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May 19 2020

At The Statehouse: Lawmakers Look To Grant Business Immunity

Both chambers are working on legislation to limit the ability for businesses to be sued for liability during the COVID pandemic emergency. A Senate committee will hold a third hearing and vote on that chamber’s version of the bill (SB308) while the House plans two hearings this week to consider the House Bill (HB606). 

Lawmakers last week introduced new legislation (SB311) to rescind current health emergency orders and limit the power of the Director to enact new orders. 
The House and Senate have session scheduled for Wednesday with an additional meeting of the House penciled in for Thursday if necessary.

New Legislation This Week

Several new bills were introduced last week that we will be monitoring. You can also view the complete list of bills we’re tracking.

  • House Bill 633 (Boggs) – Workers Compensation – To make COVID-19 contracted by specified types of employees an occupational disease under the Workers’ Compensation Law under certain circumstances and to declare an emergency.
  • House Bill 634 (Denson, Upchurch) – Marijuana – To allow for the cultivation and possession of marijuana, to modify possession and cultivation penalties, and to allow for the expungement of certain marijuana convictions.
  • House Concurring Resolution 27 (Russo) – Health Insurance – To urge the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to immediately issue a special enrollment period through HealthCare.gov for uninsured Ohioans who may be unable to access COVID-19 testing and treatment.
  • Senate Bill 311 (McColley, Roegner) – Health Orders – To rescind certain orders of the Director of Health regarding COVID-19, to require the approval of the Joint Committee on Agency Rule Review for Department of Health orders to be effective for more than fourteen days, to require statewide Department of Health orders to include the Governor’s signature, to modify the Department’s rulemaking authority, to allow in-person high school graduation ceremonies, and to declare an emergency.

Statehouse Meetings and Events

Tuesday, May 12

  • 9 am – House Criminal Justice – 7th hearing (all testimony, possible amendments & vote) on HB3 (Domestic Violence). Statehouse Room 017. Watch online at ohiochannel.org.
  • 10 am – House Insurance -1st hearing (sponsor) of HCR27 (Emergency Health Insurance Enrollment), HB571 (Occupational Diseases), and HB579 (COVID Testing). Statehouse Room 116 (overflow in Room 114 for social distancing). Watch online at ohiochannel.org. 
  • 10am – House Rules and Reference – meeting to set agenda for May 20 House session. Statehouse Room 018 (overflow in 017). No broadcast.
  • 1 pm – House Finance – 8th hearing (all testimony, possible amendments & vote) on HB388 (Out of Network Care) and 2nd hearing (all testimony) on SB310 (Federal Funds). Statehouse Room 313. Watch online at ohiochannel.org.
  • 1:30 pm – Senate Finance – Invited testimony from Buckeye Association of School Administrators, Ohio School Boards Association, Ohio Education Association, and Ohio Federation of Teachers on re-opening of K-12 schools for 2020- 2021 school year. Senate Finance Hearing Room. Watch online at ohiochannel.org.
  • 2 pm – Gov. DeWine Briefing on COVID-19. Watch online at ohiochannel.org.
  • 3 pm – House Civil Justice – 3rd hearing (all testimony) on HB606 (Civil Immunity) and SB175 (Firearms Immunity). Room 121 (overflow in Room 122). Watch online at ohiochannel.org. 
  • 3 pm – House Higher Education – 1st hearing (sponsor) on SB40 (Campus Speech). Statehouse Room 116 (no overflow). Watch online at ohiochannel.org.

Wednesday, May 13

  • 9 am – House Civil Justice – 4th hearing (all testimony, possible amendments, and substitute) on HB606 (Civil Immunity). Statehouse Room 116 (overflow in 114). Watch online at ohiochannel.org.
  • 9:15 am – Senate Judiciary – 3rd hearing (all testimony, possible amendments, and vote) on SB308 (Civil Immunity). Senate South Hearing Room. Watch online at ohiochannel.org.
  • 11 am – Senate Rules and Reference – meeting to set agenda for May 20 Senate session. Senate Majority Conference Room. No broadcast.
  • 11:45 am – House Rules and Reference – meeting to set agenda for May 21 House session. Statehouse Room 017 (overflow in Room 018). No broadcast.
  • 1 pm – House Session – agenda TBD. Watch online at ohiochannel.org.
  • 1:30 pm – Ohio Senate – agenda TBD. Watch online at ohiochannel.org.
  • 2 pm – Gov. DeWine Briefing on COVID-19 – Watch online at ohiochannel.org.
  • 3 pm – Senate Local Government – 2nd hearing (all testimony, possible amendments & vote) on HB242 (Plastic Bag Ordinances). Senate South Hearing Room. Watch online at ohiochannel.org

Thursday, May 14

  • 1 pm – House Session – agenda TBD. Watch online at ohiochannel.org.
  • 2 pm – Gov. DeWine Briefing on COVID-19 – Watch online at ohiochannel.org.

Friday, May 15

  • 2 pm – Gov. DeWine Briefing on COVID-19 – Watch online at ohiochannel.org.

Written by Terra Goodnight · Categorized: coronavirus, Higher Education, Ohio State Budget, Statehouse Update · Tagged: Budget Cuts, coronavirus, hb606, hb633, hb634, hcr27, Mike DeWine, ohio house, Ohio Senate, ohio statehouse, sb308, sb311, state, State Budget, Statehouse

Jan 16 2020

Ohio’s School Voucher Explosion and 5 Potential Solutions

Well, that was fast. 

In late November, we at Innovation Ohio noticed there was a startling increase in the amount of taxpayer money being transferred from school districts to private, mostly religious schools.

In fact, it was an explosion — $47 million since the end of last school year and $57 million between November 2018 and November 2019 – a more than 20%, November-to-November increase.

We also noticed that many school districts losing sometimes hundreds of thousands of dollars to private schools this school year lost zero dollars to them only two years ago.

Our post led to a series of newspaper and other media reports demonstrating the issue throughout the state. It even forced Ohio House Speaker Larry Householder to say that his top legislative priority this year is to fix the voucher issue.

But what is this voucher issue, and why has it exploded so recently?

The answer is simple: the state report card and money. 

Let’s take each issue in turn.

Problem 1 – The State’s Report Card

While there are several voucher programs in Ohio (for more detail on them, check out our report from a couple of years ago), the one that’s exploded is the EdChoice voucher transfer program. This program has been around since 2005 and it takes state money originally designated for a traditional, public school district and instead transfers that money to a private, most often religious school.

Which Ohio school districts are eligible for the EdChoice voucher program? Well, it’s complicated. 

Generally, the worst-performing districts in the state on the report card, as well as any child who would attend a building that has received bad marks on the state report card would be eligible for the EdChoice voucher program. Thus, a student who would otherwise attend a poor-performing school building in a well-performing school district would be eligible to receive a public subsidy to attend a private, most often religious school.

Ten years ago, the group of schools and districts eligible for EdChoice were mostly concentrated in Ohio’s urban areas, with only about 30 or so of Ohio’s 613 districts losing at least some of their state funding to private, parochial schools.

But then the state started to use Common Core tests — tests that ended up being changed several times over the course of a few years.

Common Core tests were changed several times over the course of only a few years, prompting the legislature to provide a “safe harbor” period allowing school districts to adjust to the evolving changes.

The “safe harbor” was implemented to prevent mass exodus via the voucher program of students headed to private schools on taxpayer subsidies meant for public school districts due to test changes and not actual student performance.

That safe harbor provision ended last school year, yet district and building grades in Ohio have remained artificially low. 

A bar chart illustrating how letter grades per school district have declined erratically during the period of time where Common Core was being changed year-to-year (2012-2019)
Letter grades per district have declined erratically during the period of time where Common Core was being changed year-to-year.

As the data trends suggest, poor letter grades on the state’s report card are much more likely today than they were under previous report card iterations.

In addition, as of the 2019 state budget, if districts received failing grades in only one of several report card categories, they’re eligible to lose state funding to vouchers. 

The grades earned need only be failing in one of the categories for 2 of 3 years between the 2014-2015, 2017-2018, and 2018-2019 school years. 

Yes, you read that correctly. 

The years in question are nonconsecutive. That is the state’s policy.

Under the new measurements, there are now more than 1,200 school buildings that will qualify for vouchers next year, and 512 of 613 Ohio school districts will lose state funding to the EdChoice voucher.

As the data trends suggest, poor letter grades on the state’s report card are much more likely today than they were under previous report card iterations.

In addition, as of the 2019 state budget, if districts received failing grades in only one of several report card categories, they’re eligible to lose state funding to vouchers.

The grades earned need only be failing in one of the categories for 2 of 3 years between the 2014-2015, 2017-2018, and 2018-2019 school years.

Yes, you read that correctly. The years in question are nonconsecutive.

That is the state’s policy.

Under the new measurements, there are now more than 1,200 school buildings that will qualify for vouchers next year, and 512 of 613 Ohio school districts will lose state funding to the EdChoice voucher.

Under the new measurements, there are now more than 1,200 school buildings that will qualify for vouchers next year, and 512 of 613 Ohio school districts will lose state funding to the EdChoice voucher.

Problem #2 – Way more money diverted to vouchers

In addition to expanding the universe of eligible voucher students, state lawmakers have steadily increased the amount of taxpayer money diverted into the voucher program, away from public schools for each voucher recipient. 

Today, for high school students, it is the same amount of money per pupil as the base aid amount the state’s school funding formula provides for a public school student. That amount used to be far less – a key point for why the U.S. Supreme Court determined Ohio’s voucher system to be constitutional in 2002.

Now that voucher funding per pupil is on par with public school funding for high schools (it’s about $1,500 less for elementary school students), more private schools are opening their doors to these public subsidies, further draining funds from our public school districts.

 It used to be that, generally, the dollar amount of vouchers were worth less than those students would have received to attend the local public school district. 

Now that the voucher transfer is so much more, in many more instances, the amount going to the voucher is actually greater than the amount of funding the state would have sent the district for the same student. Thus, significantly more local revenue is subsidizing the state funding loss – along the lines of what has been happening with charter schools for years.

These changes are forcing districts to go to the ballot for new money levies more frequently and at higher levels.

Through state policymaking, pro-voucher proponents have significantly expanded the universe of potential voucher recipients to encompass nearly 1/3 of all school buildings in the state. 

By increasing the funding that follows students who opt to take advantage of the voucher program, the state has hugely expanded the universe of potential schools willing to accept vouchers for these students.

The result? Vouchers have exploded.

A bar chart showing the drastic increase in voucher-eligible school buildings in Ohio over the 2018-19, 2019-20, and 2020-21 school years. The number has increased from around 200 in 18-19 to around 1200 in 20-21.
The number of school buildings in Ohio whose students are eligible for the EdChoice voucher program has exploded this year.

Now what?

Many public school advocates are effectively pushing back against the expansion of vouchers.

One event will be held next week in Toledo. I will participate in this event as Innovation Ohio’s Education Policy Fellow.

These and other events have forced the Speaker’s hand.

There are many ways to fix this. Here are a few:

  1. Limit the vouchers to only students who have been enrolled in the school building or district that’s eligible for the voucher for more than 180 days. It’s tough to “fail” a student if that student never attends the district or building

  2. In order to be designated a voucher-eligible school or district, you have to receive failing grades in at least 2 (rather than 1) report card categories for three consecutive years. Additionally, limit it to buildings in districts with overall report card grades of C or below. This is the standard for charter school closure. It shouldn’t be easier to get a voucher than it is to close ECOT.

  3. Reduce the amount of funding for the vouchers to something approaching the ratio of the original program considered by the U.S. Supreme Court. Ohio is inviting legal challenges by granting private, mostly religious schools essentially the same base aid amount as a public school student, especially given that the state already pays to bus many of these students to the private school.

  4. Add financial accountability to the taxpayer dollars going to the private, mostly religious schools. One of the real issues with now more than $330 million going to private schools is none of that money is audited. We have no idea how it’s being spent. One of the checks we had on the privately run, publicly funded charter school sector was the public auditing of the money they received, which led to the uncovering of many incidents of taxpayer money being misspent.

  5. Directly fund all EdChoice voucher students from the state. The state already does this through the EdChoice expansion program (where any family of 4 making about $100,000 or less can receive a voucher, regardless of school performance, but that’s another story). Eliminating the deduction will also all but eliminate the local revenue-subsidizing-vouchers problem, and it will reduce the angst many district leaders have when they see on their state funding reports that they are slated to receive a certain level of funding, but get much less because the vouchers take a bunch off the top.

These are just a few of the ways to respond to this crisis that’s hammering many districts.

Written by Stephen Dyer · Categorized: K-12 Education, Ohio State Budget · Tagged: Public Education, Public Schools, School Funding, school vouchers, Steve Dyer, voucher, Vouchers

Sep 25 2019

Innovation Ohio’s New Report Finds Exploding Voucher Payments, Return to Lax Oversight of Charters in Ohio Budget

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 25, 2019
Contact: Michael McGovern, mcgovern@innovationohio.org
 
Columbus, OH – A report from Innovation Ohio focused on the state’s new budget finds a huge increase in spending on voucher payments to private schools and a return to lax, pre-ECOT scandal charter school oversight. This is the latest budgetary explosion for a voucher program that has increased more than 600% since 2011.
 
The report is available at http://innovationohio.org/2019/09/23/exploding-vouchers-charter-school-oversight/
“Given the ECOT scandal, it is astounding that statehouse leaders would loosen rules around failing charter schools that suck money out of Ohio public school classrooms,” said Innovation Ohio Education Fellow and report author Stephen Dyer. “What we need is closer scrutiny and reigning in these payments to private schools.” 
 
The report highlights four key giveaway to poor-performing, privately run schools: 
1. Weakening rules to automatically close failing charter schools
2. Lowering standards for dropout recovery schools
3. Weakening oversight of charter school sponsors, many of whom are for-profit companies
4. A huge increase in public dollars flowing to private schools via vouchers
The voucher expansion alone could cost Ohio public school districts another $73 million over two years, on top of an already ballooning $389 million per year private school voucher program.

Over the last several years, Innovation Ohio has been leading the fight to expose Ohio’s failing charter school system and sounding the alarm bells around expanding voucher programs. 

 
###

Written by Michael McGovern · Categorized: ECOT, K-12 Education, Legislative Updates, Ohio State Budget, Press Releases, Statehouse Update · Tagged: ECOT, ECOT Scandal, education, Ohio, Ohio Budget, School Funding, State Budget

Sep 23 2019

Ohio’s State Budget Bill – Exploding Vouchers, Lax Charter School Oversight

Exploding Vouchers. Returning to Pre-ECOT Oversight of Charter Schools.


EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The July passage of House Bill 166, the state’s two-year operating budget for fiscal years 2020 and 2021, signaled a disturbing return to the lax oversight of Ohio’s charter school system that led to a massive taxpayer scandal, as well as a continued expansion of the transfer of taxpayer funds from public to mostly-religious private schools.

When Governor Mike DeWine signed HB166 into law, he approved a budget that lawmakers had packed full of little-noticed gifts to those who seek to erode support for traditional public schools through a proliferation of charter and private school options funded at taxpayer expense.

The budget bill included four major gifts to the school choice crowd, namely: 

1. Weakening Ohio’s Automatic Charter School Closure Law

2. Weakening Standards for Dropout Recovery Schools

3. Weakening Oversight of Charter School Sponsors

4. Increasing the Transfer of Taxpayer Dollars To Private Schools Via Vouchers

The voucher expansion alone, if fully adopted, could cost Ohio districts at least another $73 million over the biennium1, on top of an already ballooning $389 million per year private school voucher program. 

Innovation Ohio’s latest analysis looks at how the state budget expands the state’s already exploding voucher program while reversing progress to bring accountability to charter schools.


Ohio’s State Budget Bill

Exploding Vouchers / Returning to Pre-ECOT Oversight of Charter Schools

House Bill 166, the state’s two-year operating budget for fiscal years 2020 and 2021, heralded a return to the lax oversight of Ohio’s charter school system that led to a massive taxpayer scandal, and a continued expansion of the transfer of taxpayer funds from public to mostly-religious private schools. Innovation Ohio is concerned that with this return to weaker oversight of and greater investment in education privatization options, scandals like the one that brought down the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow (ECOT) will become the norm, and more and more taxpayer dollars will continue to flow to unaccountable, mostly-religious private schools.

Charter Schools: Less oversight of a scandal-ridden sector

In early 2018, ECOT, at the time, the state’s largest online charter school, was forced to close after 18 years in operation after the state sought to recover $124 million the school charged taxpayers for kids they couldn’t prove were actually participating in online learning. Since the school’s first year of operation in 2000-2001, Ohio officials knew that ECOT’s ability to track students was suspecti. But little to nothing was done, in large part because the school’s founder and for-profit operator, William Lager, contributed huge amounts of cash to the campaign accounts of Ohio politicians, primarily Republicansii.

Despite the passage of House Bill 2 in 2015 – a landmark charter school oversight bill that in many ways brought Ohio back closer into the national mainstream on charter school oversight  – the law did not go far enoughiii to rein in the sector once dubbed the “Wild, Wild West of Charter Schools” by national pro-charter advocatesiv.

Rather than building on that effort at accountability, the FY2020-21 Budget Bill signed into law by Gov. DeWine actually weakened oversight of Ohio’s charter school sector and helped some of the worst-performing schools in the nation remain open. Here’s how:

• Changes current rules for automatically closing failing charter schools

• Makes it easier for failing Dropout Recovery Schools to remain open

• Allows charter school sponsors to have a do-over on their state evaluations

Weakening Ohio’s Automatic Closure Law 

When the state’s automatic closure law was first adopted in 2005, it required three consecutive years of failure as a standard (for non-high schools)v. However, in 2009, then-Gov. Ted Strickland and the Ohio House successfully updated that to a more stringent 2 out of 3 yearsvi.

To be clear, even with the tougher standard, the state’s automatic closure law has had a very small impact on closing bad charter schools, primarily because the state kept exempting charters from the requirements by changing the report card and testing regime multiple times over the last 10 years. According to state datavii, of 305 charter schools that have closed in Ohio, only 24 did so because of the closure law. By comparison, 172 closed voluntarily. Another 80 were ordered closed for primarily financial reasons. Prior to the closure law, six charters closed for failing to meet basic legal requirements. 

All told, Ohio’s closure law (which charter school proponents have called the toughest in the nationviii) is now being loosened because as many as 52 charters would other be subject to closure under the current standardix. To which we would argue: “exactly”. When more than half of all students going to charters attend schools that perform the same or worse than the district schools they would otherwise attend,x one would think that losing 52 of the worst performers would be a good thing, and it would make more funding available for higher performers.

Interestingly, of the 52 charters2 that were scheduled to be closed under the old standard, 34 are run by for-profit charter school operators, including almost 20 percent of the former White Hat schools now being operated by Ron Packard – the founder of K-12, Inc. – the nation’s largest (and most notoriousxi) online charter school operator. Another big operator set to take a hit was J.C. Huizenga’s 10 Ohio-based National Heritage Academies. Six of those were on the chopping block before the legislature offered a legislative reprieve. Huizenga is an acolyte of Betsy DeVos – the controversial U.S. Secretary of Education – and his political connections have kept his schools afloat for years, despite complaints from the schools they ran about performancexii. 

National Heritage has been a darling of pro-charter school advocates over the years, with the Fordham Institute declaring them last year a “notable example of a high-performing for-profit charter chain.”xiii It would seem to burst the charter-school myth that if the poster child for “high performing, for-profit charter schools” had to close 60 percent of its Ohio schools for poor performance.

Instead, Ohio lawmakers have once again moved the goalposts on charter school accountability, helping for-profit charter school operators, and continuing to allow the worst performing charter schools to remain open and fail students for another year. We struggle to understand the public policy reasons for allowing this to continue, especially in light of the ECOT scandal, in which that school (thanks to its deep political ties) was allowed to fail students for two decades.

Weakening Dropout Recovery School Standards

Ohio’s dropout recovery schools – charter schools designed specifically to return dropouts to the state’s school system – are, simply put, among the worst-performing schools in the entire nation. Some graduate less than two percent of their students in four years and less than 10 percent in eight years. The state’s already lax standards only requires that a dropout recovery school graduate eight percent of their students in four years. 

In order to remain open, students in these schools must pass a test to ensure academic standards are met. The FY2020-21 state budget allowed dropout schools to adopt another, easier test, and reduced the passing score, which the non-partisan Legislative Service Commission predicted “may increase the number of dropout prevention and recovery community schools rated as ‘exceeds standards’ or ‘meets standards’” and “may reduce the number of dropout prevention and recovery community schools subject to closure.”xiv

Last year, of the 6,887 students in dropout recovery schools eligible to have graduated within four years, only 1,808 actually did. Meanwhile, in Ohio’s major urban districts (Akron, Canton, Cincinnati, Columbus, Cleveland, Dayton, Toledo and Youngstown), more than 75 percent of students graduate within 4 years.

Weakening Charter School Sponsor Oversight

The result of having fewer poor performing charter schools is that charter school sponsors – which can collect as much as 3 percent of a charter school’s state funding to oversee the school – will see their evaluations weakened. To make matters worse, the Budget Bill orders the Ohio Department of Education to re-evaluate sponsors’ previous accountability ratings to take into account these new, weaker dropout recovery standards. As a result, these sponsors will get a do-over on their previously-failing oversight grades.

The main accountability provision in House Bill 2, enacted in 2015,3 was to make life more difficult for sponsors – many of whom are not education entities – and create more incentives for them to provide oversight of an out-of-control charter school sector. Allowing sponsors to re-do their past evaluations greatly weakens the oversight the state can exert over the overseers, allowing for the possibility of more ECOT-like scandals to proliferate and rob Ohio taxpayers of resources that could be better spent in traditional public school buildings or higher-performing charter schools.

Voucher Explosion

Ten years from now, it’s not impossible to imagine that we’ll look back at HB166 as the “Voucher Bill,” thanks to the massive expansion of vouchers the budget bill will infuse into the system. This is thanks primarily to the bill’s $73.3 million annual expansion of the EdChoice Expansion program – an income-based voucher that any child who meets an income requirement can take to have taxpayers subsidize their private (and in most cases religious) education. In terms of scale, 10 years ago, all voucher deductions put together was only $56 millionxv. 

While it may seem like a sympathetic idea to provide low-income children an opportunity to access private school education, the issue is that under the expansion, families of four earning up to $103,000 now qualify for a nearly $3,000, taxpayer funded, public subsidy to offset their private-school tuitionxvi. It is estimated that nearly 80 percent of Ohio households would qualify for at least half of the full voucher amountxvii. 

This is just the latest in a series of expansions of vouchers in Ohio law. The state has been on the front lines of the private school voucher fight for two decades. 

In 2001, the U.S. Supreme Court case ruled the Cleveland voucher program—at the time, the only private school voucher program offered in the state—constitutional, despite the fact that it sent public tax dollars to private, mostly religious schools. This was because, as stated in the opinion written by then-Chief Justice William Rehnquist, “[a]ny objective observer familiar with the full history and context of the Ohio program would reasonably view it as one aspect of a broader undertaking to assist poor children in failed schools.”xviii The ruling found the program was limited in scope and costs; therefore, it wasn’t an overly burdensome infringement on the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Constitution.

Times have changed. What was once a single program in one city that cost taxpayers $2.9 million has become a more than $333.8 million annual venture, with 581 of the state’s 610 school districts losing at least one student to vouchers over the last 5 years. The growth of these programs will likely accelerate under HB 166. Private school vouchers are now impacting 95 percent of Ohio school districts—certainly not all of which are failing.

Originally created to help students in poor-performing Cleveland schools, the number of voucher programs has steadily grown to include 5 different voucher programs, making even more students around the state eligible. By the 2006-2007 school year, nearly a third of Ohio’s 613 school districts saw some students opting to attend private schools using taxpayer-funded vouchers. Today, vouchers impact 95 percent of school districts.

In addition, the amount of state money given per voucher has exploded since the Supreme Court ruled that its small amount compared with public schools meant it didn’t violate the Establishment Clause. Between 2002 and today, the average per pupil voucher has grown from just over $1,300 to $6,512 per student, adjusted for inflation. Meanwhile, the state’s per pupil public school investment has seriously lagged that of its private school counterparts going up from $4,100 to $4,782 in inflation adjusted dollars during the same period.

The state investment in private, mostly religious schools now far surpasses, on average, the state’s average per pupil investment in the 1.7 million Ohio students who attend Ohio’s public school districts. This reversal calls into question whether today’s voucher system in Ohio would survive the same legal analysis that justified the program in 2002.

It is also troubling that the state has chosen to increase its investment of taxpayer money in private, mostly religious schools by 428% since 2002, while at the same time only delivering a 12% increase in state per pupil investment in public school districts. It probably isn’t a coincidence that 2002 also saw the Ohio Supreme Court end its examination of Ohio’s school funding system. Those two decisions – one from the U.S. Supreme Court allowing for vouchers to be done and one from the Ohio Supreme Court giving up its oversight of Ohio’s school funding system, which it had ruled four different times to be unconstitutional – led to the state deciding to increase funding to vouchers by 400 percent and essentially freeze school district funding.

As can be seen in the following table showing funding for the state’s five voucher programs for the four years beginning in 2013-2014 and ending with 2017-2018 school year, millions of dollars have been sent to private, mostly religious schools from every type of school district in the state, not only from the major urban districts. In fact, just under half of the money sent out to voucher programs did not come from major urban districts.

District Type EdChoice Expansion  Autism Voucher Special Ed Voucher EdChoice Voucher Original Cleveland Voucher
Poor Rural  $ 4,673,702   $12,220,320   $ 6,059,308   $ 78,060   $    –   
Rural  $ 2,515,709   $ 8,305,086   $ 4,532,842   $ 33,143   $    –   
Small Town  $ 7,535,697   $ 24,120,479   $ 15,117,235   $ 190,250   $    –   
Poor Small Town  $ 17,069,071   $ 28,652,804   $ 19,851,275   $ 5,844,387   $ 3,740 
Suburban  $ 20,200,635   $ 78,416,765   $ 52,421,563   $ 8,410,821   $ 121,540 
Wealthy Suburban  $ 4,389,589   $ 66,196,920   $ 33,634,223   $ 201,652   $ 54,103 
Urban  $ 27,263,416   $ 61,046,676   $ 24,136,553   $ 93,178,052   $ 847,472 
Major Urban  $ 25,402,368   $ 65,205,127   $ 40,433,321   $ 346,571,689   $ 166,142,550 
Grand Total  $ 109,050,188   $ 344,164,177   $ 196,186,321   $ 454,508,052   $ 167,169,405 

Based on earlier expansions, the $73.3 million additional funding set aside in House Bill 166 for income-based vouchers will result in funding losses across all sectors of Ohio’s school system. This becomes a problem because as students depart public schools using vouchers, the school districts they leave behind see their state resources decline accordingly, forcing them to dig into local resources (or cut programming) to make up the difference. This impacts some of the highest-performing school districts in the state – a far cry from the 2002 claim that vouchers are meant to help poor kids escape failed schools.

District Name County Local Subsidy (2014-2018)
Columbus City School District Franklin  $    28,015,593 
Cincinnati City School District Hamilton  $    20,314,389 
Cleveland Hts-Univ Hts City School District Cuyahoga  $      8,859,655 
Olentangy Local School District Delaware  $       7,955,472 
Worthington City School District Franklin  $       7,413,205 
Hilliard City School District Franklin  $        7,110,616 
South-Western City School District Franklin  $       6,751,052 
Westerville City School District Franklin  $       6,135,993 
Dublin City School District Franklin  $      6,056,282 
Northwest Local School District Hamilton  $       5,928,916 
Parma City School District Cuyahoga  $      5,240,310 
Lakota Local School District Butler  $      4,983,578 
Boardman Local School District Mahoning  $       4,817,835 
Oak Hills Local School District Hamilton  $      4,493,305 
Fairfield City School District Butler  $      3,508,264 
Gahanna-Jefferson City School District Franklin  $      3,174,098 
Mayfield City School District Cuyahoga  $       2,915,948 
South Euclid-Lyndhurst City School District Cuyahoga  $      2,863,618 
Sycamore Community City School District Hamilton  $      2,700,666 
Newark City School District Licking  $       2,632,417 

It would be one thing if vouchers provided clearly better opportunities for students. However, the Thomas B. Fordham Institute – a pro-school choice advocacy research outfit – recently examined Ohio’s largest voucher program and found that voucher students didn’t do better or the same as their public school counterparts. They did worse.xix 

As the report put it, “The students who used vouchers to attend private schools fared worse on state exams compared to their closely matched peers remaining in public schools.” Even in Cleveland — an often ridiculed district by school choice advocates — vouchers were found to not substantially improve the performance of the students who utilized them.xx

This supports other research indicating that controlling for demographics, public schools overall do better than their private school competitors.xxi 

Overall, this budget would seem to expand the state’s investment in taxpayer investment in privately run educational options. And that’s on top of an estimate record $1.2 billion spent on them last school year4, according to Ohio Department of Education data.

What is interesting is that while charter funding dropped slightly after ECOT and a few other charter schools closed, voucher funding has increased at a greater rate. Given the state’s wholesale infusion of voucher money this budget cycle, it’s not impossible to envision a time when voucher funding may approach or even overtake charter school funding totals.

Conclusion

In short, the state budget made it easier for schools like ECOT to continue to scam the Ohio taxpayer, all while public investment grows in private, mostly religious schools with almost zero accountability for those tax dollars and who have been demonstrated to harm student performance.


Endnotes

i         https://www.dispatch.com/news/20180121/ecot-endured-despite-years-of-warning-signs
ii        https://www.dispatch.com/news/20180511/with-notable-exceptions-politicians-scurry-to-give-up-ecot-contributions
iii       http://innovationohio.org/2015/10/14/hb-2-passes-now-to-the-details/
iv       https://www.cleveland.com/metro/2014/07/ohio_is_the_wild_wild_west_of.html
v        http://education.ohio.gov/getattachment/Topics/Community-Schools/Annual-Reports-on-Ohio-Community-Schools/Community-School-LegisHistory.pdf.aspx
vi       https://www.lsc.ohio.gov/documents/budget/128/MainOperating/FI/CompareDoc/EDU.pdf
vii      http://education.ohio.gov/getattachment/Topics/Community-Schools/Sections/Public-Documents-and-Reports/List-of-closed-schools-and-the-reason-for-closure.xlsx.aspx?lang=en-US
viii     https://www.ohio.com/article/20130906/NEWS/309068868
ix       https://fordhaminstitute.org/ohio/commentary/three-and-out-ohio-should-rework-its-automatic-charter-closure-policy
x        https://knowyourcharter.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/CharterReport_Oct2017.pdf
xi       https://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/13/education/online-schools-score-better-on-wall-street-than-in-classrooms.html
xii      https://www.huffpost.com/entry/why-is-this-charter-schoo_b_5397059
xiii     https://fordhami
xiv     https://www.lsc.ohio.gov/documents/budget/133/MainOperating/FI/CompareDoc/EDU.pdf
xv      http://odevax.ode.state.oh.us/htbin/WWW-SF3-HEADER-F2009.COM?act=Final+%233%28Paid+07-May-2010%29&irn=045187+Ada+Ex+Vill+SD+%28Hardin%29&county=01+Adams&DISTRICT=TOTAL&edch=y
xvi     https://education.ohio.gov/getattachment/Topics/Other-Resources/Scholarships/EdChoice-Scholarship-Program/ExpansionIncomeChart.pdf.aspx?lang=en-US
xvii    https://factfinder.census.gov/faces/tableservices/jsf/pages/productview.xhtml?src=CF
xviii   Zelman v. Simmons-Harris, 536 U.S. 639 (2002)
xix     https://edexcellence.net/publications/evaluation-of-ohio%E2%80%99s-edchoice-scholarship-program-selection-competition-and-performance
xx      http://education.ohio.gov/Topics/Other-Resources/Scholarships/EdChoice-Scholarship-Program/EdChoice-Cleveland-Assessment-Data
xxi     http://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2013/10/are-private-schools-worth-it/280693/

Written by Stephen Dyer · Categorized: Featured Items, Front Page, K-12 Education, Ohio State Budget, Reports

Sep 17 2019

How the Latest State Budget Impacts Ohio’s Women and Working Families

Read the full analysis of the Ohio budget through a gender lens on the Ohio Women’s Public Policy Network’s website.

Ohio’s new two-year state operating budget brought numerous improvements for the livelihood of women, but that’s not to say there weren’t plenty of drawbacks and lack of action on key issues as well.

Progress was made to improve the quality of childcare in Ohio. But there’s more work to be done.

The new state budget allocates $198 million to improve the quality of Ohio’s publicly funded childcare system. This increase in funding will allow improvements in ensuring that workers within the childcare sector are paid fair wages, and will also help to facilitate professional development and facility improvements. 

Where the budget falls short is allocating resources to increase the access and affordability of childcare. By increasing the accessibility of childcare, children would enter school well prepared, and parents would have the opportunity to participate in the workforce.  While the DeWine Administration stated that increasing eligibility for childcare was a policy priority, ultimately no funds were allocated to support this endeavor. 

After attempts to restrict access to Medicaid via the inclusion of the “Healthy Ohio” Program in the budget, Medicaid services were ultimately left unharmed.

The provision of the so-called Healthy Ohio Program would have required premiums to access Medicaid, which would have had crucial implications on women, who comprise more than half of Ohio’s Medicaid population. Medicaid has long been a lifeline for women, and the legislature’s decision to ultimately remove the “Healthy Ohio” language was crucial to protect access to the program.

Progress was made towards addressing wage theft, an issue that faces many working-class Ohioans, particularly women and people of color working in low-wage jobs.

When workers are paid less than they were contractually promised, it is known as wage theft. Whether it be through violation of minimum-wage laws, not getting paid overtime, or forcing an employee to work off-the-clock, Ohio clocks in with the second-highest amount of wage theft among the ten largest states. Additional funding was allocated to the Ohio Bureau of Wage and Hour to help address this issue.

The state budget also codified some policies that we expect to negatively impact Ohio women and working-class families. 

By continuing to support a business tax cut known by many public service advocates as the  “L.L.C. loophole,” Ohio loses out on about $528 million per year or $1.1 billion for the duration of every state operating budget where it remains intact.

There is little evidence to suggest that this tax break for L.L.C.s has created any significant number of new jobs in the state. Ohio is missing out on billions of dollars of revenue that could have been allocated towards programs to address our school funding crisis, increase childcare assistance eligibility, or invest in a refundable Earned Income Tax Credit (which we’ll discuss in just a moment), to name only a few ways this money could be better spent. 

There were also some issues facing Ohio women and their families that the state budget failed to address, entirely. 

Ohio’s Earned Income Tax Credit remains non-refundable.

One of these crucial areas of inaction was the budget’s failure to make Ohio’s Earned Income Tax Credit (E.I.T.C.) refundable, a policy that would have given a major economic boost to low-income families across the state.

.@PolicyMattersOH led the charge to advocate for a refundable state #EITC during the state operating budget process.

Unfortunately, lawmakers did not answer the call, and Ohio’s state EITC remains non-refundable. #OHBudget

— Women’s Public Policy Network (@OhioWPPN) September 10, 2019


Nationally, the E.I.T.C has been crucial in lifting working families out of poverty. However, it is not without its limitations here in the state. The greatest shortfall of Ohio’s state E.I.T.C. is that it is non-refundable. If this gap in anti-poverty policy had been addressed, the state budget would have been able to put money back into the hands of working families. 

Despite the 2020 Census being right around the corner, the bill allocated no funding towards planning or conducting a complete census count in the Buckeye state. 

About $33 billion dollars in federal funding rests upon the outcomes of the U.S. Census, which determines how those federal dollars are dispersed, state-by-state. Without a correct and complete count, the well-being of women and historically undercounted communities, populations which rely heavily on these federal grant dollars, are undermined.

No efforts were made to create a framework for statewide paid family leave. 

Paid family and medical leave policies allow workers to address the needs of their families or their own health without risking their financial health. Currently, only 17% of American workers have access to paid leave through an employer, but lawmakers made no effort through the state budget to increase those statistics here in Ohio… To learn more about the push to bring paid family leave in Ohio, check out the Women’s Public Policy Network’s Paid Leave Advocacy page on their website. 

 

Read the full analysis of the Ohio budget on the Ohio Women’s Public Policy Network’s website.

Written by Erin Ryan · Categorized: Democracy, Economic Development and Jobs, Gender Equity, Ohio State Budget, Paid Leave, Reports, Taxation, Winning Agenda · Tagged: Budget, earned income tax credit, Ohio, Ohio Budget, ohio wppn, State Budget, taxation, Taxes, women's public policy network, women's rights, Women's Watch

Jul 17 2019

Innovation Ohio Statement on Charter School Provisions in Operating Budget

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

July 17, 2019
Contact: Michael McGovern
mcgovern@innovationohio.org
Columbus, OH – Today, Innovation Ohio President Janetta King issued the following statement regarding the charter school provisions in the state operating budget:
“It is disappointing that Republicans in the legislature have once again placed the interests of failing charter schools ahead of Ohio students and communities. The budget passed today weakens state oversight of charter schools like ECOT, which ripped off Ohio schools and taxpayers to the tune of $200 million. After the ECOT debacle, we should be strengthening, not loosening, the rules regulating charter schools. Ohio taxpayers – and more importantly, Ohio students – deserve better.”
Founded in 2011, Innovation Ohio is a nonpartisan, nonprofit think tank that blends policy research and advocacy to fight for working families in Ohio.

Written by Michael McGovern · Categorized: K-12 Education, Ohio State Budget, Press Releases, Statehouse Update · Tagged: Charter Schools, children, ECOT, ECOT Scandal, education, kids, Larry Householder, Larry Obhof, Mike DeWine, Ohio, Ohio Budget, Ohio Politics, Republicans, schools, State Budget, Taxes, taxpayers

Jul 17 2019

Statehouse Preview: Clash of the Titans

At The Statehouse: Clash of the Titans

After 2+ weeks of behind-the-scenes negotiations, today appears to be the day we’ll finally see what the state budget looks like. The conference committee on House Bill 166–made up of representatives from the House and Senate–has officially been in recess since late June, waiting for a breakthrough. It looks one is coming today.

The biggest sticking points between the two chambers are reported to be changes to a $1billion+ business tax break and a bailout for two First Energy nuclear power plants. House Republicans wanted to scale back the tax break, in which owners of pass-through businesses, like LLCs, can report up to $250,000 tax-free if they report it as business income. Senate Republicans, for their part, were resisting calls to attach a new fee on utility bills to bail out two First Energy nuclear plants, something that earlier passed the House (as House Bill 6), after weeks of strong-arm politics and millions of dollars in aggressive advertising.

In short, the Titans of the House were holding a tax break for wealthy business owners hostage as leverage to get the Titans of the Senate to pass a corporate bailout. If an impasse has been reached, it’s quite likely that both business owners and electric utilities will end up getting their way, even while ordinary Ohioans still don’t have a school funding plan or affordable college.

Your state legislature at work.

Temporary budgets aren’t without consequences.

As we’ve been saying, delaying the state budget has real impacts. This week we learned that, thanks to uncertainty about state funding for financial aid and allowable tutition increases, many public colleges and universities have delayed sending out tuition bills and financial aid awards for fall, leaving Ohio families up in the air when it comes to a big budget item. Libraries, too, are seeing their funding cut to 2017 levels as the budget delay meant a temporary funding increase passed in that year has not been renewed.

Innovation Ohio President Janetta King explained the irresponsibility of these budget delays in a weekend op-ed in the Columbus Dispatch.

HB6 Update

The Senate Energy & Public Utilities Committee Monday unveiled its substitute to House Bill 6, legislation to bail out FirstEnergy Solutions’ struggling nuclear power plants. Paid for via an 85 cent monthly utility fee paid by residential ratepayers, the fund would generate $150 million per year to support the power plants, and $20 million more would fund several solar farm projects around the state.

These new funding programs come at a cost for Ohio consumers and the environment. Utility bills will increase and money-saving energy efficiency rebates will be eliminated, while air quality suffers thanks to the elimination of the state’s clean energy standards and subsidies for two aging coal plants.A committee and floor vote is expected Wednesday, with more amendments possible.

What Happens Next?

Tuesday afternoon, lawmakers on the House-Senate conference committee for the budget will vote to adopt a final report, outlining which version of hundreds of budget provisions will prevail. Sometimes the conference committee process producesbrand new options not considered in any previous version of the bill, and that’s what we expect to see today, as negotiators attempt to split the differences on the LLC tax loophole and many other items.

Wednesday, both the House and Senate are scheduled to hold voting sessions to pass the conference report and send it to the Governor for his signature or veto. He has until midnight June 17 to sign the bill, unless another extension is passed.

The chambers are also on a similar timeline to pass a budget for the Workers’ Compensation system, and a conference committee on House Bill 80 is scheduled to meet Wednesday morning. See “Committee Hearings To Watch” section, below, for more.

New Legislation

Senate Resolution 303 (Yuko) – To reaffirm the Ohio Senate’s Support for the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA).

>> You can monitor the status of all the bills we are watching here.

Committee Hearings to Watch

Tuesday 

4:00 pm – Conference Committee on HB166 – Resumption of recessed hearing with possible vote on a conference report for HB166 (State Operating Budget). Statehouse Room 313 or live online at ohiochannel.org.

Wednesday 

9:00 am – Senate Energy & Public Utilities – 10th hearing, possible amendments and votes on HB6 (nuclear power plant bailout). Senate Finance Hearing Room.

9:30 am – Senate Judiciary – 2nd hearing, proponent testimony on SB17 (to redact identifying info of sexual assault victims in online reports) and 3rd hearing, opponent testimony on SB54 (to prohibit death penalty if offender seriously mentally ill). Senate North Hearing Room.

11:00 am – Conference Committee on HB80 – Hearing and possible vote on a conference report for HB80 (Bureau of Workers’ Compensation budget). Statehouse Room 313.

In Session

House: Wednesday 1:00 pm and Thursday 1:00 pm (if needed). Watch online at ohiochannel.org.

Senate: Wednesday 1:30 pm. Watch online at ohiochannel.org.


We’ll continue to post updates on Twitter at @innovationohio using the #OHLeg hashtag for legislation, #OHBudget for budget updates and #OHGov for executive actions.

>> Sign up to receive these legislative alerts in your inbox.

Written by Terra Goodnight · Categorized: Ohio State Budget, Statehouse Update

Jul 09 2019

Statehouse Preview: Gone Fishin’

At The Statehouse: Gone Fishin’

In the past week, there’s been no apparent progress on a budget deal between the GOP-controlled Ohio House and GOP-controlled Ohio Senate. A 17-day stopgap funding measure is in place, keeping state government running until next Wednesday, albeit at Kasich-era funding levels.

Unlike in 2009, the last time the state failed to enact a budget by the statutory deadline, Ohio’s two legislative chambers and the executive branch are all controlled by a single political party and lawmakers have $3 billion more to work with than they did two years ago — in contrast to 2009 when the budget was delayed by divided government fighting over how to allocate billions in difficult cuts in the middle of a recession. This shouldn’t be hard.

Temporary budgets aren’t without consequences.

During Ohio’s 2009 budget impasse, the Plain Dealer reported “Adoptions across Cuyahoga County are frozen, child-care providers are in danger of closing and school districts are having problems drawing up budgets with the next school year creeping closer each day” and that “for Ohio school districts, the temporary budgets have prolonged the suspense about how much money they can expect from the state.”

Today, Governing Magazine called out Ohio as one of 7 states operating without a budget, noting the risk to the state’s credit rating: “late budgets are a sign of governance weakness which, in extreme cases, can be negative for state credit quality. Late budgets can also expose local governments and other downstream entities to an interruption in state payment.”

What Next?

To get a deal to Governor DeWine by Wednesday, lawmakers on the House-Senate conference committee will need to adopt a final bill and send it to the floor of both chambers for an up-or-down vote by Tuesday. However, no meetings of the committee are currently scheduled, and no session dates are on the calendar other than two “if needed” sessions of the Ohio House.

Still up for debate; tax cuts, education spending and how to deal with pharmacy benefit managers, who, we learned from new reporting by the Dispatch, are cutting into profit margins so badly that parts of our state are now pharmacy deserts.


It’s worth noting what lawmakers were doing last week instead of working on a budget. If social media is to be believed, mostly fishing and walking in parades:

This week, we notice that several lawmakers — including the Senate President — are holding fundraisers away from the Statehouse. Perhaps budget-writers are looking for one last chance to curry favor with special interests before they decide which goodies will stay in the final budget package. But the optics of holding a high-dollar fundraiser when the budget is on life-support are bad.

This one, held by the political arm of the Senate Republicans, is raising eyebrows:

source: Gongwer News Service

New Legislation

No bills were introduced last week that we’re monitoring. Maybe next week!

>> You can monitor the status of all the bills we are watching here.

What To Watch At The Statehouse

News reports suggest more changes could be coming for House Bill 6, the controversial legislation to bail out two nuclear power facilities and roll back Ohio’s green energy standards. Watch for possible hearings of the Senate Energy and Public Utilities committee later in the week.

Other than that, no committees or legislative sessions are scheduled for the week, but that could change quickly if budget negotiations are fruitful.

We’ll continue to post updates on Twitter at @innovationohio using the #OHLeg hashtag for legislation, #OHBudget for budget updates and #OHGov for executive actions.

Written by Terra Goodnight · Categorized: Ohio State Budget, Statehouse Update

Jun 30 2019

Innovation Ohio Statement on GOP Budget Failure

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 30, 2019
Contact: Michael McGovern, 937-245-1232, mcgovern@innovationohio.org

Columbus, OH – Today, Innovation Ohio president Janetta King released the following statement in response to the failure of Ohio’s Republican leaders to meet the budget deadline:

“To miss a constitutional deadline like this is extraordinary. In the very few times it has happened in the past, it has been during a recession with divided government. Neither is true in this case. This is unprecedented under one-party rule and even more unbelievable given the rosy budget estimates. The Ohio GOP is clearly not able to get the job done.

“Blowing past a constitutional deadline like this is an embarrassment and will be noticed by those who evaluate the health and stability of Ohio’s finances. This dysfunction by the party that claims to be fiscally responsible jeopardizes Ohio’s bond rating and could be very costly for Ohio’s reputation and taxpayers.

“The question now is if GOP legislators will leave town and ignore the unfinished business required of them by the Ohio Constitution. Ohioans are known for our work ethic and grit—not throwing in the towel to go on vacation when there is a job to do. Gov. Mike DeWine deserves to be furious. Missing this deadline will have a significant impact on his administration and his effectiveness as a leader of the state and his party.”

Founded in 2011, Innovation Ohio is a nonpartisan, nonprofit think tank that blends policy research and advocacy to fight for working families in Ohio.

###

Written by Colleen Craig · Categorized: Ohio State Budget, Press Releases, Statehouse Update · Tagged: Budget, Ohio Budget

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