County overdose deaths up 66 percent

Franklin County, which had 353 drug overdose deaths last year, is on pace to have more than 500 this year.

Coroner Anahi Ortiz reported that her office had 173 drug overdose deaths in the first four months of 2017, a 66 percent increase over the 104 overdose deaths for the first four months last year.

“It’s a big jump. Earlier, I predicted it would be in the 400s, but now we’re on a pace for 500,” Ortiz said Tuesday.

The vast majority of this year’s overdose deaths, 78 percent, were caused by opioids, mostly from fentanyl

this event turns out like the Boston Marathon a few year’s (sic) back.” Then he used a derogatory term for gay people and said they “should be killed or at least relocated.”

Dodds was referring to the 2013 Boston Marathon, where two homemade bombs went off near the finish line, killing three people and injuring hundreds.

The Pride event, celebrating gay lifestyle and culture, drew around a half-million people to Columbus this past weekend.

“It was vile; it was reprehensible from my perspective,” staff attorney Elizabeth Bonham of the ACLU of Ohio, located in Cleveland, said of Dodds’ Facebook post. But she said courts have upheld that employees of the government, which includes school districts, have a right to speak on matters of public concern such as civil rights. Anti-gay statements made in a public forum are considered part of a belief system, she said.

The situation is different for employees of private companies, which can hire and fire at will.

She said that Dodds didn’t make threats against a particular individual or indicate that he planned to take action on his words. His posting was made from his own personal Facebook account on his own personal time.

Further, Bonham said in the ACLU’s written statement, censorship begets censorship. “When we allow the government to pick and choose what speech is acceptable and what is not, it is inevitable that censorship will increase — including censorship of LGBTQ voices,” said the statement.

When asked whether the ACLU had been in contact with Dodds about this case, Bonham said she could not comment.

On Friday, Columbus schools spokesman Scott Varner said the district does not tolerate discrimination of any kind and is “working toward Mr. Dodds’ termination.”

Dodds’ name was not on the agenda for Tuesday’s Columbus Board of Education meeting, but the board did go into closed executive session “to consider the appointment, employment, dismissal, discipline, promotion, demotion or compensation of a public employee or official.” When the board returned, the meeting resumed without comment.

Asked later whether the board discussed firing Dodds in the closed meeting, board President Gary Baker said he doesn’t comment on personnel matters.

The school district does have a policy on free speech in non-instructional settings that states: “The professional staff member’s expression must be balanced against the interests of this District.” The guidelines are “... to avoid situations in which the professional staff member’s expression could conflict with the District’s interests.”

A change.org petition has collected nearly 52,000 signatures calling on the district to fire Dodds.

In other business Tuesday, the school board reported that 81.3 percent of thirdgraders have met the state reading benchmark to advance to fourth grade. Another 835 third-graders are enrolled in summer school in an effort to get them past the third-grade reading test, or they potentially face repeating third grade by state law. For the past two years, the district has ended the summer with 91 percent advancing to fourth grade.

In all, more than 3,600 Columbus City Schools students will attend summer school this year.