Hey all. Morning news time.
Attorneys on both sides of the tense, dramatic trial of Juvenile Court Judge Tracie are making their closing statements this morning. Hunter is accused of backdating documents, improperly using a court credit card and intervening in disciplinary action against her brother, a court employee who allegedly struck a juvenile inmate. Hunter’s supporters say she’s a victim of a political witch hunt; her opponents say she thinks she’s above the law. The courtroom saw fireworks last week as attorneys, those watching the proceedings and even the judge in the case all lost their cool at various points. Closing arguments, which could stretch into tomorrow, look to be equally dramatic. After they're over, it's up to a jury to decide what to make of the spectacle.
• Bond Hill charter school Horizon Academy is drawing scrutiny for its use of work visas to bring in foreign teachers. The school is run by Chicago-based Concept Schools, which uses visas to employ 69 math and science teachers, about 12 percent of its work force, in Ohio. That’s much higher than most schools, which mostly use the visas to attract language specialists. Seven foreign-born teachers currently teach at Horizon in Bond Hill. The H-1B visas the school uses are designed to allow highly specialized workers to live in the U.S. for up to six years. Critics charge that there are plenty of qualified math and science teachers living in Ohio who could fill those jobs and that Concept is engaging in a kind of cronyism. But the school says it has brought the teachers to Ohio legally and that recruiting from Turkey is necessary to get the highest-quality instructors. Since 2005, the school has brought 454 teachers to Ohio from Turkey and surrounding countries. Concept has been the subject of a number of investigations in Ohio, including one at one of its schools in Dayton over alleged misconduct and falsification of attendance records.
• City officials have delayed presenting a proposal that would charge Over-the-Rhine residents $300 a year to park in the neighborhood, but Mayor John Cranley’s fee idea is still alive. The proposed fee, which would be the highest residential parking fee in the country, would fund at least some of the streetcar’s $4 million annual operation costs. Officials were set to present the idea to City Council’s Neighborhoods Committee today, but negative response to the idea from some council members, including Vice Mayor David Mann, triggered a delay. City officials say they’ll take the feedback into account and float a modified version of the idea in a couple weeks.
• Two Cincinnati-area nonprofits serving homeless veterans will get $3 million from the United States Department of Veterans Affairs, Sen. Sherrod Brown announced last week. The Ohio Valley Goodwill Industries Rehabilitation Center and Talbert House both received about $1.5 million to provide health, transportation and financial planning services to Hamilton County veterans and their families who are homeless or may become homeless. A study by the Coalition on Homelessness and Housing in Ohio counted 175 homeless veterans in Hamilton County in 2013.
• Thousands of DUI convictions could be in question after the Ohio Supreme Court ruled Thursday that drunken-driving defendants can challenge the results of breathalyzer tests by requesting accuracy data for specific breathalyzer machines. Defendants can request the data from the Ohio Department of Health, which provides the machines to law enforcement agencies across the state. Some have charged that the Intoxilyzer 8000 (which sounds more like something that gets you drunk rather than something that measures your drunkenness, but I digress) is inaccurate. Some Ohio judges won’t allow results from the machine to be used as evidence. The ODH has pushed back against the ruling requiring it release accuracy data, saying it presents a formidable and expensive requirement that will be impossible to fulfill. Defense attorneys pushing for the ruling, however, say collecting and releasing the data from the machines should be cheap and easy. CityBeat covered the situation here in June.
• House Speaker John Boehner’s Democratic challenger (yes, he has one) is under few illusions about his chances against the powerful, Butler County-based Republican rep. But that doesn’t mean he isn’t trying. Miami University professor Tom Poetter is crisscrossing the district knocking on doors and lambasting Boehner for his role in last year’s government shutdown, his opposition to the much-debated unemployment benefits extension and other issues. Polls show Boehner with a very comfy lead, and he’s looking right past the election and predicting he’ll remain House speaker.
• The U.S. Supreme Court has declined to review same-sex marriage cases in Indiana, Oklahoma, Utah, Virginia and Wisconsin. Lower courts ruled against bans on same-sex marriage in those states, and without review by the nation's highest court, those rulings will stand. That means the number of states recognizing same-sex marriage will rise from 19 to 24.
• Finally, here's a pretty neat NPR piece about women and their roll in the roots of computer programing. Though it's a field dominated by men in many ways today, many of the field's important early innovators were women.