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Ohio’s THC Drink Ban: From Buzz to Bust

Ohio’s latest crackdown has arrived, and this time, it’s not about fireworks or flavored vapes. Governor Mike DeWine has officially banned the sale of intoxicating hemp products, including THC-infused drinks and gummies for 90 days, starting October 14.

The order halts sales of any THC-containing items sold outside licensed dispensaries, forcing taprooms, corner shops, and gas stations to clear their shelves overnight. “I am taking action today to get these products off the streets,” DeWine said, standing beside a table of candy-like edibles designed to look suspiciously like Sour Patch Kids. He tossed one down mid-press conference, visibly disgusted, and warned that some packages contained up to 100 milligrams of THC.

The governor’s move follows months of legislative gridlock after he first called on lawmakers back in January to restrict hemp-derived intoxicants like delta-8 THC. Lawmakers never agreed on how to regulate it, a debate tangled up in post-legalization politics after Ohio voters approved recreational marijuana in 2023. So DeWine skipped the waiting and signed an executive order.

Retailers were blindsided. Shops like Aardvark Wine & Beer and Rambling House scrambled to offload their stock before the deadline. Rambling House, one of the first to make THC seltzers in Ohio, posted: “We actually want good regulations, age limits, dosage caps, proper licensing. But this sudden ban will hurt small businesses, retailers, and manufacturers.”

Industry groups echoed the frustration. The Ohio Craft Brewers Association argued that local brewers producing low-dose hemp drinks already follow safety standards. Meanwhile, the Ohio Cannabis Coalition, representing licensed marijuana operators, applauded the move, calling hemp-derived THC “a reckless loophole.” The coalition estimates the gray-market hemp industry is worth $1 billion statewide.

DeWine’s 90-day order leaves lawmakers to craft a permanent fix. Until then, intoxicating hemp products are banned, displays must be pulled, and shelves restocked with something a little less fun.

Ohio, as always, sits somewhere between prohibition and confusion.

Scarlet Letter Trivia

Question: How many speeding tickets did Ohio give out in 2024
A. 178,034
B. 215,089
C. 236,012
D. 321,008

Columbus is booming. But here’s the part city leaders tend to skip, the boom isn’t coming from Ohioans.

From 2023 to 2024, 77% of the Columbus metro’s population growth came from international immigrants. While U.S.-born residents are quietly leaving the region, families from India, Somalia, and Mexico are moving in, opening businesses, building communities, and, frankly, keeping the economy alive.

Take Sriram Menneni, who grew up in India watching Rocky and now lives in New Albany, working in tech and helping lead the Federation of Indian Associations of Ohio. Or Hassan Omar, who co-founded the Somali Community Association and teaches English in a North Linden classroom where paper letters on the wall spell out “DO RIGHT OKAY?” And Efrain Quezada, who came from Guadalajara and started El Vaquero, the restaurant chain that’s basically Columbus comfort food at this point.

Franklin County alone is home to 177,000 foreign-born residents, the most in state history. And while the rest of Ohio continues to shrink, Columbus keeps adding people, thanks to those who weren’t born here but now call it home.

Demographers say this isn’t just cultural enrichment,  it’s economic triage. Without immigration, the U.S. population could start declining by 2040, triggering labor shortages, housing shocks, and an even slower economy. Here in Columbus, the numbers are already clear: 72% of immigrants in the metro area are in the labor force, compared to 67% of U.S.-born residents.

Meanwhile, national politics are going the opposite direction. The Trump administration’s latest immigration crackdown has forced more than 2 million people to leave the country since January. But in central Ohio, there are still more jobs than people to fill them.

So while the rhetoric gets louder, Columbus keeps quietly doing what it’s always done best: building opportunity from the ground up. The city’s future isn’t shrinking, it’s global.

🍹 Service with a Purpose

Columbus knows how to throw a gala, but this one comes with more than tiki cocktails and shiny awards. Service! Relief for Hospitality Workers is back with its second annual fundraiser on October 17, raising money to support the people who keep the city’s bars, restaurants, and hotels running.

What started in 2020 as a boxed meal program for unemployed workers has grown into Café Overlook, grant programs, and now the under-construction Service Innovation Kitchen, a training hub downtown designed to give hospitality workers the skills and stability to turn jobs into careers.

This year’s gala promises legacy awards, hard-hat tours of the new kitchen, and enough feel-good speeches to balance out the mai tais. Behind the fun, though, the mission is clear: an industry built on living wages, equity, and respect. Columbus hospitality workers don’t just serve the city, they keep it alive.

Tickets HERE:

💛 The Great Pay It Forward Returns to Lower.com Field

The Pay It Forward Party is back on Friday, October 17, taking over the Huntington Field Club at Lower.com Field, home of the Columbus Crew. Hosted by the Development Board of Nationwide Children’s Hospital, the annual event raises funds for the Center for Family Safety and Healing, which works year-round to end family violence and support survivors with counseling, medical care, and advocacy.

Expect hors d’oeuvres, drinks, a silent auction, and a crowd that actually makes “doing good” look good. Every ticket and bid helps build safer, stronger communities across Central Ohio.

TIckets: Here

Ohio Bans Ticket Quotas (Finally Admitting They Existed)

Well, it only took a few decades, a whistleblower lawsuit, and every driver in Ohio muttering “quota” under their breath for lawmakers to admit it: yes, some departments were writing tickets to meet numbers. And as of September 30, that’s finally illegal.

The new bipartisan law bans police agencies from using ticket or arrest quotas to evaluate, promote, or punish officers. In other words, your next speeding ticket shouldn’t be because someone’s supervisor needed to hit their monthly graph. Representatives Kevin Miller (R-Newark) and Bride Rose Sweeney (D-Westlake) sponsored the bill, arguing that policing should be about judgment calls, not spreadsheets. Revolutionary, right?

Miller, a retired state trooper, said quotas “undermine public trust.” Which feels generous. For decades, quotas have been the punchline of every end-of-the-month traffic stop in Ohio. (“You know why I pulled you over?” “Because it’s the 29th?”)

Under the new law, officers can now report quota use directly to the Attorney General, which is great news for anyone who ever got a ticket for going 3 over in a school zone at 8:59 a.m. on a Saturday in July.

Law enforcement groups are somehow both relieved and vindicated. The Fraternal Order of Police, Ohio Patrolman’s Benevolent Association, and Ohio Association of Chiefs of Police all supported the bill, finally free to say what everyone knew: yes, quotas happen, we just called them “performance objectives.”

Not everyone’s thrilled, though. Whitehall Police Chief Mike Crispen, president of the Central Ohio Chiefs Association, argued against the bill, warning it could make lazy officers even lazier. Which is a bold position from someone whose department was recently accused of having quotas in the first place.

And then there’s the cautionary tale of Leonard Mazzola, the Independence Police lieutenant who refused to play the numbers game, got forced out, and walked away with a $1 million settlement. Proof that, in Ohio, honesty might not always pay, but it eventually pays off.

So now it’s official: no more quotas. Just good, old-fashioned discretion. Which, if we’re being honest, might still depend on how late it is in the shift and whether the Browns won that weekend.

Trivia Answer

C) 236,012 honestly less than I thought it be