Ohio

Score one for the IRS. A tax-filing experiment in Ohio recentl won high praise.Under that program, the agency in 1992 allowed some Ohio residents to file their tax returns by phone. The program was open to about 720,000 people who used Form 1040EZ -- the simplest tax form available. About 126,000 actually tried the system -- called TeleFile.About 88 percent said they liked it, and 98 percent said they would use it again.The program also slashed the rate of filing errors, with only 0.16 percent of TeleFile returns containing mistakes.

The Westminster Rockets 14-and-under softball team recently finished in the top 16 of the 56-team American Softball Association National Tournament in Toledo, Ohio.The 3-2 finish by the Rockets was the best in the 25 years the team has competed in the tournament.Highlights included a 10-5 win over the Tri-County Slammers, an Ohio-based team, in the Rockets' second game. Trailing 5-0 in the middle of the second, the Rocketsscored 10 unanswered runs, capped by a four-run fourth to go 2-0 in the tournament.

Girard, Ohio -- TOUGH guy, Bill Waldkirch. Big, gnarled hands. A face that's seen trouble. He raced sprint, stock and sports cars for 30 years until a tree, which he hit at 100-plus mph, retired him.Now he's hell-bent on patching up the wrecked candidacy of Ross Perot."

CINCINNATI -- The Ohio Civil Rights Commission is pushing for a broad expansion of benefits for pregnant workers. If its proposals are adopted, Ohio would join 18 states that require employers to offer maternity leaves that exceed those mandated by the federal Family and Medical Leave Act. That law offers workers at businesses with 50 or more employees 12 weeks of unpaid leave. Expectant mothers must have worked for a business for a year, or 1,250 hours, to be eligible. The Ohio commission has proposed that businesses with four or more employees offer 12 weeks of unpaid maternity leave to pregnant employees, regardless of how long they have worked.

DRESDEN, Ohio -- Baskets. Washtub-sized baskets line Main Street, bursting with color ful plantings. Along arbored side streets, decorating tended lawns and verandas, are more baskets. At Fifth and Main, tourists do double-takes. There, encircled by flower beds, is the World's Largest Basket. Huge? Picture a rail-car with handles.Fans of hand-woven, hardwood maple baskets tingle at the mere mention of Dresden, east of Columbus. By the bus-load they make pilgrimages here. And it owes it all to an avuncular man named Dave "Popeye" Longaberger.

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- When you ask Joel Hyatt, the Democratic nominee to fill the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by his retiring father-in-law, Howard M. Metzenbaum, whether he wants President Clinton to campaign for him this fall, Hyatt unsmilingly says only, "We'll see."This cool reaction to the prospect of having the president of the United States speak in your behalf is heard increasingly around the country as Clinton's popularity limps along. But it is particularly notable in a state where the president himself has such a clear stake in having a Democrat hold the Senate seat and where Hyatt is the underdog.

CANTON, Ohio -- Coming out of high school, only one college offered even a conditional scholarship. It was Virginia's Emory and Henry. But Don Shula, one of six children from a middle-class family whose father was a Lake Erie fisherman, would have to pay for room, meals, books and indoctrination fees -- something he wasn't able to afford.The year was 1947, and campuses were crowded with returning veterans from World War II. Because of the huge surplus of talent, Shula's football abilities and those of other young aspiring players were not exactly in overwhelming demand.

FREDERICKSBURG, Ohio -- A river of black horse-drawn buggies flowed over the hills near here in a funeral procession that stretched to another time -- when America was younger and the automobile for most was only a dream or a nightmare.Five Amish children, who were killed last week when they were struck by a car on a country road, were buried yesterday in one of the largest gatherings of the Amish in recent years.All weekend, hundreds of Amish people poured into this town of 500 residents some 60 miles south of Cleveland, where there are almost as many hitching posts as parking spaces.

WASHINGTON - Fifty-six days after voting for president had ended around the country, George W. Bush finally cleared the last prominent hurdle to his re-election last Tuesday when Ohio officials confirmed his victory there. Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell said a statewide recount had left the president with a 118,000 vote lead over Sen. John Kerry, making him the clear winner in the Buckeye State and delivering the 20 electoral votes he needed for a majority in the Electoral College.

A federal judge in Baltimore has fined two Ohio brothers $20,000 for buying 1,400 pounds of yellow perch that were illegally caught in Maryland waters, the Maryland U.S. attorney's office announced yesterday.U.S. District Judge Andre M. Davis also sentenced Anthony DeMore, 59, to three months' home detention and two years' probation and Terry DeMore, 56, to two years' probation. Both men live in Sandusky, Ohio, where they operated the now-defunct DeMore's Lake Fish Co.The brothers forfeited to the government the 1988 Ford truck they used to transport the fish from Maryland to Ohio, and the $2,444.