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The battle over Senate Bill one goes on before it goes into effect.

And voters statewide will decide on an infrastructure issue next month.

We'll dive into issue two this week in the state of Ohio.

Just.

Welcome to the state of Ohio.

I'm Karen Kasler.

Union groups have begun the march to the ballot that they hinted at when Republican lawmakers passed a law aimed at stopping what they see as liberal indoctrination at public universities by banning faculty strikes and most mandatory diversity programs.

Senate Bill one also requires post tenure performance reviews and what's termed as intellectual diversity on certain controversial topics.

The union representing Youngstown State University faculty started circulating petitions to repeal Senate Bill one over the weekend.

That quickly grew into a statewide effort, including a signature gathering event and protest outside the City Club of Cleveland on Thursday.

As Senate Bill one, sponsor, Senator Jerry Serino, spoke inside, he said the law, which goes into effect in June, is in the execution stage.

We're not kidding around with this law will not be ignored.

It will be a it will be welcomed.

And it will be implemented at our universities and community colleges.

And maybe even some of our private colleges are thinking about, adopting some of the components of that.

So we're going to make sure that, that all the work we've done doesn't go to waste because it's being ignored.

We're going to make sure it happens.

And nothing speaks like money.

The union groups must get 1000 signatures to start the process of taking the repeal to the ballot.

To get before voters in November.

They'd have to get around 250,000 more signatures by early July.

If their ballot language is approved and full disclosure of the Youngstown State Faculty Union is an affiliate of the Ohio Education Association, which is an underwriter of this program.

Also on Senate Bill one, Ohio House Republicans added to their budget a requirement that nonprofit, independent universities and colleges admit any Ohio graduate who makes the top 10% of their graduating class.

And they extended the governor's merit Scholarship, which gives $5,000 to the top 5% of graduating seniors if they stay in state for college.

All this means those private institutions will have to abide by certain Senate Bill one regulations.

That's what's Ohio University's founded on religious doctrine.

In a predicament from the Catholic mid-sized University of Dayton to smaller Baptist campuses statewide.

And so all of those provisions are now required of our colleges.

And then there's the appearance of an exemption for religious practice.

But it's religious practice as judged by the chancellor.

And so the chancellor is going to have to be in the business of deciding every syllabus.

Does it comply with a sincerely held religious belief?

Does this announcement by or op ed by the president conform to a sincerely held religious belief?

Where's the line between what is and what isn't?

And the government is going to be in the business of deciding what religions believe.

That's antithetical to the First Amendment.

It's just shocking that it came out of this legislature, The budget is now in the Senate.

Lawmakers are set to return from break the week of April 28th.

But so far, Serino, who chairs the Senate Finance Committee, says no hearings for that panel have been set yet.

The May ballot will feature local primaries and money questions, but only one statewide issue.

It's issue two, a renewal of the state Capital improvements program and almost 40 year old initiative that allows the state to issue bonds to pay for public improvements.

This year's renewal includes an increase in borrowing authority, up to $2.5 billion over ten years.

Jeff Stauch is the elected county engineer in Union County.

The County Engineer's Association of Ohio is among the more than 80 organizations supporting issue two.

can you explain it, you two, in simple terms, why this is needed.

It's been around since 1987.

But why?

Why is it now in front of voters?

So a little history.

As you said, it was first implemented in 1987.

So, gosh, it's been close to 40 years since it's been been in place.

And, it goes in ten year cycles.

So this is it allows the state to renew or reauthorize, the sale of bonds to fund infrastructure projects in the state of Ohio for local communities and counties.

And the issue is for obligation bonds up to $250 million a year.

So over that ten year, ten year period, the 250 million goes towards, infrastructure projects could be bridges, roads, certainly, sewer projects, sanitary sewer, water lines, storm sewers.

And, you know, I think back when it was first formed, the decision was made to, you know, allow the voters to take another look at this every, every ten years.

So we're at that cycle.

It's been renewed, I think three other times, pretty handily, because people, I think, understand the need for infrastructure.

So we are at that, that, stage right now where it's for it's up for renewal.

If local communities want these projects, why can't local communities just pay for them?

Why have the entire state of Ohio decide on this kind of money?

So it's it's fair question.

I've been I've been engineer now for 16 years, and I'm the guy that does the budget.

We wear a lot of hats in the county engineer world, but, you know, for managing projects, getting them to work in the budget, trying to find it, put all the pieces together.

All this stuff takes takes money, obviously.

And, there's just not enough to go over.

Never enough money to do everything you want.

Certainly in the engineering world as well.

But this is a great tool to be able to help get some of these other projects across the line.

One unique component of this is it requires matching funds to score well, and we can talk about how projects are scored here if we want to get in the weeds a little bit.

But the, the grant usually requires matching funds.

So we take some of our money that we get every year through our local revenues, match it with these grant dollars to actually be able to build a project.

Now, the state capital improvement program, which is what issue two would fund, was created with the original issue 2 in 1987.

That was $1.2 billion.

That went up to $1.75 billion in 2005 and $2 billion in 2014.

So why has that borrowing authority continued to grow over this almost 40 years?

So I think it's just the natural, trend of construction inflation.

You know, we all live, especially these last couple of years, the effects of inflation.

I tell folks all the time, construction inflation is at a different level, a different pace than even normal inflation.

What used to cost less than $100,000 a mile to pave a road is now up close to 175,000 for us.

That's just the blacktop.

One one mile a road.

So I think that's part of it.

You know, there's Ohio's doing pretty well, especially the central part of the state and the, the pressures with growth, more traffic, more needs or just a natural thing.

So you talk about the expense of these projects, why have these projects gotten so expensive?

Are the materials just the cost of them increasing so dramatically?

These projects have got or are the projects themselves just getting bigger?

It's, it's probably a little bit of everything, to be honest.

You know, the labor rates of have obviously grown some, but I think probably the biggest component would be, materials concrete, asphalt, just the materials that, that it takes, to go in, getting these projects built.

Why can't these projects be part of the capital budget or the transportation budget?

Why?

What makes these projects separate from those other budgets that lawmakers approve in different cycles?

So there's a lot of a lot of sources of money, that go into, you know, the when we step out the door every morning and hop on a local road and work our way to wherever it may be, school or work, you're driving along in a number of different jurisdictions.

Could be Odot, could be a city, could be a county council, could be even, and some of those, you know, four lane highways are funded with federal dollars as well.

So, I think that's part of it.

You just have a number of funding streams for different, different agencies.

What's unique and most helpful about these?

They go to local local projects.

And if I haven't mentioned it, it's it's counties, it's cities, it's villages.

Perhaps the utility district, sanitary sewer district, it's reserved for those smaller agencies that, you know, for instance, in Union County, we are one of the fastest growing, if not the fastest growing county in the state.

A lot of development, a lot of growth.

But the development doesn't pay for itself.

We do and have for the last 10 or 12 years, really worked with the developers to have them help fund, you know, the project impacts their traffic impacts.

But it's it's just one piece.

It takes some of that.

It takes some of our local dollars, occasional federal dollars, if we're lucky enough to get Ahold of those.

But back to your question.

It it takes all those pieces, and this allows money to be targeted just to the local projects.

You talk about scoring projects, that there are a lot of projects that will potentially be competing for this money.

How do you determine what makes the cost so, an example, in our district we have I think there are 19 districts across the state.

We be in west central Ohio, as we call a district 11.

There are eight counties.

Each county gets an allocation every year.

Ours is is somewhere in the neighborhood, averages about 1 to 1 point million, for Union County each, each and every year and has for the last number of years.

So the, the applications come in on an annual basis and they are scored.

And so the best projects, the ones that maybe have the most traffic, you know, for instance, you get more points if you are teaming with other agencies, if you're partnering with the city, City of Dublin or City of Marysville or a township, that increases your chances.

And a lot of it is just to be able to take the best projects and move them forward with the funding.

So the score sheets are are reviewed.

A small committee that's local helped choose the projects.

We submit them to the state, for approval for the funding.

So I think that's a good component because it helps separate the best projects from the ones that that won't have quite the same impact.

On the other hand, you know, small village may not compete very well with with one of the projects they want to get done.

So there's a small government fund is a part of the program.

If you're less than a population of 5000, you can you can apply to the small government fund to have your smaller project funded and have a better chance.

So there is a pretty strong measure of local control here.

Even though this is state money and this is a state voter decision, there's a lot of local control here.

It really is.

And we you know, obviously from our standpoint, we think that's a great thing.

In our world, we we often say every trip begins and ends on a local road.

So the local projects need need some attention too.

I want to ask you about a question has come up in the last couple of weeks since we've been reporting on the $600 million package of bonds for the Cleveland Browns Stadium in Brook Park.

That's in the House budget, and whether issue two would somehow be tied to that, for instance, if that bond package is removed or vetoed, could issue to pay for the Browns stadium, or could issue to pay for another stadium for, say, Cincinnati or somewhere else.

Can issue $2 be used in that way that they cannot in being and just being honest.

As a diehard, lifelong, diehard Cleveland Browns fan, I I've followed that closely.

And I have my opinions about whether or not they need the stadium up there.

However, the funds here that we're talking about for issue two are again, are directed just for local infrastructure roads, bridges.

The bonds are not tied to this proposal for a new stadium or any other stadium for sports teams.

At all.

Are you concerned that because of all the reporting that's been done and because of the inclusion of this bond package in the budget, that that might affect how people view issue two?

I mean, issue two has in the past, in its various iterations, passed pretty.

It needs to pass by a simple majority.

It's passed by larger percentages than that.

Are you concerned that people might get confused?

Concerned about this and vote against issue two or not vote at all?

So, yeah, I'm sure there's always concern there.

I just I think what helps us though is we we have a track record of, of, you know, so many years since 87 and we, we try to do a good job locally.

I know other engineers and, and city engineers out there try to share, you know, where where the funds, come from to build a certain project, a roundabout or a bridge.

And hopefully people remember that and they do a little bit of research to be able to separate the, the, the true from the not true.

And finally, I'm sure you don't want to think about this, but if issue two fails, what is the effect on communities that are looking down the road and thinking, we need to replace this road, or we need to do this water sewer project or whatever?

Yeah, it would definitely be impactful for us.

I took a look, before driving down our district, again, the eight counties average is between 600,000 and $3 million a year annually for the projects.

So each of those counties is somewhere in the middle of that range.

So if you could just imagine taking away that funding for one year, it's it's likely, you know, three miles of paving for, for a certain county or maybe a bridge doesn't get built, water line.

Does it go into a treatment plant for sanitary sewer?

Doesn't happen until, you know, they figure out another way to fund it.

It would be impactful.

Issue two was overwhelmingly supported by state lawmakers when they voted in December to put it before voters in May.

But there was a single no vote in the Senate from Republican former lawmaker Niraj Antony.

And four of the most conservative Republican members of the House also voted against it.

Ron Ferguson, Brian Lawrence, Reggie Stoltzfus and Jennifer Gross.

I talked to Representative Grosz about why she opposes issue two and why she was also one of five Republicans who joined all House Democrats in voting against the budget in the House last week.

two.

What are your concerns about issue two?

It is a renewal of a program that's been around since 1987, has funded 19,000 local projects, which communities may not have been able to afford without that assistance?

What's your concerns about issue two?

I think as you said, this started in 1990, at 1987 under Governor Celeste.

And, the reason this bond issue was started was because we had issues with roads and bridges.

My understanding was it wasn't only local projects back then, it was all of our highways and that we were, we were losing opportunities because our roads were in disrepair.

So under a Democrat governor, we started a new bond.

We have a transportation budget to care.

And so that transportation budget is supposed to cover roads and bridges.

And this bond covers roads and bridges.

I'm really, I'm really not sure that all the money is going into one pot and all the money is going into another.

Odot Odot works in both areas, is my understanding.

The other thing about this bond is that it went to 2014.

It was 1.75 billion.

And now ten years later, we're at 2.5 billion.

When we started in 1987, we were at 500 million.

And so we have another revenue stream when we already passed the transportation budget, that we're spending.

And so I think it gets confusing for the citizens to see that we have six, six revenue streams, five budgets.

One is it transportation budget.

Then we come to the ballot and we ask for more money for roads and bridges, when in my opinion, it should be, it should be all in one.

The other thing that there have been since the last Celeste is one.

There have been seven governors, five have been Republican, two have been Democrat, Strickland and Celeste.

And we just keep increasing our spending.

So, in a time when the citizens of Ohio have said that we need to, dodge and really spend our money, well, I might have approved of a smaller increase because of inflation.

And you could argue that in ten years, 31 plus percent increase in spending in this particular amendment is reasonable.

I don't think so.

I, I may have have thought of a smaller amount, but again, it's a sixth revenue stream and we have five budgets.

We already have a transport budget.

I don't see the need.

We started it as a as a fix and as government will do.

It never ended.

And all it does is keep increasing and spending.

Where would you come up with the increase for the revenue stream?

I mean, Odot has said that the gas tax revenue is not going to fund roads and bridges and all that.

Over time, they're going to have to start talking about maybe increasing that.

Where would you come?

Where would you find another revenue stream?

I think, you know, I'm not the expert or the queen of the world, but I would say that first of all, we need to dodge everything.

So we need to be sure that we're spending the money we do have most efficiently.

No, nothing against Odot or anything like that, but we all what I see a lot of times in government, maybe not so much in ours, but, but we do need to be sure that we're spending all of our citizens dollars wisely.

And, we'll be talking a little bit more about that, I'm sure, in the budget, as we continue our conversation, I want to ask you about the budget.

You were one of the votes against the budget, and you mentioned the Department of Government Efficiency at the federal level.

And there's a Dodge caucus in Ohio that you're a part of as well.

Why did you vote against the budget?

You know, that's a great question.

I want to start off by saying it was one of the most efficient budgets.

I think Speaker Hoffman ran it very, very well.

Chair Stewart did a fabulous job.

The the plan of using standing committees to hear, budget, asks, aloud almost 95 as chair Stewart says representatives to participate and add amendments to the budget.

I think that when the budget is heard and remember, we had a robust schedule.

The governor presenting our his February 3rd and us getting it voted out April 9th.

That is a very robust budget.

Me as chair of Medicaid, my assignment was to trim Medicaid and look at it, make sure that we are as transparent as possible, which I believe we succeeded in doing.

I had a lot of input in the budget.

As far as the speaker allowed me to and Chair Stewart allowed me to as my job as chair.

But when it came to remember our budget.

Karen is spending.

So, spending the people when they voted for President Trump said, we want responsible spending of our dollars.

And then the people of Ohio have been frustrated with property tax, relief.

We did not deliver when it comes to income tax relief and property tax relief.

And so in the end, I'm a I'm a Dave Ramsey girl.

And, we have needs and we have wants and, I believe that the needs of the Ohio people, we needed to bring them a type of relief and that would include, for me property tax relief, which is undoubtedly extremely complicated.

Karen.

But but we didn't we didn't deliver.

So in the end, as hard as it was to vote against my own work, which I'm very proud of, and as as much as I love the caucus and I love the leadership.

If I was voting because I liked my colleagues, I would have voted yes.

But because I represent my district and my district was not happy with the budget, I had to vote no.

And I was very much and have always been in the last four years, very much in touch with my district.

When you talk about property tax relief, there was a provision in the budget that would cap what school districts can hold the property taxes.

They collect the cap off of 30%, and they would have to refund the rest of it to their property taxpayers.

That was described as immediate property tax relief.

Those school districts have said it's going to be disastrous for them.

Was that, you said there wasn't property tax relief in the budget?

What about that?

I was tempted by that.

I'm not going to lie.

It sounded so good.

I'm like, ooh, this could be good.

The problem is what we heard in caucus.

I guess I'm allowed to say that, was that almost 300?

Or maybe Representative Williams set it on the floor.

300 schools, or the school districts were not going to receive any property tax relief.

but the citizens that were in those districts that are already at the 30% of their operating budgets have no, nothing left.

So the citizens that live in those districts get no property tax relief.

That would not have included my own district.

But again, it's a budget.

We need to we need to give property tax relief to all Ohioans.

And we just didn't deliver my particular school districts.

We're not happy with it.

And, the other thing is that and they're already talking about this, what will stop the schools now from attempting to get additional dollars by placing more levies on the ballot?

I mean, if we if we give it back, they're just going to keep that.

I mean, it it was maybe, not a fully back baked idea.

And for me, it was not a guarantee of tax relief and, property tax relief.

And so, I need, and this will date me, but, I can't vote.

If you give me a cheeseburger today, I can't vote for that.

You'll give me a dollar tomorrow.

So, it just it didn't deliver in the end.

Although, again, I will say it was a very.

It's probably one of the hardest votes that I have ever taken.

You were also concerned about the $600 million bond package for the stadium, for the Cleveland Browns and Brooke Park.

You say you've already heard from two other facilities that also want money.

Yes.

Yes.

And and so, you know, those requests had already come in even before the vote.

And those requests were from Packer Stadium and Cincinnati and also, football clubs, Cincinnati and pay Korea and pay Car had come in the night before the vote.

And I believe FC Cincinnati may have come in right around the time we were voting.

If you look at the timing and I thought the people of Ohio cannot be the bank, giving out loans to, these corporations, as much as we love soccer and football, we, we cannot keep doing that.

We I've seen other spending and I'm not going to pick out particular, organizations, but it is not the role of the Ohio people to bolster up business.

People that are running business can run their business on their own without the taxpayers taking, you know, the risk for them.

So, and it's not really clear to me, honestly, is, it also wasn't clear.

But my understanding with this bond is that that the people, if it wasn't paid back, the people would be holding the, the debt in the end.

And so, again, I wasn't clear on that.

But again, I the concept is not not palatable for me.

One final note on issue two.

It has that number, though.

It's the only statewide issue on the May ballot because Ohio has a law requiring sequential numbering of statewide ballot issues starting with issue one, the redistricting issue last fall.

So there won't be another issue two for at least decades.

And that is it for this week for my colleagues at the statehouse news viewer of Ohio Public Media.

Thanks for watching.

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Happy Easter and Happy Passover, and please join us next time for the state of Ohio.

Just.

Support for the Statehouse News Bureau comes from Medical Mutual, dedicated to the health and well-being of Ohioans, offering health insurance plans, as well as dental, vision and wellness programs to help people achieve their goals and remain healthy.

More at Med mutual.com.

The law offices of Porter, right, Morris and Arthur LLP.

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

More at porterwright.com.

Porter Wright inspired Every day in 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.