April 8, 2025 • 7 mins
Brian talks with new local politics beat reporter at the Enquirer Scott Wartman
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, friend, Thomas. Happy to welcome to the Pick About
Taisy Morning Show and congratulations. So the Cincinna acquires Scott
Whartman taking over. Do you rad your big shoes of
Sharon Coolidge and Scott. That's not to suggest Sharon has
big feet, but she's been around covering since my local
politics council and the shenanigans that goes on with the
county commissioners for a lot of time, and she's been
(00:20):
on the morning show, you know, passing along what she's
learned and what she stayed on top of. So it's
an important position and one that we all value very much, Scott,
because we really truly need to know what's going on
with city and county politics, and there's so very little
reporting on it. So Cincinnati dot com is where youre
going to read what Scott writes about local politics. So
(00:40):
you're excited about the job, Scott.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
Oh, I'm very excited. It is daunting, though, because she
did set a high bar and everybody knows her and
if anything was happening in the city, I mean, that's
that you've heard it first from her, and that's what
I hope to provide that level of deep coverage, but
I also, you know, I want to get into a
lot of the I grew up here in the Cincinnati
(01:05):
area on the West side, went to Elder and I
want to be able to tell a lot of the
neighborhood stories. A city has a great, interesting history, and
I'm really excited about, you know, taking on this beat.
But it is it's going to be a challenge.
Speaker 1 (01:18):
Well it is, and responsible reporting is a challenge, and
I know we can expect responsible reporting from you. But
I like the idea that it's not just going to
be all you know, heady, gloom and doom topic politics.
If you're going to get out into the world and
talk about some of the finer aspects of this city,
I think we could all use a really healthy injection
of that.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Oh. I agree, And there are a lot of great
stories to tell in the neighborhoods. I've been covering the
County Commission and like local congressional politics for the last
seven or eight years, and before that I was covering
the river cities in northern Kentucky. So I'm kind of
excited to get back to more like local city reporting
(02:01):
and what's going on here back at home rather than
the national scene, which is like NonStop news.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
I don't know if you've Yeah, I'm aware of that, Scott,
painfully aware of it that every single day of my
life it's covering those stories, and you know, it becomes
overwhelming for me. But moving back, this is an exciting
year to be playing this role, Scott Wortman, because we've
got a mayoral race and Corey Bowman looks like he
may get some traction in a city that's voted all
(02:32):
Democrats for such a long time, a lot of people
a little dissatisfied with the direction of the city's going
and have connected communities, got the folks in Hyde Park
rubbing the wrong way. Corey Bowman may end up getting
some support from some otherwise pretty die hard blue voters.
You're looking forward to covering that race and what's your
perception of it?
Speaker 2 (02:52):
Yeah, it's interesting because I mean, Cincinnati hasn't had a
Republican candidate since two thousand and nine when Brad wensch
Strip ran for mayor. I don't know. At this point,
I can't handicap his chances. I don't know, because I
mean every office in the city is held by a Democrat,
(03:13):
so I mean it is an uphill battle, but it
is ostensibly a nonpartisan race, so the party doesn't appear
on the ballot, So it'll be interesting to see how
much how much noise he can make.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
Well, of course, with Sharon covering, since I politics for
such a long time, I know she had established I
don't know whether they were good or bad, but she
at least had access to and had good established relationships
with the elected officials. Have you got your foot in
the door on that element of it? Scott?
Speaker 2 (03:43):
Yeah, I mean I know the people that are in office,
I've dealt with them before, and definitely from a county perspective,
I have good contacts there and I think that I
don't think that should be too much of an issue.
I'm not going into this completely blind.
Speaker 1 (04:04):
No, And you're going to go into it having to
attend a lot of city council meetings, aren't you?
Speaker 2 (04:10):
That That is the one the one downside. Because I've
been with covering the congressional politics and the county Commission,
I haven't had to necessarily go to a lot of
municipal meetings, but that's kind of how I cut my
teeth in the business, going to late nights and at least,
(04:31):
they're reasonably timed, you know, there in the afternoon, so
I won't be there till midnight or something like that.
Speaker 1 (04:37):
True that now, in terms of the County commission, you're
still going to have some you be doing coverage for
the commissioners because you know, this is an exciting time
for that one. Because we of course have this stadium
negotiation thing going on, and.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
That was something with Sherry we kind of tag teamed
because that is going to be the big story in
the next year or two years if the deal gets
done and what that will look like. At this point,
the progress is very slow, but there is a deadline
in June. The Bengals have to decide whether they're going
(05:13):
to extend the least for another two years, and they
can do that by themselves, they don't need county or
taxpayer approval. So we should be hearing something in the
next couple months, and yes, I will be monitoring that.
We will have a county reporter coming on board sometime
(05:33):
in the next month month and a half. But yeah,
that is also that's going to be other than the
mayor's race, that's going to maybe even more so. Yeah,
that's going to be the big story locally, what happens
with that stadium. Well, at this point, no one knows.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
No one knows, and I'm hoping we find out that
there is someone on the opposite side of the table
of the Brown family as opposed to being on the
same side of the table as the original agreement was negotiated,
because I don't think there's a human out there. And
I mean, we have made national attention on how terrible
that stadium deal was for the taxpayers here in Hamilton County.
I think we're looking for a little bit more love
from the Brown family this time around.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
Yeah, and they're playing their cards close to the vest.
But I mean I can say the county and the
elected officials they're they're not really making friends with the
Bengals are And it's been very adversarial so far, a
lot of brinksmanship. I don't know how much of that
is also playing out behind the scenes, but it does
(06:33):
seem actually, I mean a lot of the emails that
I've gotten between county officials and the team, it's been
pretty acrimonious. So there is a lot of pushback from
elected officials on what they want from this lease.
Speaker 1 (06:51):
Well, Scott Ortman will find you at Cincinnati dot com.
I reckon my listeners. I go ahead and bookmark that
and get yourself a subscription so you can get your
popcorn out. And what Scott's going to be writing about.
Lots of interesting topics for you to cover this year, Scott,
and I wish you all the best of luck in
the new role. And I appreciate you coming on the
program and sharing your time with my listeners and me,
and you have an open invitation here in the fifty
(07:11):
five Carcy Morning Show to give us an update on
the exciting stuff that you're covering.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Brian, I appreciate it, and I look forward to it,
and I hope I don't fiss the point.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
I'm sure you won't. Good luck, Scott, and thanks for
again for coming on
Hi, friend, Thomas. Happy to welcome to the Pick About
Taisy Morning Show and congratulations. So the Cincinna acquires Scott
Whartman taking over. Do you rad your big shoes of
Sharon Coolidge and Scott. That's not to suggest Sharon has
big feet, but she's been around covering since my local
politics council and the shenanigans that goes on with the
county commissioners for a lot of time, and she's been
(00:20):
on the morning show, you know, passing along what she's
learned and what she stayed on top of. So it's
an important position and one that we all value very much, Scott,
because we really truly need to know what's going on
with city and county politics, and there's so very little
reporting on it. So Cincinnati dot com is where youre
going to read what Scott writes about local politics. So
(00:40):
you're excited about the job, Scott.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
Oh, I'm very excited. It is daunting, though, because she
did set a high bar and everybody knows her and
if anything was happening in the city, I mean, that's
that you've heard it first from her, and that's what
I hope to provide that level of deep coverage, but
I also, you know, I want to get into a
lot of the I grew up here in the Cincinnati
(01:05):
area on the West side, went to Elder and I
want to be able to tell a lot of the
neighborhood stories. A city has a great, interesting history, and
I'm really excited about, you know, taking on this beat.
But it is it's going to be a challenge.
Speaker 1 (01:18):
Well it is, and responsible reporting is a challenge, and
I know we can expect responsible reporting from you. But
I like the idea that it's not just going to
be all you know, heady, gloom and doom topic politics.
If you're going to get out into the world and
talk about some of the finer aspects of this city,
I think we could all use a really healthy injection
of that.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Oh. I agree, And there are a lot of great
stories to tell in the neighborhoods. I've been covering the
County Commission and like local congressional politics for the last
seven or eight years, and before that I was covering
the river cities in northern Kentucky. So I'm kind of
excited to get back to more like local city reporting
(02:01):
and what's going on here back at home rather than
the national scene, which is like NonStop news.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
I don't know if you've Yeah, I'm aware of that, Scott,
painfully aware of it that every single day of my
life it's covering those stories, and you know, it becomes
overwhelming for me. But moving back, this is an exciting
year to be playing this role, Scott Wortman, because we've
got a mayoral race and Corey Bowman looks like he
may get some traction in a city that's voted all
(02:32):
Democrats for such a long time, a lot of people
a little dissatisfied with the direction of the city's going
and have connected communities, got the folks in Hyde Park
rubbing the wrong way. Corey Bowman may end up getting
some support from some otherwise pretty die hard blue voters.
You're looking forward to covering that race and what's your
perception of it?
Speaker 2 (02:52):
Yeah, it's interesting because I mean, Cincinnati hasn't had a
Republican candidate since two thousand and nine when Brad wensch
Strip ran for mayor. I don't know. At this point,
I can't handicap his chances. I don't know, because I
mean every office in the city is held by a Democrat,
(03:13):
so I mean it is an uphill battle, but it
is ostensibly a nonpartisan race, so the party doesn't appear
on the ballot, So it'll be interesting to see how
much how much noise he can make.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
Well, of course, with Sharon covering, since I politics for
such a long time, I know she had established I
don't know whether they were good or bad, but she
at least had access to and had good established relationships
with the elected officials. Have you got your foot in
the door on that element of it? Scott?
Speaker 2 (03:43):
Yeah, I mean I know the people that are in office,
I've dealt with them before, and definitely from a county perspective,
I have good contacts there and I think that I
don't think that should be too much of an issue.
I'm not going into this completely blind.
Speaker 1 (04:04):
No, And you're going to go into it having to
attend a lot of city council meetings, aren't you?
Speaker 2 (04:10):
That That is the one the one downside. Because I've
been with covering the congressional politics and the county Commission,
I haven't had to necessarily go to a lot of
municipal meetings, but that's kind of how I cut my
teeth in the business, going to late nights and at least,
(04:31):
they're reasonably timed, you know, there in the afternoon, so
I won't be there till midnight or something like that.
Speaker 1 (04:37):
True that now, in terms of the County commission, you're
still going to have some you be doing coverage for
the commissioners because you know, this is an exciting time
for that one. Because we of course have this stadium
negotiation thing going on, and.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
That was something with Sherry we kind of tag teamed
because that is going to be the big story in
the next year or two years if the deal gets
done and what that will look like. At this point,
the progress is very slow, but there is a deadline
in June. The Bengals have to decide whether they're going
(05:13):
to extend the least for another two years, and they
can do that by themselves, they don't need county or
taxpayer approval. So we should be hearing something in the
next couple months, and yes, I will be monitoring that.
We will have a county reporter coming on board sometime
(05:33):
in the next month month and a half. But yeah,
that is also that's going to be other than the
mayor's race, that's going to maybe even more so. Yeah,
that's going to be the big story locally, what happens
with that stadium. Well, at this point, no one knows.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
No one knows, and I'm hoping we find out that
there is someone on the opposite side of the table
of the Brown family as opposed to being on the
same side of the table as the original agreement was negotiated,
because I don't think there's a human out there. And
I mean, we have made national attention on how terrible
that stadium deal was for the taxpayers here in Hamilton County.
I think we're looking for a little bit more love
from the Brown family this time around.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
Yeah, and they're playing their cards close to the vest.
But I mean I can say the county and the
elected officials they're they're not really making friends with the
Bengals are And it's been very adversarial so far, a
lot of brinksmanship. I don't know how much of that
is also playing out behind the scenes, but it does
(06:33):
seem actually, I mean a lot of the emails that
I've gotten between county officials and the team, it's been
pretty acrimonious. So there is a lot of pushback from
elected officials on what they want from this lease.
Speaker 1 (06:51):
Well, Scott Ortman will find you at Cincinnati dot com.
I reckon my listeners. I go ahead and bookmark that
and get yourself a subscription so you can get your
popcorn out. And what Scott's going to be writing about.
Lots of interesting topics for you to cover this year, Scott,
and I wish you all the best of luck in
the new role. And I appreciate you coming on the
program and sharing your time with my listeners and me,
and you have an open invitation here in the fifty
(07:11):
five Carcy Morning Show to give us an update on
the exciting stuff that you're covering.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Brian, I appreciate it, and I look forward to it,
and I hope I don't fiss the point.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
I'm sure you won't. Good luck, Scott, and thanks for
again for coming on
Brian Thomas News
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