The Labor Day holiday typically means the unofficial end to summer and the start of the final push toward Election Day.

These last weeks before the election usually also see candidates in major races squaring off in debates. But getting the major party candidates to agree to debate on the same stage, on the same day is proving a tall order.

The Ohio Debate Commission-of which Ideastream Public Media is a part-is trying to put together debates for Senate candidates Tim Ryan and JD Vance and gubernatorial candidates, Governor Mike DeWine and Nan Whaley for October.

Whaley and Ryan's campaigns have accepted. Governor DeWine's campaign has not yet given an answer nor has Vance's campaign.

A third forum with the two candidates for Ohio Supreme Court chief justice also has received confirmation from Jennifer Brunner but not Sharon Kennedy her Republican opponent.

There's discord in the Ohio Republican Party, where Chairman Bob Paduchuk is accused by his vice chair of being an autocrat who is suppressing the party's pro-Trump conservative base. Paduchuk says he's singularly focused on getting republicans elected in November.

Cleveland City Council President Blaine Griffin, a Democrat, once served as the vice chair of the Cuyahoga County Democratic Party. He has publicly endorsed former Dayton Mayor Nan Whaley, a Democrat, in this year's mayor's race. So what was Griffin's name doing on a flyer, along with other names of local elected Democrats, listed as hosts of a fundraiser for the re-election of Republican Governor Mike DeWine? It's not how it looks, Griffin said, telling Nick Castele that he was livid to have his name linked to support of a republican candidate.

There are now two competing proposals for a new civilian police review board in Akron. Community activist groups have been seeking to put an issue on the November ballot to create an oversight board in the wake of the police shooting death in June of Jayland Walker-an unarmed Black man. Then this week, Mayor Dan Horrigan proposed an ordinance to be considered by city council. Horrigan unveiled his legislation just hours after the community groups filed their petitions seeking that their charter amendment be put on this November's ballot. The mayor's proposal would not immediately put the review board into the city's charter. A vote on that would come later in November of 2023.

Guests:
Andrew Meyer, Deputy Editor for News, Ideastream Public Media
Ken Schneck, Editor, The Buckeye Flame
Karen Kasler, Statehouse News Bureau Chief, Ohio Public Radio/TV