Local
Tuesday, May 26, 2020, 2:00 - 6:00 PM
Protest for Human Rights for Immigrants in the time of Covid-19. Bring your own mask. Some free masks will be provided. Social Distancing rules will be respected. It's time to tell the Governor and the public that the state can no longer neglect the health and human rights of immigrants. America needs us!! Hope to see you there! Location: n front of the Statehouse, Broad and High. Facebook Event.
On May 8th, a seemingly innocuous document showed up on social media entitled “CSI – BIA – Medical Marijuana (Comments Due 5.25.20).” As an “Active Rule Package” submitted by the Pharmacy Board, it referred to “Executive Order 2011-01K and Senate Bill 2 of the 129th General Assembly, which require state agencies, including the State of Ohio Board of Pharmacy, to draft rules in collaboration with stakeholders, assess and justify an adverse impact on the business community (as defined by S.B. 2), and provide an opportunity for the affected public to provide input on the following rules.” OK, sounds meritorious.
The official sounding doc listed eight sections of the Ohio Administrative code to be amended. It made a few semantic modifications, added legal guardians, deleted THC tiers and revised the notorious “90-day supply.” OK, fair enough.
But the devil, as they say, is in the details. Given no more than cursory mention is Section 3796:8-2-03 (Forms and form variations considered attractive to children) where four little words – “cookie, or other confection” – could change everything.
Over the previous five years the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections twice told the ICE-contracted Morrow County Correctional Facility its infectious disease control plan was out of compliance. The jail was cited in 2016 and again 2018.
What’s more, the jail was told to collaborate with its local health authority – the Morrow County Health District – to update and improve the plan. The jail is one of four Ohio jails contracted to hold ICE detainees, and about an hour’s drive north of Columbus.
In November of 2019 after another inspection, the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections (ODRC) finally found the jail’s infectious disease control plan in compliance.
Nevertheless, as of mid-May, every single inmate at the Morrow County Correctional Facility had tested positive for COVID-19, this according to U.S. District Court judge for the Southern District of Ohio Sarah D. Morrison (a Trump appointee), who so far has ordered the release of 15 ICE detainees from the jail after the ACLU sued ICE.
Sunday, May 24, 2020, 7:00 PM. Our Social Safety Net: We are terribly lacking.
Join SPAN Ohio for a webinar with Melinda St. Louis of Public Citizen and Alex Lawson of Social Security Works. Melinda St. Louis is the Director of Public Citizen’s Medicare for All Campaign. For the past 20 years, Melinda has led multiple campaigns that challenge corporate power and promote economic justice and human rights, including fighting Big Pharma greed in global trade agreements. The COVID-19 pandemic has illustrated exactly why health care should not be tied to employment and why a strong system of public health is a necessity for survival. Public Citizen has teamed up with other groups to push the agenda for Medicare for All by getting endorsements from city and county councils.
Thursday, May 21, 2020, 2:00 - 3:15 PM
The General Board of Church and Society of the United Methodist Church invites you to participate in a new webinar series, “COVID-19: Pre-existing Disparities Exposed.” We will hear from experts and learn how to take action for a long-lasting change towards a more just post-COVID-19 world. More information and registration here.
Vegans can live an enjoyable life eating the foods we were raised on in this nonvegan society using the amazing vegan alternatives we have been provided with in the modern, ever-evolving, 100% plant-based marketplace we have today.
Twenty years ago, we ate a more whole foods, an 100% plant-based diet that did not have such remarkable and comparable processed alternatives. While it was, undoubtedly, a much healthier way to eat, it required that we “give up” many of our favorite things and was much more like deprived martyrdom from the nonvegan perspective.
Perhaps this is more convenient and allows us not to feel the selfish notion of being deprived of our favorite and familiar comfort foods, yet that has never really been what veganism was focused on.
Ohio Governor Mike DeWine captured the national spotlight in early March when he issued bold directives that moved the state to the forefront of battling the COVID-19 pandemic. DeWine pushed for Ohioʼs spring primary election to be postponed and changed to mail-in ballots. He banned mass gatherings and ordered the closure of schools, theaters, gyms, bowling alleys, bars, and restaurants.
Ohio #HB242 - a bill to ban local communities from banning single-use plastic) today at #OhioStatehouse.
Testimony by Carolyn Harding:
To Chair Manning, Vice Chair Brenner, Ranking Minority Leader Maharath, and all members of the Local Government, Public Safety and Veterans Affairs Committee.
I’m Carolyn Harding, artist/activist, concerned citizen.
Once again state law makers, you, some of you, are sponsoring law to preempt communities from protecting the health and welfare of their people and environment.
I am aghast that you use Ohioans’ tax money to take away communities’ rights to protect their people and environment, by copying and pasting template preemptive law to ban towns, villages, communities from banning plastic bags and single-use plastic containers.
We all know oil and gas lobbyists are at your doors daily, making sure the Korean and Thai funded #PTTGlobalCracker #PetroChemicalHub and the #AppalachianStorageHub have no local municipalities hindering their potential profits by making #Plastics from #FrackedGas.
A growing number of Ohio employers have discovered a tool to scale back operations while avoiding layoffs: Worksharing. Ohio’s shared work program allows employers to reduce employee hours by up to half. Workers then receive unemployment compensation proportionate to the hours they don’t work. Employees keep their jobs and benefits, employers avoid hiring and training new workers when demand recovers.
The Ohio Department of Job & Family Services (ODJFS) said May 7 that some 511 Ohio employers are participating, covering 24,247 employees. Altogether, ODJFS has approved 827 plans, up from just 67 on March 15. Another 95 plans covering 2,819 employees are pending. An employer may have more than one plan, and cut hours by different amounts in different operations.
“This mini-explosion demonstrates that shared work could be a valuable tool for employers of all kinds,” said Zach Schiller, Policy Matters Ohio research director. “Moreover, it can also be used by employers to bring workers back to work.”