The Columbus Dispatch

1/17/2007

By Joe Hallett

A ballot proposal to fix school funding in Ohio shrewdly attempts to create powerful allies of university officials and mayors by mandating more state money annually for higher education and local governments.

But advocates for poor children and the elderly who rely on Medicaid and other state programs worry that the proposed school-funding ballot initiative could mean less money for them. Then, too, there are concerns that fewer dollars for Ohio’s 32 prisons could cause unwanted consequences, including furloughs for some of the 46,800 inmates housed in them.

Those questions and many others remain to be answered by proponents of the ballot initiative to be unveiled today.

The plan would further embed primary and secondary education as state government’s highest spending priority. But the state spends billions more on many other services that, among other things, ensure that the mentally ill and mentally retarded can receive care and that state parks are open and clean.

If the state constitution is amended to mandate higher spending on schools, universities and local governments, will there be enough in the state’s $51 billion biennial budget to adequately fund other services that citizens want?

“Whatever approach is taken, it has to be fair, balanced, diversified and equitable,” said Lisa Hamler-Fugitt, executive director of the Ohio Association of Second Harvest Food Banks, which relies partially on state funding to supply 12 food banks.

“We can’t do this by de-funding other basic services that are necessary to people. There are other very, very important things that government provides.”

Gayle Channing Tennenbaum, legislative director for the Public Human Services Association of Ohio, a nonprofit child-advocacy group, said the school-funding plan could handcuff the governor and legislature, keeping them from providing more funding for health care and other services.

“One of the situations you don’t want to be in is pitting our elderly, our people with mental illness and other needy populations against our children who need a first-class education,” Tennenbaum said.

Mayor Michael B. Coleman said the provision providing increases for local government spending “is a good part of the plan,” but he asked backers of the amendment to delay going forth and “step back and look at it in total.”

Along with the millions more that would flow to Ohio’s 614 school districts, the proposed amendment singles out higher education and the local government trust fund as automatic recipients of more state money, requiring that their annual allocations grow by the same percentage as Ohio’s personal income.

Latest available statistics show that between 2004 and 2005, personal income grew by 3.7 percent; for the past 10 years, the average annual growth has been 3.8 percent. If applied to the current fiscal year’s $2.6 billion higher-education allotment, a 3.7 percent bump would mean $95.7 million more. For local governments, which will receive about $1.2 billion this fiscal year from three separate state funds, 3.7 percent would add $44.9 million.

The ballot initiative also offers a carrot to a crucial voting bloc - senior citizens. It would exempt anyone 65 or older from paying property taxes on the first $40,000 of market value of his or her home.

Spending for primary and secondary education already accounts for the biggest chunk of the state’s current two-year budget at $16.8 billion, or 39 percent. State funding for human services, including Medicaid, ranks second, accounting for $12 billion or 28 percent.

Medicaid is the federal-state health insurance program for poor people.

If the plan encounters overwhelming opposition, it is possible that backers could defer to Gov. Ted Strickland, who has made fixing the school-funding system a top priority.

Strickland said yesterday that he is not working in cooperation with any group or individual but admitted he could benefit by having other proposals aired before he acts.

“That perhaps would be the result, but I can tell you absolutely that that has not been a part of any planning or collusion or discussions with any individual or any group in that regard,” he said.

Dispatch reporter Mark Niquette contributed to this story.

jhallett@dispatch.com