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"Plunderbund"
Last week, Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson collaborated with school district Chief Executive Officer Eric Gordon to submit their plan for “transforming” the Cleveland Metropolitan School District. The report, subtitled “reinventing public education in our city and serving as a model of innovation for the state of Ohio,” was delivered to some high-ranking elected officials:
Ohio Governor, John R. Kasich Ohio Speaker of the House, William G. Batchelder Ohio Senate President, Thomas E. Niehaus Ohio House of Representatives Minority Leader, Armond Budish Ohio Senate Minority Leader, Eric Kearney
The full proposal is worth reading to see how it seems to [...]
Full Story... →Yesterday Kasich gave his state of the state speech, delivering his unscripted and often rambling message to members of the General Assembly, his cabinet, invited guests and other local and state officials – many of whom he called out during the nearly hour and twenty minute rant.
Three key Republicans, however, received no such call out and were clearly missing from the audience: Ohio Republican Party Chairman Kevin DeWine, his cousin Attorney General Mike DeWine and Secretary of State Jon Husted.
History is full of epic battles and epic leaders: Grant vs Lee in Virginia, Montgomery and Rommel in [...]
Full Story... →Look, if you want a short overview of Kasich’s State of the State address, here it is:
Here’s the long version: The speech was a rambling mess of incomplete thoughts, decrees with no explanation on the plans to address it (while I’m all for ending human trafficking in Ohio, we need a plan, not a Governor to take the time out to point out that 21st century slavery is wrong), and contradictions. Kasich’s aversion to having a speechwriter makes me wonder what a speechwriter could have done to traumatize Kasich to this point.
Kasich chose the Wells Academy to [...]
Full Story... →This one reference in yesterday’s State of the State should have been a major news story:
(Applause)
Hamilton, Ohio. ThyssenKrupp – big steel people. They were going to move their shock absorbers to Mexico. Not only are they not moving them because we got down there and worked with them–not only are they not moving to Mexico – they are moving people from Mexico to Hamilton, Ohio to make shock absorbers at ThyssenKrupp.
That’s Governor John Kasich calling JobsOhio a success for keeping a plant in Ohio by giving it incentives… to bring in Mexican workers?
Hamilton is in [...]
Full Story... →In case you missed it today, we have the transcript of Kasich’s State of the State from Steubenville. It’s included at the end of this post. We’ll have more in depth analysis coming soon, but if you feel like watching it, the Ohio Channel has the video online.
Be forewarned, this is not an episode of Will and Grace or Big Bang Theory we’re talking about here. And I say that as guy who regularly watches House hearings on CSPAN and City Council meetings on the local cable access channel.
Even for people like us who follow Ohio [...]
Full Story... →PPP seemingly waited until Kasich finished his second State of the State address (more on that after my head clears from having to watch it) to release the remaining results of its most recent Ohio poll.
According to the latest Public Policy Poll, a Democratic pollster that is nonetheless well regarding in the industry as producing very reliable polling (Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight has pointed out that if anything PPP tends to overstate support for Republicans) Governor John Kasich’s approval rating is still a disaster with 33% approving and 53% disapproving. In a rematch with Governor Strickland, Kasich also loses [...]
Full Story... →Captain Eric Spicer of the Greene County Sheriff’s Office isn’t your typical Republican candidate. He prides himself have both the experience in handling a private sector payroll and also looking after the taxpayers concerning public budgets. A former business owner who felt called to serve his community to become a member of law enforcement, Spicer points out that he’s the only non-politician in the GOP primary race in the 73rd Ohio House District. But that’s not to say that Spicer is a novice when it comes to politics and public policy. He’s served as a the legislative liaison [...]
Full Story... →Kasich’s team at the Ohio Department of Transportation recently announced that only $100 million a year will be available to fund new construction projects approved by Ohio’s Transportation Review Advisory Council (TRAC). As a result, vital road work around the state is being delayed for years and, in some cases, decades.
As we’ve mentioned before, the previous administration budgeted $317 million in fiscal year 2011 while the Kasich budget appropriates just $60 million in Fiscal 2012 and $123 million in Fiscal 2013 out of a $5.5 billion two-year budget.
Kasich’s strategy is clear: cut the crap out of [...]
Full Story... →Join us at 12:30PM today when we kick off our live chat for John Kasich’s 2012 State of the State speech, live from Steubenville, OH.
Full Story... →According to the US Census Bureau, the median household income for Ohioans is $47,358. The national median is slightly higher: $51,914. (Note: per-capita income is $27,334)
Ohio’s Corrections Officers, however, start out making $34,008 per year and they max out at $41,350 with step increases.
You read that right: The MAXIMUM salary of an Ohio corrections officer is 20% below the national median household income.
The men and women who work at Ohio’s prisons are not, by any stretch of the imagination, overpaid. And considering the work they do, it would be very easy to make the [...]
Full Story... →The Columbus Dispatch made this bold claim in today’s paper:
Now, let me begin that Joe Vardon has vastly improved the objectivity of the Dispatch’s political reporting, and he doesn’t write the headlines. His story was balanced in that it mention the vast drop in the labor market we’ve seen the past two months (more on that later.) But my biggest complaint is the subheading that “most indicators point to steady improvement in Ohio’s economy.”
That simply isn’t true, as much as I wish it were. The reality is the most indicators indicate Ohio’s economy has unsteady [...]
Full Story... →Budget Watch
