News

On January 29, the Ohio Student Association protested at Senate Bill 1’s first and only proponent testimony hearing, sitting silently for the hearing’s two hour duration carefully reading copies of Senate Bill 1 before marching out with a chant of “Higher ed will be dead.” Student protesters present in the hearing room far outnumbered the proponents.

Nica Delgado, a senior at Kent State, sat front row at the hearing. “We heard a lot of misguided testimony from people who will not be directly affected by this bill, who haven’t been in classrooms since before we were born— and even before my parents were born. These people don’t know what our campuses are actually like. We’re the experts on that, but Cirino won’t listen to us.”

Far west of Columbus past 270, there are homeowners who see drones. In the skies above the prairie, between two massive metro parks, near the Big Darby River, and close to a very guarded scientific research complex that is connected to the Roswell UFO crash. Nearly every night they can be seen. And, in some instances, these drones look to be the size of a small house, they claim.

Not wanting to be identified, these homeowners live in what some describe as “country mansions.” Successful and trustworthy, one of these homeowners is a former Ohio State varsity athlete.

This individual leaves before dawn to workout at a nearby gym. He sent the Free Press the above picture top left. Albeit an obscure image, it was taken in 2023 – and whatever that is – it swooped in over his car while he was driving to his gym. Just last week near the same area he took a video of two drones flying together. Another of his videos shows a drone descending out of the night sky at an alarming speed.

“I keep seeing the same one,” he said. “Perhaps your city lights are too bright to see it.”

This article first appeared in the Scioto Valley Guardian

In what state leaders are hailing as a historic economic win for Ohio, California-based defense technology company Anduril Industries announced its plan to construct a $1 billion facility named Arsenal-1 in Pickaway County. The five-million-square-foot manufacturing site will be located on 500 acres near Rickenbacker International Airport and is expected to create over 4,000 direct jobs by 2035, in addition to thousands of indirect and induced positions. State officials, including Governor Mike DeWine and Lt. Governor Jon Husted, have lauded the project as a game-changer for Ohio’s economy, with DeWine’s office calling it the largest single job creation and payroll project in the state’s history.

Franklin County Commissioner Kevin Boyce gave the first indication and, now, City Council President Shannon Hardin has predictably followed suit. Columbus City Council claims it has its lowest budget in years. Shannon Hardin, Andy Ginther, and our County Commissioners apparently don’t intend to adequately increase funding for homeless programs. NBC4 reported yesterday that City leaders are using depleted American Rescue Plan (ARP) funds as their excuse for not being able to provide sufficient funding to deal with homelessness in Columbus.

Among his many actions on Monday in his first day as U.S. president, Donald Trump ordered a “temporary withdrawal” of any new federal leasing of the Outer Continental Shelf for new offshore wind projects.

As Reuters reported, Trump “suspended new federal offshore wind leasing pending an environmental and economic review, saying windmills are ugly, expensive and harm wildlife. ‘We're not going to do the wind thing. Big, ugly windmills. They ruin your neighborhood,’ he said. Without providing evidence, he said offshore wind projects were behind an increase in whale deaths off the U.S. East Coast in recent years.”

New York State and other states have embraced offshore wind. As its governor, Kathy Hochul, declared in her “State of the State” address a week earlier, “We recommitted to reducing carbon emissions with offshore wind off the coast of Long Island.”

(Espanol abajo)

With bitterly cold temperatures forecasted, Columbus Recreation and Parks will open warming centers at five community centers to give residents a place to keep warm. The following community centers will be open 9 a.m.-9 p.m. Monday, Jan. 20 -  Tuesday, Jan. 21. 

We welcome the news that a ceasefire agreement has apparently been reached between Israel and Palestine in the Gaza Strip. However, we approach this news with caution for a variety of reasons.

This article first appeared on Ohio Capital Journal

Environmental activists have been pressing the company buying an Ohio coal plant said to be the nation’s deadliest to retire the facility. But that seems unlikely, given statements it made in a regulatory filing that it provided to the Ohio Capital Journal.

The buyer, Energy Capital Partners, has boasted of helping plants make the transition away from coal. It hasn’t answered questions about its plans for Gavin, but in a Dec. 11 filing before the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, it expressed no such plans for the Gavin Plant.

“As with any electric generation facility, (Energy Capital Partners) and Javelin expect that the Gavin facility… will continue to operate for so long as they are legally able to do so on an economic basis,” it said.

Last night at 5:49 p.m., the Antrim, Ohio, volunteer fire department chief posted the first of four videos on its Facebook page of a raging fire at a well pad just off State Route 22. 

The location is a 5.7 miles – a seven-minute drive along SR 22 – from the entrance to Salt Fork State Park.

Information soon emerged that the fire was caused by an explosion at the Groh well pad (GIS coordinates 40.110854 N, 81.370555 W), owned by Gulfport Appalachia. Drone footage found one tank had completely collapsed with a second tank breached, the fire chief said.

As flames shot 100 feet into the air, authorities in consultation with Gulfport decided to let the fire burn itself out. SR 22 was closed and would remain closed for several hours.

This article first appeared on the Ohio Capital Journal

Ohio and the United States have a big problem with infant mortality. But the state government can take measures to significantly lessen it, the vast majority of Ohio economists surveyed on the matter said.

When infants die at high rates, it isn’t just a tragedy for them and their families. It also is expensive and it saps economic growth, a group of researchers reported last year in the peer-reviewed Cureus Journal of Medical Science.