The budget bill was formally introduced in the Ohio House this week. And the split among Republicans over Gov. John Kasich’s proposal to expand Medicaid is becoming more obvious, as treasurer Josh Mandel wrote to Speaker Bill Batchelder and Senate President Keith Faber, urging them to reject the expansion of Medicaid. As the budget bill was being dropped, Senate Republicans were unveiling the first ten bills they are introducing. Members of the Ohio Legislative Black Caucus have also released their list of priorities. A new audit released by Ohio Auditor Dave Yost has identified four more school districts that are believed to have scrubbed data on state reports.
The budget has been out for two weeks, and experts, activists, pundits, and politicos have been analyzing it from all angles. Gov. Kasich’s school funding formula has had a little extra time to be examined, since he unveiled it on January 31, five days before the budget came out. Starting our continuing coverage of the specifics in Gov. Kasich’s budget, focusing this week on the school funding formula in it, are two leaders in public education in Ohio. Damon Asbury is the director of legislative services for the Ohio School Boards Association, representing the thousands of members of Ohio’s public school boards around the state. Tom Ash is the director of government relations with the Buckeye Association of School Administrators, representing superintendents, central office personnel, higher education administrators and faculty and other education workers.
And finally to close this week’s show, a few final thoughts from the learned guests who were in these chairs last week – here are some last words from Republican budget expert Neil Clark and Democratic budget guru Bill Shurkti.