How not to report test scores
Questions continue to spread around the state about ways schools districts may have been fudging data to improve district report cards.

The Ohio Department of Education announced Wednesday that a small suburban Cincinnati district filed false data during the school year two years ago, and that it is lowering the Lockland School District’s report card status from the equivalent of a C to a D.

The state says Lockland reported that 37 of its roughly 600 students had left the district when they hadn’t.  They were later re-enrolled, but the maneuver meant none of their test scores counted in the district report card.

Similar questions have come up in Columbus and Toledo, which are both under investigation.

Akron police shooting
Akron police shot and killed a man this morning. According to the Akron Beacon Journal, they’re still trying to identify him.

Police say the man led them on a 25 mph chase before he stopped in the city’s Firestone Park neighborhood and pulled a gun. They say he did not drop the gun, but don’t know yet if he fired it.

 
Kasich asks for federal drought help
Gov. John Kasich has he signed an executive order that asks the U.S. Agriculture Department to declare a drought emergency in Ohio. That would help farmers get loans and other federal assistance to cover crop losses. It also would allow them to cut hay now designated for conservation.

Ohio's senators make different cases on the farm bill
Meanwhile, Ohio’s two U.S. Senators continue to map out differing positions on the farm bill, though both say they essentially support it. The nearly $1 trillion bill passed the Senate and is stalled in the House of Representatives, where Republicans say it costs too much. Congress is expected to break in about a week, and Ohio’s Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown says the drought has made it clear the bill is too important to too many people to be left hanging.

BROWN on program's importance

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“I don’t want to see this expire for reasons of nutrition assistance, school lunches and food stamps. ... I don’t want to see it expire because of what it would mean to dairy and I don’t want to see it expire what it could mean to corn prices and soybean prices and ultimately what it means to the safety net for family farmers.”

But it’s the food stamp program that Ohio’s other senator, Republican Rob Portman, cited as the reason he voted against the farm bill.

PORTMAN on food-stamp cuts

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“I’m supportive of a farm bill. I’m just not supportive of one that doesn’t make any reforms or changes to 80 percent of the spending, which is on the food stamp program that has increased by 50 percent.”

Portman says Republicans were proposing sensible changes including tighter eligibility requirements. Democrats also have called for tighter eligibility, but say the GOP cuts are too deep.

The drought has sharpened pressure on House Republicans to get something done before Congress adjourns next week.  The U.S. Department of Agriculture estimated Wednesday that food prices are likely to climb by 3.5 percent this year and even more next.

Four-in-10 Ohioans have medical debts
A new poll shows four in 10 Ohioans have unpaid medical debt, and the number is much higher among those with no insurance who are in fair or poor health and who are poor.

The Ohio Health Issues poll says most of those with debt owe less than $2,000. And it says about 19 percent had to make significant changes in their lives to pay their medical bills. But that was down from 2009, when nearly a quarter said they had to make major adjustments.