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Ohio

Corporate Cash Derails Train Safety Bill

August 15, 2023 Matthew Cunningham-Cook, The Lever. , , , ,
The company that manufactured the toxic chemicals that were released and incinerated in the wake of the East Palestine, Ohio, train derailment this winter gave $2 million to the primary Senate GOP super PAC as bipartisan rail safety legislation stalled in Congress. The manufacturer, Occidental Petroleum, has been lobbying on rail and tank car safety, and its lobbying group, the American Chemistry Council — which also donated $250,000 to the main House GOP super PAC — had pushed for changes weakening the bill in committee. The railroad legislation, introduced in the immediate aftermath of the East Palestine disaster, was once seen as the first real shot at imposing new regulations on the railroad industry in years.

Doctors Emerge As Political Force In Battle Over Abortion Laws

August 1, 2023 Cassandra Jaramillo, Pro Publica. , , ,
In her eight years as a pediatrician, Dr. Lauren Beene had always stayed out of politics. What happened at the Statehouse had little to do with the children she treated in her Cleveland practice. But after the Supreme Court struck down abortion protections, that all changed. The first Monday after the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization ruling was emotional. Beene fielded a call from the mother of a 13-year-old patient. The mother was worried her child might need birth control in case she was the victim of a sexual assault. Beene also talked to a 16-year-old patient unsure about whether to continue her pregnancy. Time wasn’t on her side, Beene told the girl.

Activists Rally For East Palestine Residents To Get Free Health Care

July 23, 2023 Mike Valente, WTAE. , , ,
Joy Marie Mann was not expecting a large crowd Friday night, but she was heartened that some of her close friends and fellow activists traveled from across the country to meet ahead of a health care rally in Ohio. "They're just very passionate people who are just very caring and support nationally improved 'Medicare for All' and believe in human rights," said Marie Mann, a health care activist from Harrisburg. In between interviews, speeches and a short candlelight vigil, Mann and the other activists at Schenley Park spoke to each other about their plans to attend a "Medicare for All" rally in Lisbon, Ohio.

What Ohio’s Co-Op Evangelists Learned From Spain’s Union Co-Op Network

June 21, 2023 Cinnamon Janzer, Next City. , , ,
For his 91st birthday three years ago, Bob Moore, the namesake behind the ubiquitous Bob’s Red Mill Natural Foods brand, surprised his employees during a celebration of his 91st birthday. He unveiled an Employee Stock Ownership Plan that, as of April that year, turned his roughly 600 employees into co-op owners of a company that generated more than $50 million in annual sales in 2018. While Bob’s Red Mill might be one of the most high-profile examples of an employee-owned business in the U.S., it’s far from the only one—especially in Ohio. For more than a decade, Co-op Cincy has been working to both create new cooperatively-owned businesses and help current businesses transition to co-op models across the greater Cincinnati area.

Six Weeks In, Stock Dwindles At Struck Ohio Battery Plant

June 13, 2023 Courtney Smith, Labor Notes. , , ,
Four hundred auto workers have been on strike at vehicle battery manufacturer Clarios since May 8, rejecting two tentative agreements that fell short of their demands. “We’re not asking for the moon, we just want it to be a good place to work,” said Andrew Hoertz, a machine operator, citing the company’s decision to cut the piece rates—the incentives workers get paid per battery produced. The company has pulled out all the stops to prevent any hit to battery production, from stockpiling batteries to weaken workers’ leverage at the negotiating table to shifting production out of this plant, which is near Toledo, Ohio.

Norfolk Southern Won’t Clean Up Their Mess Unless We Make Them

May 31, 2023 Maximillian Alvarez, In These Times. , , , , ,
It’s been over 100 days since the catastrophic derailment of a Norfolk Southern train carrying over 100,000 gallons of toxic materials occurred in East Palestine, Ohio, on Feb 3. Since then, residents of East Palestine and the surrounding area in Ohio and Pennsylvania have had their lives turned completely upside down. Entire families have been uprooted from their homes, with many having to live in hotels or wherever they can find shelter, unable to return home out of fear of exposure to chemicals that were spilled into the water and soil from the derailment and spewed into the air from Norfolk Southern’s ​“controlled burn” of the vinyl chloride contained within multiple derailed train cars.

Former Dumping Ground Became A Flourishing Food Ecosystem

May 8, 2023 Emily Nonko, Next City. , , ,
Cleveland, Ohio - On a dead-end street in Cleveland’s Kinsman neighborhood, on 18 acres of land that previously served as an illegal dumping ground, an entire food ecosystem has emerged and thrived under the leadership of local residents. Rid-All Green Partnership started with a single hoop house erected in February of 2011; now acres of farmland support a community kitchen and farmer’s market. All food waste is turned into compost, which supports the farm and is sold across Cleveland. A training program and paid apprenticeships bring community members in, while an aquaponics and hydroponics system generates local jobs. Specialized programs emerged to serve veterans and youth.

The Cobalt Gold Rush And The East Palestine Disaster

April 14, 2023 Ellen Brown, Web Of Debt. , , ,
Holidays in my childhood were spent at my grandparents’ farm in Plain Grove, Pennsylvania, 35 miles from East Palestine, Ohio. My grandfather’s grandfather fought at Gettysburg and homesteaded the 160-acre farm after the Civil War. My grandmother sold it in the 1960s for $13,000, lacking a male heir to do the work; but my relatives still live in the area. I have therefore taken a keen interest in the toxic chemical disaster that resulted when a Norfolk Southern freight train derailed  in East Palestine on Feb. 3, although it is not my usual line of research. The official narrative doesn’t seem to add up. Something else must have been going on, but what?

Ohio: Groups Sue To Block New Law Allowing Fracking In State Parks

April 11, 2023 Cristen Hemingway Jaynes, Ecowatch. , , ,
Environmental and community groups in Ohio have filed a preliminary injunction to stop the leasing of public lands — including state parks — to the oil and gas industry. Ohio HB 507, which redefines methane gas as “green energy” and requires state parks to lease their lands for fracking, went into effect on April 7. Originally an agricultural bill with its focus on poultry, the law was quickly expanded to include granting petrochemical, agricultural and fracking rights to industry. The groups oppose the law on a constitutional basis, in addition to their objection to the obligatory leasing of public lands for fracking, a press release from Earthjustice and the Sierra Club said.

Attacks On Child Labor Laws Aren’t Going Away

March 27, 2023 Maximillian Alvarez, The Real News Network. , , , ,
While we Americans like to believe that child labor is a thing of the past, an antiquated detail of a dark history that is safely in our rearview mirror, the sad reality is that, even today, in the year of our Lord 2023, the exploitation of children and their labor continues to be a dismal feature throughout the production and supply chains behind many of our favorite brands and companies, including Lucky Charms, Cheetos, Walmart, Target, Whole Foods, Fruit of the Loom, Ben and Jerry’s, etc. There are kids farming the produce that we buy in the supermarket, kids making the parts that end up in our cars, kids cleaning industrial bone saws, office buildings, and houses, kids on construction sites and in the backs of restaurants.

Acrylate Water Safety Emergency Hits Philly

March 27, 2023 Dan Feidt, Unicorn Riot. , , , , ,
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania - A warm and sunny Sunday afternoon was suddenly interrupted by an emergency phone alert: Philadelphia authorities warned the city water supply could be endangered and everyone should cease using drinking water after 2 p.m. Eastern time. Within minutes, people headed to grocery, corner and beer stores to grab water jugs and bottles. By 4 p.m. a couple stores Unicorn Riot checked were mostly picked over. City authorities warned at a Sunday morning news conference that ethyl acrylate, methyl methacrylate and butyl acrylate spilled into Otter Creek from a pipe rupture at the Trinseo PLC chemical plant near the Delaware River late Friday night.

Phone Zap For Ohio State Penitentiary Hunger Strikers

March 21, 2023 Workers World. , , ,
Ohio - People incarcerated at the Ohio State Penitentiary began a protest in mid-March and need our support to be successful in getting their demands met. Recently, guards at OSP have been forcing prisoners to stand in the showers for hours on end as a form of retaliation for speaking out. The protest seeks to end this form of punishment, as well as several other injustices inside the prison. Without outside support and attention, protests like this one are much easier for the prison administration to sweep under the rug. It’s imperative that the administration hear from as many people as possible, so that they know we are paying attention to how they respond to this action.

Can You Tell If A ‘Bomb Train’ Is Coming To Your Town?

March 21, 2023 John McCracken, WhoWhatWhy. , , ,
In the wake of the East Palestine, Ohio train derailment, Governor Mike DeWine called on Congress to look into why the rural village didn’t know ahead of time they had volatile chemicals coming through town. “We should know when we have trains carrying hazardous materials through the state of Ohio,” DeWine said at a press conference. This information is out there, but it’s probably not what the governor had in mind. With the derailment of the Norfolk Southern train receiving international attention, more railroad communities are now asking what is traveling through their backyard.

The Role Of Big Investors In East Palestine And Ukraine

March 6, 2023 Otis Grotewohl, Workers World. , , , , ,
U.S. President Joe Biden made a surprise visit to Kiev Feb. 20 and met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. The trip was purposefully made to focus attention on the one-year anniversary of the U.S.- and NATO-led proxy war against Russia, and Biden promised large amounts of military aid to Zelensky’s regime in Kiev. Meanwhile, in the U.S., the Norfolk Southern derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, had become the lead news story. Because the Biden administration had done little to focus on Ohio, the Ukraine trip caused unexpected political problems at home.

REI Workers Form Union At Ohio Store

March 6, 2023 Dave Jamieson, Portside. , , ,
Workers at an REI store near Cleveland voted 27-12 in favor of unionizing on Friday, adding more fuel to a labor organizing campaign at the national outdoor retailer. The Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union said it prevailed in the vote following a tally by the National Labor Relations Board. The company has a week to file any objections to the results. The Ohio election marks the third union victory at an REI outpost over the past year, following other votes in New York City and Berkeley, California. The Cleveland store, which is in the suburb of Orange, employs around 55 workers who would be part of the union.
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