LOUIE TODAY: Op Ceasefire update, GrowNOW, CONSUMED

Youngstown Prosecutor Jay Macejko returns to the show-FRESH from a training session and ready to implement Operation Ceasefire in the community. First stop — the Louie b. Free Show to share what he learned, his hopes and target dates. Operation Ceasefire is a deterrence police strategy to reduce gang violence, illegal gun possession, and gun violence in communities. The program's creator, Professor David Kennedy, will also join the conversation.

Louie, Vindy.com's news radio partner, will also talk with Ohio Treasurer Richard Cordray, who is coming to the Valley with information on the Youngstown-area businesses taking part in his GrowNOW interest rate reduction program, how they’re being helped, and the dollars and jobs this means for the area. Cordray pledged last year to help area businesses access the program, which had been underutilized. He'll join the show after visiting Summer Garden Food Manufacturing, which has just become involved in the GrowNOW program.

Also returning will be Benjamin R. Barber, author of "CONSUMED — How Markets Corrupt Children, Infantilize Adults, and Swallow Citizens Whole." Barber focuses on the expanding global culture of market forces he claims will destroy not only democracy but even capitalism, if left unchecked. Those forces, he believes, seek to turn the young into aggressive consumers and arrest the psychological development of adultsleading them to "stupid" brand loyalties. The increasing drive toward privatization compounds the problem, he believes, generating a "civic schizophrenia" where everybody wants service but nobody wants to serve.