate ideas and they're being silenced, which is really concerning to me as a parent and a human being . And it's the American Association of University Professors that are really worried because they're saying this is not even the furthest he's going to go, that there's going to be more to combat the anti woke dogma. And these civics centers that he's created at five Ohio universities, including my alma mater of Miami , are going to be kind of siloed away from the rest of the campus and allow ed to keep their own budgets. And I mean, it feels like they're elevating anti democracy ideas above everything else at the college. I know. Look, I've been reading a bunch of stuff about the free speech in America for a column I'm writing for the two hundred fiftieth birthday. And it's hilarious because he is President Adams, right? He wants the Alien Sedition Act to shut everybody up. No criticism, no free speech. He wants to stifle free speech on the campus . And what we need is all of the Madisons to step up and say, What are you doing? Everybody in America has the absolute right to speak their mind. He's trying to swelch it and it's working. He is standing against the very principles we should all be celebrating as we head into next weekend . Absolutely. And the fact that he had this press conference, I thought was weird. Who has a one year anniversary press conference of their bill? Like we don't talk about every other bill that gets passed one year later, what are the statistics? I think he felt so beat down. You're right. He had to be like, look, look, puff up is just, it's working. But I don't think that's any proof. And what's really bringing attention to this, thank fully, thanks to the American Association of Prof essors, is showing how much this is emboldening them to crack down more on free speech and try to this whole anti wokeness is just ridiculous. It's basically saying we don't actually want you to be awake to the problems of this country. Yeah. It is such an anti American bill that he put in. And again, it's a sign of weakness. He knows that this is problematic and he's trying to hide it. He should just keep his mouth shut. If he's confident of it, he doesn't need to have a press conference. You're listening to today in Ohio. Well, Lisa, speaking of Serena, what does this man of the people now suggest to limit the ability of Ohioans to change state laws through their own initiatives to get around the lawmakers like Sereno . Yeah, so currently, Ohio law has no deadline limits for groups to gather signatures for ballot initiatives. But Senator Sarino says lawmakers should really talk about changing that. There's no bill or anything and there's really no discussion. He just wants to get sow the idea . But he says, maybe we should limit the process to eighteen months, one year or whatever to qualify for the ballot. And many groups do take a year or more to gather the needed signatures and those that are looking , you know, those that are thought they were going to be on the November ballot this year didn't have enough time and didn't get enough signatures. So they're pushing it to twenty twenty seven. And that includes Conserve, Ohio, which is pushing a constitutional amendment that target s data centers. They say they'll continue gathering their signatures and also an effort to abolish property taxes. They're also looking to twenty twenty seven as well. But if Serena puts limits on that, it may mean that if they don't make it, you know, in a certain time, then they're going to have to start all over again Again, this is so interesting to talk about as we come into our two hundred fiftieth birthday because what makes American government so unique and worth celebrating is the power is in the people . There's no sovereign . There is no power . It is us. And here's this guy who's elected trying to squelch that power because he doesn't want people to voice what they want from their government. It's an unbelievable anti American stance that he's taken in both of these cases as he holds himself out as this leader of the people . Well, and you know , of course, they're dividing us along political lines. And this is just another way using terms like anti woke to get people divided when really we're not that far apart when it comes to our right to, you know, to put things on the Constitution . Yeah. It's just amazing how hard he wants to be the Lord and Master, how hard he's working to stop the people from having their say. Everything we're talking about today, the idiotic photo ID that DeWine rightfully ve toed. All of it is meant to take the power from the people and our government is completely based on the people having the power . You're listening to today in Ohio, one more on Serena. Constituents in two counties he represents are having very different experiences with a new state law that he backed, that could give people tax breaks at the expense of public schools Courtney, this is one of those the laws they put in that we said were phony. They weren't really property tax relief. It was just another way to stick it to public schools. How are Lake and Joga County dealing with this so differently? Well, let's look at both counties because both are Republican leaning. Giaga, I'd say, is deeper red than lake. But on this issue, it's Giaga that twice rejected these so called piggyback tax breaks. One applies to low income seni ors and those with disabilities. The other one applies to owner occupants. And let's zoom in first on Giaga. That county's twice rejected both of them. And just commissioners this week kind of doubled down on that decision and carried it forward into next year. They say the cost to schools and other local agencies is too high because while taxpayers get money back in their pocket, that means schools and other local agencies like mental health boards and things like that don't get that revenue anymore. But if you look in lighter red Lake County, commissioners approved both of the piggybacks piggyback credits last year , and it's up for a vote again today . By the time, you know, folks are listening to this, we could have a decision out of Lake County Commissioners this morning as to whether they're going to carry both credits forward again into next year . But in the meantime, we've got public school advocates rallying outside the commissioner's headquarters this morning pushing them to drop one of these tax break s. They're cool with the one with for low income seniors, but they want to end that broader break for owner occupied homes. And there's a lot of money left in play here. In Giaga County, you know, our estimates are about seven million dollars a year that would be the cost to schools and local governments had they moved forward with this. In Lake County, the numbers are bigger. The two credits out there have docked local tax collections by about fourteen million a year and that includes more than nine million from Lake County schools. This law was a shameful, shameful move by the legislature to force local governments to basically split the baby . Instead of providing funds to help out in this situation, they just shifted the burden over to counties and said, Well, you want to give them tax breaks go ahead, but you're sticking it to the schools. And if you don't give them tax breaks, it's your fault. Haha ha, we've washed our hands of it. And I'll say again, what I said yesterday, when you see these folks out campaigning over the next few months, get in their face. Ask them why they did that and why they're not in support of public schools . Yeah, I mean, we've seen a hard line here from Giaga County's commissioners. Ralph Spitalieri, one of the three commissioners out there , said, you know, this is a hard no for our community . There's been lots of school advocates going to commissioners out there saying, whoa, whoa, whoa, we can't do this. And the commissioners are listening. Lake County, it's a bit of a different story and that the schools are vociferously pushing back on this . Menor schools are in such a budget crunch that they're now seeking their third levy after two failed . They're joining the vouchers lawsuit and Serena's daughter is on their school board. All right, you're listening to today in Ohio . Before city council rolled them back, Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibbs new parking rates and rules were gener ating some heavy revenue. Lisa Just how heavy It was a parking bonanza for the first four months of this year after they instituted higher parking rates. The city of Cleveland took over one point one million dollars in parking fees. That's almost four times more than the three hundred twelve thousand collected for the same period last year. So, you know, the rates did rise from a dollar to a dollar fifty cents hour downtown up to four hundred fifty an hour for longer stays, no free parking after six PM. This big jump was not unexpected. Citations were also way up. They went from two hundred fifty one thousand last year to four hundred fifty eight thousand this year. And a mayor spokeswoman Sarah Johnson says the revenue is really just part of the story. They're seeing more turnover in high demand areas downtown. They feel like this is a more balanced and respons ive system , but city council didn't like it. They voted thirteen to two to limit the mayor's ability to earn more parking revenue after they say there was an uproar for constituents Councilman Kevin Bishop says downtown's becoming a gated community. Blaine Griffin says the goal is not to make the goal is not to make a profit. Cheaper parking is better for residents. So council changed it. They made Sunday free again, they lowered it back to a dollar an hour, and they made weekends and after eight PM free again There's such dinosaurs on the council. They just do not have the bold vision. It's what always holds us back. It's another argument for having at large council members instead of just all these word based folks that are so myopic . Justin Busney, only elected official in Cleveland that has to look at the whole city. We ought to have three or four more people on council that have the whole city in their scope . So we stop this kind of small minded idiotic thinking that we get in cases like this. Bib did the right thing. He did the bold thing. Absolutely. And yeah, and these guys slap him down. And a million dollars is nothing to sneeze at. I mean, it's like you're really gonna turn down money. Oh, but our constituents are mad and it's like have ever gone to a city like Boston and tried to park there, I mean, come on. Right. And it is working. People can find parking. If there, if you want people to come downtown, you want them to be able to find parking, this has created the churn. I so agree with you guys here. I hate paying for parking, but it's only fair. If I can afford a seasons ticket to Broadway at Playhouse Square, I can pay six dollars for parking and now that I have to do that, I can park a whole lot closer. Right. Look, Bib did the right thing. Bib came into office. I'm the bold modern thinker, but he's dealing with just dinosaurs that are so small minded that it's painful. We need a charter change to put to put some and you know, the other thing is if you had at large council members you'd start to build the bench of future mayors people that would have a stepping stone up. A little more ambition and wider view . Yeah it would help. You're listening to today in Ohio. The Cleveland Clinic is making a significant effort to help the greater Cleveland Food Bank reach more people, Lara, what is it? This is a twenty five million dollars pledge to the Food Bank and to build a new community resource center on the west side. There's already one on the east side . So five million dollars of that is for the Resource Center built on Lorraine Avenue. It'll open in early twenty twenty seven. It'll have a healthy choice food market, and it'll connect residents to benefits, housing, employment, healthcare, and education services because these things do not exist in a vacuum. So it's kind of a one stop shop to get a lot of help. And the bulk of this is going to go to buying food and giving it away for free through the network of more than a thousand partner programs. Think about that. That's like twenty million dollars worth of food and they'll address childhood hunger, which is huge. And we know that while the really grew during the pandemic, it hasn't gone back down because of all of the changes to SNAP and all of the national programs that have been cut under Trump. Yeah , it's one of those where you wish this weren't necessary . This is a sign of distress. And I salute the clinic for helping out. It's not just here, they're helping out in several cities. But what is wrong with us that we have to we've talked about so many programs like this in the past couple of years , what happened to our humane treatment of people where the government did its thing? We're too busy giving a billion dollars to people who fought the government. You know what I mean? It's this is so shows our screwed up priorities in this country. And I'm glad the clinic is stepping up. We are pretty hard on the clinic sometimes about how they treat their neighborhoods around it. I mean, they are a world class facility, but they are kind of this white box right in the middle of the city. And so I give them credit for doing this. They're going to have teaching kitchens and pediatric meal programs and food vouchers and grocery delivery services and very important things . But this is why we have a government . Like I just don't understand why we don't think this is the government's responsibility . All right, you're listening to today in Ohio. Courtney has Brook Park done what it needs to help the Browns build their new stadium in the city Not quite, but we're getting down that path a little bit more. So Brook Park City Council this week took the first step towards creating that public entity that would technically own the new Brown Stadium and then that entity would lease it back to the team. Council voted unanimously Tuesday to approve what's, you know, the first of two pieces of legislation to get this done. Once it's created, it be called the Brook Park New Community Authority . And we're pretty much expecting final approval to come on july fifteent after a public hearing is held that same night . But even as we get deeper into this, some of the most important questions for taxpayers are still unanswered. Brook Park is not addressing them at all yet. So it's not yet clear who's going to pay for maintenance and capital repairs at the stadium , whether or how much taxpayers would really be exposed here and whether Brook Park is definitely going along with the Browns pref'erred plan to help finance construction using city admissions taxes and income taxes generated on the site. Now mayor Edward Orcut , you know, has said those details will be made public before a separate development agreement is approved. But I imagine on the taxpayer side of things, knowing sooner rather than later is probably a good thing . Yeah, I think ultimately this city is going to make Alec a bandit from the money that results from this. But in these early days, they've got to get everything right . Yan, we heard from Councilman Thomas Dufour. He said he was comfy voting on this Tuesday because this is really a procedural step. It's not that final vote coming in a couple weeks , but I don't know if we'll necessarily have those details by then either. All right, you're listening to today in Ohio. I might have to create a beat for covering historic trains given, how well these stories do on our site, Ryan Kohick's story on this next one is already riding high in our charts . So Lisa, we do have another historic train to talk about just weeks after the visit of Big Boy , which train will be fired up for the first time in almost two decades this weekend . It's called the American Freedom two hundred and fifty, and they're going to put it under steam after an eleven year restoration . That's going to happen this Saturday at Midwest Railway Preservation Society, which is twenty eight hundred West third Street. As you said, it's been twenty years since it's been put under steam in public. There's going to be a festival around this from eleven to four. You can tour the cab of American Freedom two hundred and fifty, you could blow the whistle, which would be totally cool. And then you can explore the historic Baltimore and Ohio Railroad roundhouse, which is still in use and it's been in use since nineteen oh seven. So the American Freedom Train two hundred and fifty was built in nineteen forty five in Reading Pennsylvania. It's one hundred ten feet long. It was designed for freight hauling up to sixty five miles an hour, but it later pulled passenger cars before it was put in storage. It was moved here to Cleveland in twenty fifteen from Washington and over twenty six thousand hours by restoration workers. Yeah, that's one of those towns in Pennsylvania that does not get pronounced the way it sounds. It's reading believe it or not. Yeah. Anyway, you gonna go see it? I well, I don't know. I mean, I got a lot of things going on on Saturday. I'd like to, though, but I'm certainly going to catch don't forget Big Boy is going to come back through going westbound this time. And I believe july thirteenth, it's going to stop in Rocky River. So just a few weeks right in Laaur's backyard . Hope be there . You're listening to today in Ohio . All right, Lara, how popular was flag football in the most recent season in high schools ? This is big. one hundred six andty two schools participated in this flag football. This was a spring sport for girls in high school. Nordonia won the state championship. This was the first OHSA recognized champion for the sport , but now it's going to be totally official starting next season. They're going to it's just going to be like regular football. This is just all going to go through the OHSA and girls will have another chance to play a varsity sport , which is I don't love that the NFL is the one that push this because you know they see dollar figures for more fans, especially for the female side , but anything that gives kids more opportunities to participate in athletics I am all for. Well, it's a form of football that doesn't cause head injuries. Yeah . So that's the wonder of it. It's it's great for that. I'm just amazed at how many people want to play it. Yeah, actually I know a couple middle school girls because my daughter is going to eighth grade who are really into this and good for them. I mean I only we used to call it powder puff when I was in high school. There'd be like one game in the fall. It was like a fundraiser for class council and it was every grade would play each other the freshman against the sophomores and but hey this is cool and if it's in high school you think it's going to start earlier too. There's going to be youth programs because already the boys have flag football but that turns into tackle pretty quickly. So maybe we could have coed flag football all the kids who like to play but their parents don't want them to have head injuries will have an opportunity . Why do you think though a girl would play this instead of soccer? Well soccer is a false sport. You can play both . Oh, okay. Well, there you go . You're listening to today and that's it for the Thursday epis ode. Thanks Lisa. Thanks Courtney. Thanks Laura. Thank you for being here. We'll return Friday to wrap up the week of news.