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Firefighter Recruitment Portal offers opportunity for volunteers to serve

Local Columns

As Ohio’s 39th State Fire Marshal, I’ve dedicated my career to protecting the safety and well-being of our communities. Today, I’m calling attention to an urgent matter facing our state— one that threatens the foundation of emergency preparedness in Ohio upon which we have come to rely. Across the nation, including right here in Ohio, we’re experiencing an alarming decline in the number of volunteer firefighters. Many people don’t realize that about 70% of Ohio’s nearly 1,200 fire departments rely on volunteers. That’s right, the majority of firefighters in this state ...

Not smart enough to be scared

Editorial

Every time I submit to some new medical indignity, I think to myself, “Well, I can’t write about THAT in my column,” and then of course I do. First there was an 11-hour surgery to excise a benign acoustic tumor which, thanks to the prompt and expert diagnosis of my friend Dr. Bill Bartolovich, was discovered snug up against my brain stem, signaling its existence through the symptom of double vision. A tag-team of world-class neurosurgeons hinged my left ear and tunneled in behind, removing all the acoustic paraphernalia blocking their way, and scraped out enough of the tumor to ...

Ohio has more pressing matters than this issue

Editorial

First, state lawmakers wanted to make sure teachers understood what they were not allowed to teach; now they are introducing the bits they do want teachers to include, despite repeated insistence they are not serving their own personal agendas by doing so. Ohio educators at all levels have responded with such fear to what is being called the “anti-DEI law,” that institutions such as Ohio State University are reportedly even banning some statements that acknowledge lands historically occupied by Native Americans. The university is asking its educators not to present facts to its ...

Domestic violence report should trouble Ohioans

Editorial

A recent Ohio Domestic Violence Network report included some horrifying data that should make every resident want to get to the root of a deadly trend. The network has seen an incredible 37% increase in domestic violence deaths in the state over the past year. According to a report by WSYX, 157 were killed in 108 domestic violence cases in the state between July 1, 2024, and June 30, 2025. Lisa DeGeeter, a spokeswoman for ODVN, told the news station the increased number of cases to go through this year was stunning, as was “how much more violent and brutal the cases were.” Victims ...

Young Ohioans need credit card counseling

Editorial

For some Ohioans, use of credit cards is a carefully planned luxury — perhaps used to ensure the accumulation of lots of airline or hotel points — for purchases that can be paid off within a month or two. But for residents between the ages of 18 and 34, a recent analysis of Federal Reserve data shows the use of credit cards feels like a necessity — and one that is causing them to rack up higher-than-average levels of debt. Along with those high levels of debt come high levels of delinquency, according to a report on the data by the Ohio Capital Journal. “For millions of ...

Let’s be honest when it comes to aging, driving

Editorial

Every once in a while, politicians will float the question of whether drivers should have to retake their tests as a requirement for license renewal after a certain age. With age comes the possibility of reduced vision, perhaps hearing loss, reduced reflexes and other changes we all laugh about as a fact of life until someone mentions them in the context of affecting a person’s ability to drive safely. Then pride kicks in. Well, pride and a little stubbornness as most of us bristle at the idea of the government telling us it’s possible we are less able to do something we’ve done ...