A new policy limiting the amount of sick days for Metro bus drivers was not received well by the bus service’s workers last week. Fifty-nine bus drivers called in sick Friday, Jan. 4 in protest of a new policy reducing the number of sick days available for drivers.    

 U.S. Rep. Tom Massie, the congressman who represents the Kentucky side of the Cincinnati metropolitan area, used his first day in Congress to file a bill that would erase a 23-year-old federal ban that makes it a crime to carry guns near schools.  

Cincinnati’s largest cable provider announced Jan. 3 that it will drop Current TV after its sale to Pan-Arab news network Al Jazeera.    

In hopes of quashing rumors, City Council Dec. 19 passed a resolution promising not to use Metro bus money on the streetcar.   

Cincinnati’s Music Hall will be getting renovations, but the project will be much smaller than anticipated.
  

Outgoing Hamilton County Sheriff Simon Leis is retiring after his current term and Jim Neil will replace him on Jan. 6, 2013, but that doesn’t mean Leis is done with public life.   

Cincinnati City Council approved a budget Dec. 14 that relies on parking privatization as a means to plug a $34 million budget deficit while also raising property taxes in 2014.   

The Butler County judge who granted the anonymity of a former Miami University student convicted of posting a rape tips list on campus is standing by his decision.    

LGBT rights are becoming “the new normal” in corporate America, but American Financial Group and Western & Southern Financial Group are apparently exceptions.
   

The sealing of a criminal court case involving a former Miami University student who posted a “Top Ten Ways to Get Away with Rape” flier in a freshman dormitory now has the presiding judge defending his decision to the Ohio Supreme Court.   

An Ohio policy research group is criticizing a local state senator’s “anti-immigrant bill.”   

Cincinnati City Council members focused a lot of attention on a contentious plan to lease city parking assets during a Dec. 3 committee presentation on the 2013 budget. The proposed budget would cover the first half of 2013 until a switchover to a fiscal year starting in July.   

The Hamilton County Board of Commissioners held a public meeting Dec. 3 to discuss options for balancing the stadium fund.   

In his 2013 budget proposal, City Manager Milton Dohoney suggested eliminating $300,000 in support to Media Bridges, an organization that provides public access TV and radio stations in Cincinnati.   

City Manager Milton Dohoney Jr. on Nov. 24 unveiled his 2013 budget plan. The proposal, which must be approved by City Council and the mayor, seeks to close a $34 million deficit while avoiding major cuts and layoffs. The proposed budget will only set the city’s course until mid-June, when the city will transition into establishing budgets based on fiscal years.