After 4 months of inaction, the Ohio Legislature has forced the hands of the Ohioans for Healthy Families Coalition.
At the end of this week thousands across Ohio will begin signing petitions to place Paid Sick Days on the November ballot. Legislators continue to take paid sick days themselves, and they continue to block our efforts on behalf of millions of hard working friends, family and neighbors who simply seek to EARN their own time off in case they need handle an illness.
]]>With 90 days to go, hundreds of Ohioans are now gathering tens of thousands of signatures.
Brian Dunn, OHF Campaign Manager and Dale Butland, OHF Spokesman address the media and coalition leaders at the offices of ProgressOhio.org in Columbus on Thursday.
Media Reports covering the kickoff:
Youngstown, OH
WFMJ 21
Cincinnati, OH
WLWT 5
Columbus, OH
ProgressOhio
Columbus, OH
WSYX 6
Columbus, OH
Triangle Business Journal
Columbus, OH
Dayton Business News
Canton, OH
Canton Repository
Dayton, OH
Dayton Daily News
Dayton, OH
another from DDN
Columbus, OH
10TV
Blogs:
]]>Despite over a quarter-million signatures of Ohio voters already collected, the Ohio General Assembly refuses to act on Paid Sick Days. This week the battle will be joined by thousands more hard working Ohioans.
Join us Thursday - or download a petition now.
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On April 29th at the Ohio Capitol, State Representative Jennifer Brady, above, (16th District) accepted over a dozen of Chipotle burritos and hundreds of "burrito-grams" from Ohio moms to build support for Paid Sick Days in the Ohio General Assembly. MomsRising.org led over two hundred organizations and community leaders that comprise the Ohio Healthy Families Coalition in raising awareness that Paid Sick Days for food service employees is a major public health issue. Earlier in April, over 400 diners fell ill after a norovirus outbreak at a Kent Chipolte Mexican Grill. Over 300,000 food and accomodation service workers in Ohio do not have paid sick time forcing them to make a dangerous choice, staying home to take care of their health or going to work sick and putting public health in jeopardy.
A front page story by Marc Kovac of the Ravenna Record-Courier quoted Rep. Brady on Tuesday, "I am here today not only as a state legislator but also as a concerned mom, a concerned citizen and a concerned consumer," said Rep. Jennifer Brady, a Democrat from Westlake, who accepted a burrito and spoke during the press conference. "We are seeing more and more that the paid sick days are important to Ohio's public health and to its economy. Many of us in the Legislature are listening and do support the Ohio Health Families Act."
MomsRising, a national non-profit, delivered the burritos to Senate President Bill Harris, House Speaker Jon Husted, and to the members of the House Commerce and Labor Committee. No word yet on how they enjoyed their lunch...
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This Germ Central article leads with a Carrabba's restaurant incident in Michigan...
"Key in prevention...is rethinking sick-leave policies."
"Attorneys who specialize in food-borne illness complaints, however, contend that established sick-leave policies could offer restaurants some protection in the event of a lawsuit."
"Dave Babcock, an attorney with Marler Clark, a Seattle-based law firm that represented plaintiffs in the 1993 E. coli outbreak at Jack in the Box, pointed to a 1996 norovirus outbreak at the Reno Hilton in Nevada. In that case, a jury awarded six victims punitive damages of $25 million, in part because the casino did not have a sick-leave policy."
noroblog.com leads with Chipotle in Kent.
marlerclark.com a law firm discusses how an ill food service worker contaminated lettuce for sub sandwiches served by Blimpies at a school luncheon.
6 People with Hepatitis A Ate at Chipotle in La Mesa, California
In most hepatitis A cases, food served to the sickened patrons was contaminated with the feces of a food handler who had hepatitis A. In the case of a restaurant like Chipotle, the most likely scenario was that a sickened food handler contaminated food while cooking or serving the food.
BarfBlog covers Kent State Chipotle.
]]>A day after medical tests confirmed that a “norovirus” was responsible for the illnesses of more than 400 people who ate at a Chipotle restaurant in Kent, Ohio, the Ohioans for Healthy Families coalition has posted a video on its website in which average people in that city talk about the need for paid sick days.
A link to the video is at www.sickdaysohio.org. For the latest news on the cause of the Kent outbreak, see http://www.recordpub.com/news/article/3682852.
After more than 270,000 voters signed petitions supporting it, the Ohio Healthy Families Act (a bill allowing workers to earn paid sick days) has been pending in the Ohio General Assembly since early January. Despite a looming May 8 deadline, the House has held just one hearing, Republican leaders who control the Assembly say they oppose the bill, and no vote has been scheduled.
Said Coalition spokesman Dale Butland:
“ The Chipotle situation in Kent proves what we’ve been saying all along: paid sick days are important not just to workers and their families, but also to public health. It is our understanding that Chipotle workers who prepare and handle food have no paid sick days. As a result, an employee who could not afford to miss a day’s pay apparently came to work ill. Now over 450 customers have paid the price, with more “secondary cases” of illness being reported every day.
Opponents say paid sick days would be too costly. But as we’re seeing in Kent, not having them is even more expensive. How much did it cost that restaurant to close for a day while it disinfected the premises? What is it costing their customers and the public at large? And make no mistake: Chipotle is just the tip of the iceberg. Well over 300,000 other restaurant employees in Ohio don’t have any paid sick days either. As a result, eating out means playing Russian roulette with our families’ health.”
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