Ram23

People think it's dangerous because the police get called to an emergency there 1000 times per year, not because there happen to be black people around. The lighting/fencing may have cut down on that a bit over the last couple years but it still isn't remotely safe. It's one of the most crime-ridden single addresses in the city.

My grounded theory is that it has something to do with cicadas - maybe it happens every 17 years but is being noted now because the prevalence of cell phones and social media. 17 years ago how many people would see a dead bird and take a video/post it on the internet? And if they did, would the news have noticed? On the other extreme, my theory is that it's an engineered virus designed to spread among the bird population. In a few months, "they" will release the modified variant that spreads among humans, in an attempt to convince people that viruses jump species all the time. This will all be a deflection to cover for Covid being outed as a manmade virus that escaped the lab in Wuhan.

This has been reported in DC but I've heard people say they've seen lots of dead blue jays around Cincinnati as well - coincidentally, these are both areas with significant cicada populations. It makes you wonder if there's a connection: https://www.birdwatchingdaily.com/news/birdwatching/terribly-scary-situation-as-birds-die-go-blind-in-d-c-area/

And even if the building is vacant, they would have to maintain it and minimally heat/cool it or else the elements would quickly destroy it and lead to it being condemned. My guess is that the annual maintenance/tax costs are in the same ballpark as the demo contract.

Cincy's best Chinese Buffet (Twin Dragon) has been open all along. They put up plastic shields around the buffet lines and made if cafeteria style.

I think the movement to defund the police emboldened criminals and has resulted in a lot more reactive policing, in lieu of proactive. Police don't want to make a mistake and get labeled racist, so they are more hesitant to interject in a situation they may have previously been able to deescalate. I think that is a fairly widespread view and not at all divisive. To extend an olive branch, I wholeheartedly agree with your second statement.

At first glance I thought he was complaining about the lockdowns in some sort of attempt to appeal to right wingers, but on a re-read I see that he's really just trying to pass the buck for the record number of homicides and shootings in Cincinnati last year. Instead of saying the big increase matched what's happened in other major cities, and seems to be a result of a global pandemic, sudden unemployment, protests and riots in the streets, and a widespread push to "defund the police," he tried to lay it all on DeWine, someone he hopes to one day face in the general election for governor. It was a pretty silly intention to begin with, but he totally botched it and came off sounding like an anti-lockdown protestor instead. It's like he forgot there's a primary.

I walked by this sign awhile ago and had to stand about 2 feet in front of it to read the little white text. No one is parking there because it's impossible to tell if you're allowed to park there until you've already parked and walked onto the sidewalk. When I lived in NYC a decade ago I used to take photos of some of their ridiculous signs - this reminds me of those. Also, all the temporary parking lanes in the city should be striped as parking lanes, since they are parking lanes most of the time. I think it's less safe to stripe them as driving lanes - people will drive in the lane and not expect to come up on a parked car. If they had perpendicular striping for parking stalls, people would drive more cautiously.

As someone who lives in a township and has worked from home all year, this will mean thousands of dollars back in our pockets. I'll be part home/part office for the near future but my wife seems to be looking at work-from-home permanently. I understood the need for the emergency clause even though it violated the principles of income taxing, but it makes no sense to continue it anymore. Further, it should have never been allowed to stay in place for as long as it did. People should pay income taxes where they are doing the work.

Is it? I think it's mostly just the result of how likely your home is to be damaged or destroyed. The map looks almost exactly like a map of the states with the most tornadoes/severe thunderstorms. Wind, hail, and lightning make up the majority of homeowners claims. Freezing/water damage also makes up nearly 1/4 of claims. Source: https://www.kin.com/blog/most-common-home-insurance-claims People might think CA would have higher insurance rates because of the earthquakes and wildfires, but those events are extremely rare. Meanwhile they experience virtually zero severe thunderstorms and no freeze/thaw cycles. I'm also suspicious that coverage like flood and earthquake insurance, both purchased separately or in addition to a standard homeowners policy, are not included in the map above.

Yeah it is somewhat confusing. The state health department orders are issued under a different power than the State of Emergency declaration. The health orders are set to be revoked on June 2nd, but the governor has not set a date to end the State of Emergency. That said, the legislature recently passed a law requiring the State of Emergency to expire on July 23rd at the latest. DeWine vetoed it, but they overrode his veto. DeWine could move the end date up, but he cannot legally extend it. Any new declaration would not include any of the requirements (like the income tax one) that the last State of Emergency had since many of those were only possible with the cooperation of the legislature.

There is now a bill in the House that would allow people who work from home to file for a tax return for all of 2021 instead of just the days after the state of emergency expires (though the ship seems to have sailed on retroactively applying this back to 2020). I'll watch this closely because I live in a township and work in Cincinnati. https://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/2021/05/19/ohio-moves-change-pandemic-rules-municipal-income-tax/5163233001/ A law passed during the pandemic lets cities collect taxes as if workers commuted to their offices until 30 days after Ohio's state of emergency ends. Right now that would be Aug. 23. Basically, HB 157 would let you claim a refund for every day you worked from home in 2021 and current law would let you start claiming those days in August.

PG wants to use focus groups to formulate his legal defense. I've long thought his entire political platform was formulated in much the same way and this heightens my suspicions: Sittenfeld attorneys seek permission for defense strategy focus groups https://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/2021/05/17/p-g-sittenfeld-attorneys-seek-permission-focus-groups/5125091001/ Attorneys for suspended Cincinnati City Councilman P.G. Sittenfeld want to prepare for a possible trial in his federal bribery case by using focus groups... According to court documents, Sittenfeld's attorneys intend to show videos that could reveal the identities of undercover agents. They say that any videos shown will be pixilated to obscure the agents' identities.

In Cincinnati it is surprisingly straight forward. They have a tax return form specifically for people who worked elsewhere but were taxed by the city. My only complaint about the paperwork is that the city makes you list each individual day worked out of the city as a line item. So if you work at home about half the time, you have to submit a list of ~120 days. It's way more paperwork than it needs to be because you could arrive at the same result by just writing "120 days." I live in a township that has no income tax, so my wife and I will start keeping track of the days we work remote as soon as we hit the +30 day mark after the emergency order ends on June 2nd. I will mostly be in the office but my wife will be at home a majority of the time. It should be a de facto raise unless there's something I'm missing.

Hybrid models are probably going to be the most popular, and they will still have an impact on cities. In Ohio, you can file for a return for days worked outside of a municipality where your office is. So if commuters are only in the office 2 or 3 days a week, they'll only have to pay taxes for those days. That said, I don't think many people realize that.

It was reportedly coming some time in Spring 2021: https://www.cvgairport.com/about/news/2020/10/06/business-courier-cvg's-paris-flight-set-to-return

That's all stuff you're doing aside from working. Everyone has a social life whether they live in a suburb or city, and whether they are working from home or the office. What is missing with work from home is the social aspect of working. Zoom and Teams calls only help so much. Companies are realizing this and by summer's end most people will be back in an office for at least a few days of the week. I think permanent WFH will plateau at about 20% of the office workforce, and not a whole lot of that 20% will come from companies like W&S.

Do folks really want our schools to teach our kids to be divisive based on their race, color, nationality, and sex? Seems like a recipe for disaster. I'm not that old, but when I was a kid I was always taught to treat people with the same amount of respect regardless of those attributes. I really think society has regressed a tremendous amount on this issue over the last decade or so and this is a good example - the state legislature is working to help set a public school curriculum that teaches our kids to not be racially divisive and people are somehow mad about it.

Link to some of the tweets - per the Enquirer hard copy prints of the Tweets were mailed to local Democratic party leaders: https://imgur.com/a/hj2vkvZ You can see that some of the words were bold, so whoever dug this up just searched Bauman's tweets for certain key words that are likely tied to something that can get someone cancelled. "Black," "chick," "women," etc. Simple, but effective strategy. I wouldn't be surprised if another Dem running for council was the one who dug these up. I think if you're going to try and become a public figure, you should delete and/or lock down whatever personal social media accounts you have and set up a public facing one, only.

The newscast points out that the drive-thru wait time was over 30 minutes - coincidentally that's roughly the same as the average wait at the White Castle on William Howard Taft.

This is a good summary. I share a lot of this view. It is very difficult for most families to get by on a single income, which is a shame. The greatest trick the man ever pulled on American families was convincing us, under the guise of equality, that both parents need to work instead of either mom or dad can work. The '80s and '90s saw the biggest increases in dual income households, and coincidentally wages have been pretty stagnant since then. Ideally we'd have some sort of sizable stay-at-home parent childcare tax credit for married couples filing together. There are lots of options to explore here.

I'm actually surprised that state law allows this. Seems extremely intrusive - I would hate this as either a buyer or seller. Having an inspection when construction or renovation takes place makes sense. Having a government official scour your entire house just because Person A wants to sell it to Person B seems like a stretch. At most, these inspections should be limited to exterior items visible from the right of way. I've never heard of this until now, so I'd be surprised if there are many municipalities around Cincinnati that do this.

I came across a listing the other day that required potential buyers to waive the inspection. It went pending within hours. In Cincinnati I've heard of lots of people waiving inspections altogether. From a seller's perspective, a waived inspection is a huge plus because it eliminates one of the few ways a buyer can back out of the deal and keep their earnest money. Buyers can easily take advantage of the inspection process - they may make offers on multiple properties, knowing there's almost always something in a report that they can use to walk away.

^ As someone who now lives in a township, I've been watching these cases very closely. I'm optimistic that the Hamilton County case might turn out differently. Between my wife and I, we're talking about thousands of dollars paid to jurisdictions that we have barely stepped foot in. Add that up for millions of Ohioans - there's a lot of money at play here. I understood the original need for the bill that included this tax structure - the sudden change would have wreaked havoc on municipal finances. However, we are now a year into the pandemic and many people are still working from home. Some may never return to their workplace, and most will likely see some flexibility and split time between their homes and offices. It does not make sense for a worker to pay all of their income taxes to a jurisdiction whose services they never or only occasionally utilize. Maybe it did when the pandemic first hit - but it doesn't now. This portion of the "state of emergency" really needs to be revoked, at this point. Additionally, with the recent passing of the federal stimulus bill, municipalities are set to receive massive windfalls from the federal government. The City of Cincinnati, for example, will receive $290 million. The city was only facing a $25.6 million deficit for the next fiscal year. This money will more than make up for any short-term fallout that cities may face due to the loss of a portion of income tax. There's really enough money there to retroactively return taxes from 2020, as well.

This ordeal is the talk of the West Side: 'Linnie's has never been busier': Cincinnati pub owner talks about reactions to LeBron James https://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/local/delhi-township/2021/04/27/lebron-james-linnes-pub-owner-west-side-cincinnati-continue-react/4861000001/