GOP control of state begins

Republicans are expected to target spending, unions, business regulations.


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COLUMBUS — After four years of shared political leadership, Republicans will control everything but one seat on the Ohio Supreme Court as a new year begins in state government.

The kickoff comes today with the start of the 129th General Assembly in which the GOP will run both the House and Senate.

The second step comes a week later on Jan. 10 when Republican John Kasich takes office as Ohio’s 69th governor, replacing Democrat Ted Strickland.

Republicans also will hold other statewide non-judicial offices — lieutenant governor, auditor, attorney general, treasurer and secretary of state.

The only Democrat will be Yvette McGee Brown, who’ll sit on the Supreme Court with six Republicans.

This GOP-controlled government, however, is likely to be more consistently conservative than when Republicans controlled everything from 1995 to 2007, said political scientist John Green.

“This consistency is likely to express itself first in the state budget and then in a series of efforts to reform how state government operates,” said Green, director of the Bliss Institute of Applied Politics at the University of Akron.

Those efforts are expected to include: a state budget with no tax increases and spending cuts; repeal or modification of the 1983 public employee collective bargaining law and job creation initiatives, including easing of business regulations.

“The only way you can avoid higher taxes is to run a very lean government,” said incoming House Speaker Bill Batchelder, R-Medina. “That’s what we’re going to do.”

With Democrats in short supply, much of the opposition is expected to fall to organized labor.

“We won’t make the mistake of not taking this situation seriously,” said Joe Rugola, president of the Ohio AFL-CIO, the labor federation with 650,000 members in affiliated unions.

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