Statewide News

Thousands of Ohio welfare recipients who were overpaid more than 10 years ago are being informed that they will have to repay that money to the state.

The overpayments are not the result of fraud, and most resulted from administrative errors by government workers, The Columbus Dispatch (reported Wednesday. An example would be a welfare recipient who might have reported a change in income to his caseworker that would have reduced the benefit, but that information wasn't logged before the monthly check was mailed, the newspaper reported.

Advocates trying to solve Ohio's problem of homelessness predict it will get worse in the coming months. Bill Faith heads the Coalition on Housing and Homelessness in Ohio. He says federal money to help the homeless is running out.

"Ohio got its share of money, almost 66 million dollars, that since 2010 has been used to prevent homelessness for thousands of Ohioans who were on the edge, but that money is beginning to dry up," says Faith.

The Republican leader of the Ohio Senate says it is too soon to say whether his chamber would vote before
the end of the year on a bill that would ban abortions in the state after the first detectable heartbeat.

Senate President Tom Niehaus said Tuesday that a group of lawmakers he's convened continues to research the measure.

Ohio's top election official says opponents of the state's new election law do not have the signatures needed to get a ballot repeal question before voters next fall, though foes have another 10 days to submit more signatures.

Among other changes, the law shortens the swing state's early voting period.

Secretary of State Jon Husted's ruling on Monday comes after election officials reviewed the more than 333,000
signatures that opponents submitted in late September to put the law on hold.

The Ohio Supreme Court has denied a request to halt the Tuesday execution of a man who fatally shot his
three sons while they slept in 1982.

The high court on Monday rejected Reginald Brooks' request just hours after a state appeals court denied his appeal for a chance to seek a new trial.

An attorney for the 66-year-old Brooks, of East Cleveland, had indicated earlier that a new-trial request was pending in U.S. District Court if the state appeal failed. A separate appeal was pending before the U.S. Supreme Court.