Amazon Coming to Kenmore

It's the Akron Podcast for December 12, 2025.

Our website, akronpodcast.com well, here's some good news.

The Akron Council voted 10 to 1 to allow Amazon to build its 387,000 square foot basically fulfillment center where the word church was, which was of course once the Akron Baptist Temple.

It's basically on Manchester Road.

And they approved this plan.

And the only person that voted against it was Fran Wilson.

The actual person that represents, I believe it's Ward 5 or Ward 9.

Tina Boy said she was a little skeptical at first and then they took her to the Manchester Road facility.

Also, it would operate like the Romig Road location, which of course was where the mall was many moons ago.

She said after seeing the facility, she changed her mind.

The distribution facility will aim to deliver products like groceries and pharmaceuticals to consumers in less than 24 hours.

And despite the anticipated increase in traffic, a traffic study from the Ohio Department of Transportation states the facility won't significantly impact traffic capacity on Manchester Road.

The interesting thing is a lot of the deliveries will be done by employees using their own cars.

So that's kind of an interesting little twist, but I'm thinking it's going to bring jobs.

They're going to need somebody to drive to fill those.

So a nice addition to the Kenmore neighborhood.

We talked earlier about a bill down in Columbus that would kind of crack down on marijuana users.

This is Senate Bill 56 and House Republicans passed that package last month.

It's on the way to the governor's desk.

And this is something that the governor's not for.

He started back in 2004.

He was publicly lobbying lawmakers for a crackdown on the new industry, meaning marijuana, legal marijuana, his advocacy included.

He sent a 15 year old into a Clark county gas station as a de facto undercover agent to purchase intoxicating hemp candies basically marketed to mimic well known brands.

And it worked.

Five things that Senate Bill 56 does to change Ohio marijuana laws.

It adds new minor misdemeanor penalties around the possession of marijuana for users who don't follow new rules around packaging or buying from out of the state dispensaries while rolling back certain legal protections in administrative and professional settings like housing, professional licensing or employment context.

Also, it releases tens of millions of dollars in marijuana tax revenue that that state officials have decided to have declined to distribute.

So they were kind of holding onto it.

That's going to get released claiming a technical legal issue to cities that have allowed dispensaries in town.

Well, that's a good thing.

You know, that's the problem.

You get a lot of money involved, all of a sudden it just.

Well, I don't know what happened to it.

Yeah, it also, it creates an expungent.

There's a big word system for people with past marijuana convictions on their records.

And so expungement means it gets it off their track.

It transfers all non drinkable hemp sales to 21 and up.

That's probably a good thing.

It allows bars to sell drinkable cannabinoid products for on site consumption and retailers to sell it for carry out until 2026 when a recently passed federal law banning hemp takes effect.

And while Democrats supported the legislation at various points during the two years of negotiations, they ultimately jumped ship after raising concerns about the new penalties, lost legal protections and pared down expungement availability for the marijuana users.

So Columbus Democratic Senator Bill Demora called it disgusting that the bill substantively.

Boy, lots of big words today deviates from the marijuana legalization Ohio voters approved in 2023 on a 57 to 43% vote.

He singled out one provision specifically that would allow managers of organ transplant waiting lists to weigh marijuana use against a possible recipient.

So that bill is going to the governor's desk.

I'm getting this information from Signal Akron boy.

They had a lot of good articles this week.

Speaking of Great stories from signal akron.org I had talked about how I watched that video where the bartender said, hey, there's a dude with a gun over an ellet and basically this guy shows up.

It's on his body cam footage.

He shot the guy 15 times.

It was ridiculous.

And so he struck him eight times and the dude is in the hospital.

He didn't die.

He's had a bunch of surgeries.

There is a GoFundMe.

I will put a link to that.

I actually donated 20 bucks to that that's been putting on by his sister.

He's a father of six and he wasn't even armed.

And so they started looking into this guy named Bojanik, I believe is how you pronounce his name.

And yeah, Caleb Bojanik.

And let's just say he's got a bit because that was at Karim's lounge.

That was November 12th.

And they looked back at his history and he was reprimanded for his response to a similar call in March.

And what's interesting is he's paired up and one of the shooters he's paired up with is one of the guys that shot at Jalen Walker.

Doesn't make Them guilty by any means, but it just makes you go, hmm, but there's a lot of cases.

He was December 23rd, Pauline.

Now, some of these, again, you got to realize being a cop is not an easy job by any means.

But he basically was with a group of five officers that tackled and detained a reported intoxicated man for refusing to go to the hospital.

To me, okay, but some of these where he chased a woman across the room and shoved her body into a corner.

Again, you got to realize when you see now the guy that didn't have a gun.

When I watched that video, I was like, but I do know.

I see a lot of these webcams and people are like, put your hands out of your pockets.

And they don't do what they're told.

And when you got a cop, an Akron cop telling you to do something, I would not ask twice.

But the list goes on.

One in North Hill, in East Talmage, actually, two of them.

One in January, one in February.

And again, like this one, he put his hands on this guy before he tried to leave.

And basically, again, does it say if this guy's intoxicated, but he basically said, f you to the cop, that's not a good thing to do.

And in March, again, in Elliott, he was situation.

There was another one in South Canton Road in Allett in March.

The next day, Britain Road had situations where, you know, he opened a car door and ordered somebody out and then pulled them out of the car.

So he doesn't.

And again, look, I wouldn't want to be a cop, but when you go through this list, it turns out he had 14 situations where he's getting physical with people.

And so it just makes you raise an eyebrow about maybe this guy's a little trigger happy.

Maybe.

I don't know.

Again, I've seen plenty of body cam footage where I go, ooh, that person probably, you should probably get out of the car when they say, get out of the car, or, you know, let us see your hands.

And then they don't.

So just a reminder, when a police officer asks you to do something, I would strongly urge you to do it.

But I also look at this guy's record and go, hmm.

So I'll put a link to that again out in the show notes.

Now, I don't have to tell you this, because if you're listening to this on, say, the 13th, you.

You've probably figured out like I did, hey, it's cold outside, and there are some warming stations open.

If you're in a situation where your heat's gone out or you're just, you know, whatever the situation is.

If you're like, I need someplace to go because I'm going to freeze to death, I'll put a link in the show notes to some places you can go and warm up.

As we get closer to the holidays, there's going to be more people trying to scam you.

So here are some things.

Again, this one's from Signal akron.org Some things to look into.

Number one, don't book your vacation on an unfamiliar site.

Like I use Expedia when I do my bookings.

You know, do search online for websites, but websites names plus scam or reviews.

So if you see a website, go to Google, type in the name of that site and then just put the word scam or reviews after it, you know, and then book your trip using a credit card because most credit cards protect us.

I actually just went through this where I use Citizens and somebody like took $1,000, which I did not have, and they not only reversed it, but I was covered.

So definitely use a credit card if you're going to do that.

And this one's always, always, always true.

Don't click on links provided or scan QR codes that you didn't request or share personal information.

QR codes are handy, but you don't know what they're pointing at.

So be careful with that.

Again, stick with the tried the true.

You know, contact the delivery company directly if you suspect any issue with your package.

So again, just don't purchase from sites you don't already trust or no, don't send money to strangers.

If you ever have somebody that wants paid in like a gift card, like, oh, pay me an Apple gift card.

That's a red flag.

That's always kind of weird.

Be careful of phony charities.

Don't click on links or open attachments in emails from unfamiliar organizations.

I've worked in tech support for years and I was on the phone once and he said, well, they did send me this attachment.

And as I was saying, don't click on that.

He did.

And then his icons on his desktop started dancing.

So keep that in mind if it's a local nonprofit and they call you to request a donation and they suggest that you basically, again, do some research.

Only work with those you've heard of.

You know, look up the organization online and if you want to donate, call them directly.

Because if it's the company, it's the company.

So keep that in mind.

And again, be very, very wary of anyone who wants paid in gift cards.

That's weird.

Don't buy gift cards from people you don't know.

So I just bought a bunch from Giant Eagle, which is a racket by the way, because you buy a gift card and then the banks, because they're the banks, will charge you to activate the card.

Like what?

So they're going to get a fee when you activate the card and then when somebody spends that money, 3% of that at least is going back to them.

So purchase any kind of gift card directly from the retailer or somebody at least again you trust.

So the best way to avoid scams and frauds is to slow down when clicking through your emails and just check your text.

You can also report anything to the ftc and keep that in mind.

Just stay with the tried the true with companies that you trust.

And like I said, if you see something and it looks really good, well, you can always go to that company's website and call them.

Then you know you are dealing with the company.

But don't click on a link in the email to go to their website because in some cases scammers will set up a website that looks just like who they're trying to mimic.

So go to Google whatever you want to do to find the official company.

But it's sad during this time of year where we're all kind of in the mood to spend a little more money.

It's going to attract a lot of scammers.

We have talked about the Firestone building Tower number one or Firestone plant number one.

The one with the clock tower.

And yes, it's been a part of Akron forever and Akron was looking into it and we kind of saw where it's 115 year building and we try to come up with uses for it and it just turns out that it's cheaper to rip it down than it is to restore it.

And so basically we've tried many things, but that building will be demolished.