Rain expected to return to normal come fall
The National Weather Service says the first six months of this year were the 10^th driest on record in Ohio. But things could be getting better come fall.

The Weather Service predicts,  at least in our part of the country, rain levels are likely to get back to normal for the autumn, though that may not be enough to counter the current drought. And the Weather Service’s Jim Noel cautions that an El Nino watch is in effect for late winter and spring of next year, and that often means drier weather for Ohio.

Linndale continues to lead mayors' court cases
The number of traffic cases throughout the state – including in hundreds of  mayors’ courts – is dropping.  

But among those 318 mayor’s courts, Northeast Ohio’s Linndale remains the most active.  The Ohio Supreme Court’s annual report for 2011 says Linndale had 2,500 cases per 100 residents, making this the fifth year in a row that it has led the state – by a big margin.

Statewide, the average number of cases per 100 residents was 19 – a drop from the year before.

And the annual report says new filings in mayors courts dropped overall by more than 17,000, reflecting a similar drop in municipal and county courts.

Big questions about school data scrubbing
Questions continue to spread statewide about massive deletions of absentee days in some of the state’s biggest school districts.

According to the Columbus Dispatch, school officials there eliminated nearly 3 million student absence days from school records over the past 5 ½ years. It says in some years, the number of absentees deleted from the computer far exceeded the number reported to the state.

And Toledo Public Schools have acknowledged similar deletions there. And the Toledo Blade says Cleveland came under scrutiny in 2008 for what’s called “data scrubbing,” something the district denies. At the time, the head of Cleveland schools was Eugene Sanders, who had been hired away from Toledo.

Attendance is one of the key factors in the state’s school district report cards.

Mrs. Obama will stump in Columbus
First Lady Michelle Obama  will be in Columbus and Dayton tomorrow, campaigning for her husband’s re-election. The visit to Columbus follows by less than a week a visit by Vice President Joe Biden.