(light music) - [Mike] After months of proposals, surprise amendments and wrangling, Ohio has a new two-year budget.

Highlights include a long awaited overhaul of school funding and an across the board tax cut.

Governor DeWine used a line item veto 14 times, but an item he did not veto opposed by doctors, hospitals and insurers is raising concerns in the LGBTQ community.

Ohio's crowded race to fill the 11th congressional district seat vacated by HUD Secretary, Marcia Fudge, is attracting national attention as a battle between the progressive and establishment wings of the Democratic Party.

Ideas is next.

(light music) - [Announcer] Brought to you by Westfield, offering insurance to protect what's yours, grow your business and achieve your dreams.

(light music) (dramatic music) - Hello, and welcome to Ideas.

I'm Mike McIntyre.

Ohio has a new operating budget signed by Governor Mike DeWine early Thursday.

The $74 billion two-year spending plan includes big centerpiece items, such as a revised school funding formula and a tax break for all Ohioans.

The budget passed with a lot of support from Democrats, many of them in favor of the new approach to school funding, which is aimed at providing more aid to poor districts.

The field of candidates for Cleveland mayor is down to seven.

While two candidates in the crowded race for Marcia Fudge's seat in Congress are getting national attention.

A judge orders the operator of a massive dump in East Cleveland to pay millions for his bad behavior.

Joining me to talk about these stories and more, Ideastream Public Media Education Reporter, Jenny Hamel, Host and Producer, Glenn Forbes and in Columbus, Statehouse News Bureau Chief, Karen Kasler.

Let's get ready to round table.

He's used the pen a lot more frequently in the past, the last budget I think there were more vetoes.

- 25 last time, yes.

- Okay, as opposed to 14.

Is that because of the political challenge that he faces now and that there's this framing of this as a rhino, a Republican in name only, and so if he's not striking through these items his Republican legislature put forward, then he's going to be more in line and maybe that's a political position?

- Well, he made it clear yesterday when he was speaking to reporters about his vetoes that he was really onboard with what the legislature put together in the budget.

I mean, obviously, the budget starts with him, goes to the House, they make changes, it goes to the Senate, they make changes, but he said that he and the legislature really do see eye to eye on a lot of these issues, which I think is maybe a little bit challenging for people who might have seen DeWine during the pandemic especially as somebody who was a little bit more of a Republican moderate, but it's pretty clear with some of the things that he did not veto in this budget that he is really conservative because some of these issues that were in this budget were right there in conservative policy space.

So I think that people who were hoping that maybe DeWine would for instance veto that medical so-called conscience clause that my colleague, my Statehouse News Bureau colleague, Joe Ingles, asked him about that and he said, "Hey, this is not happening.

"Doctors are not doing this, but this will just make sure "that there is some protection for doctors in law."

Which really has some people who are very concerned about that saying, hey, that means that discrimination is potentially enshrined in law.

And so there's a lot of concern about medical conscience laws.

- Glenn, the reporters yesterday at the press conference pushed the governor on that issue.

What did he say?

- Well, basically, he said it's already... Basically, he's just codifying what's already in place.

It puts in statute what the practice has been anyway.

That's what DeWine said.

I think it's important to note that this is procedure based.

This doesn't have to do with a broken leg or a life and death situation.

What the actual law says is exercise of the right of conscience is limited to conscience based objections to a particular healthcare service.

So we're talking about reassignment surgery or abortion of course is something that people might point to as some providers having a conscience based objection to.

So it's not so much on the basis of who you're treating, it's what that treatment is.

It is a procedure based statute now that has been put in place.

I'm sure that detractors of the law could say, well, there are ways around that and it's gonna be hard to enforce and make sure, but it's that same idea of the baker or the florist.

You can't refuse service to an LGBTQ person, but you can refuse a service to an LGBTQ ceremony.

It's in that same vein.

- Well, it was pretty clear from the critics of this, Jenny, that what it would lead to is the ability to discriminate based on what your beliefs are and they might clash with somebody else's.

So if they are in the LGBTQ community and you decide that doesn't comport with your moral beliefs, then you can deny service to that person.

That's basically the crux of this.

- Well, I think my understanding was it's as a Glenn was saying more about, like let's say you fix broken legs, then if a gay person comes into your office and says my leg needs fixing, you gotta fix it.

So there's no decision making about who your patients are in that respect, but I do think at the very heart of this if someone doesn't want to participate in certain types of procedures, let's say abortions or helping someone transition or anything like that, you don't have to be a doctor in that particular type of field.

But I think you're right.

It's those fuzzy gray areas that always the rights groups are concerned about.

How can this be manipulated in a way to be discriminatory?

- We all got a tax cut and there are a number of folks that are saying maybe we didn't need it and maybe the state could need that money a little bit more.

And then there's the issue of who got the most benefit out of that tax cut.

Glenn, not as much as the Senate proposed, but more than the House proposed.

- Yeah, 3% across the board.

Not only that, we've gone from five individual income tax brackets to four and each of those brackets have been reduced.

The top bracket was previously over 221,000.

Now, it's all under that fourth bracket, which is $110,000.

It's 651, 110,651.

And that rate goes from 4.4 to 3.9.

Everyone else gets a cut, 3.8 to 3.6, 3.3 to 3.2.

So it's about 3% across the board.

The interesting thing about this when we talk about the gubernatorial primary, because you know I look at everything through that lens.

I'm just a sick person that way.

(Mike laughs) But Chairman Bob Paduchik, he's the Chairman of the Republican Party in Ohio.

Big Trump guy, ran Trump's campaign in Ohio.

He was Trump's pick to run the state GOP and he is running the state GOP.

Ohio working families can be proud of Republican leaders Governor DeWine, Senate President Huffman and Speaker Cupp.

Of course, he is highlighting this tax cut.

While Washington Democrats are fighting to raise taxes, Ohioans are benefiting from the largest personal income tax cut in state history.

I thought that was effusive praise.

He didn't need to go out of his way to say Ohio working families can be proud of Republican leaders like Governor Mike DeWine, but in that statement, he certainly highlighted the tax cut.

He highlighted that's why a company like Peloton chose to build in Ohio.

So that was the statement from Bob Paduchik which I found very interesting.

He wanted to highlight the tax cut.

Now, when Governor DeWine started the press conference yesterday, he wanted to talk about all the children's services stuff that he did.

And that's really where he started chronologically before getting to the tax cut and education funding reform and all this other stuff.

So I think the framing of this is pretty interesting and I was waiting for former President Trump when he was in Lorraine on Saturday to make some sort of comment about governor DeWine.

He really didn't.

I mean, Jim Renacci was there, one of DeWine's primary opponents.

That was all about Max Miller versus Anthony Gonzales in the congressional race.

That was all about the vote to impeach.

The governor's race was not mentioned.

Bob Paduchik comes out with this statement yesterday praising and saying Ohio working families can be proud of Mike DeWine.

I thought that was quite interesting and it sets things up for the next couple months here.

- Karen, on the budget, democrats obviously weren't in favor of a tax cut.

And yet, as we mentioned, there was a bipartisan vote when it came to the end on this $74 billion budget.

What's behind that?

- Yeah, and you can even make the argument that DeWine wasn't necessarily in favor of tax cut.

In his two budgets that he's done now, he hasn't proposed a tax cut in either one, but he's not gonna veto one.

And so the people who wanted to see him veto that, that wasn't gonna happen, especially since he felt like children's services and education was getting some funding there.

But it's interesting to look at this budget and see that 30 of 43 Democratic state lawmakers voted for it.

And this was a budget that was Republican crafted from the beginning all the way from DeWine through the House and Senate.

And yet, it really got a fair amount of Democratic support.

And previous budgets have gone on party line votes.

And certainly Republicans have enough, more than enough members in both the House and Senate to get these budgets through.

But I think Democrats were really focused on the school funding issue in there and had raised concerns about other issues asking DeWine to veto those.

And I think we're seeing a little bit of a preview of how they're going to campaign next year.

They're gonna campaign more I think against DeWine because they called on him to veto some of these things.

He didn't veto them.

And so they're, even though a lot of them voted for this budget, they're pushing back on it saying that DeWine should've done these things when he didn't, which is an interesting strategy because it's campaigning against a budget you voted for.

And so that's challenging I think.

It could be challenging for some.

- One of the reasons democrats were onboard with the budget was that it does redo school funding.

However, it doesn't commit to that long term money, right?

- Right, and that was the reason that Senator Teresa Fedor, the only lone no vote in the Senate.

She's a Democrat from Toledo and has talked about education a lot.

She said that's why she voted against it along with expansions for charter schools and vouchers.

Indeed, the House plan would've had a phase in over six years and it would cost about $2 billion over six years to fully phase in what's been called the Fair School Funding Plan, which very simply put is a way to calculate state aid to schools based on 60% local property taxes, 40% income.

And this budget takes out that six-year phase in and just makes it a two-year phase in, a two-year cycle.

So it's up to future legislators to continue to commit to this plan to keep it fully funded.

And that's the real question here.

And school groups are asking that one right now.

I talked to Bill Phillis who was the guy who launched the lawsuit against the state that got the ruling back in 1997 that declared Ohio's way of paying for public schools unconstitutional.

And he said school districts right now need to be lobbying legislators to make sure that that money will be there in two years.

I have to wonder though if it will be, if we're not facing problems in two years because of this tax cut and because the federal COVID money will not be there.

I mean, it looks like there may be some trouble ahead but what do I know?

- If only we had an education reporter to ask some detailed-- (Jenny laughs) Wait a minute, Jenny is here.

Jenny, how does the school funding plan in a nutshell, how does it change the way dollars are allocated to districts, especially those in greater need?

- Okay, well, first of all, just as Karen said, one of the radical changes is the fact that when it's determining what the local jurisdiction can pay for itself, it's not just looking at property tax value.

It's also looking at the household income.

So that calculation just totally changes, like Columbus, already getting a huge chunk of this money because of that change in calculation, even with the limited funding that's being implemented in these next two years.

And so as Karen said, the full plan, the Fair School Funding Plan had a six-year roll in.

It would be about $2 billion.

Instead, this legislature said, hey, we can't look that far ahead.

So for this biennium, we're gonna offer 564 million on top of what the state already pays for school funding.

So it's still a third of the total amount.

So it's a chunk.

So I've talked to analysts who say there are local districts that are gonna be getting a lot of money that they previously didn't have and it's the big eight urban districts, the ones that have historically had high minority student population, have a hard time getting those levies passed or even have the house values that can support some major fundage for school districts.

So yeah, I was talking to Steve Dyer with the Ohio Education Association.

He was saying this is two-thirds of the revenue, immediate revenue go to the poorest districts in the state and this is the largest per pupil increase on average is going to those big eight urban districts.

- I think one question the taxpayers might have is does this mean I'll see fewer levy requests because there's a different type of funding formula?

It may not be that way in every district.

It may not be that way at all.

I know you did a little digging into that.

- Yeah, yeah, so I talked to Aaron Churchill, he's with the Fordham Institute.

He was a little bit more skeptical.

He said, school districts are getting more funding, but who's to say what their rationale is and what they say their needs are when they go to the public to support these levies.

Again, Steve Dyer said once this is completely funded and that's the big question mark as Karen was mentioning 'cause we don't know what's gonna happen in two years, you could really start seeing school districts across the board being able to at least go with levies to the ballots less.

And he does think that you might even see some of these bigger, some of these urban districts that did get a big boon just from this initial biennium may be holding back on putting a levy next on the ballot because as we've learned, I've reported on, it's trying.

I've watched CH, UH put these levies on the ballots, Cleveland Heights, University Heights and it's like the superintendent's running for office having to advocate for these levies.

That's not what she wants to do.

I mean, at least in interviews that I've done with her.

She's like, "I didn't take on this job to advocate "for the district having enough money to fund itself."

So I know that she hasn't...

I asked for an interview and I haven't gotten it yet, but I know they're gonna be pretty happy that the state is now funding the EdChoice vouchers before they have the local districts take on that burden.

- And that's another point, though, Karen.

Public school advocates are in favor of the funding change but they have concerned about the expansion of vouchers and charter schools.

- Yeah, and when I talked to Bill Phillis earlier, we were talking about the lawsuit that is potentially coming by many districts over the expansion of vouchers and the whole EdChoice Program because there is real concern about what's gonna happen here.

Now, they've said that indeed, the direct state funding really does help school districts because before, the school district would get the money and then a student would access one of those EdChoice vouchers, the money would be taken away from the school district.

Now, with direct funding, the money never goes to the school district.

But yeah, there's a real question about if the state is funding voucher programs, then the state is not funding arguably schools.

(dramatic music) - The race for Cleveland mayor is down to seven candidates and one candidate is using some extreme imagery to push the issue of crime in Cleveland.

I don't know if either of you had a chance to see this today, but this morning, there was an email that came out from Dennis Kucinich's campaign, the former Mayor of Cleveland, a long time ago and then a congressman and a presidential candidate.

He depicts the Cleveland sign as dripping with blood and full of bullet holes in order to put forward this message about the number of homicides in the city and the idea that he wants to hire police officers and wanna hire other folks who are not police officers but would intervene in certain cases.

First of all, interesting imagery but secondly, Glenn, when he made his announcement in June for mayor, this really was what Dennis Kucinich wanted to frame the campaign around, safety.

- He's gonna have to fight Zach Reid for that space.

Zach Reid, former councilman and running for mayor once again.

He ran against Frank Jackson before, got about 30% of the vote as I recall.

That's been a big issue for Zach Reid as well.

So I think that we're seeing that in a lot of major cities right now.

And even going back to the budget, I promise I won't go there for long, but Lieutenant Governor John Husted said, "I am really proud that this budget "doesn't defund the police, it helps support the police."

And I think as you see crime rising in places like Portland or Minneapolis or wherever, some of those hot bottom cities or hot button issues if you will, you're going to see that pushback from candidates who are saying, listen, when we talk to the majority of our constituents, this is what a lot of people on Cleveland council have said, when we talk to the majority of our constituents, they want the police there, they are the ones calling for service when it comes to issues in their neighborhood, be it drug houses or shootings or whatever.

The majority of constituents, this is what you hear from councilpeople, the majority of constituents in an urban area want more of a police presence, they want more support for the police because they don't wanna live in a war zone or drug zone or whatever you wanna call it.

So I think to have two candidates, two candidates with a lot of name recognition like Dennis Kucinich and Zach Reid staking their campaign on this is pretty significant.

It's an issue that's not going to go away.

It ties in with the consent decree, a lot of the things we were talking about last week, the morale of the Cleveland Police Department, shortages in recruiting, shortages among the ranks.

That's all going to be discussed.

And again, it's interesting that two of the bigger name candidates have planted their flag in this issue.

- Well, certainly, we'll have questions about that in the forums in mentioned and we're gonna dig into it in the podcast as well.

By the way, you said war zone or drug zone, I'd call it a neighborhood where there are problems that are happening, but there are people that are living there who are trying to get through their daily life.

- Those are the descriptions that are being used.

- Our framing, I mean, what line do you draw and what do you exaggerate as being an issue that you need to contend with.

And yeah, I mean, just by you describing that the logo with the bullets and whatnot, I was like, okay, so this is an overt framing that's happening.

He's putting his flag in the sand or whatever and saying, I'm taking on this war zone, but there are others who might say we need a more hopeful image of what we're doing with the city.

- And the interesting thing to me is that Mayor Frank Jackson has been criticized for what has happened to the police department, for the consent decree, for some of these, but when it comes to he locked down the city last year when there were the protests related to George Floyd that turned violent, the Jackson administration didn't mess around when it came to rioters.

I mean, they didn't give anyone space to destroy.

They didn't give anyone space.

Maybe there were some issues at the beginning, but when it comes to protecting the city...

Certainly, when it comes to protecting the business interests in the city, Mayor Frank Jackson was all about that.

(dramatic music) - The crowded race to fill the 11th congressional district seat vacated by HUD Secretary Marcia Fudge is getting a lot of national attention.

13 candidates are vying for the seat, but two are getting national attention.

Former State Senator, Nina Turner and Cuyahoga County Councilwoman, Shontel Brown.

Some are looking at this race as a battle as I mentioned between the progressives and the establishment wings of the Democratic Party.

This is really picking up steam as a narrative nationally.

- Yeah, and I think that really is what's behind the scenes here that yes this is a race for Congress and it's in a district that was drawn to be a Democratic district, it's going to go to whoever wins that special election.

That's going to be the representative.

And this long term debate, though, I mean, we're talking about the leadership of the party especially in Congress because Nancy Pelosi has said she's gonna be leaving and I think that there is an agreement there that also extends down to the other people who are in leadership.

And so that opens things up for who could be the next Speaker of the US House.

And so this struggle back and forth within the Democratic Party between conservatives and more moderate members certainly plays a part in this.

And certainly Nina Turner is seen as one of the more progressives.

I mean, when you talk about the support she's gotten from Bernie Sanders and from AOC.

That really cements her as being on the progressive wing and people like Representative Clyburn are worried about what that means for the more moderate wing of the party, which he represents.

So it's interesting how a congressional district that maybe a lot of people don't think really people would be paying attention to nationally, it certainly is important potentially for the future.

- I wonder how much the constituents in the 11th district care about the fact that establishment Democrats in Washington are worried about someone coming in and shaking it up.

I think they're looking at who can best represent our interests here.

And there are a lot of issues that are these big ticket issues that I wonder if they get down to the public and to the discussion.

For example, Glenn, Medicaid for all, the idea that on one end, Nina Turner advocates, Shontel Brown is for a public option, so what we have plus a little bit more.

One's much more radical in terms of changing the system than the other.

Is that something that gets played out in these campaigns?

- Potentially, but I was just sitting here thinking as you were talking.

I mean, it's one vote in the House of Representatives.

Now, do you want someone who would vote for more government involvement, for more of that kind of Medicare for all or Medicaid for all idea?

If you do, you'll probably want Nina Turner, but it really does go back to that framing 'cause Shontel Brown is on my TV with her mother talking about how she voted for Joe Biden.

I mean, that's not a coincidence.

I mean, they're trying to draw that distinction.

And you know, I don't know.

I don't know which side wins out on this.

I don't know which district or how that district leans.

Are they more Bernie Sanders Democrats or are they more Joe Biden Democrats?

Is it more of an easing into government running more of healthcare or do we want as you pointed out a more radical change that Nina Turner is in favor of?

And again, I go back to the fact that it's one vote.

Can it be a powerful vote?

Can they be on a powerful committee?

Eventually, maybe, but otherwise, yeah, this is still the framing is Biden versus Sanders.

- And it might be less about the policy.

I saw the Nina Turner, the Medicare for all ad and she talks about her mother dying at a very young age because she was poor and didn't have the proper health coverage and she was relating to the constituents saying we are working class people who deserve to have health insurance and health coverage.

So I think it's more about the messaging of who she's gonna represent and the things that her constituents deserve.

- And that access to healthcare idea, that's gonna be big for both candidates, but Turner might be able to capitalize.

- Right, and I mean, the polling and the money's showing that she's doing well.

(light music) - A judge this week, fined a demolition contractor $30 million for his operation of a construction debris dump site in East Cleveland.

The judge wrote that the contractor, George Michael Riley, Sr. defied state law at every step of the way.

The Ohio Environmental Protection Agency shut down the dump site, Arco Recycling in 2017.

Glenn, this has to be a victory on paper because the state may not see that fine money.

- Yeah, absolutely, the state accusing Riley of course presenting Arco as a recycling facility.

This is like you said and according to Attorney General Dave Yost, "He claimed to be a recycler, "hoping a loophole would stop us from delivering justice "for the people of East Cleveland.

"News flash, justice delivered, now, pay up."

That's a very Yost-like statement from the Attorney General.

He likes to take victory laps like that and yeah, this money may not be seen but it sends that message and it gives Yost that opportunity to be very Yosty, if you will.

- [Mike] Yosty?

Yosty.

- [Mike] Interesting.

(Glenn laughs) - And that's going to wrap up our show.

Coming up Monday, Ideastream Public Media will observe the July 4th holiday.

In the The Sound of Ideas time slot, we'll bring you a top of mind special that discusses the symbols and ideals of freedom.

I'm Mike McIntyre.

Thanks for watching and stay safe.

(light music) - [Announcer] Brought to you by Westfield, offering insurance to protect what's yours, grow your business and achieve your dreams.