Every morning in the Ohio Capital Journal’s free newsletter, The Eye-Opener, we round up the news and commentary from across Ohio and around the country and world that is catching our attention. We call this feature Catching Our Eye, republished here.

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Catching Our Eye

• Giving away federal land in Ohio to data centers. Reuters reports, “OpenAI eyes potential $500 billion data center on federal land in Ohio, per report.”

OpenAI is in talks to lease a proposed 10-gigawatt data center campus on federal land in Ohio, in a deal that could include financial backing from Nvidia, The Information reported on Tuesday, citing two people with direct knowledge of the discussions.

• 40-year data center tax breaks. The Columbus Dispatch’s Haley BeMiller reports, “Kasich deal gave 40-year data center tax break to Amazon, Google.”

Ohio provided at least $2.3 billion in sales tax breaks to companies building data centers. Tech giants Meta, Google and Amazon received 100% tax exemptions for up to 40 years.

The tax breaks for Meta, Google and Amazon alone are estimated to be worth at least $1.8 billion. State lawmakers are considering legislation to limit future data center tax exemptions to 50%.

• Inflation. The Associated Press reports, “Inflation rises to a 3-year high on spiking gas prices, highlighting affordability challenges.”

Rising gas prices pushed inflation to its highest level in three years last month, a headache for the Federal Reserve and a potential political challenge for the Trump administration as midterm elections near.

Consumer prices rose 4.2 percent in May from a year earlier, the Labor Department said Wednesday, up from 3.8 percent in April and the third straight increase. On a monthly basis, prices rose 0.5 percent last month, after big gains of 0.6 percent in April and 0.9 percent in March.

• Back on the bench. Cleveland Scene’s Mark Oprea reports, “Geauga County Probate Judge Tim Grendell Back on Bench After Six Month Suspension.”

Timothy Grendell is back on the bench in Geauga County after serving a six-month suspension by the Ohio Disciplinary Counsel for violating professional conduct policies stemming from his decision to put two teens in juvenile detention for refusing to visit their father.

Grendell, who is 73, will serve out the remainder of his term as probate and juvenile court judge. He was initially given an 18-month suspension but the Ohio Supreme Court signed off on his reinstatement after he completed continuing education and training.