The Issue 1 'brawl' cuts deep. Republicans want Ohioans to work for them| Thomas Suddes:

Thomas Suddes is a former legislative reporter with The Plain Dealer in Cleveland and writes from Ohio University. tsuddes@gmail.com.

The Ohio Senate and Ohio’s House of Representatives, both GOP-controlled, want to make it harder for Ohio’s constitutional sovereigns — voters — to amend the Ohio Constitution. And here you thought legislators worked for you rather than tried to make you work for them.

As if that weren’t enough to agitate the Statehouse, Senate and House Republicans must agree on a compromise state budget for the two years that will begin on Saturday, July 1.

Our view: A 'yes' vote on Issue 1 would drive dagger in Ohio's 'heart'

The Republican power-grab is called State Issue 1.

It’s on Aug. 8’s statewide ballot. (Early in-person voting begins July11).

If voters ratify Issue 1, it’d require a 60% “yes” vote from Ohioans voting on future state constitutional amendments to approve them. Now, the required majority for ratification is 50% plus 1 of those Ohioans voting on an amendment.

Why do Republicans lawmakers what Issue 1?

Key motive: Republicans aim to repay the anti-abortion lobby for its support by making it more difficult for Ohioans to ratify an abortion-rights amendment. Related goal: To roadblock an anti-gerrymandering amendment aimed at GOP-skewed legislative and congressional districts.

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The fight for your money

Meanwhile, backdropping the Issue 1 brawl, there’s state Budget Complication One: While both chambers are GOP-led, they’ve proposed competing versions of the budget.

The Senate version of the budget is composed of 9,198 pages. The House version of the budget is composed of 5,559 pages. (The current budget, passed in 2021, has 2,436 pages.)

A big reason for the Senate bloat is because Senate Republican wrapped into the budget what had been completely separate measures.

Example: The Senate budget consigns the state Education Department to Republican Gov. Mike DeWine’s oversight by all but abolishing the State Board of Education.

In theory the (renamed) Department of Education and Workforce plus DeWine’s supervision will make for better coordination of career preparation and the like. But it will also make DeWine, not the state board, the lightning rod for gripes about Ohio schools. That’s why in a year or two the governor might have second thoughts about getting what he wished for.

More: Ohio State Board of Education asks attorney general if bill to strip its power is legal

And here’s Budget Complication Two: A split in the House Republican caucus may give the Senate, especially Senate President Matt Huffman, a Lima Republican, extra leverage in budget negotiations with House Republicans. Troubled waters can make for good fishing.

The House is led by Speaker Jason Stephens, a Gallia County Republican, whose January election to the speakership was opposed by 43 House Republicans who instead supported suburban Toledo Republican Derek Merrin. That is, the House GOP caucus split, with about one-third of the House’s 67 Republicans voting for Stephens, and two-thirds voting for Merrin.

Upshot: Of Stephens’s 54 votes, 32 came from the House’s Democrats, while 22 came from House Republicans.

While Merrin’s 40-plus January supporters haven’t necessarily coalesced as a permanent anti-Stephens bloc, Merrin and 16 other House Republicans voted against the House/Stephens version of the budget. That wasn’t exactly Hoyle in terms of Ohio Statehouse traditions.

That virtually invited Huffman — who may want to become the House’s next speaker, first winning a House seat in 2024, then unseating Stephens as speaker in 2025 — to play budget pat-a-cake with the House’s anti-Stephens Republicans. (Merrin is term-limited out of the House next year.)

Stephens said last week that Senate-House budget negotiations could extend into July, given the stark differences between the House-passed and Senate-passed versions of the budget, in human services programs and in the Senate’s vast expansion of school voucher programs.

Vouchers divert tax money to help parents pay for sending their children to non-public schools.

A budget debate that extends into July can lead to some just-get-it-over-with decisions about Ohio’s direction.  And that’s a problem.

Ohio’s median household income is $61,938; the nation’s is $69,021. Ohio’s poverty rate is 13.4%; the nation’s is 11.6%. The question is whether House Bill 33, the proposed budget, will move those needles in positive directions when someone gauges Ohio’s prospects.

The evidence of the last 30- or 35 years says recent budgets haven’t.  And anyone who heaves him — or herself out of a General Assembly seat, and visits de-industrialized Ohio cities, knows it.

Thomas Suddes is a former legislative reporter with The Plain Dealer in Cleveland and writes from Ohio University. tsuddes@gmail.com.

This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: The real reason Ohio Issue 1 will be on the August 8 ballot| Thomas Suddes