Ohio

Snowy days often lead to salty streams. Ohio's trying to fix that

Published

2 years ago

March 6, 2024

Snowy days often lead to salty streams. Ohio's trying to fix that

Municipal road warriors in Ohio and across the country have increasingly turned to a big weapon in their fight against snow and ice to keep roads safe — salt.

It’s an excellent de-icer. And cheap.

Dayton Public Works maintains 1,700 lane miles of road.

“When we deploy for a full operation, we (prepare) 43 dump trucks. And we’re going to put approximately seven tons of salt on each truck,” said Frederick Stovall, director of the city’s public works department.

Adriana Martinez-Smiley

WYSO

One of Dayton’s 43 trucks loaded with salt in preparation for a potential snow storm.

But that tool is having a worrisome side effect.

“We’ve been able to see a rising level of chloride and chloride ions that we know are affecting our waterways,” said Anne Vogel, director of the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency.

The Ohio EPA found urban areas have seen the biggest rise in salinity in local waterways.

The Cuyahoga River watershed near Cleveland saw a 37% increase in chloride levels between 2000 and 2018. Samples of groundwater taken from an aquifer in the Cincinnati metro area show a 150% increase in chloride between 1996 and 2018.

The increased levels of salt, if they continue to climb, could eventually affect our water quality.

That’s why a new program seeks to reduce road salt pollution across the state.

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Why should we be paying attention to this?

We’re not the only state in the U.S. facing this issue. Since 1975, road salt use in the U.S. has doubled.

A three decade long study from the U.S. Geological Survey found that U.S. groundwater is getting saltier around urban areas in the Northeast and Midwest because of rock salt.

In New York, scientists sampled private wells and discovered a majority exceeded EPA standards for salt in drinking water.

“When you put salt down, it doesn’t just run off of the roadway and into a water body like a stream. It can accumulate in the groundwater and in sediments, which is really bad,” said Vicky Kelly, ecologist with the Cary Institute and lead researcher for that private well study in New York. “It’s really bad because that means that we don’t really know how much is out there.”

The corrosive nature of salt can also have impacts on water infrastructure, causing toxic metals such as lead to leech from pipes. It’s what caused Flint, Michigan’s water to become contaminated.

Kelly and other experts say that even if we stop putting salt down now, there’s no telling how long it will take to filter out.

“It became clear to me that we need to address this issue, and we need to address it right now,” Kelly said.

The new program Ohio leaders proposed

To try to get a handle on this issue, Gov. Mike DeWine and the Ohio EPA announced the H2Ohio Chloride Reduction Grant Program last month.

It will distribute $1 million to municipalities for equipment upgrades to reduce the over-application of salt on roads.

The grant, which is capped at $75,000 per municipality, can be used for things such as purchasing brine mixers and upgrading salt storage facilities.

“Nobody’s saying that we shouldn’t salt our roads in Ohio winters,” Vogel said. “But what we’re talking about is being more efficient and using the best technology available to make sure that we’re efficiently applying the right level of salt to keep us safe.”

Applying a salt brine solution instead of just regular rock salt reduces the amount of salt used and provides a more accurate application.

Adjusting salt storage practices can reduce the chances of salt traveling into the soil and groundwater.

The Ohio Department of Transportation is also working on a public education campaign for local governments on the risks associated with over-salting roads.

ODOT has been using brine for years now. Its brine is made up of 23% salt and 77% tap water.

“All of us who work at the Ohio Department of Transportation live here. We work here, we play here. We raise our families here. It’s important to us that the environment is protected just as much as it is for anybody else,” said Matt Bruning, an ODOT spokesman.

Since the winter of 2018 through 2019, the department’s salt usage per lane mile has decreased from 22 tons to nine tons.

Back in Dayton, Stovall with the city’s public works said they already use brine. But city crews have to travel to the Montgomery County Engineer’s Office to pick it up. That’s not always practical, Stovall said, including during a storm when weather can change quickly.

Through ODOT’s training resource, the city learned about the new H2Ohio program. Stovall said Dayton will pursue a grant to buy a brine mixer and storage tank.

If awarded, he said the city would be happy to share with neighboring communities who may need it.

“That’s kind of what the governor’s focus is — ‘All right, what other resources can we put out there to make sure everybody is prepared to be more environmentally efficient on the streets, but also providing safe streets for everybody to drive on,’” Stovall said. “So I think the more resources that are out there in our region, it’s going to help all of us.”

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Ohio

Ohio woman sentenced in $775,000 Medicaid scheme

Published

4 hours ago

February 27, 2026

Press Room

COLUMBUS — A Lake County woman was sentenced this morning to jail time and ordered to pay $775,000 in restitution for fraudulently billing Medicaid, Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost announced. “She inflated her earnings through brazen fraud, but her scheme burst wide open when our investigators got the case,” Yost said. “Cheating taxpayers comes with […]

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Ohio

‘Catastrophic’ Ohio farm fire kills 6,000 hogs and pigs, officials say

Published

16 hours ago

February 27, 2026

Press Room

‘Catastrophic’ Ohio farm fire kills 6,000 hogs and pigs, officials say

A wind-swept blaze at an Ohio hog farm complex caused “catastrophic” damage and left thousands of pigs dead, fire officials said, marking another devastating barn inferno contributing to the deaths of millions of animals in recent years.

The massive fire occurred on Wednesday, Feb. 25, at Fine Oak Farms in Union Township, Madison County, located west of Ohio’s capital of Columbus, according to the Central Townships Joint Fire District. Fire crews received a report of a barn fire shortly before 12 p.m. local time.

The incident was later upgraded to a commercial structure fire after Chief Brian Bennington observed a “large column of smoke visible from a distance” and requested additional resources. Multiple local fire departments, along with several other emergency agencies, were called to the scene.

“What our crews encountered upon arrival was a very difficult and heartbreaking incident,” Bennington said in a statement on Feb. 26.

The fire chief described the facility as a large farm complex used for hog production consisting of five large agricultural buildings, including four that housed about 7,500 hogs. When crews arrived at the scene, they found two of the barns engulfed in flames, Bennington said.

Crews were challenged by windy conditions that significantly impacted fire suppression efforts, according to Bennington. Three barns were destroyed in the fire, and about 6,000 hogs and pigs were killed.

Firefighters saved one barn and about 1,500 hogs, the fire chief added. No injuries were reported in the incident.

Bennington highlighted the assistance of the farming community throughout Madison and Clark counties, as multiple farmers responded with water trucks to help with water supply efforts. “Rural Ohio’s agricultural community is tight-knit, and they truly step up when one of their own is in need,” he said.

The incident remains under investigation, and the Ohio State Fire Marshal’s Office will determine the fire’s cause and origin. Bennington said there is no suspicion of arson and no ongoing threat to the public at this time.

‘Rapidly changing fire behavior conditions’

Heavy smoke from the fire could be seen for miles, and Bennington said first-arriving units were met with fire conditions coming from the opposite side of the hog farm complex.

The fire chief noted that the incident required extensive water-shuttle operations due to rural water-supply limitations in the area. Crews attempted to cut the fire off by deploying multiple handlines and using an aerial device, but “faced extremely challenging conditions throughout the incident,” according to Bennington.

Sustained winds of about 20 mph with gusts up to 35 mph accelerated the fire’s spread, Bennington said. The high winds made it “extremely difficult” to contain forward fire progression and created “rapidly changing fire behavior conditions” across the agricultural complex, he added.

After about four to five hours, the fire was contained by fire personnel from four different counties, according to the fire chief.

“Unfortunately, the fire resulted in catastrophic damage to the business,” Bennington said in an earlier statement on Feb. 25. “A significant portion of the agricultural structures were destroyed.”

Latest major fire to impact an Ohio hog farm

The incident at Fine Oak Farms is the latest major fire to cause significant damage to an Ohio hog farm in recent years.

In August 2024, about 1,100 pigs were killed in Versailles, a village about 50 miles northwest of Dayton, Ohio, according to data from the nonprofit Animal Welfare Institute. In March 2022, about 2,000 hogs died in a barn fire at Kenneth Scholl Hog Farm in Brown Township, just west of Columbus.

Before the fire at Fine Oak Farms, the Animal Welfare Institute reported that other barn fires in Ohio this year killed 162 sheep, horses, cows, chickens, and other animals.

Hundreds of thousands of animals killed in barn fires each year

Data from the Animal Welfare Institute shows that hundreds of thousands of animals are killed in barn fires across the country each year. Since 2013, over 9 million farm animals have been killed in barn fires, according to the organization.

As of Feb. 26, the Animal Welfare Institute reported that 118,738 farm animals have died in U.S. barn fires this year, including the incident at Fine Oak Farms. The majority of farm animals killed were chickens in separate incidents in North Carolina and Georgia in January, and another incident in Missouri earlier this month.

“Most fatal barn fires occurred in colder states, particularly the Upper Midwest and the Northeast. New York, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Illinois had the highest number of barn fires, respectively,” according to the organization. “The amount of cold weather a state experienced appeared to be a greater factor in the prevalence of barn fires than the intensity of a state’s animal agriculture production.”

In an updated report on farm animal deaths due to barn fires in 2025, the Animal Welfare Institute said more than 2.53 million farm animals were killed in barn fires from 2022 to 2024. The organization noted that the high death toll was “driven primarily” by fires at large operations that housed several thousand to over 1 million farm animals.

The majority of deaths in these incidents during that period, over 98%, were farmed birds, such as chickens and turkeys, according to the Animal Welfare Institute. But in 2023, a massive fire at a west Texas dairy farm became the single deadliest event involving livestock in the state’s history and the deadliest cattle fire in America in at least a decade.

18,000 head of cattle perished in the fire at the South Fork Dairy farm near Dimmitt, Texas. At the time, Roger Malone, who is the former mayor of Dimmitt, called the incident “mind-boggling.”

“I don’t think it’s ever happened before around here. It’s a real tragedy,” Malone said.

Contributing: Rick Jervis, USA TODAY; Shahid Meighan, Columbus Dispatch

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Ohio

Ohio’s LaRose pushes back on voter fraud critics, Democrats

Published

1 day ago

February 26, 2026

Press Room

Ohio’s LaRose pushes back on voter fraud critics, Democrats

Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose discussed voter fraud and Ohio’s efforts to prevent it during a recent radio appearance.

LaRose appeared on “The Bill Cunningham” radio show, where he defended the state’s efforts to minimize voter fraud. A clip posted on X shows audio of LaRose arguing that policies aimed at preventing voter fraud are necessary even though cases are rare.

Here’s what to know.

Secretary of State Frank LaRose says voter fraud in Ohio is rare, compares prevention efforts to TSA security

In the clip, LaRose says that Democrats claim voter fraud is rare, and should be ignored.

“The left claims that voter fraud is rare, so we should just ignore it,” he said. “Well, airplane hijackings are also rare — we don’t abolish the TSA. The reason why we keep voter fraud rare in states like Ohio because we do these very things that they’re trying to take away from me.”

LaRose announced the inaugural meeting of the new Ohio Election Integrity Commission, which replaces what he called the flawed Ohio Elections Commission, in January 2026. The new committee, he says, will be used in “enforcing Ohio’s election laws, reviewing alleged violations, and ensuring accountability in matters relating to voting.”

In October 2025, LaRose said that he forwarded more than 1,000 cases of voter fraud to the U.S. Department of Justice. The cases involved 1,084 noncitizen individuals who appear to have registered to vote unlawfully in Ohio, and 167 noncitizens who appear to have also cast a ballot in a federal election since 2018.

In February 2026, President Donald Trump said Republicans should “nationalize” elections. He also accused Democrats of bringing migrants into the United States to illegally vote, a claim that is not backed by evidence, USA TODAY reports.

Voter fraud in the U.S. is considered rare nationwide, according to NPR, but there are still debates from both political sides on how frequently it occurs.

What is voter fraud?

Electoral fraud is defined as illegally interfering with the process of an election, according to Ballotpedia. This includes in-person voter fraud, absentee or mail ballots and illegal voter suppression.

Criminal penalties can include fines or imprisonment for up to five years, according to U.S. code. In Ohio, election interference can carry a felony of the fourth degree, according to Ohio Code.

Voter fraud is often a topic of debate among Democrats and Republicans, where organizations such as the conservative Heritage Foundation maintains a database claiming to show nearly 1,500 cases of election fraud since the year 2000.

Meanwhile, research by law professor Justin Leavitt published in 2014 found 31 cases of in-person voter fraud among billions of ballots cast from 2000–2014, according to Ballotpedia.

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