Lawmakers passed a ton of bills this week on property taxes, voting rules and regulation on marijuana and hemp products.

Though he has never been in, former Congressman Tim Ryan has announced he's out of the 2026 governor's race.

And regulators socked FirstEnergy with a hefty financial penalty for the HB six bribery scandal.

Ideas is next.

Hello, and welcome to ideas.

I'm Mike McIntyre.

Thanks for joining us.

The Ohio Legislature, led by a two Republican supermajority, passed four bills aimed at property tax relief in a marathon session this week.

It also included the elimination of the four day grace period for boards of election to receive mail in ballots postmarked on election Day.

They took up intoxicating hemp and looked to tighten legal marijuana rules to First energy must pay a big fine for its role in the HB six bribery scandal.

Most of it back to ratepayers.

And Tim Ryan says he will not run for governor next year.

Joining me to discuss all of the week's top news from industry and public media.

Supervising producer of newscast Glenn Forbes and environment reporter Zachariah Johnson in Columbus Statehouse news Bureau chief Karen Kasler.

Let's get ready to roundtable.

Former Congressman Tim Ryan has decided not to run for governor next year, ending months of speculation that he would challenge former Ohio Health Director Amy Acton for the Democratic nomination.

He issued a statement this morning after careful consideration, much prayer and reflection, and after long conversations with my family, my closest friends and advisers, I've made the decision not to run for governor in 2026.

So I don't think that's a huge surprise.

But now we know, and this has ended months of speculation on whether he would actually get into the race and run against Amy Acton, who's been in the race since the beginning of the year, for the chance to go up against likely Republican nominee Vivek Ramaswamy next year.

Right.

And it's speculation that kind of was driven by him.

I mean, he he didn't go out and I might well, yeah, I mean, there were there were people who certainly wanted to see him get into the race.

And he went back and forth saying he was trying to make the decision.

There were even rumors that he had already.

Well, I mean, he'd already made some calls to people that he had even made a campaign announcement video, you know, these sort of things.

But he is eventually now we have a decision that he is not going to run.

If he had gotten into the race at this point, it would have been really late for him to have raised money for a contested primary and then for the general if he had won that primary.

Yeah, I know Democrats I talked to were like, boy, we don't want to fight in a in a primary.

Glenn.

Yeah, yeah.

And not only that, I don't think it's a coincidence.

Reportedly Amy Acton polling very well right now.

So that might have been kind of the, indication to Tim Ryan, maybe not get involved.

And as you said, no party really wants that sort of division, especially when you're seemingly up against it in a red state.

Yeah.

You're going to need the money for the general election.

Both sides.

You certainly don't want to spend it in a in a contested primary.

Ohio lawmakers got busy in Columbus this week, passing dozens of bills, including for aimed at property tax relief.

Proponents say it will result in $2 billion of savings for taxpayers in the coming years.

Karen, here's the question.

It's a savings for taxpayers, but I didn't hear a whole lot of discussion when this was being debated on Wednesday or being voted upon Wednesday about the impact that will have.

So that's $2 billion less for schools, local governments, etc.. What's the discussion on that?

Well, kinda.

I mean, here it's this is why property taxes are complicated, because it really isn't a $2 billion loss for schools and local governments, because first of all, the state did put in some money on one of the bills that specifically deals with, the capping of property tax revenue growth for districts at the guaranteed minimum funding rate, which is known as the 20 mill floor.

The state put in $306 million to offset that.

And also, we're being told that the owner occupied tax credit.

That's also part of that bill, which is going to be $400 million in tax credits for people who live in the homes they own.

What that is is just a rebalancing of a tax credit for those folks, but also a decrease in a tax credit for people who own multiple homes and rent them out.

And so those people will get less of a tax credit.

And people who own the home they live in, they'll get more of a tax credit.

So some of these things kind of offset each other.

But yeah, it's a it's a legitimate question if you're talking about $2 billion in tax relief.

Where did all that come from?

And Glenn, the when we talk about the homeowner tax credit, that's great for somebody who's a homeowner.

But we've heard from people who are in the Real Estate Investors Association as well as, just basically landlords that renters are going to end them are going to take the brunt of this.

Yeah.

Scott Ellsworth, the president of the Ohio Real Estate Investors Association, as you mentioned, he's calling this a pittance in savings, but that the brunt is going to go to renters.

He also points out national investors own about 3% of single family rentals.

And he says most of these rental homes are owned by ordinary people and not corporate giants.

So again, you know, you're going to we talk a lot about this in corporations anyway.

You know, kind of passing the cost on to the consumer in this case would be passing the cost on to the renters.

So that's his evaluation.

Agricultural land will continue to receive the 10% tax credit, but, they're going to the plan is to phase out this 10% non business tax credit for most properties okay.

Yeah.

And that's what does the offset there.

The increases the owner occupied tax credit.

But I ask Republican Senator Bill blessing who really spoke favorably about this on the Senate floor, about whether it would raise rent.

And he said he doesn't think it will because it doesn't affect apartments.

And so if people are in homes that they're renting and their rent goes up, they can go to apartments where the rent may not go up.

So we'll have to see here.

But this is a chance, I guess, for a discussion about what the state wants to put into property tax relief versus what local communities and schools have to pay to provide property tax relief.

Two more quick, bills.

A quick overview of House Bill 335 that would limit, inside millage.

And when we talk about that, it's basically, the portion of property taxes that can be levied by the local government without a direct vote of the people.

So on voted taxes, those will be limited under that law.

And that was a big change because the initial bill was to eliminate inside millage, which school districts howled about, saying that's going to cost 20,000 teaching jobs across the state.

So that was an improvement, at least on the schools.

And and it was a compromise here.

So that was, that's one of the four bills that was passed.

All right.

And then let's talk about the fourth one.

Then it would allow county budget commissions to reduce tax levels even if voters approve them.

So there's budget Commission will say, yeah, you don't really need that much.

Let's let's ratchet it back down.

Who who will these commissions be?

How will they have authority?

Well, counties have budget commissions that are made up of.

And I'd have to look up the exact I mean, you know, there's there's different ones.

But the whole point of this is to allow a second set of eyes, I guess, on voting tax levies to determine if they're needed.

And sponsors have said this gives a little bit more in terms of transparency and accountability.

But I have to say that this was something that was put in the budget, and governor Mike DeWine vetoed it.

And in his veto message, he said that, quote, giving county budget commissions the authority to unilaterally reduce a tax levy passed by voters for school, district or other taxing authority under certain circumstances, breaches the approval of such millage by the voters.

So it sounds like DeWine was really concerned about that when it came to him in the budget.

So we'll just have to see how he reacts to it when it comes to him.

When he sees it from this bill.

Democrats are concerned about that as well, Kent Smith said.

It's a direct affront to voters.

He's a Euclid Democrat.

So you're seeing a lot of that essentially saying that this is undemocratic.

Yeah.

And DeWine also said that there are some tax related issues in terms of how the Department of Taxation calculates tax rates at the local level.

And so, you know, these are all things that are part of this, because once again, we keep saying property taxes are really complicated.

When you move one part, another part is affected.

And that kind of is is part of this.

Here, Daryl shot us an email that asks the question, I think it was on the mind of lawmakers as they were making these pieces of legislation and passing them, he says.

Does the property tax reform package head off the petition efforts to totally eliminate property taxes?

It does not.

In fact, we are hearing from the group that is gathering signatures.

It's an all volunteer group gathering signatures across the state to put an amendment before voters next year that would abolish property taxes.

They say they're going forward.

No matter what.

They don't appreciate the, insinuation.

I guess that if the legislature does something, they will stop with their effort.

And, I'm actually moderating an event next month with one of the leaders of this group and specifically asking him, you know, is there anything that would stop your effort?

And I'm expecting the answer would be no.

It's a huge task to get that many valid signatures in an all volunteer effort by next year, by next July, as a matter of fact.

And, also, I'm starting to see some suggestions from state lawmakers that they are taking this seriously.

I mean, I'm hearing, you know, Senator Jerry Serino and other people who are out there on social media and other places talking about this and how eliminating property taxes would be chaotic and a disaster.

And so definitely, they're looking at this as being, a potentially serious concern.

That's finally a bipartisan issue.

The Republicans and Democrats are worried about this.

A small committee from the House and Senate hammered out a compromise on a bill that regulates intoxicating hemp products, eventually banning them and tweaks the existing recreational marijuana statute.

The Senate still needs to vote on it, likely next month.

Karen, let's just start with the Senate was gone by 930.

They didn't stick around because they didn't think this thing would be hammered out.

Well, I think the question was whether it would be done well, whether there was the urgency to get it done.

And there are dates for session that are set next month.

So I guess senators decided, hey, we can just come back if they do end up doing anything.

So it was around 1:00 in the morning that that vote happened, and it was a really close vote.

We don't see close votes like this in the legislature very often.

So 52, 34 and all the Democrats in the Senate in the House voted against it.

But it was a deal that had been, gosh, a long time in coming.

I mean, we've talked about this changing not only the rules on legalize marijuana, but also on these intoxicating hemp products since voters approved legalizing marijuana in 2023.

So this has been a long, long time coming.

But let's talk about that intoxicating hemp.

Essentially, the state would comply with what the federal government recently did, and so it would essentially ban, I mean, the amount that could be in a product would be so low.

But there's some time yet.

There's there's a grace period, particularly for, for drinks.

Right.

And yeah, it kind of just goes along with that.

It takes these intoxicating hemp products out of convenience stores and gas stations and wellness centers in places that they have been selling them and puts them in dispensaries.

But then also that ban on THC beverages that has a little bit more room to move.

And in fact, some Republicans who were behind this were saying they were expecting that maybe the federal government will come back and change that a little bit.

And then the state will have time to rework that, because those drinks are proving to be pretty popular.

They're in bars, they're in grocery stores on that kind of stuff.

So there's these are all laws that can be tinkered with and changed.

And so this could have some changes as we move forward.

Yeah.

That was part of the compromise here, which is if the federal government relaxes its rules, then Ohio's General Assembly would consider also doing that, that it doesn't it's not going to go against that.

So there's an opening essentially.

Right.

But, governor Mike DeWine, who had been pushing for this ban on intoxicating hemp products, had said he was really hoping that the federal ban would force lawmakers to make a decision, that they would look at what the federal government is doing and kind of mirror that.

And so we did see that.

One of the other things that happened in this, though, that I think is really important to mention, is that the bill also preserves the 36% of marijuana sales taxes that the state has been collecting since that was approved in 2023, and will start distributing it to host communities.

Communities that have those dispensaries and communities have been saying, I mean, Columbus has sued over this, saying that they want their money.

And so it's about $80 million in tax revenue over the next two fiscal years.

Yeah.

Zaria, let's talk a little bit more about that.

That's the host community cannabis fund.

So the local communities will get their share.

Yeah.

And they're essentially saying now that they plan to use that money to fund different community needs in their communities.

So it could be anything like streets issues, public safety issues.

But, it's a significant amount of money that they'll be able to allocate toward other, resources in their community.

Other regulations for marijuana.

Karen, that were that were pushed through this, legislation.

Yeah.

I mean, it's a lot of according to the Republican sponsors of this, it was a lot of the same stuff that we saw in the issue to the 2023 vote.

A lot of that is preserved here because there was certainly some complaints about how, hey, voters spoke.

They made it clear what they wanted to see when it came to marijuana legalization.

In terms of the number of plants you can have and things like that.

And so that was where some of the compromise came about, because I think there were some Republicans who wanted to limit home, grow and do things like that.

But this kind of preserves all that stuff.

So that's where I think there was a little bit of a struggle.

Another priority for Republicans in the marathon legislative session this week tightening Ohio's election regulations.

Senate Bill 293, which has received approval in both chambers, now goes on to governor DeWine.

He said previously he doesn't see the need to sign off on more voting restrictions for Ohio voters.

Karen, let's talk about that.

A big change in this bill is the removal of the grace period for absentee ballots, even those marked postmarked before or on Election Day.

Before it was if you turned it in by Election day, we'll have four days for the mailman to bring it.

Now they're saying the letter carrier to bring it.

Now they're saying, if it's not in our hands by the close of polls, we're not counting it.

Right.

Except for military and overseas voters.

They get that carve out because that's a separate protection under federal law.

But yeah, the whole idea of the four day grace period, in case you mail it too close to the deadline or maybe you mail it three weeks before the deadline and it doesn't get there.

That grace period is gone.

So if it's not in-house that your Board of elections to be counted on Election Day, this bill would say that it doesn't get counted.

The bill moved fast.

Okay, I did, and I think part of the reason it did is because Attorney General Dave Yost had gotten a letter from the Department of Justice that suggested that Ohio could be the target of litigation because of an executive order that President Trump signed in March that said that votes should be counted on Election Day.

And so this four day grace period had apparently raised some flags at the federal level.

And, I think that was one of the things that kind of move this forward.

Some Democrats in wanted to add something called a, permanent absentee voter list to this, which would allow people to say that I always vote absentee.

So, you know, please consider me an absentee voter.

And that was other states do that, but that was rejected.

In fact, I think, all the Democratic amendments were rejected, as is is pretty typical here.

But, you know, the four day grace period, some opponents have said this would mean if it had been legal in 2024, that tens of thousands of ballots would have been thrown out because they did not get to the Board of Elections in time, so that they're concerned that this would potentially disenfranchize voters and that also this moved really fast, as you just mentioned.

And that that really didn't give people a chance to weigh in and talk about how this could affect, you know, elderly voters, disabled voters, people who are in the classes of the in the group of people who tend to use absentee voting by mail.

Frank LaRosa, secretary of state, said it was a little more than 7000 late ballots that were counted last year that were non, military.

There were civilian, late and asked about whether he thought they would be disenfranchized.

He called it a logical fallacy and he said those voters would not be disenfranchized because his office, local boards of election and the media would work to inform voters of any of the new rules.

Right.

And that's certainly an argument that Republicans have made as they have changed these voting laws over time, that, hey, we're telling you about them.

So you have plenty of time to absorb this, but you know, that's one of the things that DeWine has said has had him concerned about changing all these voting laws is that if the system is already solid and you hear Laura talk about how he has the gold standard of voting and that our, election system is very accurate and is completely great.

You know, if it's so great, why make all these changes?

Why continue to do these things that potentially could lead people to not vote or have their votes not count?

And so I think the threat of the federal lawsuit may be a little bit on DeWine's mind here when it comes to whether he will sign this or not.

But he said before that he thinks that maybe we need to stop changing election laws so much because we're doing things okay.

State regulators have ordered First energy to pay a quarter of $1 billion, most of it to its customers, as penalty for its actions in the bribery scheme to pass HB six, the nuclear bailout bill.

This, basically tells Firstenergy's three companies the Illuminating Company or CEI, Ohio Edison and Toledo Edison, that they have to start paying back $180 million to customers over three billing cycles, and then also an additional $6.64 million plus interest later on.

And they have to pay $64 million in civil penalties to the state's general revenue fund.

Okay.

So we have, we had had hearings all over the summer.

It just took them a while to get to do.

Yeah.

And the puco, the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio, said that they went through, two evidentiary hearings, 14 pretrial conferences, all are pre-hearing conferences, all of this stuff to come up with this.

And they said they took their time.

And we don't often hear the commissioners explain some of what they were thinking here.

But this time in this decision, it was a short meeting.

But the commissioners, I think all of them spoke out saying that they were really hoping that this decision would deter any sort of activity like this in the future, and that they really felt like First energy violated the trust it had with state regulators and with its own customers.

Glenn, the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio, Puco, has also approved a new rate hike plan, a rate plan that will impact some customers of First Energy, not all of them, but in Northeast Ohio.

It will, as well.

Yeah, I got to say, I don't watch many Puco hearings, but I did watch this one.

And if you just call it Puco Puco okay.

I've heard.

Yeah, I'm sorry, I heard it called that too.

It's got a funny sorry.

It's fine as long as you define it, like go ahead, Public Utilities Commission of Ohio and say.

I mean, that's about it.

I think whatever you want.

Puco.

It's just weird.

See?

Well, anyway, I haven't watched many of these.

I did watch this one, but I've watched a lot of public meetings in the last 20 years.

Karen's absolutely right.

I've never heard them, you know, members of a board or commission be so adamant about how thorough they were and kind of about how upset they were to kind of, you know, enumerate this and say, you know, we've had, 92 issued commission and administrative law judge entries.

This is very they certainly wanted, themselves to be heard on this issue.

But in terms of what you're talking about in this, the rate case, bringing in an additional $34 million in total per year for up to four years, some will see their rates go down.

Ohio Edison's now, this is on 1000 kilowatt hours per month.

Using a nice round number there, Ohio Edison, customers could see a savings of about $2.50 per month, about $9 savings per month for Toledo Edison.

But illuminating company, many Cleveland area have that, could be an increase of about $5 per month.

Okay.

And so this is for, you know, grid improvements and things of that nature.

So 34 million, sorry, it's a lot less than what they were actually trying to guess.

Yeah, they wanted $190 million per year rate increase.

And they said they needed that money to modernize the grid and improve the reliability of the grid.

But, there's this watchdog organization called, Ohio Consumers Council.

They wanted a first energy rate decrease, considering everything going on with House Bill six.

So this 34 million is still like a significant amount of money for them, considering the council wanted to cut it into.

Cleveland Browns legend Bernie Kosar had a liver transplant Monday and minutes after the surgery, there he was again making a positive You Matter video on social media thanking his donor's family and promoting his health supplement business.

Cleveland is pulling for him.

This guy is a force of positivity and it's just amazing.

I know some people that have had that kind of surgery didn't fare as well, certainly immediately after the surgery, but I couldn't believe literally minutes after this, Glenn, he's in his hospital bed, with somebody shooting a video.

And there he is with his wide smile, saying, hey, I feel great.

Bernie's been doing his own reporting, and I. Yeah.

And, I mean, I give him a ton of credit because, you know, obviously physically he's he's having problems, but mentally it still seems, you know, very sharp.

I mean, to your point, imagine doing these videos after Major transplant surgery, but I think he's very aware of, you know, how popular he is in Cleveland.

He's known that for for a very long time.

We've seen it in his in his public persona.

And that everybody was for everybody.

As you said, everybody's been following this story.

So he was providing these updates from the hospital and their people were very concerned.

Obviously.

Our sports commentator, Terry Pluto had talked about how critical, these, you know, hours were obviously after the, after the transplant.

Incredible story.

The donor, family spoke to Fox eight.

This was a 21 year old Browns fan who had a medical issue that he wasn't going to survive.

And, again, the parents kind of looked at each other and they told Fox eight, well, what if we put Bernie on the list?

Really an incredible story.

To to think about, you know, how this developed over the last week and, and just you see the goodness in people.

Bernie has had a GoFundMe people have set up and it's essentially for him, but he has said in his videos that this is going to help a lot of people.

He's he's into, former athletes and making their wellness.

He also talked about, making sure that people are supporting this family, where this young man who died and donated his liver, Phil Mickelson, the golfer, apparently gave 20 grand to Bernie's GoFundMe.

Me and another, chunk to to this family as well.

So just a lot of people in Cleveland responding, some of it with money, some of it was just thoughts and, and well wishes.

Yeah.

And again, it just shows his popularity and it shows how Browns fans kind of kind of think and and operate.

I mean, Bernie has been a civic treasure for a long time.

Again, you know, regional kid, local kid from Youngstown.

Yeah.

Manipulated the supplemental draft to get his way here and, played very well last sustained success, for the Cleveland Browns was, when Bernie was flinging it all around Municipal Stadium and, just such fond memories.

Yeah.

And, again, you really see that come out in a situation?

I might have told this story before, but I between before my first real journalism job, I worked at Domino's for one day.

They gave me training and then they said, okay, you can go on your own, kid.

Deliver a pizza was to the penthouse suite of the Westlake condominium in Rocky River, and it was to Bernie Kosar in his prime.

I handed him a pizza, he says today he goes, did I give you a $20 tip?

And I go, no, you give me like three bucks?

And he's like, no, I gave you 20 bucks.

So that's, that's his story.

Like.

Like you just said, he finds a way to connect with everybody, and so.

Absolutely.

He, we're certainly pulling for him, as is all of Cleveland.

The US based American Cruise Lines is skipping Cleveland and launching Great Lakes cruises from Buffalo.

Toledo will be the only stop in Ohio.

Toledo, not Cleveland.

Come on.

Seriously?

Cleveland.

Cleveland.

I mean Toledo, not Cleveland.

Yeah, I mean, I love Cleveland, so I wouldn't have done it.

But, most cruise ships that stop here in Cleveland have to dock at the port of Cleveland, west of Huntington Bank field.

And it's kind of unclear exactly why they decided to skip.

Us this time around.

But even officials said that they were disappointed by the decision, but are willing to work with American cruise lines to figure out some sort of solution in the future.

Yeah.

I mean, just last month, there was a it was announced that we'd had a record breaking cruise.

Yeah, 53 port calls carrying approximately 8700 passengers.

The economics of that or an average of 150 bucks spent in Cleveland, $1.3 million.

And the thinking then was not only would they stop in Cleveland, but we are going to be the launching and and disembarking point.

And that just didn't happen.

Yeah.

And you've got to think about the amount of people that would stay overnight at hotels, frequent local businesses, check out shops, restaurants, maybe sports games, things like that.

So these are all things that would have been, generating money for our local economy had we had these two cruise lines.

But we'll have to see.

We'll have to find a good parking spot.

Yeah, exactly.

Monday on The Sound of Ideas on 89 seven KSU Northeast Ohio chefs share tips on making your holiday dinners delicious, inclusive and memorable.

We're off next week for the Thanksgiving holiday.

May your day be filled with family, football, and fun.

And may all of us, especially the most needy, be filled with a nutritious meal.

I'm Mike McIntyre.

Thank you for watching and stay safe.