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At O H E A dot org, Ohio gains another candidate for US Senate state loses a seat in Congress, which puts a strain on the process to draw new maps, concerns that a quartet of bills aimed at protecting co-ops could potentially affect free speech rights.

And the head of the Senate Finance Committee talks about changes he thinks are coming to the state budget all this weekend, the state of Ohio.

Welcome to the state of Ohio, I'm Karen Kasler to long expected announcements finally came this week.

The first, the Democratic Congressman Tim Ryan of the Youngstown area will indeed try to become his party's nominee to replace Republican US Senator Rob Portman.

Ryan's campaign video strikes a worker focused populist message very similar to another Democrat has been successful in the Mahoning Valley in recent elections.

Senator Sherrod Brown.

Ryan would face the winner of the Republican primary, which has four major candidates now, and could get another adventure capitalist JD Vance, who's been said to be shoring up support and money.

And Ryan's decision to jump into the race may have had something to do with the US Census Bureau's announcement that because Ohio's two point three percent population growth did not keep up with other faster growing states, Ohio will lose one of its 16 seats in the US House of Representatives.

Those seats have been occupied by 12 Republicans and four Democrats since the drawing of the last map after the 2010 census.

Some call that map one of the most gerrymandered in the country.

But because the map of data isn't coming in until August, Republican Senate President Matt Huffman says it will be impossible to draw new congressional and Ohio House and Senate maps based on the dates approved by voters in twenty fifteen and twenty eighteen.

So Hoffman is proposing lawmakers put before voters an amendment that would move the September 30th date in the map drawing process, but not the May twenty twenty two congressional primary.

But Huffman says it needs to pass by a three fourths vote and has to be done by May 5th next week.

If everybody's on board, it will pass.

If if Democrats do not support this and they're saying it's whatever negative thing that they would have to say about it, it's not going to pass.

I mean, we're not I'm not going to go around the state and raise two million dollars to try to solve the housekeeping.

I mean, it would take millions to pass this, especially if the national groups and I know the One Nation groups already weighed in here and they think it's a terrible thing.

Hoffman says he's still negotiating with the majority and minority leaders in both chambers.

But Senate Minority Leader Kenny Youko said in a statement that reads in part, As presented to us, the proposed amendment does not guarantee that people's voices will be heard and does not ensure that the redistricting process will be fair, open and transparent.

For years, Ohio's congressional and state legislative districts have not represented the diversity of our state.

It is imperative that we work together and deliver on the people's goal of ending gerrymandering.

It's time to draw maps that truly reflect the will of Ohioans.

A chart from NPR ranked Ohio 20th among all states in the number of residents who have had coronavirus vaccines.

But over the last few weeks, the gap has narrowed between the numbers of Ohio and starting the vaccination process and those who have completed it because the percentage of those getting their first shot is slowing way down.

Gov.

Mike DeWine is trying to figure out how to boost that.

It was asked this week about West Virginia's program to offer one hundred dollar savings bonds to those between 16 and thirty five years old who get vaccinated.

Everybody's motivated in a different way.

I think when a business there's a motivation, maybe some financial incentive, but also part of it is, is a culture.

You know, if you're working with other people and they're coming on the shop floor or they're coming into your factory or they're coming in to wherever you are and your friends are getting shot, I think that is important.

We're working with reached out with labor unions and working with them to make it available to their members as well.

I don't think there's no magic bullet here.

I just think our obligation is to make it available to everyone is convenient.

And we can work with local communities who are really working very hard.

More than three quarters of Ohioans over 80 have received the vaccine and nearly 80 percent of people, 70 to seventy five years old have received their shots.

But only twenty nine percent of Ohioans in their 20s have been vaccinated and thirty six percent of those in their 30s.

DeWine also announced with the latest CDC guidelines, Ohioans don't need to wear masks outside except in crowded areas, but should still wear them indoors.

And he said those who have been fully vaccinated no longer have to quarantine if exposed to someone with covid, including high school students who are participating in sports or other activities.

Since twenty sixteen lawmakers and forty five states have considered around two hundred and twenty bills that would potentially silence protesters, according to the International Center for Not for Profit Law, 30 states have enacted some of those bills.

Ohio was among those that approved laws to crack down on protesting near pipelines and other infrastructure.

Other states have passed limits on public employees ability to picket banned people from wearing masks or hoods to conceal their identities and toughen penalties on those who trespass on private property.

Block traffic or.

Interfere with first responders.

There are four bills that Ohio lawmakers are looking over to create new offenses and penalties for actions while interacting with law enforcement.

Supporters say they're in the interest of public safety, but opponents see them as a crackdown on free speech as people protest police violence.

Statehouse correspondent Andy Chow reports.

Republican lawmakers in the House and Senate have proposed bills that expand the definition of obstruction of justice, create new riot based violations and allow police officers to file civil action lawsuits against people who file a false complaint.

Representative Jeff Luray is co-sponsor of HB 22, which would allow someone to be charged with obstruction of justice if they disobey a, quote, lawful order while interfering with a police officer during an arrest.

The intent of this bill is not to infringe upon individual freedom of speech and assembly.

And we both support these rights and believe they are fundamental for a republic.

However, violence is not protected and should not be tolerated.

The provision of what constitutes an obstruction of justice found in the bill will create a deterrent on actions that escalate situations into violence by making it a punishable crime to interfere with the duties of a law enforcement officer after a lawful order is given.

Michael Wineman, with the Fraternal Order of Police of Ohio, says the bill would create clearer language and state law on the penalties for intervening with law enforcement officers, making an arrest or taking other enforcement action or increasingly becoming subjects of threats shoves, kicks and punches ever being struck by everything from frozen water bottles, stones, bricks, homemade shields, chemical sprays, fireworks and laser pointers.

Luray says his bill is about day to day operations of police, and an amendment was added to ensure bystanders would still have the ability to record video of officers arresting others or performing other actions.

But many opponents see HB 22 and the other pieces of legislation as a direct attack on the demonstrations that happened around Ohio last year to protest the police killings of black people, including George Floyd and Brianna Taylor.

Zachary Reed, former Cleveland City Council member who's running for mayor, was among those protesters last year.

He says demonstrations were peaceful and civil disobedience broke out when provoked by police is not.

The Third Amendment is not the Fifth Amendment.

It's the first time we have the freedom of speech.

And on that day, on May 3rd, if we exercise our freedom of speech.

And on that day, if this legislation, in my opinion, would have gone forth, I would be a felon.

Joe Malorie with the Cincinnati NAACP says there are already enough laws that handle such crimes.

Citizens should always have the right to respectfully question and challenge the actions that are excessive and abusive.

Lawmakers must cease and desist from the attempts to strip away rights that are protected under the First Amendment of the Constitution.

HB 109 would create new offenses such as riot assault and riot vandalism, which come with tougher penalties and felony charges.

SB 16 creates various new offenses and increased penalties for actions such as assault, harassment or intimidation of police officers along with other first responders.

And SB 41 would allow public safety entities to incur costs by making protesters pay restitution, for example, if they damage property while testifying against HB 22, the obstruction of justice Bill McAdory, with the conservative Americans for Prosperity says lawmakers are continuing a problematic trend of over criminalization.

Statue already covers the illegal acts that occurred during last summer's events.

In the fact that many criminals were not apprehended and prosecuted for their deeds does not seem to justify the creation of new penalties in the enhancement of existing ones.

Assessing a situation where in a great many illegal acts occurred in reaching the conclusion that we simply need more criminal penalties seems to miss the point.

Dary, who was among those protesting last year, said instead of creating and increasing penalties, the legislature should focus on creating police reform that address the concerns of the demonstrators.

The bills are still in House and Senate committees.

Andy Chow Statehouse News Bureau.

The seventy four point seven billion dollars to your state budget is now in the Senate.

Republican leaders will soon be making changes to the changes the House GOP made to Dwayne's original proposal.

I talked this week with Senate Finance Committee Chair Matt Dolan about that.

Let's start with the two percent income tax cut in this budget.

Will it stay or might it be increased?

I mean, two percent isn't much to the average taxpayer, but it will cost the state three hundred eighty million dollars.

And I'm wondering if it does happen.

Can it happen with the American rescue plan and that money somehow being mingled here or will it be OK?

Well, there's two questions there.

Look, I hope it stays and I actually would like to increase it.

I think I think lower taxes are a good incentive for our economic growth as it relates to the rescue plan.

There's a number of issues there.

One is, is we don't have a Treasury guidelines, but they did send out saying if your tax cut is supported by your own state revenues, we shouldn't have any problems with that.

The House version of the budget does not rely on any AARP money.

And maybe a source of irony, the the the loudest voices that we're putting the federal money in jeopardy seem to be the House Democrats.

Yet they introduced an amendment for a 10 percent non refundable tax or a refundable tax credit, which is a tax cut.

So that's specifically targeted toward low income people.

The intent and motive as relates to AARP shouldn't matter if it's a tax cut and you're worried about losing the money, you shouldn't be offering tax cuts anyway.

So so my guess is we will not be in any violation of the American Rescue Act.

You said that you'd like to see that tax cut increased, but you've also said that you're concerned about the sustainability of the budget.

President Hoffman has said that he's concerned about the spending.

The House added to the budget.

How could you be concerned about spending, but also be considering increasing a tax cut?

Well, when you increase the tax cut, people have more money and they have more money, they spend.

It is not it should not be lost on people.

Despite the pandemic, the state revenues are doing very well.

In part, they're doing very well because people are spending money on taxable goods versus services.

So we are seeing an increase in our income tax.

Part of that, of course, is that they receive money, some stimulus money or through the threat of pandemic rescues, but also is because people are getting back to work and they do have disposable income to spend.

The last two budgets that I've been involved with have brought tax cuts to Ohio.

So more money in people's pockets ultimately leads to more money for the state.

So you can't you can't say that you can't build the budget on tax cuts because the revenues return in different form.

But two percent is so small, most people won't even notice that the calculations have been, you know, in the fifty dollar range for most people.

Can you really claim it's a tax cut when it's only a two percent?

Tax cut?

Well, first of all, it's not final, but second of all, are you going to take a picture or a movie picture?

You're just looking at what did the house do?

But you have to look at it in terms of a movie.

What have we done here in Ohio to make our tax more competitive and incentivize people to come?

So this is a series of tax cuts which are lowering income tax for everyone in Ohio.

I mean, you don't pay income tax in Ohio to your for your first twenty two thousand dollars.

So everyone's taxes have been lowered or eliminated over the last few years.

So you can't just look at this one and say, oh, that's that's not enough.

You have to look at the overall picture in the culture we're trying to create.

I want to talk about school funding in this budget.

What was the cut?

Patterson funding overhaul is now part of this House budget.

That plan didn't move in the Senate last year.

You were among those who raised concerns about the costs involved in fully implementing it.

The House says it's a one point eight billion dollar funding overhaul.

The most of that, one point eight dollars billion is left for future legislatures to enact.

Is that a good idea?

That concerns me.

You don't build a budget based on saying to folks, hey, in the future, we will pay for it.

Here's the plan.

But in the future, we're going to pay for it.

But I understand that first we have to make sure we understand the plan of all of us, or I want predictability and stability for our school districts across the state so they can plan accordingly.

We asked them to build on five year projections, but every two years they're sweating out what they're going to get from the state.

So, you know, whether it's comparison, whether it's a version of it, stability, predictability for school districts is a goal of ours.

You have to look at what they're trying to accomplish if there's going to the money that they're basing it on, for instance, the valuation they value.

The property valuations are in twenty, eighteen numbers here.

We sit in two thousand twenty one.

Are those going to be accurate?

And I understand the teacher salaries in this are also on twenty eighteen numbers as well.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I'm going to keep that out of it because there's you know, you can argue with the property valuations have gone up.

They don't ask for a reevaluation until two thousand twenty seven.

What does that do for the fund.

There is look, there are some provisions in there that were not one hundred percent sure are actually going to students who are in the class.

There's a supplemental assistance, which means if a school system in the old way of doing things, if the student was on school choice, the suit, the school had to write the check to the school.

Well, let's say it's a high school student, so six thousand twenty dollars.

If you're a school district, it gets thirteen thousand dollars from the state.

You get to keep the additional seven thousand dollars for a student you're not educating.

Well, if I'm reading their plan, they built in a supplemental assistance for that same school district, which now means we're basing comparison on enrollment, but we're willing to pay additional dollars for a student that doesn't even exist.

So that's a concern.

The concern the overall concern I have is understand that the school systems ultimately get one payment per month.

They don't get it broken down as to where the money should be spent.

So we we're trying to figure out the cost of educating a kid, but we have no way of knowing the money is going there.

I don't I don't say that in a nefarious way.

I just say that's that's just the reality.

So when when the wellness dollars from the governor are put into the school funding formula, that's a concern of mine, because those dollars are designed not to go to the school district to help outside agencies, help students get prepared for when they are in the school system.

So after and before, school safety tutors, food, mental and social awareness and well in health, that all is part of wellness dollars that we don't want the schools to do because we want them.

Educating child with wellness dollars are doing is saying when that child's ready to be educated, they're ready.

And that's a more than a billion dollars in wellness dollars that the governor had put in his budget.

I want to ask you, too, about some of the backers of this school funding overhaul have said that no district will lose funding during this six year phase in.

But there are documents on the House Finance Committee's website showing ninety six districts could lose money.

And in fact, there's a number of districts that could lose money even in this two year budget cycle.

Are you clear on whether districts will lose money or not during this phase in and during this budget cycle?

Well, look, it's your old saying everybody has a plan to their hit where school funding plans work great until everybody sees a print out.

So I have heard both as well.

I have seen a printout that shows some schools losing money and I've heard statements saying no school will lose money.

So are we creating a formula which again, I want stability and predictability.

But if we're saying, OK, yeah, but you're on the guarantee.

If you lose money, we'll still make sure you get the same money.

That's the slippery slope that we've been on in the past.

So, you know, the answer is the House is going to have to answer that question.

We will address it in our in our plan.

And one of the other things that was in the Patterson plan in the House bill, one that was folded into this, was that there was a full funding of the increase in poverty based funding for students as a priority.

And now that appears to be different.

Are you concerned about changing that and putting funding for economically disadvantaged students as a priority here?

Well, that would be a priority.

If it's going to be a priority.

We have to make sure the dollars are actually getting to fulfill that priority.

So that's a concern for me, is how do we know the money is going to really go towards that to that body of students?

So, yeah, I mean, it's very difficult.

I applaud the house for taking it on.

They shouldn't be upset that if we're going to look at with our sets of eyes and what we try to do in the conference committee, we'll see what we can work out.

But again, I believe the goal of the Senate and the House is to provide stability and predictability for the school districts so they can plan accordingly.

There is direct funding of vouchers and the House version of the budget.

And Senate President Huffman, definitely a fan of vouchers, talked about expanding them in the past.

Is the possibility exists then that the Senate budget could expand vouchers?

And if so, are you worried about the long term sustainability of the state now paying for those?

So I think our attitude is we have to focus on making sure the child gets educated and maybe not be as concerned as to where they're getting educated.

That's not to say that there aren't great schools and all public, private, non-religious.

But if a child is not getting educated and if a system is not meeting up to our standards, that is an appropriate investment of state dollars to make sure that child gets educated.

So I would expect you're going to see expansion of choice.

I am hoping that you see it, though.

While it may expand in number of scholarships, an amount, but it's actually more targeted as to who's eligible and where they're eligible to get that education, because that was an issue right before the pandemic.

There was the ED Choice program that really kind of exploded in terms of failing buildings, buildings that had met certain criteria to be considered failing buildings.

Do you have a definition of what a failing building is?

So what we're working on.

So, yeah, there's two types of performance based and income based well, on the performance based because of multiple changes that have been made to the report card, to the testing.

They didn't all mesh when it came to the final grade, so.

I think parents expect that their public school should meet the expectations of a solid education, and we're going to have to define that and there are some who are going to be above that.

But if you're below that, you have to take the steps necessary to meet that.

And if you don't, we shouldn't hold kids hostage while you're trying to figure out how to meet expectations.

When you look at the budget and some of the things that the Senate might put its imprint on it.

What are some things that we should be looking for as you consider what you're going to be adding to it?

So I think it's a little early for for me to reveal what we're working on, but as in any budget, you have to determine what are our priorities and is the funding there to match up with our priorities.

So I think we've talked about a number of them.

I think lowering the taxes for Ohioans is a priority.

Predictability, stability for the school systems is a priority.

Water quality and investment in our future for a water economy is a priority.

So I think what you're going to see is we're not going to be all that different from what the ads introduced version is.

But we may move money around and say this is a higher priority for us than this project.

The governor introduced what about bringing back the gun law changes that Governor Mike DeWine had put in his budget?

They were part of his so-called strong Ohio package that you helped that you introduced in the last session that didn't go anywhere.

Is there any possibility that some of those provisions might come back in the budget?

I doubt it.

There's just not enough votes.

So I am going to introduce something shortly that deals with gun violence.

Hopefully people will see it.

It's not a gun, bill.

It's not going to take away individuals guns, but it's recognizing that people with emotional and mental instabilities and and they're not healthy.

They shouldn't have a gun until they can get help.

So you'll see a bill that talks about medical evaluations, due process to make sure that the events that are happening do not happen again.

So not as much on the background checks and some of those other provisions, but really focusing on the so-called red flag portion of that proposal.

Yeah, I would quibble with the word red flag because that takes on a life of its own.

You'll see it is due process.

There is no party or the ability for the government to take away your guns without a medical hearing and without a legal full due process here.

And finally, the budget was almost three weeks late last time.

Any idea if it'll be on time this time?

Are there going to be major differences that you can see obstacles that could potentially make this going forward, a difficult budget to work out?

Well, finding compromise can always be difficult, but I have every expectation that we will have this budget done on time.

Dole and voted against the bill that will allow lawmakers to overturn Governor Mike DeWine health orders when it takes effect.

In mid-June, I asked Dolan if he would support discarding the mask mandate and he said he's not against that.

He said he'll wait to see what the conditions are then, but most likely would, given how things are going.

And that's it for this week.

Please check out the Ohio Public Radio and Television Statehouse News Bureau Web site at statenews.org.

And you can follow us and the show on Facebook and Twitter.

And please join us again next time for the state of Ohio.

Support for the statewide broadcast of the state of Ohio comes from medical mutual, providing more than one point four million Ohioans peace of mind with a selection of health insurance plans online at Medda Mutual dotcom slash Ohio by the law offices of PorterWright Morris and Arthur LLP.

Now with eight locations across the country, PorterWright is a legal partner with a new perspective to the business community, Morad PorterWright Dotcom and from the Ohio Education Association, representing 100 24000 members who worked to inspire their students to think creatively and experience the joy of learning online at O H E A dot org.