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Home > Blogs > Ohio politics > Archives > 2009 > October > 21
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
House approves budget-balancing bill 55-44
The Ohio House on Wednesday, Oct. 21, approved a budget-balancing bill that postpones the fifth year of state income tax cuts.
It also cuts legislative salaries by 5 percent staring in 2011.
Two Republicans- Reps. Ross McGregor of Springfield and Matt Dolan of Novelty - joined all 53 Democrats in backing the bill which now goes to the Republican-controlled Senate.
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Indictment announced in casino-related absentee ballot application probe
Hamilton County Prosecutor Joseph Deters on Wednesday, Oct. 21, announced the indictment of Walter Sullivan of Montgomery in an investigation into fraudulent absentee ballot applications.
Sullivan was employed as a field worker for FieldWorks, a consulting company providing ground level organization for the Ohio Jobs and Growth Committee, the group promoting Issue 3 on the Nov. 3 ballot, a press release said. The issue calls for casinos in Cincinnati, Toledo, Cleveland and Columbus.
FieldWorks resigned from the campaign after the investigation started.
“Our investigation at no time found any evidence that Ohio Jobs and Growth was involved in any criminal activity,” Deters said in the release. “They at all times acted cooperatively with the investigation. Any representation that they were the target of a grand jury investigation is entirely false.”
Sullivan was charged with five counts of false signatures for forging applications for absentee ballots. If convicted of all charges, he faces a maximum of five years in prison, the press release said.
The probe started when a staffer at the Hamilton County Board of Elections noticed irregularities when processing applications and contacts voters whose signatures were on the forms.
The voters confirmed that they had not requested the forms, the press release said.
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Bipartisan land bank plan could help Dayton, Montgomery County cope with abandoned properties
Bipartisan legislation that would allow 28 additional counties - including Montgomery, Warren, Clark, Greene and Butler - to organize land banks could help deal with the aftermath of the mortgage foreclosure crisis and the vacant, abandoned properties it has created, backers said on Wednesday, Oct. 21.
Reps. Roland Winburn, D-Harrison Twp. and Peter Ujvagi, D-Toledo, have introduced House Bill 313 and Sens. Mark Wagoner, R-Ottawa Hills, and Sen. Teresa Fedor, D-Toledo, have sponsored a companion bill, Senate Bill 188.
The state’s current land bank law applies only to Cuyahoga County, which includes Cleveland. The new bills would focus on counties with populations greater than 100,000.
Such legislation gives counties a tool to acquire properties, develop creative ways to develop them, reduce blight and increase property values, Lavea Brachman, co-director of Greater Ohio, a public policy organization that works to revitalize urban and metropolitan areas.
Winburn said the bill would help Montgomery County. County Commissioner Dan Foley said the bill would give local officials a needed tool “that could help neighborhoods.”
