And 30 technical fields. Shut out to everyone from edison state. We were saturn one saddened to learn of the death of john lewis on saturday. He really helped change america. And then to be on the civilrights pilgrimage led by john lewis he did that a number of different times we were privileged to be on one of those tours in the south. And it is an amazing experience he took us to the bridge in selma alabama where march 1965 known as blood he sunday he and other civil rights protesters were attacked and beaten as a peacefully marched. Im sure many of you have seen the film replayed the last few days. Extraordinary man. And then to speak out very loud and is very gentle a very courageous man. This past week. Looking at the data we are reporting 1527 new covid19 cases in ohio sadly this is the second highest daily new cases we have reported 1679 cases last friday. Sadly we have 16 more deaths reported since yesterday and we also have 128 new hospitalizations, 19 icu admissions reported in the last 24 hours. Look at that with the icu admissions not a huge change but goes up and down the hospitalizations are certainly higher than the 21 day average as about what it has been and in cases hovering between 12151600 over the last week or so. Looking at the hospitalizations slide look at the daily number of patients currently in Ohio Hospitals until you see an increase 908 on july 9 so it is a slow but steady increase in the number of patients. Last week i call upon all ohioans to wear a mask in public. The evidence is clear the verdict is in a mask works. And that makes a huge difference. The cdc said last week if all of us would put on a Face Covering now for the next four weeks or six weeks we could drive this epidemic to the ground. Very very strong language. At the vast majority would wear them it matters a great deal. Im on the phone regularly to the county Health Commissioners and then with a number of the mayors. And this is from last week. So a lot of the red counties reporting and getting back to indicate more more people wear masks. And the retailers who have been involved but wearing a mask in the red communities has certainly gone up and im grateful for that. And this is significant and this has slowed but the rate of increase and a lot of this is done to the fact that people are Wearing Masks. So those that are slowing not to a plateau yet i dont want to get overenthusiastic but it looks like wearing a mask will have some affect. Thank you for wearing a mask its making a difference. You will see more counties go red tomorrow so talk about the yellow counties and see you know its happening nationwide. And then at the pandemic. So it may help those counties not turn red. s and then it is essential we wear a mask statewide to contain this virus so therefore tomorrow at 6 00 oclock tomorrow night but i mask order for people in public will be extended throughout the state of ohio. Every county in the state of ohio those should in fact wear a mask. s the wearing of the mask plus a social distancing makes a huge huge difference. So just to reiterate, and with that indoor location but are unable to maintain and in all of those in the past are extending not to more counties. I also want to emphasize as we see more and more people wear a mask and some people who do not, want to emphasize is somebody has a medical reason for not wearing a mask, they do not have to wear a mask. I would also urge all fellow citizens not to be judgmental if they do not have a mask we should assume they have a medical problem. We should assume there is a legitimate reason why they do not wear a mask would emphasize this is only for those ten years of age and older and i will emphasize what medical experts tell us they are not to be worn by infants. One indicator certainly is not under to somebody who was young does not have to wear a mask or certainly someone who is very young should not have a mask on at all. You can look at the guidance that we are not requiring anybody to do that. Again the following do not need to wear a mask, medical conditions, disabilities or trying to communicate with someone who has a disability. Those actively exercise or playing sports, officiating at religious Services Including anyone speaking at a religious service or a mask would impede what they are trying to do. Those actively involved in public safety, actively eating or drinking. In conclusion we have to get this virus under control wearing a mask will make a difference in what fall looks like between now and the next several weeks will determine what our fall looks like. We want kids to go back to school we want to see sports and a lot of Different Things and have more opportunities in the fall to do that is very important we all wear a mask. Continuing on the topic of masks calling upon fellow citizens to help us explain thi this, we have two new commercials on the air right now starting today one starts today. One starts tomorrow Workers Compensation will sponsor these air ads created in partnership with the Ohio Restaurant Association and the ohio Business Roundtable 32nd spots explaining to ohioans why we should all wear a mask. The bottom line is we do it to protect loved ones and coworkers and strangers alike so we can continue to have an effective and safe economic recovery we can do two things at once i want to offer special thanks again to Restaurant Owner gary calico and the former air National Guardsmen and Fighter Pilot and ceo of ohio health lets take a look at these two ads. I wear a mask to keep my grandmother safe. I wear a mask to protect my sister who is immunocompromised. To protect my coworkers a make my office safe. So businesses can stay open and not close again and jobs can come back to help my favorite store in my favorite restaurant and to protect my customers. Please wear a mask in public. Its up to all of us. And now the next one. Years ago i flew combat missions in the middle east. And im on the frontlines of fighting another enemy have a very Important Message for young adults. You can carry covid19 without even knowing it and in fact others were not as healthy as you like a coworker immunocompromised please mask in public protect your family and friends and coworkers. We can win this battle but it will take all of us. I will now move to another subject. A few weeks ago we talked about a group of students who traveled to myrtle beach and in all 45 students made the trip and returned 16 people initially tested positive with covid19 today we know 28 of those have in fact tested positive. Those individuals could have exposed family and friends. Unfortunately this story is not that unique we have heard from multiple local Health Departments something we have been doing is calling for local Health Departments to find out exactly where they see people infected. We have heard from Health Departments they are tracing cases to outofstate travel with their high Positivity Rates like South Carolina that is leading to the outbreaks right here in the buckeye state. Today we are putting out an advisory, a travel advisory for all individuals who come into ohio from the states it includes anyone from ohio and then come back let me just say what people should be concerned about is the state they are going into the higher the Positivity Rate the more they should be concerned. Also to state the obvious if someone is very careful are able to go to the beach separately from other people or hiking a lot depends on the risk that is based upon what you are doing on the other states. This advisory covers all the positive testing with a 15 percent or higher and we recommend those individual self quarantine for 14 days. So again these are the states. Florida, 19 percent, the highest state looks like arizona but all of these are over the markers obviously the people should be careful no matter where they go but on a warning list we will update this every week and again it is similar to the advisories you use to get at the airport i havent flown for a while but you walk in and see someplace did not have good security and there is a caution warning about that. We are putting this out looking at Positivity Rates which is a good way to look at it hours is six. 2 in that area just to give a Reference Point we asked people to be careful this is based on the seven day rolling average we will update the list of states weekly but today it includes travel to and from alabama arizona florida georgia idaho mississippi nevada and texas. If you are traveling from one of those states you can self quarantine at home or in a hotel and people that are traveling into ohio with high Positivity Rates please visit our website for more specific information. And then to protect others and then we ask that you self quarantine. We know all of these are sacrifices but we hope these are shortterm sacrifices that we all want to see to get this virus under control to do more things moving into the fall. Talking about our system we announced several weeks ago and providing an update. We will show you the new map tomorrow. The Early Warning system advises ohioans based on several and separate indicators the more that are triggered the more precautions ohioans should take the system is designed to be refined over time we said that the beginning and we will continue to refine it in the next few weeks we are moving toward indicators related to testing two more localized testing data becomes available. We dont have that yet but we are getting to it also no contact spreading the virus when data is made available. In addition with this weeks updated map for tomorrow we are making enhancements to our icu indicators this was developed in conjunction with the Ohio Hospital association currently this indicator is triggered that the capacity exceeds 80 percent of normal capacity this is by region we will be adding to this and enhancing this indicator to address concerns in the event the icu levels increase other than covert it so this indicator will trigger icu capacity has region 80 percent normal capacity and 20 percent normal icu capacity using covid19 positive patients the normal capacity icu covid capacity this is a good Early Warning the enhancement improves the indicator to ensure we capture developments that related to covid19 and not from changes unrelated. Let me talk about county fairs for a moment. I had a conversation this morning with all the fair directors around the state the fair boards and other associations. Let me talk a moment about this. Our goal was to, with the coronavirus, living with a to provide an outlet for young people for h, ffa to participate in the junior fairs around the state. This is important to many families. Its part of their summer activities. Some kids have raised a steer for a number of months, they get lambs in the spring and they raise them. Others might doing something electrical or a project in so many other things. In spite of covid we wanted to preserve this. We came out with three pages of what we felt were fairly simple orders. And then to be followed by the fairs. Unfortunately what we have started to see is some fairs were not following that. And so far then grandstands so that they have to follow the rules so we have a good understanding of that and we want to see that carried out they allow people to be safe again so with the new order today beginning at 6 00 oclock tomorrow night everybody on the fairgrounds will have to have a mask on unless they are walking through at 7 00 a. M. And nobody is there. Ive been there myself many fairs in the Early Morning just use common sense youre interacting with other people is different than what you see at the fair at 7 00 oclock at night you need to have a mask on also following the other protocols we lay out in the guidelines one reason we provided them to each county fair be provided extra money to give them for masks we do not want to be in a position in local Health Departments do not want to be in a position to close the fair no fair or before the fair but the fair boards everybody has to own their own fair basically if you have too many people that cant keep social distancing then the fairs will have to shut their doors. So again something between the local fair and im confident people can get this worked out. Thank you governor. Good afternoon i am going to share some good news. Talking about the economic momentum from the health point of view an economic point of view focusing on economics is important because lets face it theres a lot of challenges people are facing out there with high Unemployment Rates people need jobs to pay for essentials to sustain their quality of life an opportunity to get ahead from our point of view we have a responsibility to provide a safety net for people that depend on the government for education k12 higher ed and medicaid and Public Services we provide at the state and local level and we had a little bit going on in ohio. It was announced last friday the Unemployment Rate is ten. 9 percent which is down from earlier months and was 13. 9 percent in may and now in june 208,000 in the month of june, more jobs were created 208,000 more people 166 fewer on unemployment coming off and unemployment going to work this is incredibly important for the future of our state and creating momentum additionally talking to employers they went to get people back in the office and on the floor and back to work one of the things they will tell us they are concerned about Employer Liability the governor signed a letter along with 20 other governors across the states asking for the federal legislation to address the financial needs and additional circumstances that face the people of our nation to include Employer Liability nothing can keep us 100 percent safe but when employers are doing the right thing they need to have some certainty. We encourage the Ohio Legislature to get legislation passed for the state of ohio because lets face it anytime theres a new set of regulations to potentially create a new sense of litigation we want to make sure as the governor did with that stability for ohio employers so the letter calls for the Liability Protections with the spread of coronavirus so long as they follow the appropriate safety standards. The letter specifically request that protections be drawn in a narrow fashion with gross negligence and misconduct or recklessness so people are doing it right they should be protected from unnecessary losses to create that environment where they will make investments and get the economy going and help people pay their bills and help build the safety net for the vulnerable populations in our state. One example of a busines business, actually a lot of businesses are doing great things most are doing it right. Ge aviation they have their headquarters in cincinnati and started initiative called layers of safety just like swiss cheese one layer over another and that helps that is what layers of safety is about. They are conducting daily temperature screens for those entering the facilities with the cdc guidelines and to maintain social distancing and if thats not feasible with the physical barriers in place requiring the masks which we do now across the state of ohio has significantly increased the cleaning of manufacturing in Office Environments and made Available Cleaning Solutions for disinfecting establish signage and checkpoints to let people know its being cleaned up weve seen in the grocery carts and in many businesses around the state to make sure they know the place they have entered is cleaned also just to reduce the density and those facilities reducing the occupancy levels one person can work here to establish in the distribution area. To provide facial coverings and talking to their employers on employees of risks of after our conduct, cafeteria seating to make sure everything is in alignment with cdc guidelines. This is the extent employers are doing what they can do to slow the spread they deserve to have that protections in place to allow them to bring people back to work without having the legal liabilities associated with coronavirus. Were all in this together. Businesses are stepping up to do their part and to create a safe environment. When we have employers support the livelihood and put people back to work allow them to get the paycheck to pay for the essentials and grow the economy that has been working well but we have to keep doing it. Keep doing the things that allow people to go back to work to slow the spread for those challenges to continue to comply with and if we do that ohio will continue to improve economicall economically. Looking to see where they get the virus we rely on the 113 to give us that information. Something that may surprise you how many times it is just the informal gettogether. There is a general tendency with people that we know that the problem with the viruses you could have it and not know that you have it spread it and not know your spreading it and that is the real danger. To call yesterday with local departments they shrugged them off as allergies, didnt wear a mask nor to the wedding. The ceremony and reception guests came from across the country and internationally to attend. They were offered a mask and many did not use them. How many cases are tied to the wedding. The virus is real. We certainly cannot let our guard down. Living on a farm in south vienna married, mother of three, adult daughters, two beautiful granddaughters. She is a graduate of shawnee high school, president of the Northeastern School district in clark county and shes here today to tell her story. Thank you for joining us. We appreciate you doing that and if you could tell everybody kind of your story. Thank you for inviting me. We had a very small Family Gathering on the fourth of july. We believed we were safe. No one knew of anyone they have been around but was positive. There was an asymptomatic carrier and the first people started having symptoms. Thankfully everybody was responsible and had been isolating. So we dropped our guard. You heard the story we thought we dont have any symptoms, we know these people weve been around and sadly people got sick. I know you shared this on facebook which is where i think we saw it first. Can you tell us why you came forward with your story . Its challenging enough to deal with without the social and political rhetoric attached to it. We all know people who have misused masks and i had been careful and we still got the virus and its scary. Its terrifying when you have it. I thought it was necessary for me to share my story and let people see how. How is your family doing and how are you doing . We are doing very well. Thank you for asking. We were fortunate despite having the checklist of symptoms from the cdc and some were very mild and everyone is recovering, we were very thankful that that was the case. Thats great. We also had young people coming and its important to know not necessarily in a high danger demographic [inaudible] thank you for sharing this with us and thanks to your family for doing the right thing. We appreciate the story, and i think it kind of illustrates i dont know if you are able to hear some of the examples i read, but people kind of going about their lives like they normally would, and i suppose being around either friends or family i think our natural tendency is when we are friends or family with people we know, we let our guard down. We dont worry about it. Thats part of the challenge. Of course maybe people dont know who has or doesnt. I think that is the real challenge. A sense of familiarity and false sense of security. Thank you. We appreciate it. Thank you for sharing that with us and good luck to you and your family. Thank you very much. We are ready for questions. Dan perlman here in columbus and in light of the news yesterday im sure youve heard there are now bipartisan calls to repeal house bill six. Is this something you would support given the situation and where we stand today . No, i would not. For a long time ive advocated, Lieutenant Governor has advocated for a balanced Energy Policy in the state of ohio. We think having Nuclear Plants is a part of the balanced poli policy. We had a couple of big factor is a. One is the jobs. We had the opportunity to visit one of the plants install some of the workers. When you look at the numbers theres a lot of workers there. Second, if we would have lost the Nuclear Plants, which we would have thought this bill, it would have meant we would have had virtually very little noncarbon generating energy, and i think that would have been good. The balance of her energy and as much as we would like to see other forms of energy that are not carbon, the nuclear is where you get the most of it today and is certainly where you get the most of it in the state of ohio. So what was going on in the campaign is a very sad story we read yesterday when we looked at the charges and the affidavit. It doesnt impact where i am in regards to the policy of the. On. I have been involved in Energy Policy in ohio for a long time. When i was the speaker of the house i put the original standards and the ohio. Ohio needs zero Carbon Energy to hit our target goal for carbon reduction and in the near term i literally talked to the secretary of energy this morning in the near term, nuclear is the only largescale way to do that and we hope over time that we will have more wind, solar, conservation options, Battery Technology that will enable us to do this but for the time being to ohi for ohio to get any reasonable carbon reduction goal we have to have nuclear energy. Jack windsor, mansfield. Governor, in your address to ohio last week, you talked about the spread and Positivity Rate in ohio has about 6 . The World Health Organization at Johns Hopkins has indicated the Positivity Rates around 5 in the december control. We also know the director of the cdc said on june 26 and again yesterday up to 24 have already been infected based on the Antibody Testing. All this validates statements made by doctor faico back in march. Without overrunning hospitals in seeing massive spike projected out of the gate couldnt its been a sprint is the home of this because the horse is already out of the barn . And doesnt it mean Contact Tracing is nearly impossible based on the sheer numbers alone and we should be hyper focused on the Antibody Testing to understand the spread and focus on those that are most vulnerable plaque . Focusing on the most vulnerable we have an enhanced policy regarding Nursing Homes as far as testing. We are going to be testing, the National Guard is almost done. That wave of testing we will have additional testing that will start right after that in regards to employees at Nursing Homes into the lead on regularly so they are focused on that group of individuals. 6. 5 a year at the height of where weve been for a while at least. When we have this more under control we were about 4. 5 positivity. We were testing a lot more people. Weve increased testing at least 90 days weve seen the Positivity Rates of up. Weve seen the cases below 200 , so to say this is under control i think i dont know anyone who really would look at this and say with the numbers we are at higher numbers than weve done it before but its under control. What we are seeing i think is the beginning of getting some of december control in regards to more people Wearing Masks. It matters. It makes a difference. And if we continue to get people to focus when they were out in public, keeping a distance, we can drive this thing to the ground. But weve got a way to go. We are in a very delicate situation as i indicated earlier i dont know if weve plateaued or not, but weve got to wait and keep knocking this down. You will see more of the counties will turn red. Some will go back which is good, but this is a very dicey time so we are going to continue to fight this and i will continue to talk with people. We can do two things at once. We are optimistic. We can move forward weve got to be careful as we do it. Right now they are i we are d of her own antibody test, but i would check with the American Red Cross theyve been reporting numbers that showed the number of people when somebody goes and gets plugged the tests to see if somebody has antibodies and i think the numbers they are coming back with our less than 2 . The lates latest from the resulf ohio might have been 1. 4 positive for Antibody Testing so you may want to go check with the red cross and some others because i hope you are right i hope it is higher but the data that we have so far indicates that its not their. We do have the number and i forgot to bring you toda it tode will bring it tomorrow from the red cross is reporting to us. Theyve reported wit what those numbers are, so its pretty good sample of ohioans. Good afternoon, governor. In cincinnati. The Ohio High SchoolFootball Coach Association released a set of guidelines. Theyve asked you to review it. Have you reviewed them, is it acceptable and is it enough for them and other Contact Sports if they follow suit to move forward with their season . We are going to be giving them Additional Guidance based upon what we are seeing in ohio. Before we do that, we are going to have conversations with them. We are not ready to announce that yet, but everybody is concerned about young people and concerned about Contact Sports. We all want to see our kids and grandkids in sports, whether its high school or they continue to participate in college kid with the season means to a young person whether they are running Cross Country like a lot of kids have done, whether they are playing football. But they know how important they are. Frankly weve got to get a little closer to the same time. We know training is going on and we know the practices have been taking place, so we understand the timeline that we want to see where we are and they nee we net a little closer before we can make any kind of decision in regards to that of the people be in consultation, a lot of the coaches will begin consultation with the schools. I have seen it. Its right here. We are taking a look at the plan. Theyve got some great wor doned its helpful to inform the conversations. So thanks to them. I want to go back to an earlier issue. The question that should have been asked. Your reaction to the federal investigation and the charges, and did you have any suspicion at all of the illegal activity right here at the statehouse i had no suspicion of illegal activity. I quickly read the document that you wont have seen which came from the u. S. Attorneys office. A very sad story. I said yesterday this is a sad day for ohio when you have the speaker of the ohio house charged with a very serious crime. Its a disgusting story. Having said that, i think we always have to say in this great country of ours but every one that is accused as a presumption of innocence, and we have to maintain that. But the story is laid out by the u. S. Attorney is just kind of a sickening story. We all new ads were being run. I saw what the other small. We knew the ads were being run, but didnt know the back story. Thank you, governor. I just want to ask about what goes into Effect Tomorrow at 6 00. Why was the decision made now and do you wish you would have made earlier . No i said when this is all over, or ive jokingly said that because we wouldnt want this to ever happen if we had to replay this but we make different decisions, sure. Hindsight is always better. My thought process was this. The mask would make a difference and also significant resistance in ohio, kind of wanted to bring ohio along this journey. Thats part of the governor does, lead and bring people along. Sweve been talking about masks for a while. The evidence as i said the other day certainly more clear today than its ever been about the abundance of proof about how important masks are so we started off as you saw with the counties we saw more and more move to red. Weve also seen pretty good evidence more people Wearing Masks because more people are Wearing Masks we are seeing a slowing of the acceleration of this in a lot of these red counties, so all of that together, seeing that it was the right time to do the i will second guess myself later. Other people can argue doing it now, but the people out here are watching this on tv right now saying there he goes again doing something, telling us to do something they shouldnt be doing. Theyvweve got other people oue saying he should have done it a week ago, two weeks ago, three weeks ago. I gave a speech to the safety people purposely didnstatepeopy orders and it. What i wanted to do is have a conversation with the people last wednesday and talk about where we needed to come as a state and where i saw it and frankly i was concerned. There are numbers looking like florida three and a half, four weeks ago. We are putting the orders and tomorrow, and again the goal is going to be on those counties that are yellow and orange from our goal is to keep them there and for them not to move into the red and we think this would make a difference. So we are moving ahead. Just following up on jims question. The u. S. Attorney has said related to the hospital that its very much an Ongoing Investigation and a just for the record, what contact if any have you or your administration had with investigators and what assurances can you provide that might not implicate someone in your administration up to and including your self . Ive had no contact with the investigators. The first time i heard about this was yesterday morning. Absolutely no contact and no one in our administration has had contact with anybody in the investigation. Also, going back the question was asked several of you asked the question yesterday to the u. S. Attorney. I will go by what his answer was. We dont have any involvement in this and we didnt know anything about the investigation. We were surprised as everyone was yesterday morning. Ohio public radio and Television Statehouse bureau. Im wondering what you consider calling a special session of the General Assembly upon the household removal if he doesnt resign him self . Well, yes i would. I think we first have to look to the house, the house elected him. They are a separate branch of government. There has to be some due respect to allow them to deal with the problem and look, i called yesterday and thursday presumption of innocence that always must be maintained, but i think its clear the speaker cannot function as the speaker. Charged with a very serious crime and very tough affidavit describing a very horrible set of events. I dont think theres anyway the speaker can continue to be speaker and function as a speaker should function so we are talking to members of the house. Its their obligation to do something about this. If they cannot come and again im still trying to understand the house rules. I was in the senate many years ago but trying to understand those rules. If its necessary for us to call the legislature in the session and give them a specific on a specific topic which would be the speakership, i certainly wouldnt hesitate to do that at all. Hello, governor. How do you restore the Publics Trust after Something Like this come up with a case like this so huge that could have affected taxpayers . Well, thats another sad thing about the story is that it doesnt shape the Publics Trust and people who are in office and fun for all this and that is a very sad thing. The other side of that is a every time you see a case where someone is charged with public corruption or something similar to that, what you notice the system works, but they were in fact brought to justice so that maybmay be a slight consolationt something people should consider when you see a case like this, it means somebody came forward in all likelihood i dont know anything about the case or how they did it, but you would think someone came forward in some way to the fbi. The fbi did what they should do them Justice Department did what they should do and here we are. But those of us in Public Office have to look every single day to obtain the Publics Trust and its like a lot of things in life youve got to look at everyday. Its something those of us in office and especially hold Public Office have an obligation to the public to at least look up and say i agree or i dont agree with that official, but ideally they are honest and trying to do the best they can. Good afternoon, governor. About house bill six, there are many stories and editorials written for months about how this bailout stomp and how the speaker of the house funded, how can you say you didnt suspect anything and even if you support Nuclear Power, why are you not more concerned about the legitimacy of a bill passed to use what authorities sa said was the largest bribery scheme in history . My position on this predated the bill. The position has been that we need Nuclear Power. The position has been that we need non carbon polluting energy. So the question that i was previously asked, was there anything illegal going on, my answer to that is no i wasnt aware of anything illegal going on. Was it clear that a lot of money was being spent on tv ads, yes that was clear. Was it clear that there was an effort going on to first pass it and then an effort to defeat or pushback on that petition process that was going on . All of that was reported by you and others, so sure we are certainly aware of that. But hell that was being done to certainly there was talk that the speaker was involved in that. But beyond that, there there wo indication anything illegal was going on. This is a practice that is followed many times for people in favor of a bill or against a billboard against some cause. Raise money, and they spend the money but by and large most times, they follow the law. And they do that in a proper way that has respect for the public. Governor wondering if youve gotten any indication from washington on your request for funding for the National Guard and do you foresee the need for continued work related to civil disturbances which is the request letter addressed . The request we are looking for is primarily covid work. The National Guard is out and i get a report every day for my talking general. I look at the numbers, how many people they tested or pooled samples from. They are doing a bang up job and also working on something is. So, we have requested an extension as many governors have the federal government to continue to pay for the card. We have made a decision that frankly if the federal government does not, we will pay for the guard ourselves because they are so essential at least for the next few weeks they were so essential to what they are doing. We would review that on a week to week basis. But the work they are doing to the anticovid efforts, Nursing Homes and also the ones out of doing a great job in the Community Come in the minority communities and underrepresented communities. We are very proud of the guard and we will continue that and hope the federal government will pay for it if they dont, then we will have to do that ourselves. Jessie with the inquirer. Given the severity and obligation yesterday, what can you do or lawmakers do to prevent companies from subverting the legislative process or benefiting certain individuals . I am a big lever and transparency. I think as much transparency as we can right into the law, its consistent with Supreme Court decisions coming u. S. Supreme Court Decisions that we should do. I am not a constitutional scholar, but the rules have to a great extent been sacked by the United StatesSupreme Court decisions so we would have to follow those. But i would think i will ask the state legislature the judiciary committees ove both of the of te senate to take a look at that and to see how we can bring more transparency to the process. They say life is a great disinfectant. Not my quote, but i think this is something we certainly should look at. I had a bill when i was in the ohio senate that would require Public Disclosure of these type of funds. With substitute house bill 240 of the 128th General Assembly. I think it serves as a template for doing these things and it passed the senate and never made it through the ohio house, but this has been a problem for years. There are solutions to it to force more transparency. Its a template for doing it and we should see more of it. Governor, this is chick from the ohio capital journal. The more ohioans are in the hospital right now with this before then any other single point of the pandemic. For one, the hospitals have looked to shoulder the load and two, is there any reason to believe that number will decrease in the next couple of weeks . Well, that is a good question. First of all, hospitals tell us that they are doing fine, but they always more concerned about what happens if we have spikes and if the current trend would continue. We are way up as far as the number of cases. We hope weve hit a plateau but we dont know whether we really have or not so with the hospitals today, we talk to them all the time, they will tell you they are doing okay, but its incumbent upon all of us to drive these numbers down. Some of the actions weve taken today and in the past and actions they will take in the future. Working together is going to matter and make a difference. We are going to continue to work on that. I missed part of your question. Are you seeing anything in the data that makes you think it will decrease or is it going to get worse . Hospitalization is always a lagging indicator. Hospitalization is a lagging indicator. Picu is always something we look at. I cannot predict, but what i do know is if ed president of us wear a mask when we are out in public, if we focus on keeping our social distancing, if we think twice about bringing people over who we havent been spending much time with and bringing them over for a special occasion, if we do those things done everything we can to stay safe, yes we can control this. We can control this. It could go either way. So we have it within our control but i am an optimist. Im seeing progress with people Wearing Masks. I think we can do it im betting on the people of ohio that we can do thi this if youre not gg twe are not goingto see an overy are seeing in florida or texas or california. Hello, governor, ben schwartz with cincinnati. More and more schools are announcing the backtoschool plans for next month. Many are implemented blending learning and limited class sizes. How do you think this will affect all sports in high school essentially with the number of seasons set to start in the coming weeks with sports like football and soccer with more than a dozen Players Per Team . They just dont know yet. I know everybody would like to know and would like predictability. Our ability to have full sports, all sports but we want to see the ability to go back to school in a safeway depends what youre going to do in the next couple of the so we have to have everybody wear a mask, the vast majority of people wear a mask. People need to be careful. We can take this thing down. Its coming up on us but we can certainly take it down. I dont have a crystal ball, he cannot predict, but its within our hands what they do in the next he. Hello, governor. This is a followup to jakes question a moment ago. Your initial shutdown of the states economy was designed to give hospitals time to prepare and expand capacity for a potential surge in cases. Those emergency plans were for the most part no not into play because the initial search never happened. What is the status of the plans and how quickly can they be put into play if necessary . Every hospital did a good job. Some spend a lot of money and planning. One of the things we were checking with them. We checked with them today. The last 24 hours. What is there to be further build up capacity and how is can they do it. So theyll know where they are going. They all know there is a surge of physically where they are going. They dont know what they are going to do. Some of them, for example, will take the current hospital and add a bedside in the hospital. They may add additional quote, regular bed someplace else. But theyll knotheyll know whee going. And so, we are not starting we would be starting over again. We are a long way from where we were the first time. Time. Everybodys got their plans from everybodys had contact on where they are going. So, i feel confident that if we reach that point, and we hope they never do, but if we reach that point, hospitals are ready to move. Patrick with the columbus dispatch. My question is on testing. You mentioned the Testing Capacity has gone up quite a bit. Are we where they need to be coming if not, how close are we . Weve doubled testing and we need to double it again. That is my best guess. Weve taken this testing up. Wthey are averaging now probably 21,000, 22. We were at 12. Thefavorite age not that long ao really. What is starting to happen again, and this has been an ongoing process is a lot of testing is being done obviously in the Southern States we put out there a while ago and there is a real crunch again sometimes for some of the ingredients thei can use that term but going to the testing. And if so, we are now having for example from companies that have contracts with that are coming down the contract saying we cant supply you with as much testing, but we are still trying to build out the testing. But its a problem that every state is facing, every governor is facing. Every governor is trying to battle with. So, we are trying to expand the actual testing. We have been successful but if you ask me where should we become aware what i like to be today, i would like to be on a lot more testing than we have now. You have to also have the tracing that goes with it. And again, we also focus a lot on making sure our Health Departments have what they need and are able to get the tracers do they need. Do you have any idea how long that is going to . Its aspirational. We are a lot better off than we were. He asked me where i would like to be or at least thats where i entered is where we would like to be coming into double where we are now. We are going to go into testing for example in the staff that works with the care we are going to be doing them very regularly and that is going to consume a lot of testing capacities, but they also need to be out in the communities and be in more apartment buildings. Theres a lot of our testing we should be doing but its not just testing. You have to be able to follow this and make an appeal. One of the things we discussed was how directors this past week is the tracing into peoples willingness to help them so im going to make a special appeal to those in their 20s to please be cooperative if you get that call help them out. All we are trying to do is make sure that we slow the spread of this disease and virus and so giving them information and helping them is something you can do for your community and for others. Think you hello, governor. When we have election fraud, we do a recount. Under house bill number six in a cloud of bribery and obligation of otherness of the. Explain why you dont support repealing so we have the transparency and also your Campaign Donations from first energy. Have you considered giving the money back . We are going to give money back to me that he has been charged, not to those who been charged, i said that wrong. Anybody that gave us money we are going to donate that money to charity. They should benefit from it frankly. The charities should get back, maybe send it to food banks. As far as first energy, love, they are not even named in the indictment are the affidavit. It would appear very name is in there and also first energy. The Spinoff Group so we are going to see what they said about the investigation isnt over. We certainly would give back any campaign money. We wouldnt ge would get attackd give it to charity. We have no problem doing that. Going back to the first part of the question, look the house can bring this matter back up backue senate can bring the matter backup. The policy is good policy. Because people did bad things doesnt mean that the policy isnt a good policy. We could disagree, some people but against the. My position is going to stay the same on the policy. Not how it was done, but on the policy. If we have any chance of having production it has to come from new jersey. We also have a lot of families represented in the two Nuclear Power plants, so the policy is the right policy in my opinion, but that certainly could be brought back up if they want to be voted. Thisll be the last question. Hopefully ohio can conduct. Do you remember when voting for this in the bill it was confusing. Either no means yes or yes means no. In the legislation that could be put in so when the voters come to the ballot on election day yes means yes and no means no . Certainly our plate was full before this. Its been an interesting year. I have a great deal of confidence in ohio. We were resilient and would this likely have gotten through other things. One of the things they look at is how to get transparency and shine a light on this. We have to live with what the Supreme Court has said in regard to First Amendment and free speech. Some of this activity as part of the spending of money and free speech is interpreted by the Supreme Court. But i think th the legislature should look at this and maybe use this as an opportunity to examine if there are ways to make people come forward they have a constitutional right to spend money. But it would seem to be spending it in public so Everybody Knows we are to be where the money is coming from is certainly very, very important. Look, people are assuming proponents of this may have been behind this as part us money. But knowing exactly who is paying for what seems to me to be a smart thing to do. I dont want to add anything to that. The ballot for when its a ballot issue before the people of ohio that youre supposed to clarify that and do yes means yes and no means no making sure the ballot language is clear and the state plays a role in that and if they dont get it right the Supreme Court takes that up and you can take the Supreme Court. That process has worked pretty well over the years. The Supreme Court has a firm test on this so that is the process for how when it gets to the ballot yes means yes and no means no. Although albeit when a group pays the money to collect signatures, they get to write their own language and terms for the Ballot Initiative says and that can be confusing but that is the process in terms of how they can access the ballot is theres no doubt i its a wellfunded organization whether that would be the casinos, the repeal of her its for the right to work in all kinds of things weve seen over the years where money and influence can impact the way that they see the language that appears before them. There are people who will engage on the publics and candidates and so on [inaudible] i couldnt hear the question very well. For those of you at home, theres a basement of the statehouse and bathroom has tough acoustics. This negative repercussions on election day . Are there negative repercussions in november . We will have to see what impact it has. Im not sure. I dont have the crysta a crystr that one, not yet anyway. Thank you very much. We will end with the video weve seen some people come up with great shows this one as you will see from cincinnati. Keeping everyone safe is our goal. Never leave home without it. I dont know what the big deal is. Some happy thoughts. Look forward to seeing you all tomorrow at 2 00. Thank you very much spoke about the issue at a News Conference on capitol hill. Good afternoon everybody. Im pleased to be joined by my colleague senator warren and van hollen. In just two days the moratorium expires. Established by the cares act and millions will be at risk. 22 million households