State school investigation may stretch into next year
Ohio Auditor David Yost is urging the state Board of Education to go ahead and release the annual school report cards, saying his investigation into data manipulation may not be done until next year, and it’s unfair to keep all the schools in limbo.

Yost is investigating whether as many as 100 schools fudged their attendance data to make themselves look better on the report cards. So far, the investigation has taken more than 7,000 hours and has cost $140,000, according to Ida Lieszkovszky of StateImpact Ohio. 

The report cards measure each of Ohio’s more than 3,000 traditional and charter schools by test scores, attendance and graduation rates. But one school district has already seen its grades drop because it had artificially removed children who were likely to perform poorly on tests from its rolls, and then re-enrolled them.

Originally, new report cards were to be released Aug. 29, and Yost had hoped to complete his investigation early this fall, so school districts with levies on the November ballot do not have to operate under a cloud of suspicion. He has not said which districts he is investigating.

Some Ohioans give Romney more credit than Obama for killing bin Laden?
A new survey by Public Policy Polling shows President Obama apparently is getting a post-convention bounce, at least in Ohio. But one other item in the poll is getting a lot of attention.

The polling firm leans Democratic, though its polls have shown the presidential race between Mr. Obama and Mitt Romney pretty much a toss-up. The latest poll, however, shows Mr. Obama leading former Gov. Romney 50-45 percent.

Of more note is its finding that 6 percent of those surveyed -- and 15 percent of Republicans -- give Mr. Romney more credit than Mr. Obama for the killing of Osama bin Laden.  Notes the Washington Post’s Wonkblog, “voters have trouble crediting politicians they don’t like for policy outcomes they do like.”

More candidate visits to the Buckeye state this week
Ohioans will have plenty more time to get a closer look at the presidential and vice presidential candidates this week. Romney is in Mansfield today. Vice President Joe Biden is in Dayton on Wednesday,and Romney’s running mate, Congressman Paul Ryan, will be at the  Clermont County Fair the same day.

Cuyahoga County consolidation
Cuyahoga County and some of its southeast suburbs are expected to announce today that they’ll consolidate their emergency dispatch operations into a single center. The county will match a 180,000 grant to boost the consolidation. The communities that are expected to join the regional effort include Bedford, Bedford Heights and Maple Heights.

Ohio State scandal figure fights license suspension
The Ohio Supreme Court will hear arguments tomorrow on whether a key figure in the Ohio State scandal should lose his law license for six months.

The Board of Commissioners on Grievances & Discipline has recommended that Christopher Cicero’s license be suspended because he had emailed former Ohio State Coach Jim Tressel  with information he got from a prospective client, the owner of a Columbus tattoo parlor frequented by Ohio State football players.

Cicero told Tressel that police had confiscated “several boxes” of championship rings, signed jerseys and other memorabilia during a drug raid at Rife’s home. The memorabilia had been exchanged for tattoos, and the disclosure that Tressel had known about it months before he acknowledged it led to his forced resignation.