SNOW!

Top of Mind

The nation’s food program is officially caught in the world’s worst bureaucratic ping-pong match.

Late Friday, the U.S. Supreme Court sided with the Trump administration, freezing lower court rulings that had ordered full SNAP payments during the federal shutdown. Within hours, the U.S. Department of Agriculture told states to “undo” those payments, or risk losing federal funding altogether.

Ohio hit pause. Wisconsin refused.
Twenty-six states sued. Millions of Americans checked their EBT cards and found nothing.

Here in Franklin County, one in eight residents relies on SNAP. That’s $263 million in benefits suddenly stalled. Food pantries have stepped in where Washington stepped out.
On the Hilltop, My Family Pantry director Saad Ijaz says they’re scrambling to meet the surge, calling restaurants and grocery stores for donations as lines stretch down the block. “People don’t come to these parts of Columbus if they live in the suburbs,” he said. “They aren’t aware of the kind of struggles people have in these parts.

As federal agencies trade memos and lawsuits, local groups are doing what Columbus always does, feeding its own.
Heading into the holidays, demand at food banks can spike 30%, and shelves are already thinning.

If you want to help:

• Donate to Mid-Ohio Food Collective or My Family Pantry

• Drop canned goods in your neighborhood food box

• Or skip one DoorDash order and turn it into dinner for someone else

Scarlet Letter Trivia

Question: What is the average SNAP benefit per month for an Ohio resident?

A) $190
B) $300
C) $560
D) $375

 Roll With It: Pro Bowling Returns to the Palace

For the first time in 35 years, the pros are coming back to Columbus Square Bowling Palace.

When the PBA Ohio Classic rolls into town on April 5, 2026, it’ll be more than a tournament. It’ll be a time warp. The last time the national tour stopped here, E.T. was still in theaters, Ronald Reagan was in office, and Saturday afternoon bowling on ABC pulled more viewers than college football.

The Palace wasn’t just another bowling alley back then; it was part of the broadcast. Six nationally televised events were filmed there through the 1980s, when bowling’s top names, Pete Weber, Mark Roth, Walter Ray Williams Jr. were household figures. The building itself was built for that kind of spectacle: 68,000 square feet, 64 lanes, and Central Ohio’s largest bowling center, still family-owned and operated since it opened in 1983.

Then, like so many parts of American leisure culture, bowling’s prime-time run faded. The PBA stayed alive, but the cameras didn’t. The Palace turned inward, hosting leagues, OHSAA tournaments, and the kind of birthday parties that smell like pepperoni pizza and burnt neon.

Columbus still found ways to stay on the pro map. Wayne Webb’s Columbus Bowl hosted the PBA Players Championship from 2016 to 2020. Western Bowl held a U.S. Open in 2013. The city never lost its appetite for bowling; it just stopped being televised.

That ends next spring. The PBA’s new TV deal with The CW Network will bring 10 consecutive weeks of live broadcasts under the title “PBA Championship Sundays,” and Columbus gets one of them. The April 5 broadcast will beam the Bowling Palace, and its unapologetic 1980s charm, back onto national screens for the first time in decades.

For anyone who grew up in the glow of those lanes, this return means more than nostalgia. It’s a full-circle moment for a sport that helped define weekend TV and for a venue that never stopped showing up for its community, even when the lights went out.

The lanes are polished, the pins are set, and the Palace is finally back in the game.

Turbulence at John Glenn: The Shutdown Takes Off 

If you were hoping for a smooth trip out of Columbus this weekend, you might want to unpack your bags.

At least five flights were canceled out of John Glenn Columbus International Airport on Sunday, part of a growing national wave of travel disruptions tied to the ongoing federal government shutdown.

The list included routes to D.C., Chicago, and Orlando, the holy trinity of layovers. American and Southwest both pulled flights, leaving travelers stranded, rebooked, or explaining to Grandma that Thanksgiving might have to happen over FaceTime.

Federal officials say the chaos may just be getting started. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy (yes, the former Real World guy turned cabinet member) warned that air travel could “slow to minimal levels” in the coming weeks as TSA agents and air traffic controllers work without pay, or stop showing up entirely. Nearly 3,000 flights were canceled nationwide on Nov. 9 alone, with another 1,500 the following day.

So far, TSA lines at John Glenn have remained surprisingly normal, but travelers are already feeling the ripple effects from canceled connections and tighter schedules.
“I don’t know what’s going on,” one traveler told ABC6. “A little structure would be nice.”

Meanwhile, flight reductions are expected to ramp up from 4% to 10% across 40 major airports, just in time for the holiday travel season. Columbus isn’t on that list yet, but good luck finding a connecting flight that isn’t.

If you’re flying this week, check flycolumbus.com before you head out. Or better yet, drive. At least I-71 doesn’t shut down when Congress does

The Vanity of the Plate

Ohio’s Bureau of Motor Vehicles, protector of the open road and occasional arbiter of free speech, is being sued, again, over what people are allowed to say on their license plates.

A Lakewood man’s request for “GAY” and a Strongsville man’s request for “MUSLIM” were both denied under the state’s vanity plate rules, which prohibit anything that’s “profane, sexually explicit, advocates lawlessness, or could provoke a violent response.”

Apparently, that includes words describing an identity.

It’s not the first time the BMV’s approval algorithm has gone off the rails. The agency once banned “H8OHIO,” “IH8OHIO,” and “H8MYST8” for being too negative about the state, but approved “LUV OH” and “LUVN OH.” You can get “STR8” and “CIS,” but not “GAY,” “QUEER,” or “LESBIAN.” Bureaucracy, but make it moral philosophy.

Cleveland attorney Brian Bardwell is representing both cases, calling the system “arbitrary and discriminatory.” The BMV, for its part, rejects around 800 plate requests a year, which is apparently enough to justify its own censorship department.

This follows another lawsuit filed by Jeffrey Wonser of Heath, who wanted the plate “F46 LGB” a reference to President Biden (the 46th) and the coded conservative slogan “Let’s Go Brandon.” The BMV said no, first for being “potentially inappropriate,” then for being “obscene or scatological.” Wonser called the process “a largely arbitrary censorship regime,” and the lawsuit cites the rejection of “TIGSUX” (deemed likely to incite football violence) as evidence.

All this traces back to a 2003 settlement, when a man sued the BMV after his plate “RDRAGE” was denied for promoting aggression. The state lost, agreed to clear up its standards, and then just kept moving the goalposts.

The new lawsuits argue the rules are so vague they’re unconstitutional, a claim that might actually hold up if the case doesn’t get stuck in a bureaucratic loop like the plates themselves.

Somewhere, someone is still driving around with “LUV OH.” Everyone else is still waiting for their turn to offend the BMV.

Trivia Answer:

A: $190 I know, shocking, right?