For more than half a century at the University of Akron, its chief in-house legal counsel has seen the ups and downs of the university from both sides. In those 50-some years, Ted Mallo has been at the university as either a student or full-time employee. He has had many roles: a student leader, student-athlete, alumnus, faculty member, administrator, chief legal counsel and officer of the board of trustees.

He has served eight presidents and two interim presidents, and was chief legal adviser to the board of trustees, administrators and university officers.

“All the time I worked at the university I always remembered I only had one client — the University of Akron,” he said. “You always have to keep your mind focused on who your client really is, and not think that it’s any one individual as your client.”

Mallo, 71, announced he will retire at the end of this year.

Celeste Cook will succeed him as the chief general counsel. She joined UA in June 1997 after 10 years with the attorney general’s office. In her second year in law school, she was Mallo’s law clerk.

Mallo began attending UA in 1962 after graduating from South High School. He received three degrees there — his bachelor’s degree in biology in 1967, a master’s in education in 1968 and his law degree in 1972.

In his sophomore year, Mallo was the editor-in-chief of the student-run newspaper, the Buchtelite. He wrote controversial articles uncovering administrative wrongdoing and advocating for more student-friendly policies. A decade later, he worked side by side with some of the same administrators he complained and wrote about.

He met his future wife, JoAnn Batchik, in 1963. He interviewed and hired her as one of the staff writers for the paper. They’ve been married nearly 50 years and have three adult children and nine grandchildren.

Mallo said he has a strong affinity for the Buchtelite and was disappointed to learn of its financial problems.

“I think the Buchtelite and the yearbook are two publications that the University of Akron should always have so there is a history of the institution,” Mallo said. “We really need them. I think it’s just a matter of priorities on what we spend our money on, and if it’s not a priority, it’s not a priority. Personally, I think the university should pay something to help keep the Buchtelite going. I don’t know that a lot of people agree with me.”

He said the university stopped publishing a yearbook 10 years ago.

“We still use them when we have guests, and talk about what it was like back then and can go look at pictures,” he said. “Now, we have a decade of students who have no documented history of that time frame or of their classmates.”

His career path

Mallo discovered his interest in law after taking a law class that was required for his certification to become an administrator. He said he knew right away that he wanted to become a lawyer.

He ended up teaching that same class that sparked his interest — for 25 years.

He also taught in the Akron Public Schools for three years, and as a member of the graduate faculty taught graduate courses in the School of Law and Higher Education Law in the College of Education.

“I really enjoyed teaching biology, but it was hard to raise a family on a teacher’s salary,” he said.

He said he has come a long way. He grew up on a farm in rural Tennessee without running water or electricity. He attended school in a two-room schoolhouse. The family moved to the area because his father worked in a family business grocery store, and it became too difficult to travel back and forth.

Mallo got a break in 1969 after his first year of law school. UA asked him to advise students during the campus disturbances across the nation over the Vietnam War.

“They needed someone who knew something about the law, so I was put in charge of student discipline. One thing led to another, and I later became coordinator of student conduct programs and director of student legal programs,” he said. “It was a tough period.”

He got his first full-time job in a legal capacity at UA in 1972, but not without a brief snag.

“I accepted a position contingent to passing the bar. I waited all night for the phone call that I had passed, but never got it,” he said. “When I called the clerk of courts office, which had the list of who had passed, I wasn’t on it.”

So he called his parents, the UA president, and dean to tell them he had flunked. But the next day when he went to work, his wife called him and said he had gotten a telegram from the Supreme Court. He told her to open it.

“It said ‘congratulations, you passed’... Apparently, because I lived in Cuyahoga Falls, they made a mistake and put me on the Cuyahoga County list of names. I went from an absolute low to an absolute high in a matter of hours. It was just a fluke.”

First in Ohio

Akron was the first office of general counsel of any state university in Ohio. There are four in-house attorneys. Before an in-house general counsel, there were attorneys to represent different departments. Mallo worked in the office of legal affairs. The general counsel is now being modeled at other state universities, including Ohio State.

He was also instrumental in his hometown to incorporate the Township of Green into the City of Green. He said it took seven years.

He dabbled in politics a little as well, serving 12 years as a member of the Green Local Schools Board of Education (including two years as president).

At the last board of trustees meeting of the year, on Dec. 7, Mallo was praised for his work.

Former board Chair Richard Pogue said in addition to Mallo’s solid advice over the years, he has always been “good-natured with a sense of humor and balance of humanity.” He said Mallo “has a wealth of know­ledge, history and good common sense. I think we all have benefited tremendously from his service, his knowledge, his background and his wisdom.”

Current board Chair Rollie Bauer, also added: “Ted Mallo has had 47 years of distinguished and exemplary service to the university. He is an honorable attorney, a friend of the university and the board of trustees ... and young at heart.”

Marilyn Miller can be reached at 330-996-3098 or mmiller@thebeaconjournal.com

It’s not easy for a journalist to conduct interviews in a crowd while the speaker at the podium is pointing, telling every­one that reporters aren’t to be trusted.

“I hate some of these people, but I’d never kill ’em,” Donald Trump said at a December 2015 rally in Michigan, pointing the news media. “I would never kill them. I would never do that, but I do hate ’em.”

Trump framed news media as his enemy, so that by the time of an October rally in Cincinnati, the mere act of reporters filing to their seats caused supporters to erupt into an angry, unnerving roar, according to a New York Times account.

We in the media took a beating in 2016. But it’s not like we didn’t see it coming.

Several Ohio news outlets joined a year ago to form the Your Vote Ohio project, which grew from a recognition that we were out of touch with the people of our state who were feeling helpless and becoming angry.

We set out to reshape ourselves by doing three things: Make sure you were heard in the 2016 presidential election; provide you with information vital to making good decisions; and meanwhile look for ways to rebuild trust between you and us.

You told us you want to know who we are and how we do our jobs.

So that’s what this is about. After a tense year, we’re telling you what we did in 2016 and invite your direction for 2017.

Over the next few days, we will publish the final installments of the Your Vote Ohio election project, then meet in Columbus to discuss what we learned and consider how we can help Ohioans digest the work of the new administration.

That meeting will have its holy schnikes moment. We had no idea that at the end of the election cycle, as we arrived at possible solutions to rebuilding trust, that the entire news industry would be in upheaval over the very question that launched us.

We won’t fool ourselves in that meeting.

As Beacon Journal politics reporter Doug Livingston observed a few weeks ago, we probably haven’t changed Ohioans’ thoughts about the media, but we have changed the way some journalists respect the people.

Nuts and bolts

This has been an expensive and time-intensive endeavor.

The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation provided $175,000 to conduct polling to learn what was important to Ohioans. The polling defined our coverage. There also were three intense, three-day sessions with regular people in which they wrote prescriptions for restoring trust in the media.

In weekly phone conferences, newspapers, radio and television stations divided responsibilities for stories that grew out of the polling. The Akron Beacon Journal/Ohio.com served as the story hub, the Bliss Institute at the University of Akron did the polling and the Jefferson Center, a St. Paul-based civic engagement organization, conducted citizen workshops in Akron and helped manage our web presence.

By June, we had our first round of research showing what Ohioans wanted from us, and we began to produce news according to that format.

So, as we emerged from the election with some possible solutions to the trust issue, others in the news industry were recognizing the problem.

The enabler

We can’t be shy about this: Trust in traditional media has waned the last several years. Donald Trump transformed the lack of trust into anger.

As early as 2012, media animosity surfaced as the Beacon Journal, the Bliss Institute and the Akron faith community explored growing incivility.

UA polling showed that people blamed media most of all for creating an unhealthy environment. The National Institute for Civil Discourse held a media retreat in October 2015 that spawned the Your Vote Ohio project as Trump said he hated journalists.

By the time of our November post-election poll, Trump supporters unequivocally blamed media more than anyone else for the sad state of politics — 53 percent said news media are “very responsible.”

In contrast, only 43 percent of Clinton supporters said the same. They were more likely to blame the candidates.

And as for who was most dissatisfied with media coverage, it was 65 percent of the Trump supporters compared with 32 percent for Clinton’s fans.

The fix

For decades, local media equipped people to participate in their communities.

We viewed ourselves as critical. We still do.

But today we fear that too many of you don’t, partly because our work is lost in the internet mayhem. We compete with sources around the world, some of which are careless, or, worse, fabricate information.

Our business model was disrupted when advertisers — the main source of our income — chose to reach their markets directly rather than on local radio and TV or in print. Most newsrooms are half the size they were 10 years ago.

So, we wanted guidance. In workshops led by the Jefferson Center, we heard citizens tell us:

• Stay focused on what is important to the people.

• Show how major issues affect people differently.

• Be bold and graphic with facts.

• Tell people how journalists do their work.

• Don’t be aloof. Engage children, young people and adults in problem-solving conversations.

Disbelievers

In one of the three-day citizen sessions, people worked hard to write those prescription to restore trust between people and the press.

Solutions seem simple.

But one woman, after reviewing the guidelines she helped write, said that even if reporters follow the guidelines, she still won’t trust them.

In the UA post-election poll, 70 percent of Ohioans said it is “very important” that news media fact-check the candidates. Yet, Andrew Meyer, news director at the National Public Radio affiliate WKSU in Kent, said a critic recently told him that fact-checking is an indication of reporter bias. That person said journalists should transcribe candidate statements and no more.

And then there was our grand experiment.

Polling of Ohioans showed us which issues to address, among them immigration. WKSU reporter M.L. Schultze took the lead and used the prescription as the guide.

The Jefferson Center tested her stories by asking a group of voters to compare hers with two other news outlet presentations.

Without knowing the background, voters picked hers as the most interesting and informative, equipping them best to act on this issue.

There was one holdout, a person troubled that the story didn’t reflect immigration as the overt threat as she saw it.

Others challenged her, saying Schultze had provided an accurate and fascinating Ohio perspective backed by solid data.

She wasn’t satisfied.

She wondered, was WKSU’s reporting influenced by the immigrant population on campus?

Is it possible to reset that relationship? How?

Beacon Journal managing editor Doug Oplinger can be emailed at doplinger@thebeaconjournal.com.

AKRON

Man, 25, killed in shooting

AKRON: Police are investigating a Monday shooting that left a 25-year-old man dead in East Akron.

The man, whose name has not been disclosed, was found at about 3 p.m. with several gunshot wounds and was transported to Summa Akron City Hospital, where he died. The man’s name will be released following notification of his family.

He was found in the 1000 block of Ericsson Avenue. Akron police said it appears he was involved in a verbal altercation with several other men, whose descriptions are not available, before he was shot.

Anyone with information about the shooting, which is being investigated as a homicide, is asked to contact detectives at 330-375-2490.

CANTON

Police to increase patrols

CANTON: Canton police have announced plans to boost traffic patrols through the month of January.

In a news release, the police department said its goal is to reduce traffic fatalities and injuries by focusing on cutting speeding, driving while intoxicated, failure to use seat belts and failure to obey traffic signs and lights.

The program, which will span Jan. 1 through Jan. 31, is funded by a grant from the Ohio Department of Public Safety.

WOOSTER

Nine are hurt in collision

WOOSTER: Officials said nine people were hospitalized following a collision between two vehicles on Christmas Day.

Two cars crashed at the intersection of state Route 302 and Bates Road in Wooster around 4:05 p.m. Sunday, according to the Department of Public Safety Wooster Communications Center.

A total of nine people were injured in the accident. They were transported to Wooster Community Hospital.

Police have not released details regarding the victims’ conditions or how the collision occurred.

STATE NEWS

Girl, 8, dies after crash

COLUMBUS: An 8-year-old girl hurt in a crash that killed her parents and another driver in suburban Columbus has died.

The Franklin County Sheriff’s Office said 8-year-old Mylee Music of Columbus died early Sunday at a Columbus hospital.

Investigators said the driver of the other vehicle lost control Saturday on Interstate 270 southwest of Columbus and crossed onto the other side where he hit a car carrying the family.

James Music, 39, and his wife, Suni Music, 41, both of Columbus, were pronounced dead at a hospital.

The SUV driver, 38-year-old Loren Colombini of Columbus, died at the scene.

The sheriff’s office said it thinks alcohol or drugs may have played a part in the crash.

Retiring University of Akron chief in-house legal counsel Ted Mallo recently reminisced about his 50-plus years at the university in an interview with the Akron Beacon Journal.

Q: What were the best years at UA?

A: Midcareer, when the university was more like a family. We had events that involved all the university employees.

In those days, you knew everyone from the custodian to faculty members. But in the late ’80s/early ’90s, when the university established the early retirement option, it transitioned 750 employees.

You lost a lot of people ... the turnover wasn’t forced, but because it was such an incentive, the university paid for five years of retirement. ... Also the job grew, it was no longer a 40-hour-a-week job.

Q: What were the hardest years?

A: It centered around the 1970 shootings at Kent State University, when we had thousands of students gathered in Lee Jackson Field — an open field at the time. It was during the Vietnam War period when attitudes changed.

Q: What did you enjoy the most about higher education law?

A: One of the things that is exciting about the practice of higher ed is that it is so broad.

It’s really the variety of general practicing. If I were in a corporate law department of a major company, I would either be in real estate law or litigation; I’d be narrowly focused. There is so much more variety in higher ed. You’re not 10 feet deep, you’re 10 feet wide.

Q: What will you miss about UA?

A: The people.

Q: Will you stay retired or will you do something else?

A: I don’t know yet. My first priority is trying to plan something special for our 50th anniversary on Jan. 20. I’m thinking about taking my wife on a trip to the beach somewhere. Other than that, I really can’t say. I plan to keep all my options open. My father worked until he was 90.

Marilyn Miller can be reached at 330-996-3098 or mmiller@thebeaconjournal.com

In the 2016 Your Vote Ohio project, Ohioans said they want the news media to view voters as participants not only in democracy, but in journalism.

Ohio news organizations will meet soon to discuss how best to serve the public as the new administration takes shape in Washington. What would you like us to do on such issues as health care policies, restoring coal and manufacturing jobs, dealing with immigration and religious diversity, adjusting abortion rules, solving the heroin crisis, or prosecution of Hillary Clinton and draining the swamp?

Tell your local news organizations whether you think they should be part of this effort and what they should do to help you make informed decisions.

Coming this week:

An examination of religion, voter disgust, attitudes toward voter subsets and fake news.

Your Vote Ohio

This series is based on a series of polls designed for the Your Vote Ohio project by the Bliss Institute of Applied Politics at the University of Akron and conducted by the Center for Marketing and Opinion Research and designed.

The post-election poll surveyed 800 Ohioans who participated previously in three other polls. Interviews were conducted between Nov. 9 and Dec. 10. The margin of error is plus or minus 3.5 percentage points. Results were weighted to conform with the demographic parameters of the original sample.

COLUMBUS: Ohio State University researchers have released several suggestions to reduce toxic algae blooms.

The researchers have been testing different strategies to reduce phosphorus discharge, which feeds toxic algae, the Columbus Dispatch reported.

The project results announced last week follow an agreement this year between the U.S. and Canada to cut phosphorus discharge into Lake Erie by 40 percent.

The Ohio State project found that farmers should apply fertilizer below the soil surface and plant cover crops and buffer strips.

Cover crops prevent rain from washing fertilizer into lakes. They’re grown in fields that would otherwise go unplanted.

Buffer strips serve a similar purpose. They’re often planted with grass or other non-crop plants and surround fields.

The researchers found that 39 percent of farmers in the Lake Erie watershed already use subsurface fertilization, 22 percent grow cover crops and 35 percent plant buffer strips.

They say each of those figures is at least 20 percent less than where they should be if phosphorus discharge into Lake Erie is to be cut 40 percent.

“A lot of farmers have already taken the risk ... to help move the needle,” said Jay Martin, project leader and director of the university’s Field to Faucet water quality program. “That’s really encouraging. But we need to accelerate.”

Ohioans also are willing to use tax money to combat algae blooms, researchers found.

HARTFORD, Conn.: Frustrated after seeing another candidate secure the presidency without winning the national popular vote, mostly Democratic lawmakers in several capitols want their states to join a 10-year-old movement to work around the Electoral College.

In states including Ohio, Pennsylvania, Connecticut and New Mexico, legislators have said they plan to introduce legislation that would require that their state’s Electoral College voters cast ballots for the presidential candidate who earns the most votes nationwide, regardless of the statewide results.

“Every vote in this country should have equal weight. The Electoral College is a relic of a bygone era, and we need to change this system,” said Connecticut Sen. Mae Flexer, who filed a state bill with several fellow Democrats requiring Connecticut to join the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact.

Since 2006, 10 states and Washington, D.C., have signed onto the compact, which require their Electoral College voters to cast ballots for the national popular-vote winner. In theory, it would take effect once it involves states representing at least 270 electoral votes, the threshold to win the presidency.

The states that have already passed legislation to join the group represent 165 electoral votes.

The compact wouldn’t benefit any one party, said Patrick Rosenstiel, a consultant to National Popular Vote, the group that has been pushing for the compact since 2006. Rather, the Republican said, it will encourage candidates to campaign in every state, regardless of its politics, and make every voter relevant.

“Right now, we’ve got a system where the battleground states have all the political influence,” he said.

Recent polling shows support for the Electoral College among Republicans is high following Donald Trump’s victory, said Robert Alexander, a political science professor at Ohio Northern University and author of a book on the Electoral College.

And battleground states like Ohio have little motivation to give up the attention they receive from presidential candidates, Alexander said.

Associated Press

ALLIANCE: A woman accused of threatening to shoot people at a Stark County hospital and blow it up after a relative died there has been arrested on a charge of making terroristic threats.

The Repository in Canton reports the 35-year-old Alliance woman was arrested at Alliance Community Hospital early Monday morning.

Alliance police reported that hospital employees believed the woman’s threat of revenge to be a credible threat to the safety of their workplace.

She was taken to the Stark County Jail.

It wasn’t clear Tuesday whether the woman has an attorney. The felony case wasn’t yet listed in court records.

The Ohio Turnpike is cutting back on its construction spending next year, saying motorists complained that there were too many orange barrels on the highway this year.

“We did hear from customers about the number and length of some of the work zones we had in 2016,” spokesman Brian Newbacher said. “We want to continue the program but do so at a less aggressive pace.”

The 2017 capital budget, approved last week by the Ohio Turnpike and Infrastructure Commission, calls for $121.4 million in spending, compared to $145.5 million this year. The work includes pavement reconstruction, resurfacing and bridge projects on the 241-mile toll road, which stretches across northern Ohio.

The turnpike estimates that there will be 25 percent fewer lane miles under construction.

It’s not a matter of having less money to spend, but rather responding to motorists, Newbacher said.

One of the big projects involves the toll plaza at Interstate 77 in Richfield Township in northern Summit County. The turnpike will rebuild pavement, make repairs and resurface some ramps from May through October. The estimated cost is $3 million to $4 million.

In the Akron area, the turnpike plans to reconstruct pavement between Streetsboro and Shalersville Township in Portage County, and replace bridge bearings, joints and decks on several overhead bridges in Summit and Portage counties.

The budget also calls for the installation of fiber optic cable along the highway. The so-called “Dedicated Short Range Communications” technology will allow the turnpike to gather information on road conditions, monitor fleet vehicles and improve maintenance, the turnpike said.

Rick Armon can be reached at 330-996-3569 or rarmon@thebeaconjournal.com. Follow him on Twitter at @armonrickABJ .

An 18-year-old Akron man is heading to prison for burning his 4-month-old daughter in scalding water.

Demetrius Ford was convicted by a Summit County jury in November of felonious assault and two counts of child endangering, second-degree felonies. Summit County Common Pleas Court Judge Todd McKenney sentenced Ford Tuesday to eight years in prison.

“This innocent child suffered significant, painful injuries,” Summit County Prosecutor Sherri Bevan Walsh said in a prepared statement. “She will have to deal with the physical and emotional scars for the rest of her life. A father’s main goal should be to protect their child, not cause pain.”

Prosecutors say Ford, who was 17 at the time, was giving his daughter a bath in February when she suffered second- and third-degree burns to her face, shoulders and chest.

At trial, a child abuse expert testified that the girl was purposefully submerged in scalding water. Investigators also discovered the girl suffered a skull fracture and broken ribs, according to the Summit County Prosecutor’s Office.

Ford was bound over from Summit County Juvenile Court to be tried as an adult.

Chavelle Grier, the child’s mother, was sentenced to probation in June for her part in the girl’s injuries. Grier, 21, pleaded guilty to two counts of child endangering.

A Doylestown woman has been charged with theft after returning a Santa Claus statue she’s accused of stealing from a Barberton movie theater following a complaint she had with service there.

Barberton Municipal Court has issued a summons for the 45-year-old woman. The charge is a first-degree misdemeanor.

According to police reports, the woman took the 2-foot cloth statue from near an exit door as she was leaving Lake Cinema 8 on Thursday night. Police asked the Barberton Herald to post security camera images of the woman on Facebook, and she returned the statue to the theater on Monday — four days after allegedly taking it — following a storm of social media activity. The posts about the stolen statue were shared hundreds of times.

“When she returned it, she told the person working that she didn’t mean to take it,” Detective Bob Russell said. “How you can take a Santa Claus statue accidentally is beyond me.”

Russell said the woman also complained to theater management after her visit on Thursday. Managers appeased her with passes to see a movie for free at a later date.

“So not only did she get free passes,” the detective said, “but she also took Santa with her.”

The woman is not being identified because the Beacon Journal typically doesn’t name people charged with misdemeanors.

A patron who shared a theater with the alleged thief told the Beacon Journal that the woman and two children, who were about 10 years old, were disruptive during a movie. The patron, Jessica Colbetzor, said she and her friend complained to theater management, who ejected the alleged thief and the children from the movie.

Mark Budnick, one of the theater’s managers, said security cameras captured the woman stealing the statue as she left the cinema. He said she “had the guts and audacity” to return later and complain that her children had been reprimanded. That’s when another manager appeased her with free passes.

“What the manager on duty didn’t know was she had already taken Santa,” Budnick said.

The woman returned the statue after commenters on Facebook lobbed insults and accusations about her.

Budnick said workers caught the woman on Monday — the day after Christmas — trying to return the statue stealthily.

“She said obviously she felt ashamed and guilty,” Budnick said. “We’re just glad to have Santa back.”

The statue was one of five sitting near an exit. It was accompanied by four elf statues, which were left untouched.

Budnick said he’s unsure how old the statues are or what they’re worth. They were used at a display in the city at some point and the cinema inherited them for decoration a few years ago.

“To be honest, I’m surprised no one’s tried taking them before,” he said. “We’ve got security cameras, but they’re sitting right there in the open.”

A few people on social media expressed glee that the woman did the right thing in the end.

“At least she did the right thing and brought it back. Most wouldn’t have,” one woman said. “Then again, most people wouldn’t steal a Santa in the first place.”

Nick Glunt can be reached at 330-996-3565 or nglunt@thebeaconjournal.com. Follow him on Twitter @NickGluntABJ  and on Facebook @JournoNickGlunt .

About the poll

The postelection survey contacted 800 voters drawn from the nearly 2,000 first interviewed in June 2016 and re-interviewed in August and September. The postelection interviews were conducted between Nov. 9 and Dec. 10. The margin of error is plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.

Online extra

Polling data on religion

BEACON JOURNAL

Call center holiday hours

AKRON: The Beacon Journal Customer Service Call Center will take calls from 7 to 10 a.m. Saturday, Sunday and Monday. The phone number is 330-996-3600 or 800-777-2442.

Regular business hours of 6:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. will resume Tuesday.

The Public Service Counter inside the Beacon Journal, at 44 E. Exchange St., Akron, will be closed Monday. Regular business hours of 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. will resume Tuesday.

AKRON

Officer faces more charges

AKRON: A Bedford Heights officer facing a domestic violence charge in Stark County now has charges pending against him in Summit County for the same incident, which prosecutors say began in Akron.

Officer Douglas Dardzinski, 39, of Cleveland, has been charged in Summit County with kidnapping, extortion, abduction and disrupting public service.

Dardzinski was arraigned Friday in Akron Municipal Court and is free on a $7,500 bond. He has a temporary protection order, forbidding him from having contact with his alleged victim, according to court records.

The incident in Akron happened Dec. 9 at Spring Street and Maiden Lane in downtown. Prosecutors say Dardzinski forced a woman into his car, assaulted her and then drove her to Stark County.

Dardzinski, who is on unpaid leave from the Bedford Heights Police Department, has a jury trial scheduled on a first-degree misdemeanor domestic violence charge scheduled for Jan. 9 in Canton Municipal Court, according to court records. He is free on that case on a $15,000 bond.

CANTON

Regular schedule for trash

CANTON: City trash and recycling pickup will be on its regular schedule through Friday.

Also, trash and recycling pickup will be on schedule starting Monday through Jan. 6.

For questions or more information, call the city sanitation department at 330-489-3020.

COLUMBUS

Sibling charged in death

COLUMBUS: Police are investigating the fatal shooting of a man by his brother during an argument at a home in Columbus.

A statement from Columbus police says officers went to the residence after 19-year-old Mohamud Mohamed was shot by 21-year-old Ali Mohamed on Monday afternoon. The statement says the older brother told officers his brother threatened him with a knife during a dispute and that he was forced to fire in self-defense.

Mohamud Mohamed died Monday night at a hospital.

Police say Ali Mohamed has a concealed carry permit.

The Franklin County Prosecutor’s Office is expected to review the circumstances of the shooting to determine whether criminal charges are appropriate.

CINCINNATI

Cops not liable in chase

CINCINNATI: The Ohio Supreme Court says five law enforcement officers sued by a woman injured during a high-speed chase are immune from legal liability.

There was disagreement among the justices on immunity standards. The majority ruled officers chasing suspects receive the same level of immunity provided by state law to all government employees. Justice Judith French wrote officers couldn’t be held liable unless they acted “in a wanton or reckless manner.”

Justice Sharon Kennedy agreed with the court’s judgment, but disagreed with some of the ruling. Two justices dissented.

The ruling stemmed from a lawsuit by Pamela Argabrite, who was injured in 2011 when burglary suspect Andrew Barnhart’s vehicle hit hers head-on as he fled from Miami Township and Montgomery County officers. Barnhart died in the crash.

Argabrite’s attorney didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the ruling.

By Laura A. Bischoff

Dayton Daily News

Columbus: New polling data show evangelical Christian voters in Ohio overwhelmingly backed Donald Trump and he won a majority of mainline Protestants as well — support he received even though he has been married three times, had a child out of wedlock, bragged about groping women and says he hasn’t been to church in three years.

When dissecting Trump’s Ohio victory — which was confirmed last week when all 18 Electoral College members remained faithful to him — it’s clear large pockets of religious-oriented Ohioans liked enough about his policies to forgive less desirable aspects of his personality.

“Obviously, he said a lot of stupid things,” said Tabitha Huschilt, a freshman at Cedarville University. “But I felt that I was supporting his policies, more so than what he said.”

Postelection polling data from the University of Akron as part of the Your Vote Ohio project found 78 percent of evangelical Protestants and 54 percent of mainline Protestants voted for Trump for president. That largely mirrors the results from 2012, when those groups backed the Republican candidate, Mitt Romney, in big numbers over President Barack Obama.

But although Republicans often draw hefty numbers from Christian conservatives, many people expected a less definitive result in 2016, in part because of Trump’s many controversial statements.

He even tangled with Pope Francis over what it means to be Christian, yet 52 percent of Roman Catholic voters in Ohio picked him, while just 41 percent voted for Democrat Hillary Clinton, the poll found.

“Trump did very well with evangelicals and well with other white Christians — Catholics and mainline Protestants. This was generally not expected,” said John Green, director of the Ray C. Bliss Institute of Applied Politics at the University of Akron. “But overall, the religious lineup looks a lot like 2012. In terms of voting, the GOP is basically the party of white Christians and the Dems are the party of religious minorities and the nonreligious.”

The Bliss Institute conducted the poll for a coalition of Ohio news organizations that collaborated on polling and other news coverage this year aimed at giving Ohioans a voice in the election process. The news organizations shared resources and worked together to shine a spotlight on the issues that matter most to Ohioans, including the economy, income inequality, immigration, trade, money in politics and negative campaigning.

Religion was not emphasized much by either candidate, though Clinton’s position on abortion may have doomed her with a group that professes deep religious convictions.

“No Republican presidential candidate has ever said that they would only nominate “pro-life justices” to the court,” Mike Gonidakis, president of Ohio Right to Life, said about Trump’s pledge during the campaign. “That cleared the path for those evangelicals on the fence with Mr. Trump due to some of his bombastic and offensive comments.”

“Evangelicals played their odds and won,” he said. “Now Mr. Trump has to deliver on that specific promise.”

Abortion drew the line

Students at Cedarville, a private, conservative Christian college east of Dayton, tracked closely to the poll results. Some wrote in alternative names in protest, others voted for Trump — largely because they opposed Clinton on social issues such as abortion. None of those interviewed said they voted for Clinton.

Bonnie Higgins, a freshman from Harrison County, let out a big sigh when she admitted casting her ballot for Trump, even though he made “overtly degrading” comments about women.

“I had to,” she said. “I was more against Hillary than for Trump. I was worried about who was going to be appointed to the Supreme Court. I did not want Hillary to have that power.”

Brandon Smith, a freshman from Springfield, said he voted for Trump despite misgivings about his public statements. “The problem is he has a mouth — and a Twitter account,” he said. “His running his mouth is morally incorrect.”

Like other evangelicals at Cedarville, Daniel Ernspiker said he couldn’t support Clinton because she supports abortion rights.

“I can’t support abortion whatsoever,” the junior from Ashtabula said. “I think it’s a complete disregard for human life. I believe life starts at conception.”

Stephanie Cradduck, a senior from Cincinnati, said she talked with her parents and prayed about her decision before casting a ballot for write-in candidate Evan McMullin.

“I could not support either of the two major party candidates,” she said, describing Trump as hot-tempered and “incredibly underqualified.” But, she added, “It’s going to be OK. There are systems in place to restrict and limit his power.”

The poll showed support for Trump was strongest among voters who reported attending religious services regularly. Fifty-nine percent of weekly worshippers backed Trump while 54 percent of those who seldom or never attend services backed Clinton.

The candidates’ faith

Trump himself is not a regular churchgoer. The New York Times reported in September that Trump admitted he hadn’t been back to Marble Collegiate Church in about three years. Trump had attended services there for almost 50 years and married his first and second wives there but told the Times that he wasn’t sure if he had ever formally joined the congregation.

Clinton’s Christian faith, on the other hand, began at a young age and continued into adulthood, according to a CNN report this fall. She grew up in a Methodist church and continued to attend while her husband was Arkansas governor and president and near her home in New York.

Whatever the religious convictions of the two candidates, they took a back seat to other issues: Clinton’s emails, hacked emails of people close to her, an FBI investigation. In the end, Clinton’s unpopularity left her vulnerable — even to a candidate who seemed to make every mistake in the book.

During the campaign Trump, 70, personally attacked women, Muslims, Mexicans, a Gold Star family and others. He made oblique references to the size of his penis during a live televised debate. He appeared to mock the physical disability of a New York Times journalist.

Then, just weeks before Election Day, an Access Hollywood hot mic video from 2005 emerged. Trump, unaware his microphone was recording, can be heard bragging about kissing and grabbing women by the crotch without consent, saying his celebrity status allowed him to get away with it.

Trump apologized, attributing it to “locker room talk.” Although initial polls showed some damage to his campaign, it wasn’t as fatal as many thought it might be, and among some groups it didn’t seem to hurt him at all.

Treatment of women

The University of Akron poll found that many Ohioans were uncomfortable with how women were discussed during the campaign, but evangelicals were less upset over it than some other groups.

More than 70 percent of nonreligious voters and those of other faiths said they were uncomfortable with how women were discussed, but only about half of the evangelicals felt that way. Evangelicals were also more likely than other religious groups to have an overall favorable opinion of Trump — and an unfavorable opinion of Clinton.

About 69 percent of evangelicals said they viewed Clinton unfavorably.

“Once committed, evangelicals are hard to persuade otherwise,” Gonidakis said, adding that tipping the balance on the Supreme Court was a bigger factor than anything Trump said or did. “This voting bloc realized that this less than perfect candidate could deliver what was most important — a conservative court for a generation to come,” he said.

For many voters, personal faith and morality take a back seat to how a political leader will act on public policy questions, such as abortion and appointments to the Supreme Court, Green said.

“Religious voters of all kinds often face difficult choices because candidates do not align perfectly with their values,” said Green. “For example, Obama was a model of a traditional family man — which evangelicals believe in — but he was pro-choice on abortion and for same-sex marriage. Evangelicals did not vote for him in large numbers.”

On the other side

Some students at Cedarville said they couldn’t in good conscience support Trump.

Ben Larsen, a junior from Texas, said Trump flipped positions on gun rights, abortion and other issues and was too closely associated with the “alt-right” — a name embraced by some white supremacists — movement to win his vote. He also said he believes Trump could end up starting a devastating trade war with other countries.

Jacob Calloway, a senior studying international relations at Cedarville, skipped voting entirely. Not out of laziness, he said, but out of a general unhappiness over the lack of choices.

“It was just kind of depressing, to be honest,” he said. “As a young person, I didn’t feel I could vote in this election.”

Dayton Daily News reporter Laura Bischoff can be emailed at lbischoff@coxohio.com

MEDINA

Hetsler, Larry L., 72, of Lodi. Died Sunday. Parker.

Holy, Joseph, 94, of Wadsworth. Died Monday. Cox-McNulty.

Maxwell, Marilyn R., 64, of Medina. Died Monday. Waite & Son.

Nordick, Robert A., 70, of Wadsworth. Died Saturday. Parker, Lodi.

Vasil, Josephine, 92, of Brunswick. Died Monday. Carlson.

STARK

Austin, Rosemary, 84, of Massillon. Died Dec. 21. Atkinson Feucht.

Batiste, Rogers Curtis, 64, of Cleveland Heights. Died Dec. 19. Paquelet, Massillon.

Buchanan, Charles Sr., 86, of Massillon. Died Thursday. Atkinson Feucht.

Callahan, Angelyna, 15, of Massillon. Died Friday. Paquelet.

Judge, Gertrude Winifred, 93, of Massillon. Died Dec. 18. Paquelet.

Patterson, Patsy, 73, of Massillon. Died Saturday. Heitger.

Ruppert, Connie F., 75, of Canton. Died Friday. Paquelet, Massillon.

Shaffer, Richard L., 85, of Canton. Died Sunday. Paquelet, Massillon.

Slicker, Mary, 86, of Massillon. Died Saturday. Heitger.

Stallman, Jerry L., 77, of Jackson Township. Died Dec. 21. Paquelet, Massillon.

Woods, William Ray, 81, of Massillon. Died Saturday. Paquelet.

Yant, Ada, 79, of Canton. Died Sunday. Heitger.

PORTAGE

Leithold, James F., 63, of Kent. Died Saturday. Bissler & Sons.

Arrington, Betty Jean, 89, of Munroe Falls. Died Thursday. Bissler & Sons, Kent.

Foster, Bill, 61, of Streetsboro. Died Dec. 21. Bissler & Sons, Kent.

FAIRLAWN: With its message of bringing light to the world, Hanukkah is the only Jewish tradition that is specifically supposed to be a public spectacle.

So what better place to celebrate the holiday than at the Summit Mall food court on Tuesday night?

“The more people, the better, so why not here? The Hanukkah message is supposed to bring light to everyone,” said Rabbi Mendy Sasonkin of the Revere Road Synagogue.

He said this breathlessly as he paused from a jubilant dance in which he had passed out dollar bills to schoolchildren from the Lippman School in Akron and dodged a bowling pin juggler atop a unicycle.

It was the 26th annual Chanukah at the Mall, a festival organized by Sasonkin and his wife, Kaila.

Nearly 100 people sat in rows of chairs watching a program that included a choir of Lippman students and Summit County Executive Ilene Shapiro reading a poem on the history of Hanukkah. Weaving between the crowd, two youngsters dressed as Judah the Maccabee and a larger-than-life dreidel passed out gelt, gold foil-covered chocolate coins that have been part of the Hanukkah tradition for centuries.

The stage was flanked by three menorahs:

• An oil menorah to serve as a reminder of how a one-day supply of oil lasted eight days when Jews reclaimed their Holy Temple from superior Greek armies more than two millenniums ago.

• A menorah made of canned food, destined for the Akron-Canton Regional Foobank, that was a nod to the holiday’s tradition of charity.

• An 8-foot menorah made of blue, white and yellow Legos that seemed appropriate for a celebration that is largely centered around children.

The seated audience was surrounded by many others, including shoppers who paused to take in the party atmosphere, tap a foot to some loud music played by a disc jockey, and sample trays of potato latkes and jelly donuts.

Dahna Fox of Akron, who has four grandchildren attending Lippman (including two singers on the stage Tuesday night), said the mall atmosphere was a great way to “share our culture, especially in these times.”

“These kids are no different than other kids, singing songs about their holiday, celebrating life,” she said. “We are all one.”

Gary Himmel, president of the Fairlawn Community Foundation, bounced from one foot to another as music reverberated through the food court. He watched with admiration as Rabbi Sasonkin sang, clapped and encouraged children to join him on the dance floor.

“He’s so full of energy,” Himmel said. “That’s what the miracle of lights is all about.”

Shay Goldenberg, an Israeli educator who is 1½ years into his two-year visit as an emissary for the Jewish Agency for Israel, wore a broad smile as he watched the happy celebration.

Assigned to the Akron area, he is one of 450 emissaries around the country whose job is to meet with schools and synagogues and give people the opportunity to “be close to Israel through meeting me and hearing my story.”

But on Tuesday evening, he was learning as much as teaching.

His second Hanukkah in America has been “awesome,” he said, and just one more lesson on how the Sasonkins “do everything with love” for their community.

“They are always willing to share, always willing to find a way to reach out to others,” Goldenberg said. Then with a final look at the festivities, added, “I love this!”

Paula Schleis can be reached at 330-996-3741 or pschleis@thebeaconjournal.com. Follow her on Twitter at http://twitter.com/paulaschleis.

CLEVELAND: Catholic Diocese of Cleveland Bishop Richard Lennon is retiring, effective immediately, because of health reasons.

Pope Francis granted the 69-year-old Lennon’s request, made in early November, for early retirement and has appointed Rev. Daniel Edward Thomas as the apostolic administrator of the diocese. Thomas currently serves as bishop of the Diocese of Toledo.

He will oversee the Cleveland diocese until the pope makes a permanent appointment.

The news was announced in a press release early Wednesday and a news conference has been scheduled at 10 a.m. at the diocesan offices of Cathedral Square Plaza in Cleveland.

Lennon was named bishop over nearly 700,000 Catholics in eight counties in April 2006. He was the 10th bishop of the diocese.

Lennon attended Boston College before entering St. John’s Seminary in Brighton, Mass., where he received master’s degrees in church history and sacramental theology.

He was ordained to the priesthood in May 1973 and served in the Archdiocese of Boston as a parish priest, fire department chaplain, assistant for canonical affairs and rector of St. John’s Seminary.

He also previously served as an auxiliary bishop in the Archdiocese of Boston and was apostolic administrator there from December 2002 to July 2003.

The Catholic Diocese of Cleveland is the 23rd largest diocese in the United States. It encompasses Cuyahoga, Summit, Lorain, Lake, Geauga, Medina, Wayne and Ashland counties. There are 185 parishes, 114 Catholic schools, one pastoral center and one mission office within the diocese.

BRUNSWICK: The city is looking to merge its transit system with Medina County Public Transit.

Brunswick City Council approved the merger this week, the Medina Gazette reports, and now the Medina County commissioners will vote on the plan.

Read the Gazette report here.

COLUMBUS: Ohio Gov. John Kasich issued a series of vetoes Tuesday, including one to a bill that would have made compliance with the state’s renewable energy mandates optional for the next three years.

Barring a legislative override, the Republican governor’s action on the energy measure will resume benchmarks established in 2008 that were gradually increasing electric utilities’ use of alternative energy sources such as wind and solar power. The standards also require utilities to find measurable ways for consumers to reduce their energy use.

Kasich also vetoed a tangible property tax exemption for Ohio’s oil-and-gas industry and a bill expanding legislators’ power to abolish state agencies and departments.

Lawmakers have until midnight Saturday to override his vetoes, which also include striking down a so-called heartbeat bill banning most abortions as early as six weeks into pregnancy, at the first detectable heartbeat. Overrides require a three-fifths supermajority of both legislative chambers.

Here’s a closer look at Tuesday’s vetoes:

Clean energy

Kasich’s veto of optional standards brings back mandates on the use of renewable and alternative energy that had been phasing in since 2008.

In a 700-word veto message, Kasich supported the objectives of the original law, passed under former Gov. Ted Strickland, a Democrat. The law required utilities to generate 25 percent of electricity from alternative and advanced sources such as solar, wind and clean coal by 2025.

Sen. Bill Seitz, a Cincinnati Republican, has said the bill making compliance with the state’s renewable energy mandates optional for the next three years was needed to allow time for federal regulations to be sorted out. More than half of U.S. states have challenged implementation of the federal Clean Power Plan in an ongoing legal battle. The plan’s fate under President-elect Donald Trump isn’t yet clear.

Renewable-energy companies and environmental advocates backed the veto, calling the optional mandates just a freeze in another form.

Oil-and-gas tax break

Kasich vetoed a legislative provision that would have delivered a $264 million tax break to Ohio’s oil-and-gas industry.

It was one of three items he struck from a larger bill that saw 20 amendments in a last-minute legislative flurry on Dec. 8.

It would have expanded the sales-tax exemption on drillers’ tangible personal property and made the change retroactive to June 30, 2010.

The Ohio Department of Taxation estimated refunds would have cost the state $215 million and local governments $49 million.

Lawmakers behind the change said the tax was misapplied to certain property for years. An industry lobbyist said the language simply clarified current law.

Agency review

Kasich struck down legislation that would have allowed Ohio lawmakers to more easily do away with state agencies and departments.

The proposal affected at least 25 departments in the governor’s Cabinet. Among them are agencies charged with paving roads, monitoring clean water, regulating dangerous wild animals and funding schools.

Critics of the plan said it was a risky approach that could have created gridlock and allowed lawmakers to hold departments “hostage” in political maneuvers. Its backers said it sought to improve accountability and efficiency in state government.

Under Ohio’s current sunset review law, agencies generally are subject to review but state departments aren’t.

Other tax provisions

Kasich also line-item vetoed two other tax provisions from the larger tax bill.

One item would have allowed municipalities to keep unspent grant money set aside for hosting major sporting events from year to year.

The other would have exempted digital music, multimedia and books from sales taxes when they were purchases through an amusement or entertainment device, such as a jukebox or arcade machine.

Ohio recently changed its law to impose state and local sales on such digital products, and Kasich believed the provision was watering down the tax change’s effect.

COVENTRY TWP.: The exit ramp from U.S. Route 224 east to Interstate 77 south was closed for about three hours Tuesday night after a one-vehicle crash.

A 68-year-old Springfield Township man operating a 2005 Buick drove off the side of the road at 8 p.m., struck a guardrail and overturned, trapping him inside, the Summit County Sheriff’s Office said.

The man, who was not identified by name, was extricated and taken to Summa Akron City Hospital with serious injuries.

Alcohol appears to be a factor in the accident and the investigation is continuing, authorities said.