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Area lawmakers back cuts, not tax hikes

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By William Hershey, Staff Writers Updated 12:35 AM Thursday, June 25, 2009

COLUMBUS — Dayton-area lawmakers almost to a person are prepared to support major spending cuts to fill the $3.2 billion hole in the proposed state budget, but only one member would even consider a tax hike to help fill the gap.

That member, Rep. Roland Winburn, D-Harrison Twp., said on Wednesday, June 24, that he has not joined a group of about 10 House Democrats pushing a tax hike but was keeping an open mind.

Gov. Ted Strickland’s proposal to raise an estimated $933 million over two years by putting slot machines at Ohio’s seven racetracks without a vote of the people has divided lawmakers.

Reps. Clayton Luckie, D-Dayton, and Terry Blair, R-Washington Twp., who owns race horses, support the plan. “This way the money will stay within our state and we can control what happens to it,” said Luckie.

Winburn and Rep. Jarrod Martin, R-Beavercreek, are willing to consider slots at the tracks, but haven’t signed on.

The only other Democrat in the area delegation, Sen. Fred Strahorn of Dayton, wasn’t ready to back fellow Democrat Strickland’s slots plan or any other budget solution just yet.

“I’m still listening to some of the experts to see what’s the most prudent thing to do,” Strahorn said.

Rep. Peggy Lehner, R-Kettering, cited the four times since 1990 that voters have turned down expanded gambling for her opposition to slots.

“I think voters have spoken on the slot machines enough times that the message (that) gambling is not how we are going to solve our budget problem,” said Lehner.

She and other Republicans said part of the budget hole could be filled by a GOP-backed government reorganization proposal but House Speaker Armond Budish, D-Beachwood, dismissed that as political talk. The proposal calls for eliminating staff positions by consolidating state government into fewer departments, among other changes.

Hostility to Strickland appeared to be building in the Republican-controlled Senate.

Sen. Gary Cates, R-West Chester, called Strickland a “hypocrite” for reversing his position on gambling. Cates said proposed cuts to libraries are “totally unacceptable” but didn’t offer his own cuts.

“That’s what we have a governor for,” said Cates. “He’s supposed to make those proposals. If he wants to lead, let him lead.”

As the clock kept ticking toward the Tuesday, June 30, deadline for coming up with a new budget, Strickland’s office released an analysis that said new legislation is needed to authorize the slots at the tracks. Republicans, including Sen. Jon Husted, R-Kettering, have said Strickland already may have the authority through the state lottery.

The analysis said, among other things, that investors in the slots would “insist on the greater certainty that comes with a statute.”

Also Wednesday, an estimated 300 mental health advocates, recovering addicts and others gathered outside the Statehouse to protest budget cuts.

Hope Manley, 33, of Troy, a rape victim and recovering heroin addict, said she is worried what will happen if services at the SafeHaven Mental Health Support Center in Piqua are reduced.

“It has changed my life,” Manley said.

Contact this reporter at (614) 224-1608 or whershey@Dayton DailyNews.com.

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