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Portage County Auditor Janet Esposito flouted pandemic safety guidance and traded expletives with another county official during a routine budget commission meeting, according to a livestream posted to the county’s YouTube channel. Esposito did not wear a mask for the duration of the March 30 meeting, even though it was indoors and she shared a small table with other county leaders.

Goose poop and what to do about it was a main talking point at Brimfield Trustees’ April 7 meeting. It’s everywhere in the township center area, making sports activities, and simply strolling, an exercise in judicious foot placement. The area is also the site of Brimfest, outdoor movie screenings and concerts.

In polls, some residents said downtown Ravenna “feels dirty” and prefer Kent. But commissioners want an upgrade that doesn’t reduce available parking.

The maintenance and cleanup is ongoing at Grandview Cemetery, where trustees plan to install a columbarium by summer’s end. A columbarium is a prefabricated structure designed to house cremains. Turns out space for cremains is actually an issue at Grandview.

At their April 6 meeting, Shalersville Township trustees were pleased to accept Girl Scout Troop 7575’s offer to do roadside cleanup on April 25. While no roads have been identified, Trustee John Kline is adamant that Covid-conscious safety protocols will be in place, and each group of scouts will be accompanied by a chaperone.

Supporters of public transportation spoke, and the Ohio legislature listened. A new transportation budget investing $8.3 billion over the next 2 years was approved with bipartisan support in both the Ohio House of Representatives and Ohio Senate. The bill allocates $70 million in public transit funding.

After a wave of anti-Asian hate crimes nationally, the Kent State University Asian, Asian American, Pacific Islander Faculty and Staff Alliance hosted a rally Wednesday on campus to show solidarity against racism.

Ravenna Parks and Recreation is operating at full speed in a Covid-conscious sort of way. Covid has caused the cancellation of many in-person events, but Ravenna’s running enthusiasts didn’t let the pandemic stop them. The city recently raised about $7,000 from a virtual 5K run, said Council Member Tim Calfee at Monday’s meeting.

Legislators are proposing to amend the law to expand the offense of obstructing justice to include failure to follow a lawful order from a law enforcement officer or diverting a law enforcement officer’s attention. There are laws on the books that address those issues; HB 22 is nothing but an overreach aimed at obstructing and silencing the voices of our people.

In honor of my first spring sports season with The Portager, I thought this was a good time for some lighter fare. So in that vein, let’s take a walk down memory lane and revisit some of the high — make that low — moments of my first year covering spring sports in Portage County for the Record-Courier.

Recycling in Portage County may seem complicated. Which plastics are allowed in the big blue bins? Which aren’t? What about paper? In this article, we specify just what is and isn’t recyclable.

Windham Township’s spring cleanup is set for 8 a.m.-3 p.m. April 23 and 24 at the sewer plant on State route 303. The event is open to township residents only, and ID will be checked, said Township Trustee Dan Burns. Township employees will be on hand to help unload vehicles.

Trustee John Festa invites residents to visit the township’s website, mantuatownshipohio.gov, which includes links to livestream trustee meetings. The meetings are held the first and third Thursday of each month at 7 p.m.

If all goes well, Minyoung Road in Paris Township may be in for an upgrade. Trustees agreed Thursday to pursue state Issue 2 funds to repave the road, assigning experienced grant writer Derek Reed (also the township’s fire chief) to spearhead the project.

Christian-Bennett is concerned about the sheriff’s swelling price tag: ‘There’s going to be more and more people coming to us for money. … Why shouldn’t they come to us?’ Kline and Badalamenti believe the sheriff’s requests are necessary.

Joe Leonard has created massive carousel figures featured at Disneyland Paris and Put-In-Bay. Visitors to his gallery are ‘blown away,’ he says.

In my house in Kent, we were already no strangers to avoidance of germs. I had been diagnosed in 2009 with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), essentially cancer of the immune system. My family already knew not to allow friends in the house with so much as a cough and to wash their hands like their mother’s life depended on it.

Leighann Fink lost her bid for county recorder, then faced the prospect of losing her mother to Covid-19.

Covid-19 has killed 2.8 million people across the globe. Some of them were our friends or family members. Over 10,000 people in Portage County have tested positive for Covid-19, and many more may have had it and transmitted it without knowing. Each of us has been disrupted by it. This timeline is a chronicle of the pandemic in our community.

Klara and the Sun is the latest novel by Kazuo Ishiguro, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2017. I found the book emotionally engaging, thought-provoking, and interestingly different. And it’s a good read. Technically a work of science fiction, this is really a tale about the human condition.