Latest news with #OhioDepartmentofRehabilitationandCorrections
Yahoo
09-05-2025
- Yahoo
Springfield man pleads guilty, sentenced in November shooting, police chase
May 9—A Springfield man pleaded guilty and was sentenced this week for a November shots-fired incident that was followed by a police pursuit on the east side. Raekwon Hall, 26, pleaded guilty to one count of improper discharge of a firearm at or into a habitation, a second-degree felony. He was sentenced to 4-6 years in prison and ordered conveyed to the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections in Orient. Four other people were allegedly involved in the incident. Charges are still pending for Noah Cameron, 20; Sha'Ron Threats, 18; Shelton Threats, 19; and Kavonte Knolton, 26. According to court records, at 10:19 a.m. Nov. 26, a police officer was at the Springfield Police Substation at 17 W. Johnny Lytle Ave. organizing Operation Thanksgiving when he heard 30 or more gunshots. When officers responded, they saw a gray Chevrolet Tahoe fleeing eastbound on West Grand Avenue. According to police, two homes were struck by gunfire during the incident: one in the 100 block of West Southern and one in the 100 block of West Grand. Police began to follow the vehicle and it pulled to the curb in the first block of West Southern Avenue. Hall allegedly exited and fled on foot. He was arrested after a brief foot chase, and police said they found a 9mm Glock handgun on him. A police incident report says the pursuit reached 65 mph on city streets, then went onto the Simon Kenton Trail bike path, and onto East Main Street. When the Chevy Tahoe reached the intersection of East Main Street and Belmont Avenue, Shelton Threats allegedly exited and fled on foot. He was later arrested. He had a gunshot wound to his left leg and was transported to the hospital. Police said that while the search was ongoing, a Springfield police detective crashed his vehicle at Main and Belmont. They said the detective was treated for minor injuries at Kettering Health ER. According to court records, the Tahoe continued south on Belmont Avenue to East High Street before stopping. Police found Sha'Ron Threats and Noah Cameron inside and arrested them. Another person fled the scene. A search of the Chevy Tahoe found a .357 semiautomatic Glock with a device that made it fully automatic, as well as Knolton's belongings, according to court records. Soon after the Nov. 26 incident, an officer stopped a man who identified himself with a different first name and date of birth but gave the last name Knolton. Body camera footage allowed police to positively identify him, according to police. He was later arrested.
Yahoo
17-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Ohio Republicans propose citizenship tracking with threat of future budget cuts
Activists protest the agenda of President Donald Trump during a rally near the water tower on the Magnificent Mile on Jan. 25, 2025, in Chicago, Illinois. (Photo by) Two Ohio Republicans have introduced a measure directing state agencies to track the number of people they interact with who aren't in the country legally. The bill, sponsored by state Reps. Josh Williams, R-Sylvania Twp., and Tex Fischer, R-Boardman, requires an annual report from law enforcement, education and health officials among others. Backers describe it as simply 'adding a box to a form,' but make it clear they want to leverage that information to restrict benefits. 'This information is going to come to the legislative body who has the power of the purse,' Williams told committee members. 'That's where the teeth are. ' Under the proposal, four state agencies — the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections, Job and Family Services, Education and Workforce, and Medicaid — as well as every Ohio law enforcement agency, are directed to 'collect and maintain' citizenship status for the people they serve. Each year the agencies must report their figures, broken down by the citizens who are lawfully present, and those who aren't here legally. Agencies in charge of benefits like Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) food assistance or cash assistance have to report data based on household — whether all members are legal citizens, or if at least one member is not, with information about their specific immigration status. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX The agencies are also directed to report the monetary value of the benefits given to households with individuals who are not citizens. However, the proposal doesn't indicate how agencies are supposed to verify an individual's status or how the reports will avoid counting individuals multiple times. There's also no effort to quantify what immigrants contribute to the state. A recent American Immigration Council report, for instance, estimates in 2023 Ohio immigrants paid $7.3 billion in taxes — $2.5 billion of that to state and local governments. Williams and Fischer introduced their bill last week. Fischer noted agencies throughout the state already collect several kinds of demographic data, 'but there is currently no provision in Ohio law to require these entities to collect data on citizenship status.' 'The citizens of Ohio have a right to know where their tax dollars are being spent,' Fischer said, 'and this bill allows us to take a step forward in painting the full picture of where our public funds are going.' Under federal law, unauthorized immigrants are generally barred from access to benefit programs like SNAP, Medicaid and various forms of cash assistance. Even lawful permanent residents (green-card holders) have to wait five years before getting access to those benefits. 'I think ultimately our hope is that this data will come in over the next couple years, and we will see that we don't have a widespread problem with people who are unlawfully present in the country collecting these benefits,' Fischer said. But his co-sponsor, Williams, thinks benefits definitely are going to unauthorized immigrants. The Toledo-area lawmaker criticized the city for becoming a 'Welcoming City.' One element of that designation is that programs supporting entrepreneurs don't discriminate based on immigration status. Williams said that means 'our local tax dollars are definitely going towards illegal immigrants.' 'This claim is patently false,' City of Toledo Communications Director Rachel Hart said in a text message. She described the designation as an affirmation that the city is a place where immigrants 'can pursue the American Dream' and that it does not 'dictate funding decisions.' 'This kind of ludicrous rhetoric is a waste of time and a distraction from the real challenges Toledoans face,' she added. 'Once again, Rep. Williams is more interested in pandering to the extremes of his party than in serving the real needs of Northwest Ohio.' And while the sponsors pitched the changes as minor record-keeping updates, Williams has long-term plans for the information. 'We're going to get into a budget cycle where we're going to have those department heads come and answer to us in (the) Finance (committee) and to our individual standing committees, and we're going to be able to say 5%, 3%, 10% of your budget went towards this — here's the data.' Williams said. '… It's the legislators that have the teeth when it comes to the budget, right? We're able to strip that funding out.' Across the aisle, Democratic lawmakers wondered if the sponsors had adequately thought through their bill. Rep. Tristan Rader, D-Lakewood, said he's sensitive to the limits on eligibility after working with the Cleveland Food Bank to sign people up for SNAP benefits. He noted the five-year waiting period for permanent residents, and that officials need to collect applicants' social security numbers. 'So, I'm wondering if you had conversations with (Job and Family Services) if this is not information in some way, shape or form, they already have, and if this isn't sort of, at least in this respect, a little bit redundant,' Rader said. The sponsors said they had not spoken with the agency. State Rep. Latyna Humphrey, D-Columbus, asked if they'd reached out to school officials or superintendents? Again, no. ACLU of Ohio Chief Lobbyist Gary Daniels said 'there appears to be a lack of knowledge' about what data are collected and what services immigrants are eligible to receive. Referencing limits on SNAP, he noted the bill requires state officials collect citizenship information about an entire household while remaining 'silent about how this is to be accomplished to the satisfaction of the bill's sponsors.' Daniels added that collection of data from schools is particularly revealing. The sponsors have argued these data could be the premise for budget cuts, but federal law and U.S. Supreme Court precedent requires public schools enroll undocumented kids. 'So, if/when the data reveals how many undocumented students are attending Ohio's public schools, what do the sponsors anticipate the legislature's response will be,' he asked, 'keeping in mind schools have no choice in this matter regarding enrollment?' Practically speaking, he added, carving out private entities like charter schools or hospitals from the data collection requirements would likely leave whatever report their legislation does produce, 'skewed and perhaps entirely unreliable, no matter what side of this issue one takes.' SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Yahoo
13-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Commissioners host meetings on jail project
Feb. 13—JEFFERSON — The Ashtabula County Board of Commissioners hosted a pair of public meetings on proposed plans for an expanded Ashtabula County Jail Wednesday. The first of two meetings Wednesday was well-attended, with nearly every seat in the commissioners' conference room filled. J.P Ducro, president of the commissioners, started the event by thanking everyone for attending. Commissioner Casey Kozlowski said the jail project has significant public interest. Commissioner Kathryn Whittington said the purpose of the meetings was full transparency. Sheriff William Niemi said the current jail does not meet the county's needs. "I have an obligation to keep my community and the county safe, and I can't do that properly with the current facility that we have," he said. "So this is something that had to be addressed a long time ago, and I'm glad the county commissioners are listening to me." Ducro said while the jail may look great on the outside, the inside is a completely different story. "It's kind of become a money pit," he said. "We've put hundreds of thousands of dollars into just the elevator repairs over the course of the last few years." How corrections was addressed 50 years ago is completely different from today, Ducro said. "Because it's a multi-story facility, it's operationally inefficient, and it's undersized to meet the needs of today's incarceration," he said. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, the jail housed as many as 170 inmates. The Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections recently lowered the maximum number of inmates to 98, Ducro said. "It's housing half as many people, and that's all we're allowed to house by law," Ducro said. The county has contracted with the Geauga County Jail to house inmates there. The jail is not equipped to deal with many complex issues, including inmates who are detoxing or on suicide watch, Ducro said. "Because of the size of the jail, also, we have one room in our current facility that is used for GED classes, for parenting classes, for budgeting classes, for religious, faith-based observation, for Alcoholics Anonymous or other programs like that," Durco said. There are many different programs in the community that exist, but there is not room in the jail to accommodate them, he said. "We're housing gang members, murderers, you name it, they're in our county jail," Niemi said. "And we have to separate people, by law, we can't have them all in one room." He suggested adding on to the current facility to the commissioners. "I don't need anything fancy, I need a jail and I need space to house people, that's all I need," Niemi said. "I don't need anything like a Taj Mahal, I don't need that." He said people who steal are given summons, and some have received five or 10 for minor crimes and do not show up to their court dates. "We're dealing with a whole different type of individual now than we did 10 years ago," Niemi said. He said there are people who have been turned away four or five times when trying to serve their time. The Geauga County Sheriff cut the county a break with the deal to house inmates, which has helped them out, but it is not a permanent solution, Niemi said. "Our situation is dire," he said. "So I suggested we add on to our current footprint, it saves the county money, and it gives us a 209-bed facility." The current booking area will have to be modified, he said. Niemi said adding onto the current facility is the cheaper route, and easier to do. Whittington said this is not a new issue, and the commissioners have been working on it for several years. In 2021, the commissioners put a sales tax increase on the ballot in order to pay for the construction of a new jail north of Jefferson. Voters rejected the proposal. Whittington said the commissioners started saving money and looking at where they could reduce things after voters rejected the proposal. The new plan would be an addition on the north side of the current facility, which would cover the entire Sheriff's Office parking lot, Whittington said. The proposed expansion is approximately 55,000 square feet. Potential additional costs would include purchasing additional property for parking. The construction cost estimate is $36 million, Whittington said. Kozlowski said there have been two components to the discussion — construction and operations. "We've learned that actually building the jail is the easy part, we're told," he said. "The hard part is actually going to be able to ... afford to maintain it and run it for many years to come." He said the current jail was undersized to begin with. The proposed jail would have an operationally-efficient design, with a mezzanine, Kozlowski said. The design is an open concept, so corrections officers can keep an eye on everyone in the jail. He said a few additional corrections officers will have to be hired, because of the increase in inmates. "We're calling this an addition, but really it's a new facility added on to our existing Sheriff's Department," Kozlowski said. The county is applying for $15 million in grant funds from the state, and has saved an additional $15 million for the project, he said. "I think that's a pretty aggressive grant application, because we can say we have a 100% match," Kozlowski said. Kozlowski said the commissioners saved the money from federal COVID-19 relief funds, along with spending less on general fund items and taking in increased revenue. That leaves a $6 million difference, plus any ancillary costs. "It would be our desire, the commissioners' desire, for us to borrow funds to pay for that difference," Kozlowski said. Niemi said he expects the county will likely hear about whether or not the county received the grant by June. In response to a question from the audience about what would happen to the old jail, Whittington said the space would need to be renovated before it could be used for anything else. She said the commissioners have been fiscally conservative over the last eight years to save money. Niemi said there is a lot of work that would need to renovate the current jail space before it could be used again. The county cannot demolish the current facility, because the second floor is connected to the courts, Kozlowski said. He said construction is expected to take three years, in response to a question from Ashtabula City Manager Jim Timonere. The county needs the grant for the project to move forward, Kozlowski said. However, Gov. Mike DeWine included $130 million in his proposed state budget for jail renovation and construction, he said. Whittington said this is not the first grant the county has applied for. "Our chances are getting better, because others have already been funded through the other grant opportunities that, unfortunately, we were not awarded," she said. Ducro said the county has not had funds to put forward as a match for grant requests before. Kozlowski said the county is being methodical in their grant request. "We learned, don't ask for the full amount and hope we're going to get less," he said. After the meeting, Niemi said the county has to do something. "I can't keep the community safe as they deserve and they way it should be, because you've got to put people in jail when needed," he said. "It's a law and order issue, it's a safety issue. It affects the entire county. This is an option for us to do it, to where we don't have to go to the taxpayer and ask for more money."
