Today (Thursday) in the Akron Legal News

For the handful of folks who read both this blog and my column in Akron Legal News, an announcement: This week's column appears in today's paper, not the usual Wednesday. There were some absences at the paper due to, yes, the flu again and things got moved around as a result. "Cases and Controversies" will return to its usual Wednesday spot in two weeks.

This week's column takes on Issue 2. Issue 2 would set up an Ohio Livestock Standards Board, has been endorsed by pretty much everyone who matters on either side of the aisle and for the most part 2 has slipped under the radar. It's not the worst idea ever, but it's not a good idea. The board is set up in a way that goofs around with the usual constitutional system of separation of powers for no good reason.

What's more, the particular not-good reason at work here is fear of direct democracy. The backers of Issue 2 explicitly say that they have put it together because of the possibility that animal rights activists (of the relatively sane Humane Society variety, not the PETA crazies) might introduce a ballot issue establishing a few minimum standards for livestock care. Reflect on that. Voters might have to opportunity to consider livestock standards, so we need amend the constitution to establish a new bureaucracy.

Further reading:

Here is the official Issue 2 website. You can also find lots of pro talk at Ohio Farm Bureau. The anti- forces have styled themselves Ohioans Against Constitutional Takeover. The particular potential ballot issue that has given people the fantods is California Proposition 2. Here's some background from Wiki and thumb-sucking reaction from a Wisconsin ag paper. And here, for grins, is a piece in The Hill by Ohio's own Jean Schmidt about the issue.

Charter Schools and Unlikely Ally for Strickland

Interesting post last week on Flypaper, the blog of the Fordham Foundation, a free-market oriented, pro-charters think tank with roots in Dayton. They propose some logrolling regarding Gov. Strickland's proposal to freeze the tax cut for a year. As FP correctly notes, a ten percent cut in ed. funding would devastate Ohio charters.

The proposal is to get charter backing for the tax plan in exchange for passing/signing a Husted bill poking holes in the current charter moratorium. FB says it would allow sponsors of "high-performing" charter schools to set up new schools.

To the extent this is a real trial balloon it's something worth considering. Recall that the charter industry ran attack ads against certain legislators deemed unfriendly during the budget battle. Having the charter industry as an ally, however temporary, would be a help at a time when friends are hard to come by.

I'd be all for a little legislative logrolling, but the Husted bill has serious flaws. First off, in addition to allowing new brick-and-mortar charters the bill would also lift the lid on more e-schools. Just because. Of course the fact that eschools make tons of money despite poor performance might have something to do with it.

As for the brick-and-mortar provisions, they need to be tightened up. The current language would set the threshold at having schools in continuous improvement. That's hardly high performing. And a sponsor can open new schools for each schoolin continuious improvement, regardless of the shape of its overall portfolio. 100 school in Academic Watch and 2 in continuous improvement? No problem, open two more. Much better would be to allow only those sponsors with a generally clean bill to open new schools.

But the thought by Fordham is a nice one. The post as a whole has predictable snark coming from a Republican-leaning outfit -- it's not a tax hike if taxes don't go up and saying the fiscal crisis is Strickland's fault is laughable. But all that said, Strickland will need all the help he can get to make this work. If the charter honks are willing to reach across the aisle, it's at least worth a listen.

Casino Effort Calls and Raises

Following up on posts from last week, the would-be casino operators who were subject to an injunction last week have moved to have the whole thing vacated. Their theory -- that Mahoning County Common Pleas doesn't have jurisdiction over a statewide petition effort makes little sense. Where violation of a state law is alleged, you are going to start at the county level somewhere -- there is no statewide court with original jurisdiction. Without seeing the actual motion, it's hard to opine further.

Having said that, this description of the argument in the Dispatch's Daily Briefing blog is pretty funny. Granted this is a reporter putting the position into non-legalese, but it's pretty funny:

In today's legal filings, the Ohio Jobs and Growth Committee asks Mahoning County Common Pleas Judge James Evans to dismiss the party's lawsuit and lift the restraining order against lying. The committee's lawyers say the Mahoning County court has no jurisdiction over a statewide signature-gathering process and that the Democratic Party is playing politics.

Objecting to an injunction against lying? Accusing a political party of playing politics? Yep, sounds like a gambling initiative.

Ohio của tiếng Anh chỉ hoá đơn -- không vấn đề , không có giải pháp

Ohio Nhà Bill 477. hiện tại hạ cân nhắc , sẽ đơn xin bất cứ " Công Cộng thân thể -- về cơ bản bất cứ chính phủ tác dụng , bang hoặc bản xứ -- yêu cầu kia " tiếng Anh là dùng cho mỗi hội nghị của một Công Cộng thân thể và cho mỗi quan chức sự chuyển động của bất cứ bang tác dụng hoặc chính trị, bao gồm mỗi kỷ lục chuẩn bị , hội nghị cử hành , chính sách câu hỏi , hoặc khác sự chuyển động cầm hạ màu của hợp pháp."

Gho kia chúng tôi không hiện tại có một vấn đề có , nói , Ravenna Hội Đồng Thành Phố sự xuất bản cái đó phút tại Slovenia , hợp pháp là chĩa phiên dịch phục vụ dịch vụ đến dân nhập cư. Hợp pháp sẽ hạn chế , một chút , năng lực của chính phủ tác dụng cung cấp phiên dịch của quan chức cái giũa đến ấy ai sự cần chúng nó.

nhưng hợp pháp cũng làm một số của sự trừ ra kia vung hầu bất cứ địa thế hạ nào một tác dụng có lẽ muốn cung cấp phiên dịch . ở giữa chúng nó :

( 3 ) bảo hộ hoặc đề cao Công Cộng khỏe mạnh , an toàn hoặc phúc lợi ;
( 4 ) bảo hộ quyền lực của đảng và người chứng kiến tại một dân sự hoặc tội phạm sự chuyển động hoặc hoa lợi tại một sân nhà hoặc tại một hoa lợi sự quản lý ;
( 6 ) cung cấp sự biểu thị đồ án đến sự giúp đỡ học sinh có hạn chế tiếng Anh proficiency như thế chúng nó có thể làm một hợp thời sự quá độ đến dùng tiếng Anh trong trường công ;
( 7 ) đề cao thương nghiệp quốc tế , buôn bán hoặc sự du lịch ;
( 9 ) hành nghề informal và phiên dịch nonbinding hoặc thông tin

Như thế hoá đơn cứu cánh sự biến đổi rất nhỏ. Tôi sự xảy ra đến ngồi tại ban giám đốc của một từ thiện kia công tác có dân nhập cư và người lánh nạn, chủ yếu từ châu Á. Iôi liên lạc có giám đốc chúng tôi ai bảo đảm tôi kia nhiều quá phiên dịch không phải là hiện tại Ohio của vấn đề. H.B. 477 có lẽ làm một ít nhỏ hơn phiên dịch có thể dùng được , nhưng từ khi Ohio không hiện tại cung cấp cả phiên dịch sự cần đến " bảo hộ hoặc đề cao Công Cộng khỏe mạnh , an toàn và phúc lợi " có lẽ không bằng nhiều.

477 là một giải pháp tại lục soát của một vấn đề . đại phàm phương pháp này vấn đề là địa chỉ là được người tuyển dụng và kia nhất định coi bộ ca ở đây . hoá đơn cuộc biểu diễn tại sự sợ -- sự sợ một, Balkanized Mỹ , và liên hệ sự sợ người ai không vẻ ngoài và âm thanh thích chúng tôi , những ai " chúng tôi " là.

chúng tôi có sự tranh luận này ở đây đẹp nhiều mã mãi . từ NINA dấu tại thứ mười chín thế kỷ thương nghiệp cửa sổ đóng hạn ngạch Do thái² của thứ hai mươi thế kỷ , chúng tôi luôn luôn nghe tối tăm cảnh cáo về ấy người ai sẽ đến ở đây và sự biến đổi văn hoá Mỹ . cảnh chung , chúng nó đến và chúng nó đổi văn hoá chúng tôi cho càng hay

dùng Balkan Peninsula khi nào một cờ hiệu cho hại của đa dạng văn hoá nhấn mạnh thế nào sai của sự tranh luận là . chia tay của Yugoslavia là một và công việc chảy máu , nhưng không , tại chủ yếu , do sự chuyển động của phần ít văn hoá . phần lớn Serbia chị huyết nhất chạy theo một lớn hơn -- và " purer " -- Serbia

tại khác tự , sự khác nhau không phải là vấn đề . ngoan ngạnh là

Thanks to Jill for conceiving and organizing the Blogging in Tongues action day. You can find the translation here.

¹ “Không sự cần Ai-len đơn xin.”

²Phải đó nào hủy diệt untold nghìn đến chết tại khí chambers khi nào chúng nó đang giữ gìn tại thế giới chiến tranh II.

Cleveland's Slavic Village Becoming Forclosure Crisis National "Poster Neighborhood"

This week's Newsweek features a lengthly story about how predatory lending decimated Cleveland's Slavic Village neighborhood. Over the past week two public radio programs have reported on Slavic Village: NPR's Weekend Edition and American Public Media's Marketplace.

The Newsweek story is devastating. We heard about Cleveland trying to regulate predatory lending and being preempted by state officials. As the story makes clear, the unregulated environment and promises of easy money led to widespread fraud:

Yet insidious forces were at work in the neighborhood. After the mortgage-refinancing boom of 2003–04, demand for fresh subprime "product" grew so intense that lending standards nationwide disintegrated. To meet Wall Street's demand for a steady supply, lenders kept reaching lower and lower down the scale of quality in both property and borrowers, until the street hustlers jumped in to offer up their "product." Not surprisingly, the once shunned inner city became a prime lending spot across America. That, in turn, led to the phenomenon of reverse redlining. More than a decade ago, the big story was the redlining of low-income, often African-American, neighborhoods by banks that refused to lend there. Now the opposite happened.

Wall Street's insatiable demand inspired the local shop owner and plumber to go into the mortgage business—what Brancatelli calls "station-wagon brokers."

"There are a lot of former drug dealers who have gotten into the business," adds Ed Kraus of the Ohio Attorney General's office. Many brokers simply invented biographies and jobs for their indigent borrowers, officials say. In one case, says Brancatelli, Kellogg saw a lawn mower in a truck belonging to Williams's husband and declared him a "landscaper" for the mortgage records.

Kevin Coughlin's Fetal Positioning

What with him taking on Alex Arshinkoff and all, it's easy to lose track of why Kevin Coughlin is generally so dislikable. If you need a refresher, check out one of his recent legislative opuses, Senate Bill 175, the Grieving Parents Act. The bill has been kicking around for a few months now, but gets it's first committee hearings next week.

The act rewrites some Ohio definitions, so that death of a "product of human conception" prior to twenty weeks is now "fetal death." (Technically, prior to twenty weeks, it's not called a fetus, it's called an embryo, but why worry about medical jargon when there are political points to score.) The act then allows parents to request a death certificate and burial of the dearly beloved product of human conception.

To the untrained eye, this looks like it might possibly have something to do with abortion. For those of us following abortion politics, that's entirely what it is about.

Let's get you up to speed.

The essential debate in abortion politics is when life begins. Few on the pro-choice side would endorse purely elective abortion for a fetus that they think is a human life, and few on the pro-life side would proscribe aborting something clearly not alive -- a D&C for a blighted ovum, for example. Problem is, like whether the man goes around William James's squirrel, the question turns on how people define terms. That part of the argument is essentially unresolvable as a matter of pure reasoning.

One tactic of abortion opponents is to invoke arguments of moral reasoning. "People only deny humanity of something when they wish to deprive it of humanity." That sort of thing. Such arguments have their strengths, particularly a certain moral resonance.

But one weakness in the abstract moral arguments for treating fetuses as human is the totally real, very non-abstract fact that people regard unviable fetuses as different from children fully gestated and born. One example is how parents grieve miscarriages. This I can speak of from experience. Not only have we gone through a miscarriage, I know many families who have. My wife and I were sad for a while and then we moved on. And understand, my wife's miscarriage has had enduring implications. While I wouldn't trade Kid T for any alternative fate, fact is my wife's miscarriage is the reason we have only one biological child.

The experience of others who have been through the same thing is similar. After a period of sadness, life gets better and the incident eventually fades into the backdrop of memory. I also have friends who have lost children. That's something different. That is true grieving, the kind that never truly leaves a person. Friends have said things like "not a day goes my I don't think about -----"

So it's different. Enormously different. Firing a bullet from a gun versus dropping one on the ground different. And when an abortion opponent is trying to make the appeal to moral reason that a fetus is the same as a human life, the difference is inconvenient.

Which, it seems, is the point of the Grieving Parents Act. It is government-generated propaganda aimed at making something sad take on tragic dimensions, thus muddying these waters. The Act says to parents, "not only is it OK to grieve, it's really not natural to do otherwise. Let's have a generation of people burying miscarried embryos and see if we can't make everyone truly deeply sad about miscarriages. Then maybe you all will appreciate fetal life."

Like so much that is pestilent in the state Republican agenda, this is part of a nationwide trend. A number of states have enacted the laws and more are considering. They offer an platform to trumpet the fetus=life message decorated with concern-for-parents bunting. And in states with Democratic governors, they offer a serious veto dilemma.

And it's vintage Coughlin. It's symbolic, politically calculated and media-friendly legislation that does nothing to make the lives of real Ohioans better. It's this year's pink license plates. It's exactly the kind of bill Coughlin has been pushing his whole career. And this is one criticism team A² dare not make.

Strickland Directs Creation of "University System"

We had heard that the Strickland team was set to make a major announcement when Chancellor Eric Fingerhut spoke to the University Presidents and I was told that it is indeed a big deal. Strickland has issued a directive to the Chancellor to establish a "university system" for the state's four-year and two-year colleges. That's the new logo above.

From the Governor's press release:

Under Strickland’s directive, Ohio’s 13 public universities, 23 public two-year colleges, NEOUCOM (Northeastern Ohio Universities College of Medicine) and numerous adult career centers are asked to work together in a coherent, rational way to unify resources and maximize the potential of individual institutions. The directive does not change the governance structure of the university system or of individual institutions.

From the AP story covering Fingerhut's speech:

“We are asking you to embrace your role as a leader in Ohio’s system of public higher education and to align your missions and actions to advance the success of your institutions and the system as a whole,” Fingerhut said.

Each college will become part of The University System of Ohio. The universities and colleges will continue to function as separate units, but it is not “a symbolic name change,” Fingerhut said.

The story goes on to say that Gov. Strickland is planning a press conference "later" to outline the details. The press release only gives broadly stated goals that could mean anything like the snippet above.

So. It's new. It's big. It Means Something. We just don't know what exactly yet.

By the way, the AP story ends noting that Strickland is supposed to be announcing the creation of a new web site. No more detail than that, either.

Strickland Tackling School Funding; Meeting with Amendment Coalition.

Again, this is something I've alluded to but didn't have clearance to blog. Today the Beacon Journal's Dennis Willard writes that the Governor will meet with members of the coalition that came together to propose the school funding amendment as he starts the long process of forging a consensus on school funding reform.

I'm bracing myself for a spate of posts on the right crowing that Strickland doesn't have a school funding reform plan. Well, duh. The Governor's position has always been that he wants to lead to state toward school funding reform as opposed to imposing a plan on everyone. A process bringing all the parties together to reach consensus is by no means guaranteed to succeed, but proposing reform without consulting those parties is guaranteed to fail.

The budget was the first step. Strickland now has momentum and credibility to move forward with something more complex and permanent. At the same time, the stakeholder groups certainly have been made aware of their limitations. They didn't have the strength to get their proposal on the ballot and they certainly don't have the muscle to reform school funding all by themselves.

Personally, I couldn't be happier. My discomfort with the GIRFOF is not secret to even casual readers, but reform in nonetheless needed. We have a Governor who can actually lead and is willing to take on the challenge directly, as opposed to dishing it off on a blue ribbon panel. Finally, Akron appears to be in a decent place to weather a couple more years until reforms are in place.

Breaking: No GIRFOF This Year

The coalition advocating a proposed constitutional amendment about school funding announced this afternoon that they anticipate not qualifying for the ballot this year. Currently they have about 150,000 signatures and support resolutions from 166 school districts. They would need over 400,000 signature to qualify for the ballot and aim at collecting 50% more than that to ensure they make it.

From the press release:

“We are pleased about the dialogue that our efforts have initiated to finally fix Ohio’s unconstitutional school funding system,” said Jim Betts, spokesperson for The Campaign for Ohio’s Future. “We look forward to building upon this momentum by continuing to collect signatures and working with Governor Strickland.”

They are not insisting that a proposal negotiated with the Governor's office track the language in the current proposed amendment. The situation is shifting somewhat, thanks in large part to the Governor's efforts. Some of the concerns addressed in the amendment have now been addressed in the budget -- most notably higher education and tax relief for seniors.

There are a number of reasons the Coalition elected to announce this at this time. One reason is that they wanted to update local school districts so those districts contemplating a school levy would know that they would not be competing with a statewide education funding issue.

Budget Watch: Strickland Likely to Veto Special Ed. Vouchers

The budget passed its floor vote with a unanimous-minus-one vote last night. Still not definitive word from Strickland about special ed. vouchers, but word seems to be that he will veto. Last night Jill noted a quick mention in Openers that Strickland said he would "almost certainly" veto the program.

Then this morning, this in the Dispatch story:

A key item likely to be excised is a proposed voucher test program for special-needs students. The program would offer about 8,000 students with individualized education programs up to $20,000 apiece toward the cost of private-school tuition.

No source is given, but it looks like Dispatch reporters are hearing murmurs. All of this is consistent with the grapevine hum I'm hearing. Rest assured, special ed. vouchers will come up again. This is the second go round; Sen. Kevin Coughlin proposed much the same bill last year, and he's nothing if not persistent.

It's entirely possible that at some point we will have a special ed vouchers bill. This one is as bad as a proposal can be -- basically a new middle class entitlement. Even voucher supporters should think twice about it.

Budget Watch: Whither Special Ed. Scholarships?

More than anything, as the budget end game plays out, I'm looking for indications about what will happen to the Special Ed. vouchers proposal. On WKSU last night they aired a piece about Gov. Strickland's appearance before the Cleveland City Club yesterday. Kevin Niedermyer's intro says that Strickland and the GA have made enough compromises that he expect to "avoid any vetoes." Of course the piece also said that he would sign the budget last night, which was way off.

The Toledo Blade reports that the budget sailed through the conference committee with yet another unanimous vote. According to the Blade, the special ed. voucher proposal is still in the bill.

Dennis Willard writing in the ABJ today outlines the steps taken to rebalance the budget after the dip in projected tax revenue. He also notes some changes made to the new health insurance expansions, and some failed attempts to impose some order on school privatization schemes.

The Governor can line-item veto the program and, given the close split in the House, I doubt they can override. My concern is that he's so taken with the happy, shiny budget process that he won't want to buck the trend with a nasty veto. In a PD story about the budget, they quote him at the City Club predicting that the signing will be "joyous."

On the other hand, he set out his principle in his speech -- voucher programs, to the extent they are acceptable in compromise, must have some means test in them. The special ed. voucher program is universal, and will pay people who are already sending kids to private schools.

When I testified before the Senate Finance panel I went off script based on the testimony before me. I argued that once an education program is in place -- whether it's a brick-and-mortar school or a funding program or a virtual school, that program gains a constituency and
becomes extremely difficult to change or eliminate. The GA has taken no care in crafting this program and it's basically the Trojan Horse's nose under the tent.

Strickland should veto special ed. scholarships, Kum-ba-ya be damned.

A Day Without Internet Radio

A number of internet radio stations are going dark today as a "preview" of what might happen if the Copyright Royalty Board's ruling on royalty rates is allowed to stand. This email from FreePress explains:

In March, the Copyright Royalty Board (CRB) rushed through a decision at the urging of music industry lobbyists. Their ruling -- which increases fees by up to 1,200 percent for online radio stations that stream songs -- will go into effect on July 15 unless Congress acts.

If implemented, the CRB's draconian rule will shut down many noncommercial and independent Internet radio outlets, leaving the Web with the same cookie-cutter music formats that have destroyed commercial broadcast radio.

The bipartisan "Internet Radio Equality Act of 2007" would reverse the CRB decision in favor of a balanced structure that supports artists without putting webcasters out of business.

OMW has a rundown of what is happening with some local webcasters. Kent's Folk Alley has been working the royalty issue on their website. They don't go dark today, but if you listen, they are heavy with PSA's asking people to contact representatives and lobby in favor of the proposed legislation.

Arkansas FRC Affiliate Putting Gay Adoption on Ballot

The New York Blade carries the AP story. The ballot issue will look like an adoption ban defeated in the Arkansas legislature last year after the state Supreme Court struck down the legislative ban. h/t FiPL.

Because they are responding to a state Supreme Court case, the ballot issue is a constitutional amendment preventing either gays or unmarried couples from either adopting or serving as foster parents.

The Arkansas group is a "State Policy Organization" of the Conservative Christian political group The Family Research Council. If all that sounds familiar, Phil Burress's Citizen's for Community Values in Ohio -- they of the proposed stripper law -- is similarly affiliated with FRC.

The way these things go, Arkansas's proposed ban will probably also look like the bill that went nowhere in the Ohio leg running up to the election last year. It's conceivable we could see this in Ohio next year in Ohio in time for the Presidential election. If it goes down in Arkansas, probably not.

But it's that much more likely if Burress is feeling it. For instance if someone tries to take to the voters the issue of whether patrons should be allowed to touch strippers and Burress is able to hand them their heads. Just in case you wondered why I was so irate.

The B-W Education Poll -- Found

Well, actually I didn't find it so much as project investigator Tom Sutton dropped a comment in the original post giving the address. He had been alerted to my post by Ryan of BlogginRyan (formerly based in SummitCo, now in Atlanta.) And in retrospect I should have written to Tom before kvetching about the lack of online information. I was irate after like ten different searches failed to dig up either the report or the Center website, but no excuse. Bad blogger! No coffee!

So, the website for B-W's new Public Interest Research Center is here and the report pdf of the actual survey is here. From the latter we find that the question about the GIRFOF was:

15. A coalition of education groups is trying to put an amendment to the Ohio Constitution on the ballot in November. If approved, the amendment would require the State Board of Education to determine the cost of a good education for every student in Ohio, and then require the state legislature to provide the funding. The proposal also includes a cap on the level of property taxes paid by senior citizens. What is your opinion?. . .

Which is a pretty solid summary of the proponents' description of the amendment. It doesn't mean GIRFOF fans should breath easy. Given the aforementioned KnowledgeWorks findings that few people have heard of the amendment, this is an indication that when pitched in this way, you get 63% approval at first hearing.

A "No" campaign will take that as a starting point and come up with ways to either move people off the belief that the amendment will do that or move them off the belief that a system like that is a good idea or -- and this is the biggie -- make them nervous about the details. Think about how likely it is that come election day, everyone is going to go into the voting booth thinking only that the amendment is as described in the question above. Now you understand why I say that 13% isn't much room to fall.

The poll itself covers far more ground than just the issues raised in Stephens' article. If I find anything else interesting as I dig around, I'll post.

Ohio Senate's Unanimous Omnibus Budget Amendment Includes Special Ed Vouchers

Just got a copy of the Omnibus Amendment. The House version of the budget bill included a voucher program for special education students. At the beginning of Senate consideration the program was taken out in favor of a "study" of special ed. vouchers. But now it's back in the Omnibus Budget Amendment that Senate Finance just voted out unanimously. I haven't done a line-by-line comparison, but the essentials of the proposal are unchanged. (The proposal starts at section 3310.51 of the House version, for those of you following along.)

The Special Ed Vouchers Scholarship is another step in the road to universal vouchers. This time, the legislation makes no attempt to make voucher eligibility contingent on need. If a child has an Individual Education Program (IEP), the child can get a voucher, period. Never mind if, for example, the child's family is wealthy and already paying for private school. And never mind if the child's home school runs an excellent special education program. The proposal before the Senate would allow any family to receive money regardless of need. And without the unpleasantness of attending the public school for a couple of months.

Governor Strickland tried to draw a line regarding school privatization by zeroing out EdChoice and putting stronger controls on charter schools. The Special Ed. Scholarship proposal strides defiantly over the line. While he could do little when the legislature removed his proposed language that would have eliminated EdChoice and tightened charter school accountability, he can do something about this. He should use his power to line-item veto special ed vouchers.

DISCLOSURE: The organization I contract with -- Ohio Fair Schools Campaign -- has been lobbying on the budget bill including the various "School Choice" provisions. I personally have been researching special ed vouchers as part of my work and this post reflects some of that research, though I did not bill for writing this post.

GIRFOF News Part II: The Polls

As I teased last week, a Scott Stephens story over the weekend regarding a poll by Baldwin Wallace showing strong support for the amendment. As you may guess from the story, I got wind of it when Stephens called the Exec. Director of the agency I contract with last week. You may have caught the AP pickup running in today's ABJ. Stephen's piece is the most detailed explication.

Detailed being a relative term. Trying to limn the significance of the result from the news reports is more than a little frustrating. First off, the actual number I heard is 63 percent in favor. Stephens only say “More than two-thirds.” Meanwhile, the poll itself is available no where online. The B-W Public Interest Research Center as yet has no online presence. It apparently is new, but now much work does it take to host a pdf on the College website? And as of now, there is nothing on GIRFOF Central.

Without the poll, it’s hard to evaluate the results. Issue polling is considerably more tricky than candidate polling. The first question to ask is whether the poll summarized the amendment and asked the respondent for an opinion or whether it just referenced the Getting it Right amendment.

Probably it was the former. According to Stephens only about 20% of respondents said they had no opinion. A KnowledgeWorks poll released at the end of May found that a whopping 46% of respondents had neither read nor heard anything about the amendment proposal. If the pollsters just asked for opinion about the amendment it’s unlikely they would get 20% “Don’t Know.”

It’s also possible that B-W just filtered out the people who hadn’t heard of the issue. That being the case, the sample gets much smaller – probably around 400. And by the way, we have no MOE or confidence interval either.

Assuming the 63% figure is solid, it doesn’t leave GIRFOF proponents much room to fall. Recall that the minimum wage issue polled in the high seventies before the launch of the No campaign. And that’s an issue that people understood before the yes campaign, and that is fairly easy to get a brain around. The proposal itself was considerably less complicated than GIRFOF.

With all that, support for the minimum wage dropped around 20% during the No campaign. GIRFOF supporters will need a hell of a Yes campaign to hang on to enough of that 63% to win.

GIRFOF News Part 1: The Signature Collections

Team GIRFOF made the papers last week with a public disagreement about whether the proposal is likely to make the ballot this year. The signature campaign has racked up about 100,000 signatures so far. That’s actually not bad for an all-volunteer effort, but it’s about a quarter of what they need and since the conventional wisdom says you want to overshoot by fifty percent, they have a long way to go.

As a result, some leaders are saying the issue may not hit the ballot until next year. Others say they are still OK for this year. What hasn’t been discussed publicly is how much they are willing to put into paid signature gathering, and how much they will have left for the campaign.

If they are to have a prayer to pass this thing, GIRFOF proponents absolutely must get it on the ballot this year. Otherwise, they will be competing for earned media with a once-in-a-century Presidential campaign and a knock-down, drag out fight over control of a closely divided Congress. They will be buying time during the most expensive campaigns in the history of the planet.

Meanwhile, the opposition will have a year to slowly make the case against the amendment through word of mouth, op-eds and existing social networks. Think that doesn’t matter? Ask Ken Blackwell.

Skill, Secrecy and the Games Gamblers Play

Today’s Dispatch runs a lengthy, info-packed story giving background to the ongoing “skill games” controversy.

Briefly, gambling industry is trying to skirt the laws of the states that don’t allow casino gambling by making games that allow payouts based in the “skill” of the players. One company took Ohio to court arguing that their games aren’t gambling devices

Attorney General Marc Dann reached a settlement agreement under which a pre-selected consultant will evaluate whether or not a given machine’s operation is “51% skill.” The consultant’s word is final.

To throw a little more political drama into the mix, the righty blogs have been on Dann for making the decision after taking campaign contributions from skill machine manufacturers.

Then late last week papers started requesting the consultant’s reports under the public records laws. The one skill game maker that has submitted machines for evaluation moved to block disclosure of the reports. The company argued that the report includes information that is proprietary and that would enable people to break the machine. Dann has suggested that if the reports are not released, the settlement is off:

Attorney General Marc Dann might call off a deal to legalize wagering machines in Ohio if their manufacturers succeed in their bid to keep reports on the machines' operations private, a Dann spokesman said yesterday.

This plugs into something I was wondering about “skill games” – how do the makers and operators stay in business without house odds?

The basic business model of a casino is set up games whose odds favor the house. There will be losses but statistically speaking, over the long haul the house will come out ahead. If a skill game truly has a skill component, presumably that means that a good player can consistently win. And if someone consistently wins, that person can make tons of money at the expense of the game parlor.

But this from today’s Dispatch story caught my eye:

Last year, then-Attorney General Jim Petro issued a ruling opposite Dann's. Petro concluded that the games' outcome is "largely by chance rather than a player's skill," making them illegal.
He hasn't changed his mind as an attorney in private practice.
Petro said the machines are manufactured so that players, no matter how skilled, can't win every time. A governor controls the number of times the machine can have a winner, he said.[emphasis added]

I’m wondering about that bolded part. If Petro’s reference to a “governor” is another way of saying that the skill is impossible, it’s one thing. But if the machines include a true governor – a component that keeps track of payouts then makes further payouts impossible, that’s, well, cheating.

Meanwhile, the reports have to be public. They just do. How these machines work is a matter of public import. If someone can end run around state law then hide information about how they did it behind a veil of trade secret, they will set a precedent that will spill all over state regulation, particularly where environmental regs are concerned.

Budget Hearings: Stupid EdChoice Tricks

OK, I have to tell you about the best testimony of the day. Then I'm pouring myself into bed.

Officials from Liberty Local School District testified about the EdChoice vouchers. Liberty has one elementary school – E.J. Blott – which was in Academic Watch a couple of years ago. As of the most recent Local Report Card, the school is in Continuous Improvement.

One of the eleventh-hour miracles performed by the One-Winged PsychoDemon Duckbeasts from Hell was to broaden eligibility for EdChoice vouchers – because when people aren’t interested in a program the obvious move is to expand it. Whereas originally the program was open to students living in a district that would send them to a school in Academic Emergency, the new rules opened the program to students whose home school had been in Academic Watch for at least two of the last three years.

So as of January people living in the draw area for E.J. Blott are eligible for EdChoice vouchers, though probably only if they take them this year because the school will probably continue in Continuous Improvement. Almost immediately, 34 kids transferred to Blott from local parochial schools. One is the child of the principal of the school he/she was attending. Two had parents who remained active in the parent-teacher organizations of the parochial schools. And one, a first grader, announced two her class that she was only at Blott for a short time because she was going to a much better school and Blott was her ticket there.

The tab will be somewhere around $200,000 per student to send them to schools they were already paying for.

Classic.

Committee members asked the inevitable question and unfortunately the witnesses weren’t well prepared with an answer. The inevitable question is: since these parents pay taxes for schools, don’t they have a right to have that money for their children’s education? Actually there are many answers to that question. Take your pick.

• Basic answer – the state shouldn’t be paying people for something they are doing anyway. Even if I grant it’s a good idea, we can’t afford all good ideas. By my calculations, giving vouchers to those kids who are not currently in public schools would cost between $1.5 and 2 billion.

• What parents have a right to do is send their kids to the schools they pay for – and they retain that right. Everyone pays taxes for something they don’t use or would rather not use. I’d just as soon not have to drive to Columbus when I go down there. That doesn’t mean that I get to take my share of highway money out of highway funds and apply it to chartering a plane.

• If the goal is “fairness” as opposed to the stated goal of giving poor families a way out of failing schools, let’s debate that point. Given that EdChoice was sold as a benefit for poor kids, this is clearly an abuse of the program. Or it belies the true purpose of the program.
  
  Take your choice.
  

Budget Testifying

I was away from the blog world today because I was in Columbus testifying before the Senate Finance Committee about the Education budget. As is often true of a trip to C-Bus, I came back with many post ideas, most of which I probably won't get to. I'll try to get the basics up tomorrow, including an update about the Senate version of the budget bill, how the hearings went generally and what I had to say.

Meanwhile, between today and getting Carnival stuff set up, I'm way behind in responding to comments. It'll happen, just give me time.

Finally, keep an eye out for Plain Dealer education beat reporter Scott Stephens. He's likely to have some interesting GIRFOF news in the next day or two.