The Xenia, Ohio, police department has a friend in Sen. Mike DeWine (R), not to mention the woman who runs DeWine’s offices in the state.
The Buckeye State’s senior senator came through with $100,000 in federal budget allocations that would keep the Xenia Police Division’s Internet Child Protection Unit afloat for at least one more year. The unit, staffed by two detectives who work on overtime pay, has nearly exhausted its initial $200,000 in funding, which DeWine secured two years ago.
Fortunately for the hard-working officers, Greene County prosecutor William F. Schenck used to practice law with DeWine. To take it a step further, Schenck’s wife Barbara manages DeWine’s state offices. DeWine included the $100,000 in the massive government spending package that Congress is trying to send to President Bush before leaving for the Thanksgiving holiday.
Despite the pejorative label of “pork,” this particular slice appears to be yielding dividends. According to Police Chief Randy Person, that initial $200,000 enabled the detectives to arrest more than 100 people from Ohio and other states who came to the Xenia area looking to have sex with children whom they met online. The unit also contributed information to more than 400 other online child-pornography cases throughout the United States, Person said.
That money is not entirely in the bag, however. Congress approved the package Saturday only to discover that it must revisit the legislation to remove one small provision that would allow congressional investigators to look at people’s federal tax returns after they’re filed at the IRS. Congress was expected to send the revised package to the White House before the end of the week.