There is no "reform" in the Kasich budget

John Kasich, Republican Governor of Ohio, keeps talking about "shared sacrifice" and "reform" in fixing Ohio's problems.  Unfortunately, the only people sharing in the sacrifice are the middle class, the elderly, disadvantaged children, college students, the working poor, and public employees.  Those who won't have to sacrifice are the wealthy big shots that contributed to the Kasich campaign and continue to offer him advice. There are no sacrifices for the wealthy in Ohio, and Kasich wants it that way.

Kasich has labeled his budget as major "reform" for Ohio.  It is more like he is paying back his rivals, punishing those that spoke against him, and grabbing more power (ex: the firing of the State School Superintendent, removing state school board members before the end of their term, etc., etc.).



ThinkProgress:

OHIO: Gov. John Kasich (R) has proposed cutting 25 percent of schools’ budgets, $1 million from food banks, $12 million from children’s hospitals, and $15.9 million from an adoption program for children with special needs. A Kasich staffer revealed yesterday that these cuts are more about politics then budget-balancing, telling the Cincinnati Dispatch that “even if there weren’t an $8 billion deficit, we’d probably be proposing many of the same things.” The plan includes tax cuts for oil companies, a repeal of the estate tax and an income tax cut for the rich that former Gov. Ted Strickland (D) halted last year because of the state’s fiscal crisis. 


>  The Ohio Education Association provides a fine explanation of what the Kasich budget does.  Ohea.org:

Today Governor John Kasich delivered his two-year budget plan to the Ohio General Assembly. The plan slashes funding to K-12 public education by 11.5 percent, from $11.5 billion in the current year to $10.2 billion next year, ratcheting down to $9.7 billion in fiscal 2013. 


“Now we see the sleight of hand. The cut in funding for K-12 next year will mean a real 5% decrease in funding for K-12 public schools overall, counting state, local and federal sources,” said Ohio Education Association President Patricia Frost-Brooks. “This plan takes $3.1 billion from local school districts over two years in order to balance the budget while holding charter schools financially harmless.”

.....“Instead, the Governor has chosen to bolster and protect charter and voucher programs that serve only 10% of Ohio students, with ample research showing they do not improve the chances for student success,” Frost-Brooks said. “Punishing the other 90% of students who attend traditional public schools will mean larger class sizes, less individual attention, fewer courses in foreign languages and the arts and less opportunity to participate in advanced placement courses.....

By cutting programs in the public schools, Kasich will reward those charter school owners who provided all that campaign money to the state's Republicans.  Giving all that extra money to charter schools is just like throwing your tax money away since most of them have lower performance levels than their public school counterparts. Now that Kasich has stacked the state school board with pro-charter school, conservative right wingers, we should all fear how else Kasich plans to destroy public education in Ohio.


Did you happen to watch the broadcast of the Kasich town hall meeting the other night?  I watched about two minutes and just got sick of listening to him. His audience was not really open to the public since 99% of the people in the audience were his invited Republican supporters. Kasich spent many years working for Fox News and we know what kind of propaganda information they promote.