Support for the Statehouse News Bureau comes from the law offices of Porter, Wright, Morris and Arthur LLP.

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And from the Ohio education Association, representing 120,000 educators who are united in their mission to create the excellent public schools every child deserves.

More at OHEA.org The 2026 primary is over, and the fall campaigns are underway.

And the Browns break ground for their new stadium.

Though the game plan to use state funding for it is still under review.

That's this weekend.

The state of Ohio.

Welcome to the state of Ohio.

I'm Karen Kasler.

The Republican primary is on Tuesdays ballot included a landslide for governor, an easy win for a statewide office holder seeking another statewide job and a multi candidate Supreme Court race and a contest for treasurer that were very close.

Meanwhile, the two Democratic primaries ended with less dramatic results.

There has long been little doubt that tech billionaire Vivek Ramaswamy would be the Republican nominee for governor this year.

He cruised to an easy win, with unofficial results showing him with more than 82% of the vote, which Ramos says shows the party has never been more unified as they prepare to take on Amy Acton, who he says would be Ohio's first Socialist governor if she's elected.

I do believe that this marks, without exception, the single most consequential election for governor that our state has ever seen in our history.

There has never been a greater contrast between two candidates.

Perhaps the most important contrast between myself and my opponent, Amy Acton, is our vision and our attitude towards success.

I believe that success is something that we ought to celebrate as a people, something that we ought to celebrate as a state.

Our educational success, your family's economic success, your individual success, America's civic success.

I believe in celebrating success.

And the person I'm running against in this race believes in villainous success.

She will remind you every day that I'm a billionaire.

And I will remind you that I was not born a billionaire.

I was not born a millionaire.

I was not born in anything air.

I was born in air to nothing.

Okay.

But my story is possible in this great country and in our great state, because we embrace free enterprise, because we embrace liberty, because we embrace the idea of exceptionalism and the pursuit of excellence.

That is who we are.

Automotive designer Casey Putsch launched a late challenge to Ramos in January, promoting himself as a white Christian alternative to Ramaswami, Indian heritage and Hindu faith.

However, Ramaswami had taken an aggressive but traditional route to the nomination, campaigning for more than a year, lining up support from most prominent Republicans and securing the endorsement of President Trump not just once, but three times, including on primary election night.

On the Democratic side, the governor's race was uncontested, but the party still held a primary watch event.

Acton agreed.

There is a huge contrast between Ramaswami, a billionaire who she says doesn't understand the problems facing Ohioans and herself.

Someone with humble beginnings.

I am in Ohio, girl, through and through.

This is my home.

This is my state.

And if it wasn't for the kindness of the people of this state.

I wouldn't be here.

And I want every single kid in this state to have the opportunities I have had growing up.

Growing up in Youngstown, we didn't know what party you were.

We knew what union you were in.

We knew what food you made from the country you came from, and we knew that people in your neighbors would always have your back.

There was a sense of justice that got steeped in me growing up in Youngstown.

I learned what it was like to feel invisible.

I would not be standing here today if it weren't for the people who refused to look the other way.

And I'm going to be asking a lot of you and us to refuse to look the other way, while my brother and I were suffering, while we see suffering in the state.

Now, I am a scrappy kid from Youngstown, make no mistake, and scrappy kids never back down from a fight.

Who never.

Because that's what we have on our hands.

We have a fight.

And this isn't about political party guys.

It's not about that anymore.

It is about extreme wealth, power, ideology, special interests against everyone else.

Democratic former U.S.

Senator Sherrod Brown also had an opponent in this primary, but he won with nearly 90%.

Brown will face Republican incumbent John Houston, who's running for the U.S.

Senate for the first time since being appointed to finish out.

Vice president JD Vance term.

There were primaries on both sides for Secretary of State.

Republican Treasurer Robert Sprague scored an easy win, beating Marcel Starbuck 3 to 1.

Some thought this would be a close contest for the Democrats, but former House Minority Leader Allison Russo beat Cincinnati cancer doctor Brian Hambly with two thirds of the vote.

Redistricting was an issue on the Democratic side.

Though Ohio's district maps aren't set to be redrawn until after the 2030 census.

Russo had been criticized for voting for a compromise map that many Democrats opposed in required redistricting last year.

And though voters rejected changing the redistricting process in 2024, Russo hopes the issue comes back to the ballot soon.

Listen, we have a broken process.

I have never argued any differently.

We have a very broken redistricting process.

My hope is that the voters will come back and reform that process.

But this time they are going to have a secretary of state who will actually give these ballot initiatives a fair shot and not put my thumb on the scale to confuse voters.

Columbus attorney John also easily defeated former lawmaker Elliot Forehand in the Democratic race for attorney general in the four way Republican race to challenge Supreme Court Justice Jennifer Brunner, the lone Democrat in elected statewide office in Ohio.

Former Franklin County Common Pleas Judge Colleen O'Donnell pulled out a win with 32% of the vote.

But perhaps the most watched race of the primary was for the GOP nomination for State treasurer.

Former Representative Jay Edwards, who was endorsed by Vice President JD Vance and U.S.

Senator Bernie Moreno, beat State Senator Christina Romer, who was backed by Ramaswami, by six points.

Edwards was one of the so-called blue 22 who had supported former Speaker Jason Stevens as he challenged now former representative Derrick Marin, who the Republican caucus had elected speaker after the 2022 election but lost in the vote on the House floor in early 2023 when Democrats backed Stevens.

Those 22 Republicans were censured by the Ohio Republican Party and were targeted with primary challenges in 2024.

In this primary, Stevens racked up a solid win over Larry Kid, who was endorsed by the Ohio Republican Party, and Derrick Marin, who left office last year because of term limits.

One The Republican nomination to run against the longest serving woman in Congress, Marcy Kaptur.

Marin defeated representative Josh Williams and former Ice Deputy director Madison Sheehan.

Other noteworthy results from Tuesday among Republicans.

This is for the House.

Senator Andrew Brenner lost to Shaun Stevens.

Representative Rodney Creech beat former Representative Todd Smith, and Representative Ron Ferguson beat former Senator Frank Hoagland.

Former Representative Christina Hagan won in a four person race for the nod to replace term limited veteran lawmaker Scott.

On the Senate side, former Representative Craig Rydell beat Representative Jim Hoops to run for the seat being vacated by president Rob McCauley, who is running mate, and Representative Beth Leer lost her bid to move to the Senate to Ryan Rivers.

Among Democratic results for the House, former Representatives Matt Lundy and John Bushiri won their primary races, and there is a very close contest among two Democrats for Republican Representative Gail Manning's House seat as she runs to go back to the Senate.

Only 147 votes separate Mike Baker from Greg Bank.

Turnout was only around 22.5%, which is about average for Ohio primaries, even when there are contested races.

The largest turnout in recent history was in 2016, when nearly 44% of registered voters weighed in on the primaries for president and U.S.

Senate, and Republican then Governor John Kasich scored his only state in the 2016 presidential race.

The lowest recent turnout was just under 17% in 2014, when Democrat Ed Fitzgerald won the primary, but lost in a landslide to Kasich later that year for governor.

By the way, if it's Gerald ran in the eight way primary for the opportunity to face Republican Congressman Max Miller this fall and came in second with 22.5%.

Construction is now underway in Brook Park for the $2.6 billion Dome Stadium for the Cleveland Browns, after a groundbreaking ceremony on April 30th.

Governor Mike DeWine joined team owner Jimmy Haslam, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and others to celebrate construction on the project, which actually began in March.

But the ceremony had been delayed until after the NFL draft.

The state kicked in $600 million toward the stadium through the budget signed last year.

my goal I'll be quite honest, my my goal was to be supportive of this and do what we could at the state level because we need state money.

But you also have the Haslam organization putting a ton of money into this thing as well.

And that's sometimes something that is is forgotten.

My goal here was not only to be able to supply some help and state money for the Browns, but frankly, we've got a lot of other sports teams in the state.

And the state for the last 30 to 3540 years has participated in, in the building of new stadiums, new ballparks.

We've also participated in renovations.

We were it's clear we're going to do that, and it's the right thing for us to do.

But it was important that sports and stadiums and state money going into it, not compete with education, not compete with mental health services, not compete with all the other things that that we need that makes a society a good society.

And so I came up with with a plan.

And it was I was, frankly, to tax the sports companies.

Legislature didn't didn't go along with that.

But what they did do is they came up with another another plan.

And it's a plan that does not also does not interfere with the money we need for education and all the other things that we want.

So that's what makes this work.

Republican lawmakers replaced a wine's idea of taxing sports gambling companies with a plan to use unclaimed funds.

But state and federal court battles are holding up the transfer of those funds.

The Haslam Sports Group could pay the money during the legal fight to keep construction on track, but if using unclaimed funds is ruled unconstitutional.

DeWine said two days later that legislators who didn't want that tax increase may have to go back to his proposal as a plan B. the legislature came up with a plan.

It wasn't my plan.

It wasn't my first choice.

But it did provide for a flow of money.

And it did provide that that money would not come.

We would not be taking that out of school if that is turned down by the courts.

And if, of course, tell us definitively that that is not legal, then we have to go back and look what the other choice is.

The most logical choice is to go to the tax for on our sports gaming companies.

It's the most logical place to go.

Lawmakers could also resurrect the House's original plan to issue $600 million in bonds, but that would require hundreds of millions of dollars in debt service the state would pay until the Haslam Sports Group covered that money.

For many people, spring is the time to finally get outside, and many Ohioans choose state parks, which were showcased throughout the long and cold winter, and a film that played an Imax theaters across Ohio.

Ohio.

Wild at heart is now in wide release, available to teachers and schools that want to show it before school is out for summer, just in time for those end of year movie days.

The movie was created by the Ohio Department of Natural Resources and McGillivray Freeman Films, which has produced movies about Mount Everest, ocean life and aviation, and space travel.

I talked with Odhner director Mary Mertz about the movie in December.

well.

And it was important to us to have a story we didn't want just great cinematography and just individual stories.

But the theme of the movie is that we restore nature because nature restores us.

And so we looked for opportunities to tell that story.

But it was a long process.

A lot of back and forth, lot of film on the cutting room floor.

So you say when we, you know, how do we select the parks that were in it?

So filming took place, many, many more places than you see in the final movie.

And we told many, many more stories.

And then it just came down to what you can.

You fed in a 45 minute documentary that makes sense, that flows.

So there are fantastic parks that are not featured.

There are amazing species who, have been, protected by great conservation measures.

And we don't tell those stories.

So, so many.

There are more untold great stories than there are in the movie, but it just became a matter of time.

And what better helped us convey that message of nature restoring us.

The movie appears to go through all four seasons, so how long did it take to film this movie?

It took all four seasons, so it was a 12 month filming process.

So the team first came out in the summer, then did their fall shots, winter shots and spring shots, and then they came back to get a few more summer shots again.

And, you know, because they're not based in Ohio, it was kind of tricky.

I mean, you don't know exactly when the leaves are going to turn.

And so you're doing the best production you can.

You don't know the day the snow is going to fall or when the lake is going to ice over.

So, a lot of guessing, a lot of, predicting a lot of back and forth.

But it did take a full 12 months just for the filming.

And then, of course, the editing after that, which was pretty extensive and about $2 million total.

Is that right?

Yup.

How are you going to make this movie accessible to people who can't go to see it at Cosi in Columbus or the Great Lakes Science Center, or can't afford to go see it at those places?

How do you make this movie, which was paid for by taxpayer dollars, more accessible?

Absolutely.

We are absolutely going to do that.

So it is at the museum centers because we thought we would get interesting clientele there.

And that's where the Imax theater truly are, right.

And hopefully from out of state.

But there's Imax theaters, AMC, so it's playing at, you know, I think a dozen AMC theaters across the state.

So that's a much lower, ticket price.

And at several of the museum centers, once you get in the movie is free.

You don't have to buy a ticket on top of that.

But all that being said, you know, I think come mid to late spring, we will make it available to classrooms across the entire state.

So if you look on our website, there is a guide, a curriculum guide that teachers can use.

And it shows what science standards you can reach by using the stories in the movie.

And it has, you know, a whole curriculum plan.

So it'll be free to these classrooms and eventually, I mean, it'll just it will put it up on YouTube.

I mean, this is this is for the people.

But we did want to give the museum centers a chance to sort of premiere it.

When I ask you about a couple other things over the years, there's been concern about fracking in state parks, which is allowed under law signed in 2023.

Governor Mike DeWine has said there's no drilling in state parks, but there is fracking allowed and has been approved for Salt Fork State Park, which is the largest state park in the system.

How do you reassure people?

What do you tell people who are concerned that this is going to be a threat to the state parks, which I should know.

You just got a national award for being the best state park system in the country, from the American Academy for Parks and Recreation Administration, in partnership with the National Recreation and Parks Association.

You want to preserve that?

How do you make sure that you do when that's being allowed?

Yeah.

Well, Karen, thank you for mentioning the award.

We are so excited about that.

I think Ohioans can justly be proud that this is an incredibly beautiful state.

And our job at DNR is to provide ways for people to get access to the beauty that's already here.

So we are really, really proud of that.

Gold medal award I think are the finalists were, Wyoming and Florida.

We beat them and are very pleased that for the next two years, we will hold the title of the best state park system in the nation.

And I hope Ohioans appreciate that and get out and enjoy it.

But your question about fracking.

So, I mean, fracking has been around a long time and we have developed a pretty extensive series of rules and regulations, and a lot has been learned over the years, about what what what, what is safe and what is safer.

And we continually move towards what is safer.

And, I think the regulatory team does a great job.

I mean, fracking is going on under much of the state, right?

And where people live and where there's a lot going on.

And I think if it is, you know, we are committed to making it safe there.

If it's safe there, it's going to be safe under a state park.

So, I mean, we're talking about thousands of feet underground, which is where this activity is taking place.

We learn every day.

So.

So it's not like we know this is the final answer, and we're never going to continue our research.

We're never going to continue our inquiry.

We're never going to continue our efforts to be safer.

We will continue all of those things.

So, I don't we have a terrific team at our oil and gas, division.

We have fantastic regulators who go out there and they do their jobs, they hold people accountable.

And, you know, we are committed to continuing to do that.

Well, people see those effects when they go to the parks.

You will see what's happening.

I think very little.

I mean, in some cases there are the loss of buffers.

In some cases, you know, when all the leaves are gone and you can see a distance, maybe you're going to see, some of the completion pads.

I mean, when the drilling is actually going on, which is only for a very short period, that piece of it is a fairly short period.

Maybe at some great distance you might see that, we do have some provisions in place that they don't, you know, they make some noise and so that it won't make that noise during the drilling.

If that conflicts with the hunting season or other very important seasons at our parks.

And the oil and gas companies have worked with us on that.

So, you know, they, they want to be good neighbors.

I truly believe they want to be good neighbors.

They want to be cooperative.

They want the opportunity to, you know, support Ohio's, Ohio's and America's energy independence.

They want to extract that energy.

I think they want to do it safely, and they want to be good neighbors.

So, you know, a visitor to a park shouldn't see too much of that.

There might be a certain season.

There might be a certain angle where you see it, you know, across the park border.

But that should be relatively rare.

Is Odnr benefiting in any way from this drilling, or does that money, as I recall, that money is going back to the general fund rather than going specifically to and R. Yes.

It kind of kind of the way it worked.

So Salt Fork specifically did get some money because the way the statute is written, the park where the drilling occurs, they get a percentage of the, bonus revenue and they can use that for capital improvements.

So South Fork did get that, but the the bulk of the money, goes into an account.

And at this point in time, what has happened is that, the general revenue that our park system would typically depend upon has been replaced with that revenue.

So kind of budget neutral, for the agency in terms of that, Ohio, of course, still benefits.

But for our particular agency budget neutral, you're also dealing with plugging up inactive orphaned oil and gas wells.

Why is that important?

What's the status of that?

Yeah.

Well, it's important because, there's always the possibility that these orphaned wells will leak, and, there could be methane issues.

There could be oil issues.

There could be gas issues.

You know?

So.

So all of those dangers do exist to, more or less an extent.

I mean, when we go out and we look at intervening, well, we we rate it in terms of its priority in being fixed.

And some are emergencies and some are not.

They need to be taken care of, but they can be taken care of at a later time.

And, you know, so these Russian wells have been out there for some 100 years, you know, 150 years.

I mean, they've been out there for a long time.

Drilling in Ohio started back in the 1800s, and it was prolific around the state.

So they're everywhere.

Now we have the opportunity to take care of it for many years.

I think the program limped along, you know, 20, 50 wells a year.

Our goal is really to plug 500 wells a year.

I think that is sustainable.

I think we have the workforce in Ohio to do the work.

We have the funding to do that work.

We were a little short of that last fiscal year, but we were over 400 and we're working hard.

And already I think this fiscal year we've already plugged 188.

So we are on track to hit that 500 goal.

But, it is important to take care of them, to take care of them in priority order.

So the ones that could pose a danger are taken care first, and then we move on to the rest of them.

But it's an important thing to, take care of.

And we are fortunate in Ohio to have the funding to do that.

Speaking of funding, finally, just since June, you've opened a new Marina and nature center at Buck Creek State Park, a new welcome center at Lake Laramie State Park, a new Mohican State Park visitor center, a new aquatic visitor center at Put-in-bay, and a new exploration center at Clifton Gorge State Nature Reserve.

Right.

There's these are expensive projects, aren't they?

I mean, how are they?

How are you continually funding all of these things?

And will there be more down the road?

Right.

So some of those are renovations.

So, the last one you mentioned, Clifton Gorge Exploration Center, the building was already there.

So what we did was renovate the inside to make it fantastic.

Other places.

It's an entirely new building.

And, I think really what happened about four years ago, we were very fortunate as an agency.

I think there was a recognition, by the public and by the General Assembly that the infrastructure in our state parks was not in good shape, it was not in good shape.

And they were willing at that point to say, it's not looking good.

We need to invest.

And so a capital bill four years ago, gave us, a really nice chunk of money, and now we're at the point where that construction is completed.

So that's why this summer has been, sort of a bonanza of new opportunities, but it's all an outgrowth of four years ago.

And so now, I think people can be proud of this.

This is one of the reasons we won the gold medal award, because the state invested.

And I'd like to say that our agency spent that money wisely.

We In March, more than 8000 acres at Egypt Valley Wildlife Area and more than 500 acres at Salt Fork State Park, both in eastern Ohio, were approved for fracking by the Ohio and Gas Land Management Commission.

Governor Mike DeWine has said the money from fracking is helping pay for infrastructure in the state parks, and that he's monitoring fracking to ensure that visitors are not impacted by drilling operations.

And that is it for this week for my colleagues at the state House News Bureau of Ohio Public Media.

Thanks for watching.

Please check out our website at State News or find us online by searching State of Ohio Show.

You can stay in the know by registering for Ohio State House alerts through this QR code, or by texting state news to this number.

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And we close with congratulations and best wishes to our colleagues.

Sarah Donaldson.

We were so pleased to celebrate with her at her wedding last weekend.

Support for the Statehouse News Bureau comes from the law offices of Porter, Wright, Morris and Arthur LLP.

Porter Wright is dedicated to bringing inspired legal outcomes to the Ohio business community.

More at Porter Wright.com.

Porter Wright.

inspired every day.

And from the Ohio education Association, representing 120,000 educators who are united in their mission to create the excellent public schools every child deserves.

More at OHEA.org