On the recordAugust 16, 2018
as a number of my colleagues did, last week when the Senate wasn't in session, as I always do, I returned to my beloved State of Ohio and went home to Cleveland and spent much of last week going around the State. I love Pope Francis's comment when he exhorted his parish priests to go out and smell like the flock. That says to me how important it is to go out and listen to people and listen to people's concerns. I was in Lima talking to workers about pensions and about their work manufacturing. I was in Findlay with the mayor and a number of providers, and we listened to people talk about what they are doing to address the opioid crisis in Cleveland, Toledo, Dayton, and around the State. What strikes me perhaps more than anything is the dignity of work; that whether you see someone waiting tables in a diner, whether you see someone at a plant working on an assembly line, whether you see somebody doing construction, whether you see somebody in a school or in a hospital, taking care of children in a school, taking care of patients in a hospital, what comes through to me is just the dignity of work. What concerns me is, this body doesn't really understand that. They don't understand people want a chance to make a living, they want a decent wage, they want a chance to raise their children in a safe neighborhood, and they want access to housing.…
