Ohio is clawing back money it gave Cleveland to help make homes lead safe.

Because the city moved too slowly to spend it.

Northeast Ohio lawmakers and students are pushing back on immigration enforcement efforts, And Ohio legislators threatened to strip funding from the many public school districts suing the state over its private school voucher program.

Ideas is next.

Hello and welcome to ideas I'm Mike McIntyre.

Thank you for joining us.

Efforts to remediate toxic lead from old Cleveland houses will be even harder.

After the state announced it'll claw back most of a federal grant because Cleveland moved too slowly.

But good news testing shows blood lead levels in Cleveland.

Children is down for the second straight year, when a driver veered around, stopped traffic and threw a crash scene on I-90, striking and killing a responding Cleveland firefighter.

Did the driver commit murder?

The Cuyahoga County prosecutor pressed that case before the Ohio Supreme Court this week.

The Trump administration has ended its immigration enforcement surge in Minneapolis.

Meanwhile, an order allowing Haitians to maintain their temporary protected status will stand while the US government appeals it locally.

Pushed back on immigration enforcement.

Crackdowns include city leaders and high school students, and a key lawmaker has thrown his support behind a bill that would ding public school districts who sued the state over its voucher program by cutting the district's funding.

Joining me for the roundtable from Idea Stream, public media education reporter Connor Morris and Akron Canton reporter Abigail Boat are in Columbus.

Statehouse news bureau chief Karen Kasler.

Let's get ready for a roundtable.

The state of Ohio will claw back more than $3 million from a nearly $5 million grant that it awarded Cleveland for a program meant to help rid old houses of toxic lead.

Abigail.

The bottom line from the state's perspective was that if the city isn't going to spend it quickly enough and it's federal money that could disappear from the state, let's get it to somebody that can get it done.

Yeah, and city officials from Cleveland say it's been really hard to spend the money.

They can only spend $15,000 for new doors and window replacements per house.

Right.

Which they say has made it incredibly difficult to get the money out the door fast enough.

And they also said like $15,000 per house is is not enough to make the house completely safe and lead free.

Some people estimated up to $100,000 for some of the housing stock in Cleveland.

So obviously it's a huge loss to lose any money to chip away at that.

But the city says it's kind of been impossible to get it out fast enough.

Yeah.

Part of the issue here is that the $15,000 is just for windows and doors.

That is one source.

But many of these houses have tons of other problems, so they need to combine other grants.

And they have other money that's coming in and you put all that together.

But then it's a matter of logistics.

Can we get all the grants timed at the same time?

And the requirement of this thing is that when you're done with the windows and doors, you're able to certify that the house is Lead safe.

But it isn't because there's all these other things that need to be done.

Yeah, yeah, it's really tricky.

And the city almost lost $11.9 million last spring in federal grants for lead remediation, but they were granted a reprieve.

And I believe they hired someone to help, kind of coordinate the grant funding to make sure that it's getting out the door fast enough.

So they do have other money.

They have, $10 million from three separate Department of Housing and Urban Development grants to continue remediation efforts.

They say they'll have 90 properties remediated with state funds before they're pulled.

So there is still movement.

This isn't like the end of the road by any means, but it is showing a glaring problem in, you know, tackling this issue.

Yeah, they've got to get their act together for those other grants too, because as you said, it was a reprieve.

It wasn't like, okay, you're fine.

You don't have to meet the requirements.

Right.

And Connor Cleveland says the grant structure to make it difficult to spend the money.

We talked a little bit about that now.

But when you think about all of the alchemy that goes into that, spending $15,000 on doors and windows is nice, but it isn't going to get you there.

Yeah.

If anybody has been to Cleveland in general and you've seen the housing stock, you understand that these houses need a lot of work.

I mean, the porch sagging, you know, roofs are collapsing, you know, and folks just don't have the money to fix these big budget items, you know, in their homes.

And, and the lead can be in every kind of aspect of the home office in the paint of course.

Right.

And, you know, as an education reporter, just a quick note.

I mean, this is partly why there are some, you know, issues with learning in the city.

In general, folks say that.

Yeah.

As we mentioned, the tablets show lead poisoning can lead to problems with learning behavior, etc.. But yeah, I mean, generally speaking, there's there's some blame going around about the city not getting its ducks in a row on this front.

We should also mention on the other side, though, that the lead Safe Cleveland Coalition has allocated about almost $50 million in grants in recent years, roughly almost 500 units remediated as of like late last year.

So there's this has been a multi citywide effort.

There's been a lot of hard work from tons of people in the city to work on this.

And that's why you see these rates declining in recent years.

But still there remains this issue of trying to get all these grants stacked on top of each other and then getting there.

And this has been a long been a problem in the city, and the city has been working on it for a long time and has had many of these types of problems where we get the money, but yet we don't have the inspectors that we're supposed to have, and so then we're getting dinged for that.

And then we didn't do this.

We didn't do that.

The health director who delivered good news and said, listen to what the efforts that we've done so far have borne out is that lead levels in the blood of the children that we're testing is lower.

It's lower for two straight years now, it's lowest it's ever been.

It's still way too high.

And as you mentioned, if you have lead levels, at a certain point you're going to have learning problems and other types of issues, long term health stuff.

But he said even though there has been progress, Cleveland has got to figure this out because that's where the grant money is going to stay, and that's where we're going to continue to make progress, where our children are able to learn and not have these long term health impacts, of course.

And it's not just a Cleveland problem, although it is acute here.

It's large cities across the country, especially just places that have a lot of low income, like just just poor housing stock and folks that can't afford to, to keep up their homes, you know, you know, any place with old houses is going to see this because they used to think it was a great idea to slap lead paint on everything.

Yes, way back in the day.

And it's way underneath all the other latex paint layers that you have today.

Exactly.

Cuyahoga County prosecutors argued before the Ohio Supreme Court Wednesday that a murder conviction is appropriate for the man who struck and killed Cleveland firefighter Johnny Tetrick, as the first responder was responding to an accident on I-90.

And Abigail, the argument in this case comes down to the distinction of what he knowingly did and what he might have recklessly did, and that's where it goes from manslaughter to murder.

Let's talk about that argument.

Sure.

Yeah.

So, yeah, essentially, the appeals court found that Bissell did not know that his actions would lead to Tetrick staff.

And yeah, the argument hinging on the word knowingly.

Prosecutors say there's no way that he couldn't have known that his actions could lead to someone's death, because he was driving through an area that had been blocked off for first responders to deal with this accident.

So he drove around, stopped traffic into a lane that was blocked off, where prosecutors say he should have known there would have been firefighters, paramedics, police officers responding to the scene on foot.

So he should have known that he could have hit somebody.

So that's what prosecutors are saying.

His lawyer says that he thinks he's like, someone died at the end of the day, but he doesn't understand why this wouldn't just be viewed as recklessness, which would be the involuntary manslaughter charge.

So it's a really interesting distinction there.

Between.

Yeah, what someone knows and doesn't know when they're doing a reckless action.

Yeah, I saw the arguments and the defense lawyer.

So this is standard that if unless you are looking at the firefighter and saying, I want to run that person down, that's knowingly I'm running him over or you're being reckless, which is I went around traffic because I was tired of waiting.

And then a guy walked out into the road because he was cleaning up debris and I hit him.

Now, the other thing, the justices were asking about was he didn't stop.

And the lawyer was like, well, there's no evidence that he knew even hit him.

So the question is, is that reckless behavior or knowing behavior?

And this goes a lot.

Well beyond just this one particular incident.

Because if we change the way we define whether you knew someone would die not just being reckless, and that resulted in someone's death, that seems to me to change the legal equation greatly.

Yeah, absolutely.

I think that's a great point.

Yeah.

I mean, I think it would be considered homicide if you took your car and was like, I'm going to hit this person and you went and hit that person, that would be homicide or attempted homicide versus a car accident.

Most of us aren't intending to kill someone when we go out in our cars every day.

But you might act recklessly.

Correct.

It might have been speeding.

It might have.

Yeah.

So, you know, what's the line there?

I mean, it seems pretty egregious to to be speeding through an area that's blocked off for, for first responders to deal with this accident to, to, you know, circumvent all of the hundreds of cars that are stopped and backed up in this situation.

So that's a prosecutor saying there like that action goes over the line of recklessness.

Yeah.

Two more murder.

And the defense says no, that's that's just recklessness.

That's not anything different.

Karen.

When I was watching this hearing, it seemed as though the justices the kinds of questions they ask.

And I know we we do a lot of, extrapolation from that, but it seemed that they were leaning toward Cuyahoga County arguments.

And Chief Justice Sharon Kennedy comes from a law enforcement background.

She and her questions, seemed to to drill down on those points as well.

Yeah.

She said along the lines of he along with 27 other people, should have waited their turn to get into those far right lanes, because there are plenty of cruisers, active red lights creating the scene.

And so, you know, we can't guarantee which way that, the justices are going to roll.

But that's what gives you an indication of the perspective that she came from, at least in terms of the questions you asked.

A federal judge yesterday denied the Trump administration's request to pause a ruling that allows Haitians in the US under temporary protected status to maintain that status.

Thousands of Haitians with such protection.

Live in Springfield.

The administration's appeal continues.

Karen, do we know what the judge said in the ruling against the administration's request?

What specifically?

Yes.

I was listening in on that conversation between the judge and the lawyers.

This was a hearing that was being held in Judge Ana Reyes courtroom, and she did not issue a written opinion.

But she said at the end of the hearing that she was not going to stay her order.

And that order is the order that stops deportations of Haitians who the administration says do not have TPS.

And, it's so it's not an extension of TPS, it's just stopping those folks from being deported.

But it was really an interesting hearing because she doesn't believe that Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem consulted with any federal agencies before deciding to end TPS for Haitians, even though we've heard, President Trump and others say that they supported ending TBS for Haitians.

And, she also made some comments about a database that the government may have does have on people who have TPS in, the Springfield area, who I, you know, they the government does keep those addresses of people on file.

And so she was concerned about what's going to happen with that.

But I think probably the most interesting part of this, other than the decision, was she started talking about the death threats that she's gotten, and she read some of them in court out loud.

I mean, these are profanity filled, horrific things to hear.

I can't imagine getting those in your inbox.

But she said she's she's really she is she welcomes criticism, but that shows that it's gone too far.

We also heard this week the administration say they didn't have any plans for a big crackdown in, in Springfield.

But then again, TPS wasn't removed.

Maybe that plan would happen after after the status is lifted.

Well, again, they they have the addresses of people with TPS.

And so it would be something that could happen because they know where these folks are.

So, that's something that I think, could come up.

She's supposed to rule.

She said she was going to rule sometime next week.

Okay, so we wait to hear from that.

We'll talk about it next week then, for sure.

The Trump administration announced yesterday it was ending its immigration surge in Minneapolis borders.

Our Tom Homan called Operation Metro Surge a success.

Two U.S.

citizens were killed.

Widespread protests gripped the city, but he credited coordination with local law enforcement as a factor in the success of the operation.

Protests continue across the country, Karen, including locally.

Yesterday, students at Cleveland Heights High School staged a long planned walkout to show solidarity with immigration, our immigrant families impacted by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Many of those participating have direct ties to immigrant communities.

We want the schools to be safe spaces.

And in Akron, too, it became the latest to oppose proposed bills in the Ohio legislature that would require local police to help with federal immigration enforcement.

So let's start with Akron.

How, what is Akron doing to oppose this state legislation?

Then Karen can fill us in a little more on the state legislation.

Yeah.

Council passed a resolution opposing a slew of bills.

And, my overview is that the bills would mandate local law enforcement to cooperate with federal authorities on detainer requests, essentially ban sanctuary cities, and allow federal agents to enter hospitals for immigration enforcement.

I remember this was a thing that the the American Civil Liberties Union was calling for.

It's optional for local law enforcement, local sheriff's departments to partner with Ice.

There's nothing that says that they have to, enter into these agreements to either house immigrants or help them detain them, because their job is to enforce, local and state laws.

And this sounds like something Cleveland had done recently as well.

And in neither case have they said, we're going to obstruct ice or we're going to block them.

They're basically just saying we got other stuff to worry about, and it's not our job to do your job.

Correct?

Yeah.

One council member in Akron in particular was like, we are stretched so thin with our policing.

Like we, you know, struggling with hiring.

There's enough violence and things that the police need to be focused on in Akron.

We don't need them focusing on, ICE's job.

We don't we don't need them to be doing that.

So their argument is that this is, an overreach of the state to essentially force local law enforcement to do the federal government's bidding.

And, Karen, what are these lawmakers thinking that the that the local police ought to work as, as crews to help enforce federal and, immigration laws?

Well, it depends on which side of the aisle they're on.

If you've got, Republicans who have introduced a package for bills, which they're calling the cooperation package.

So I think that pretty much says the viewpoint they have.

But then you've got Democrats in the House who have said they'll introduce eight bills to respond to what they feel is aggressive Ice efforts.

So, yeah, it really depends on what side of the aisle you're on, whether you are agreeing with this.

Now, Attorney General Dave Yost has said in the past that, you know, local communities don't get to decide about federal law, that, you know, local communities can't print their own money, for instance.

So, he actually came out in support of the Republican bills.

He actually stood with the sponsor as they were introduced.

Right?

They don't print their own money, but they also don't have to print the money for the government if told to, you know what I mean?

It's like, yeah, the question is, what are you required to do?

And when we hear the term like somebody is a sanctuary city, it's really a label that's put on whether you're cooperative or not or cooperative enough or not.

Right.

And you know, there's been bills there was a bill that passed, I think, earlier this year or last year that specifically went after sanctuary cities.

Now, Ohio doesn't have any official sanctuary cities, but some municipalities have passed ordinances saying that they will not cooperate with federal Ice enforcement and that sort of thing.

The College of Worcester is cutting staff in response to shrinking enrollment.

you write this story about Worcester, and it seemed to take off like people were really keyed into 22 people losing jobs at Worcester.

Yeah.

Tell me, tell me why the reaction you think has been, so acute.

Yeah, it's a good question.

I think that these small colleges are super important to their communities, and these are the schools that kind of have tighter margins in some regard, because their populations are small and kind of meant to be smaller.

So, you know, about 15 years ago they had 2000 students.

Now it's down to like 1600 or a little less.

And, you know, that is a big impact on an institution.

However, as we do these stories and we peel back the layers, we always learn that it's not just about enrollment and budget.

As we're talking to people on campus, they're saying, well, actually, there's been a lot of turnover on campus.

We've had like five different presidents over the last 15 years or so.

And so there is some of that going on where folks are like, well, actually, I think there have been some unwise short term not looking at long term decisions made.

And also these are folks that, you know, the staff really isn't that large to begin with.

They're at these small colleges, you know, so the university, for their part, or maybe the college for their part, says a lot of these were these were all administrative positions.

These were a lot of these were non student facing.

But then you talk to students and they say actually you know we need these people.

Yeah.

They were at the writing center.

All of these folks kind of touched our lives individually.

And you know it feels like a big loss to them.

It's interesting, too, that the, I heard one of the faculty members, you talked to say while it wasn't faculty that's losing their jobs, we weren't consulted on this.

Like, this is just like a sudden decision.

22 people are gone, and maybe we could have had a better process.

Yeah.

They said that the the professor that I spoke to said that there is a structure a lot of these colleges have like administrator and faculty structures where like advisory committees where they're like, well, we generally are pulled in to be consulted on big decisions at the college.

And they say that did not happen here.

So that led to a sense of feeling blindsided here, by it, by these folks on campus.

And, just a quick shout out.

I did go to high school in Worcester.

So I was as I was interviewing folks for this story, I was trying to oh, you know, you went to high school with my kid.

You know, I so I was kind of running into folks.

Northeast Iowa is a very, very small place.

More than half of the public school districts in Ohio, part of a coalition called Vouchers Hurt Ohio, are suing the state over how it funds schools.

A new bill would punish those districts by yanking their funding.

How would this work if a school district says, listen, I don't want you to take my, funding and give it to kids to take with them to private school, because it's really going to hurt public education.

And then the state says, well, we're going to double down.

Well, what happens here is, is this bill would allow the Department of Education and workforce to withhold state foundation funding.

Funding for any school district that is part of a legal action over their state funding.

And, you know, Senator Serino told me earlier this week that he thinks it's a good idea because legislators have the power of the purse.

He thinks it's bad for districts to be using the state's money, money the state sends to them to sue the state over that.

And, he says he's not sure it's constitutional.

He's not a lawyer, so he's not sure it's constitutional, but he thinks it's the right thing to do.

The schools, on the other hand, and again, more than half of the state school districts, 320 districts are suing the state over this.

And they say that this is a bill designed to intimidate them, designed to get them to drop that lawsuit over vouchers.

And they specifically shout it out.

My interview with Serino at the Press conference, saying that it's lawlessness to say that a bill might not be constitutional, but we're going to do it anyway, right?

They're calling it bullying and obviously, yeah, trying to coerce them.

Where does the lawsuit right now stand?

The lawsuit is in the 10th District Court of Appeals after a Franklin County judge ruled that the system of the voucher system is unconstitutional, but she allowed everything to continue while the case goes forward.

And this is specifically about the Ed choice and Ed Choice expansion, those vouchers.

And, it's certainly going to go to the Ohio Supreme Court.

There's there's just no question here.

Kent State University is mourning the loss of Professor Emeritus Jerry Lewis, who witnessed the May 4th, 1970 shooting of students by the Ohio National Guard and spent his life researching the incident and assuring the students were remembered.

In a prepared statement, Kent State President Todd Deacon described Lewis as a living trustee of history and the search for truth and meaning.

He was 88 years old and I just wanted to acknowledge his passing and what a leader he was.

In fact, I saw him.

He led the first candlelight march the year after the shooting.

You know, hundreds of students that were walking and, to commit to one of the parents of the students and say, I'll never let them forget.

And then to follow through on it till he's 88, somebody else will have to pick up that torch.

Now.

He was an amazing man.

I luckily got to hear him.

He came and spoke, spoke to one of our classes.

And he was so young when that happened to witness such, I think it was like 35, 36 years old.

Yeah.

Yeah, he was just that fresh, fresh into being a college professor.

And Kent really went through a tough history of kind of trying to separate itself from that tragedy.

And it's really his doing.

And, and the students that, you know, now, now this is a university run event, the candlelight vigil, like, he really worked with the students to find how they could mourn and how they could commemorate.

And, yeah, it's been more than 50 years.

And, and it's very sad.

He was he was a wonderful person.

And also very, he, he studied this.

He did a lot of stuff with this.

He was also like very well respected and published in his original field.

Right.

So just just an incredible person.

I'm very sad that he passed.

And we'll be talking to people today.

I think it's going to be you, Connor, actually, to be able to put together a story of with what folks have said about his influence and impact.

Yeah, yeah, I've already been talking to folks there was and can forever chicken for, you know, it'll be a good story, I think.

The long stretch of days at or below freezing ended this week, when temperatures soared to 50 or more across northeast Ohio.

But it is northeast Ohio.

Wait five minutes and yep, the cold was back.

and all the freeze thaw freeze cycles are taking a toll, especially on water mains and pipes.

It sounded like meteors crashing on my roof earlier this week, when there was enough melt that these ice dams and icicles started crashing off of the roof.

So have you been hearing that kind of stuff, too?

Oh, yeah.

And there's water leaking through my window.

Oh, no, that's not good.

Oh, well, at least it's just the, It's just a window.

Yeah.

One big pipe break impacted Cleveland Clinic, Akron general medical center.

Abigail.

How to do that?

Yeah, it happened last Saturday.

It caused canceled appointments.

They had to divert ambulances.

People couldn't visit.

It was a 12 inch pipe near the emergency departments interest entrance that burst in the early morning, and it flooded the entire first floor.

I don't know if anyone saw those videos on social media.

Just like water pouring into the stairwell like it was.

It was crazy.

So they, you know, we're able to resume ambulances and and visitation after that this week.

So it was, just kind of a crazy accident there.

I have some friends that, go out to the Lake Erie Islands, and they've been showing me videos of them walking all around there.

And other folks, they're taking snowmobiles and even little, little vehicles and driving across.

And I remember back in the day, the word was you'd mark with Christmas trees after Christmas, the path that you could drive to Put-In-Bay or to, Kelleys Island.

That was way in the past, but it seems like we had that kind of winter again.

Connor, I have one question.

First of all, would you go for a long walk out deep into Lake?

Not with, this 80 mile long crowd that's like, you know, going across.

It's too scary for me, man.

I mean, it does look very solid, but, you know, this this crack that you can see from space.

I mean, my my creative mind is my imagination is really running wild.

It's like there's this dark beast trying to rise up from the lake that are going to, you know, explode outward.

They drive vehicles on the frozen lake.

Yeah.

So now it's like there were, like, little four Wheeler things, but back in the day, you'd get into the family trucks there and drive over to to the island.

That's horrifying.

I feel like all the way across to Canada, you are one movie of someone like falling into a pond or a river, thinking it was frozen.

And I feel like I was scarred for life.

Like, I don't know how everyone else isn't scarred for life.

Herman, our man Richard Cunningham did a story this week and you can see his real on Instagram too.

You can follow us there.

At I do stream public media, but he went walking out there and he said it was weird.

He almost slipped.

He said, A little slippery out here, but.

Yeah, but, it was just kind of a weird experience.

And I have friends that live on the Gold Coast in Lakewood who look right out and see people, you know, way out there walking on the water.

But, for me right now, there's a big crack.

So maybe it's time to end.

It's getting a little warmer.

So let's bring ourselves in closer to the shore.

Never do that.

And not only will we see a little bit of warrants coming our way, but days are going to start getting longer, too.

Starting Sunday, it's the first day that we're going to have a sunset at 6:00 or later.

Since November.

It's been so brutal and with the snow being so tall, it gets important for me to leave the house and no one has shoveled any of the dry, any of the sidewalks near my house, so I've been feeling very cooped up.

I can't go on a walk.

The snow is up to my knees.

I know one.

You mean yourself too?

Well, I live in an apartment, and it's on the other side of the street.

And also the.

Yeah, the lake, the hiking bike trails haven't been haven't been shoveled anyway, so I've been feeling very cooped up, so I'm happy the snow is melting.

I'm happy to see some sun.

I'm happy for spring to come.

Monday on The Sound of Ideas on 89 seven KSU the team is off for the Presidents Day holiday, but we've got a great replacement planned.

LeVar Burton will host an NPR special celebrating the life and legacy of author James Baldwin.

I'm Mike McIntyre.

Thank you so much for watching and stay safe.