The two-year $75 billion state budget is awaiting Gov. Mike DeWine’s signature before the fiscal year expires June 30th. The budget process was led by Republicans, from DeWine’s initial proposal through the House and Senate, which are dominated by the GOP. But a lot of Democrats ended up supporting the final product. Statehouse correspondent Karen Kasler reports.
The last budget vote in 2019 was the first bipartisan one in a decade. 20 of 38 Democrats voted for that budget in the House, and the only no vote in the Senate was from a Democrat.
The budget passed this time with more Democratic support, though there are fewer Democrats in the state legislature than in 2019. Among them was Rep. Dan Troy of Willowick, who is on his eighth term in the House – he served seven of them before term limits forced him out in 1996.
“You know, I’ve never voted against a budget bill, because I understand that a budget – the budget is basically the essential document that makes sure that the services of civilization that our state is required to provide continues.”
And he wasn’t alone. 22 House Democrats – two thirds of the caucus – voted with the majority for the Republican-created budget. Only one of the 89 total Republicans in the Ohio General Assembly voted against the budget – Rep. Bill Dean of Xenia.
Democratic Rep. Michael O’Brien of Warren said he liked that the budget put $250 million into broadband expansion and $170 million for the Lake Erie cleanup program H2Ohio.
“Let’s not talk about our priorities. Let’s talk about how we will fund our priorities. And this is just that.”
But for most Democrats who voted for the budget, including Rep. Bride Rose Sweeney, the school funding plan was the reason.
“Having a real formula is bigger than any of us and perhaps bigger than this budget before us.”
The budget conference committee scrapped the Senate school funding proposal and settled on the House’s plan, which Sweeney had been a joint sponsor of when it was House Bill 1. Simply put, it replaces the current way of calculating state aid for public schools with a formula of 60% local property taxes and 40% household income – but the budget does leave the full funding of the plan up to future legislators.
It was the final House vote for Democratic Rep. Erica Crawley, who’s leaving for the Franklin County Commission. And she admitted she had mixed feelings about the budget: because of the $1.6 billion, 3% across the board income tax cut, the lowering of requirements for the Step Up To Quality program for child care providers serving families getting state assistance, the conscience clause allowing medical professionals to refuse to provide treatment if it conflicts with their beliefs, and the language that prevents doctors who work with certain abortion providers from working at hospitals that get state dollars.
“Even though I did support this version of the budget in the conference committee, it definitely is not the budget I would have crafted at all. It would have had a more people-focused priority.”
But Rep. Stephanie Howse of Cleveland said she was a no because more needs to be done to help Ohio’s growing elderly population and economically disadvantaged kids, especially after the pandemic.
“With that, unfortunately, I am going to strongly urge our colleagues to not agree with the conference report. I know we can do better. I believe Ohioans deserve better.”
In the Senate, the lone no vote was from Democrat Teresa Fedor of Toledo – who also went solo with that one no vote on the budget in the Senate in 2019. Fedor says she’s concerned the budget doesn’t commit to fully funding schools and leaves a lot to future lawmakers, and she’s angry about the language to expand charter schools and the state-paid voucher program. But Fedor says she was caught off guard by her Democratic colleagues.
“Yes, I'm very surprised we didn't have Democrats looking at the totality of the budget. And of course, we always in the minority party have a very short window to digest this. But, you know, there's a lot of public policy that was inserted into the budget that has nothing to do with the budget.”
While 29 of the 43 Democratic state lawmakers voted for the budget, the Ohio Democratic Party is speaking out against it. A party statement said the budget “includes several toxic provisions inserted by extreme Republicans who are using the budget process to play politics with the welfare of working Ohioans.” The statement goes on to say Gov. Mike DeWine has caved to those extremists and has been too weak to stand up to them. It urges DeWine to veto the tax cut, language on vouchers and charter schools, the medical conscience clause and the abortion access provision – which Democrats who voted to support the budget are also calling on him to veto.
