By Stephen M. Gavazzi, Ph.D.

The Latest News, Views, and Announcements

What’s New at CHRR

We have initiated planning activities that will surround next year’s (2025) commemoration of CHRR’s 60^th anniversary. Ideally, we will host two intersecting events. The first event likely will be located on campus and will be designed to generate greater awareness of our center’s talents and services among the Ohio State research community. The second event is expected to be located on-site at CHRR and will focus on celebrating our local, state, regional, and national stakeholders (funders, clients, donors, etc.).

I want to thank those CHRR employees who have volunteered to serve on the 60^th anniversary committee, including Amanda Roose, Brittany Poast, Clare Jellick, Jen Hoffman, and Rosella Gardecki. Special thanks to Clare for coming up with a set of outstanding logos for these celebratory events… here is a sneak peak of one of those logos!

CHRR's Leadership Team

On Wednesday January 31^st we hosted our second Virtual Town Hall meeting for all CHRR employees. Like our first meeting, over 90% of staff members were in attendance, displaying exceptional commitment to the topic of the day: building a sense of community within and among our many program areas and units.

We employed a conversational format that included both small breakout and large group discussions, combined with a set of quick polls designed to facilitate decision-making. Out of this process, CHRR team members concluded that two regularly scheduled Virtual Town Hall meetings per year would allow us to continuously involve our hybrid and fully remote employees in various community-building activities. Additionally, there was a range of interest expressed in terms of in-person activities. Approximately 50% of town hall participants believed that our 2 current in-person events (the summertime IT security training with lunch and the wintertime holiday party) were enough, while the remaining 50% expressed interest in additional live events.

Because every “All CHRR Team” event is voluntary (except for the IT security training, although it can be completed online), the Leadership Team has decided to offer additional activities on an ad hoc basis.

Next up: On April Fool’s Day we will host a small event from 2-3pm that will feature jigsaw puzzles and brownies. Save The Date!

Things You Might Want to Know

Publication from DEPC Study

Using the American Population Panel, the CHRR Special Projects Team worked with members of the Moritz School of Law’s Drug Enforcement and Policy Center to complete a survey on attitudes towards legalization of marijuana and other substances for recreational use. The first article from the DEPC study was recently published and can be found on the SSRN website.

From the abstract of this article:

“Utilizing a survey of veterans/active military, family members of veterans, and non-military individuals… results showed that a majority of individuals, regardless of their veteran status category, supported the legalization of recreational marijuana. The results also showed that a majority of veteran families and non-military individuals supported the legalization of recreational psychedelics (the veteran/active military support level was approximately 40%)… Overall, these results indicate differing levels of support depending on drug type and whether one is a veteran/active military, a family member of a veteran, or non-military.”

Citation of this article is as follows:

Leasure, P., Hrdinova, J., Berman, D. A., & Ridgway, D. (2024). Attitudes of Veterans/Active Military, Family Members of Veterans, and Non-Military Individuals on the Legalization of Marijuana and Other Substances for Recreational Use. Ohio State Legal Studies Research Paper, (817).