It was “Rich People Voice Their Concerns Night” at city councils across town last night, as proponents of the $1 sale of Music Hall packed Cincinnati City Council chambers even though the proposed lease deal wasn’t on the agenda. Mayor Mark Mallory insisted that any middle ground that will allow the nonprofit Music Hall Revitalization Co. to renovate the building will require that the city retain ownership.

Across town (and about 10 miles northeast toward the area with mass trees), Madeira City Council shot down a plan to develop a luxury apartment complex on Camargo Road. Council voted 6-1 to scrap the plan for a 184-unit complex after residents who voiced concern said the complex would be “too dense” and take away from the city’s single-family character. Word on the street is that the Council majority didn’t want scumbag renters like this guy to be able to move into the neighborhood and start playing music really loud out of their car stereos. 

Cincinnati City Council yesterday pretty much canceled its plans to build an atrium at City Hall. Six council members approved a motion asking administrators to shut it down, and City Manager Milton Dohoney says he’ll abide by it even though he technically doesn’t have to because the funding was approved in a spending ordinance. 

Council also voted yesterday to keep the property tax rate pretty much the same next year despite a projected deficit. 

Now that the Supreme Court has temporarily upheld part of Arizona’s racist controversial immigration law, no-name state legislators in Ohio and Kentucky plan to break out the laws they couldn’t previously get passed. According to The Enquirer’s Mark Curnutte (who apparently won a national book award for his work covering poverty in Haiti — big ups, Curnutte!), some dudes named Courtney Combs (R-Ross Township, Ohio) and John Schickel (R-Union, Ky.) have some great ways to rid of their states' illegal immigrants, at least until the court strikes down the rest of Arizona’s law.

New York Times: "Arizona Ruling Only a Narrow Opening for Other States"

Housing prices are going up in most cities due to low interest rates and cheap prices. 

A new Obama campaign ad refers to Mitt Romney as “outsourcer in chief.” Ouch!

The War on Drugs is making the AIDS epidemic worse by driving people away from treatment, according to a report released today by the Global Commission on Drug Policy.

California condors are being threatened by lead poisoning from bullets left behind in dead carcasses shot by hunters, which the birds eat. 

Facebook changed users' listed email accounts, and people on the Internet are mad. Gizmodo explains how to fix it. 

The Spice Girls are reuniting to create a musical called Viva Forever! at London's Piccadilly Theatre.

The George W. Bush Presidential Library denied a request by a Democratic super PAC for documents related to Sen. Rob Portman’s work in the George W. Bush administration. The library says it is not subject to the Freedom of Information Act and that all are welcome to see the documents in 2014. The super PAC, American Bridge 21st Century, has been researching GOP candidates as Mitt Romney moves closer to choosing a running mate.

“When you look at the roster of V.P. candidates, each of them is significantly flawed,” American Bridge senior adviser Ty Matsdorf said in a statement. “For Portman, it is his calamitous record on fiscal issues while working at the Bush White House. It shouldn’t be a shock that he is going to want to keep that under wraps for as long as possible, but unfortunately it’s pretty hard to hide a record as terrible as that.”

CNN is live blogging from the Supreme Court to see if there are any rulings on the health care law or immigration.

Gay pride celebrations took place in New York, Chicago and San Francisco over the weekend, and Obama organizers were there to recruit volunteers.

Spain formally asked for European aid for its banks.

The sea level is rising faster along the Atlantic Coast than other places in the world.

Facebook has created a new “find friends nearby” function that will allow users to see friends and people they don’t know who are at events or social gatherings. From some Facebook engineer’s comments on the story:

I built Find Friends Nearby with another engineer for a hackathon project. While it was originally called ‘Friendshake’, we settled on ‘Find Friends Nearby’ for launch (the URL was a little bit of a homage to the previous iteration).

For me, the ideal use case for this product is the one where when you’re out with a group of people whom you’ve recently met and want to stay in contact with. Facebook search might be effective, or sharing your vanity addresses or business cards, but this tool provides a really easy way to exchange contact information with multiple people with minimal friction.

HBO’s The Newsroom premiered last night, and this guy at the Toronto Star said it kind of sucked while the New York Times says CNN could learn something from it.

The Kentucky Speedway and state of Kentucky will find out soon whether the $10 million they spent on highway infrastructure improvements in response to last year’s traffic mess at a NASCAR race was worth it. The Speedway and Kentucky Transportation Cabinet will hold a news conference today to outline plans to actually get all of the race attendees into the venue to watch the race rather than sit in traffic all day and get super mad.

A Cincinnati police officer with a long record of wrecking police vehicles was arrested on Monday and charged with assaulting a woman who he’s already been charged with assaulting once before. The Enquirer detailed the disciplinary history of officer Kevin Jones, who was also charged with two counts of assault from an incident that occurred May 19. 

Politico says President Obama’s recent announcement of a new immigration policy that allows many young immigrants who have never been in trouble with the law to stay in the country, and even travel across its borders, was a really smart move. The policy is not permanent, which leaves Mitt Romney to answer the question of whether or not he would repeal it if elected. The idea is reportedly similar to legislation that Republican Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, a potential Romney running mate, has been considering introducing. 

“This is a stroke of political genius,” Bruce Morrison told me. A former Democratic congressman from Connecticut, Morrison was chairman of the House Immigration Subcommittee, a member of the U.S. Commission on Immigration Reform and House author of the Immigration Act of 1990. He’s now an immigration attorney and lobbies on a wide variety of immigration issues.

“Obama has taken Rubio’s idea and put it into action,” Morrison said. “He has given these people a work permit, the ability to remain in this country, but no permanent status.” Their legal status can be terminated at any time. “But it won’t be terminated by Obama,” Morrison said.

A breast cancer survivor who has undergone a double mastectomy has been allowed to swim topless by the Seattle Department of Parks and Recreation after stating that wearing a bathing suit over her chest causes pain. 

(Jodi) Jaecks opted against reconstructive surgery. "I don't see a need to fake having breasts," she said.

"My ultimate goal is to change policy at beaches and pools, to increase people's awareness of cancer and the realities of the human condition," Jaecks told Reuters.

LeBron James and the Miami Heat won the NBA title last night, completing a 4 games to 1 series victory over the Oklahoma Thunder. It is the first title for James, who has been widely mocked for stating that he’d like to win more titles than Michael Jordan’s six. James, who is 27, won his first a year younger than Jordan did, thought Jordan then won the title in six of eight years. 

Two alien plants planets around the same star apparently rise in the night sky of each other, looking like a giant full moon. The planets, Kepler-36b and Kepler-36c, are 1,200 light-years from Earth and 1.2 million miles apart, the closes two planets known. 

A local developer has offered to build a new jail adjacent to the Justice Center, a cost of $65 million, in return for the county leasing it for 30 years at $10 million a year, according to The Enquirer. The developer, Rob Smyjunas, said the offer isn’t about making a profit, just making the county better for his and other families. 

Mayor Mallory didn’t answer The Enquirer’s questions about the potential for a Council majority to block the property tax increase in City Manager Milton Dohoney’s proposed budget. A Mallory spokesman says he’ll work behind the scenes on a budget that will win a Council majority and that he’s off to New Orleans for a conference on reclaiming vacant properties. 

An environmental summit in Rio de Janeiro kicked off on Wednesday, with environmental groups and activists disappointed with the Rio+20’s lack of progress on creating clear goals for sustainable development. 

The Sanford, Fla., police chief who drew criticism for not investigating the shooting death of Trayvon Martin has been fired. Sanford City Manager Norton Bonaparte said he relieved Bill Lee of his duties because the police chief needs to have the trust and respect of the community. 

A video of middle school kids in upstate New York bullying a 68-year-old bus monitor has drawn international media attention. The woman says the kids are all pretty much normal and are OK to deal with one-on-one. 

The bullying continues unabated for about 10 minutes in the video, reducing Klein to tears as a giggling student jabs her arm with a book. Recorded by a student Monday with a cell phone camera, the brazen example of bullying went viral and spurred international outrage.

A population of chinstrap penguins in Antarctica has declined by 36 percent due to melting sea ice. 

"Actually, in the '90s it was thought that the climate change would favor the chinstrap penguin, because this species prefers sea waters without ice, unlike the Adelie penguin, which prefers the ice pack," study researcher Andres Barbosa told LiveScience. He added that at the time, chinstraps, named for the thin black facial line from cheek to cheek, seemed to increase in numbers, with some new colonies being established. The sea-ice decline in the winter, however, has become so big that it is now impacting krill populations, said Barbosa, of the National Museum of Natural Sciences in Madrid.

Researchers found evidence of ice on the moon. 

A new study has found that eating disorders are common among older women. Researchers say weight and eating concerns do not discriminate based on age.

College football BCS commissioners have endorsed a four-team playoff format to determine college football’s national champion instead of the current computer-human two-team system. The plan will go to the BCS presidential oversight committee on June 26 for approval.

LeBron James and the Miami Heat are one win away from winning the NBA championship after going up 3 games to 1 with a 104-98 win in Game 4 Tuesday. 

Here are two ways to report the latest news regarding potential Duke Energy rate hike connected to streetcar construction:

• From The Enquirer:  “Duke customers could face streetcar tab”

• From The Business Courier: “Cincinnati, Duke making progress on moving utility lines”

A 15-year-old girl was killed in Over-the-Rhine around 11 p.m. last night. She was reportedly standing with a group of people, though Police haven’t released any details about the shooter.

A new poll shows support for President Obama’s shift on immigration policy.

More Asians are immigrating to the U.S. than Hispanics these days.

Adult humans are 16.5 million tons overweight, which researchers say will threaten the world’s food security and environmental resources.

Approximately half of all new AIDS cases are occurring in the South, and the region is severely short on HIV specialists.

Attorneys for the Penn State football coach who showered with a bunch of boys are starting their defense by painting him in a positive light.

Spotify will stop charging $10 per month for use on mobile devices. Free now.

Facebook acquires Face.com. Ha.

Former baseball player Roger Clemens was acquitted of perjury charges, the latest in a bunch of wasted time by the federal government investigating athletes who can afford really good lawyers.

Ohio political season will be in full force today as Mitt Romney visits a manufacturing company in Carthage to discuss the manufacturing industry and trade, Barack Obama will be in Cleveland talking about the economy and Rob Portman, a candidate to be Romney's vice presidential running mate, will be in Washington D.C. telling the Faith and Freedom Coalition that it's still really important to have religious freedom.

Some Columbia-Tusculum residents are upset about the proposed design of new apartment buildings on the corner of Delta Avenue and Columbia Parkway. The 76-unit Delta Flats' design was apparently supposed to fit into the nearby business district, which includes the Precinct restaurant.

China doesn't want to have sanctions on Syria, and Russia is reportedly still selling Syria weapons.

OPEC has decided to keep oil output on hold, meaning Saudi Arabia gets to decide if gas costs go up.

A new poll suggests that Americans blame George W. Bush more for America's economic issues than President Obama.

HBO and showrunners for its new medieval show Game of Thrones have apologized for using Bush's head on a stake in a scene where one of the dudes shows someone a line of traitors' heads on stakes.

Surgeons replaced a 10-year-old girl's has blood vessel with one grown with her own stem cells. The vein was taken from a dead person, stripped of its cells and then coated in the girls' stem cells. Doctors says there has been a “striking” improvement in her quality of life, according to the BBC.

Nokia will cut 10,000 jobs by the end of 2013 after being hit hard by both expensive competitors like the iPhone and cheaper Android models.

San Francisco Giants pitcher Matt Cain threw a perfect game against the Houston Astros last night. It included an awesome diving catch by outfielder Gregor Blanco in the 7th inning.

Mitt Romney will visit the Cincinnati area this week: tonight at a private fundraiser at the Hilton Netherland Plaza, Thursday at a Carthage manufacturing comany and this weekend to hang with Rep. John Boehner up north and probably with Sen. Rob Portman at some point. President Obama plans to be around soon, too.

Economists say Romney's job creation claims need more specifics before they'll be believable. On the other hand, Obama's American Recovery and Reinvestment Act has saved or created 1.4 million to 3.3 million jobs, according to the Congressional Budget Office, and the American Jobs Act would create 1.9 million, according to Moody's. From NPR:

+11.5 million — that's how many jobs Romney claimed last September he would create in the first term of his administration. But true to form, Romney never said how he would create that many jobs, nor has any reputable economist backed up his claim. "Nowhere in the 160 page plan could I find a stated job creation number," wrote Rebecca Thiess of EPI. "The math doesn't just appear to be fuzzy — it appears to be nonexistent." Added David Madland of the Center for American Progress: "It is a plan from the Republican candidate for president designed to maximize corporate profits. What it doesn't do is help the middle class or create jobs." Even the conservative editorial page of the Wall Street Journal called Romney's 59-point economic tome "surprisingly timid and tactical considering our economic predicament."

Democrat Ron Barber won the congressional seat left by Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, who survived an assassination attempt and resigned to focus on her recovery. The win gives Democrats hope for taking control of the House in November.

California could become the first U.S. State to require that genetically modified (GM) foods be labeled as such on the package if a November measure, “The Right to Know Genetically Engineered Food Act,” passes.

What makes the referendum in California different is that, for the first time, voters and not politicians will be the ones to decide. And this has the food industry worried. Understandably so, since only one in four Americans is convinced that GMOs are "basically safe", according to a survey conducted by the Mellman Group, and a big majority wants food containing GMOs to be labeled.

This is one of the few issues in America today that enjoys broad bipartisan support: 89% of Republicans and 90% of Democrats want genetically altered foods to be labeled, as they already are in 40 nations in Europe, in Brazil, and even in China. In 2007, then candidate Obama latched onto this popular issue saying that he would push for labeling – a promise the president has yet to keep.

Retail sales were down for the second month in May. Go buy something.

More than 2,000 proposals for new internet suffixes have been proposed, including ".pizza," ".space" and ".auto."

Scientists have figured out why woolly mammoths went extinct: “Lots of reasons.”

County Commissioner Todd Portune's idea to borrow more money and extend a half-cent sales tax in order to keep up with stadium costs has been shot down by a Bengals lawyer who used 15 bullet points to demonstrate that Portune's plan “proposes to breach one or both leases.”

Duke Energy is asking state regulators if it can bump customers' rates up again. Duke says the increases are to pay for infrastructure investments. The change would increase customer costs of electric service by $86 million and for natural gas by $44 million. A federal appeals court on Monday reinstated an antitrust lawsuit against Duke Energy that accuses the company of paying kick-backs to corporations opposing a 2004 rate increase.

A rally for “religious freedom” will take place on Fountain Square today in response to federal health care legislation requiring women to have abortions employers to provide insurance that covers birth control. The law includes a religious exemption, which bishops have said isn't enough.

A group pushing to ban dog auctions in Ohio has halted its effort to put the issue on the November ballot due to lack of funding and time. CityBeat in February reported the group's efforts to ban the sale of dogs through auctions or raffles, as well as all trafficking in dogs from out-of-state auctions.

New York City officials, including Brooklyn Democratic Rep. Yvette Clarke, are arguing that the city's “Stop and Frisk” policy is racist. The policy allows police to stop an individual and pat him or her down for contraband if they suspect illegal activity. From USA Today:

Clarke says the program, known as "Stop, Question and Frisk" or "Stop and Frisk," amounts to racial profiling. It is based on a 1968 Supreme Court ruling that police could stop people on the basis of "reasonable suspicion."

Last month, U.S. District Court Judge Shira Scheindlin approved class-action status for a lawsuit that alleges the practice subjects people to race-based illegal searches.

President Obama's health care law helped 6.6 million young adults stay on their parents' plans during the first year and a half.

Rick Santorum has formed a new conservative organization aiming to recruit 1 million supporters to help get Barack Obama out of the While House. No word on how Santorum's “Patriot Voices” group will differ from the tea party patriots.

NASA says it has spotted the universe's first objects.

Black members of the Netherlands soccer team were subjected to racist chants at their Euro 2012 practice facility in Krakow, Poland. The team says fans were making monkey chants at the players.

LeBron James scored 45 points to lead the Miami Heat over the Boston Celtics last night, forcing a deciding Game 7 for the Eastern Conference championship. The Oklahoma Thunder await in the NBA Finals.

Hamilton County has been killing people more often than Ohio counties of similar size, despite actually asking for the death penalty less often. Today's Enquirer takes a look at the growing opposition to the death penalty in other states and recent legislation and task forces aimed at either studying its effectiveness or stopping the practice altogether. Prosecutor Joe Deters says he's going to kill all the people who deserve it because the law is still the law.

Would you like to pay tolls or higher gas taxes in order to have a new Brent Spence Bridge? No? Then you're like a majority of people who take the time to respond to Enquirer polls.

City Manager Milton Dohoney plans to ask City Council to raise the property tax rate in response to a projected $33 million 2013 deficit that everyone knows was coming.

The Community Press on the East Side says Norfolk Southern is willing to consider selling the Wasson Way right of way that some would like to see turned into a bike trail. CityBeat in March found the proposed trail to have support among cycling enthusiasts but some resistance from light rail supporters.

President Obama hooked up an 11-year-old kid with a note excusing him from class on Friday.

“He says, ‘Do you want me to write an excuse note? What’s your teacher’s name?” Sullivan told ABC. “And I say, Mr. Ackerman. And he writes, ‘Please excuse Tyler. He was with me. Barack Obama, the president.'"

Fortune magazine has taken exception to Mitt Romney's recent criticism of Solyndra, the solar panel company that went out of business despite a $500 million Department of Energy loan.

So last Thursday Romney held a surprise press conference at Solyndra's shuttered headquarters. During his prepared statement, Romney said:

"An independent inspector general looked at this investment and concluded that the Administration had steered money to friends and family and campaign contributors."

Romney then repeated the claim later in the press conference.

Small problem: No inspector general ever "concluded" such a thing, at least not based on any written reports or public statements.

Wisconsin Gov./Union Crusher Scott Walker holds a slight lead over his Democratic challenger, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, according to a recent poll.

George Zimmerman is back in jail after what his attorney is calling a misunderstanding over telling a judge that he had limited money even though a website set up to fund his legal defense raised more than $135,000.

Legal issues will be involved in New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg's attempt to ban giant sodas.

Jason Alexander has released a lengthy and quite thoughtful apology for referring to the sport of cricket as "a bit gay" during a recent appearance on The Late Late Show With Craig Ferguson.

Why do people on the West Coast get to see all the cool stuff that happens in space? First the eclipse and now the Transit of Venus, when Venus will cross paths between the sun and earth. Next time it will happen is 2117. And Australia got to see a partial lunar eclipse the other day, too.

Ohio Treasurer Josh Mandel has already had a rough week, having to give back more than $100,000 in campaign contributions in response to an FBI investigation. Today The Cleveland Plain Dealer's Politifact website looked into one of the five claims made in Mandel's new 30-second TV ad, and it seems to be pretty false. Mandel claims that his opponent, Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown, “cast the deciding vote on the government takeover of health care." Politifact notes that since the health care overhaul passed by the minimum 60 votes necessary, that every vote was technically “deciding.” But, on the other hand, Brown was an early supporter of the legislation, and it is widely known that Ben Nelson of Nebraska was the final “yes” vote to join. Plus, technically, Brown was the seventh person to vote because it was taken in alphabetical order.

Ohio public schools have received a waiver for parts of No Child Left Behind that will remove a requirement to get all of their students proficient in math and reading by 2014. Nineteen states have received the waiver, meaning they'll have to create their own federally approved academic progress standards.

Covington leaders are expecting staff reductions as part of balancing the 2012-13 budget to cover $1.5 million that was left out. The city is facing $1.6 million in cuts to public-safety services and about $700,000 across other departments.

Mitt Romney officially won the Republican presidential nomination yesterday, but no one's talking about it because all the stories involve Donald Trump and the fact that his iPhone app misspelled “America.”

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange has two weeks to offer arguments against extradition to Sweden after a U.K. supreme court ruling.

The makers of Blackberry are considering how to remake their products into something people will actually want again.

Facebook's public offering drama has caused experts to ask questions such as, “should investors see the wretched performance of Facebook’s IPO as any sort of signal about the likely future direction of the overall stock market and the economy?”

While the rest of us were living our lives, two asteroids zipped past the earth early this week. Don't worry — they were small.