Gadfly Bites 6/30/25—You can keep that red rink dry, Governor

News stories featured in Gadfly Bites may require a paid subscription to read in full. Just sayin’.

1. It’s almost all about the Benjamins today as we wait for the new state budget bill to be signed into law by the governor. First up is some questionable (IMO) kvetching about the provision which would prevent school districts from keeping more than 50 percent of their general fund expenditures in reserves…if they are “fortunate” enough to have taxed their citizenry into that position. If the provision becomes law, any district that goes over will need to return the excess to the local taxpayers who gave it to them. Amid the whining and doomsaying in this piece—and it is all pretty loud—we invaluably learn that just three districts in Summit County are currently above that limit, and at least one of those will be under the limit by the end of the day today (which is also the end of the current fiscal year and lots of final expenses for it will be disbursed before COB). We also learn that the limit—equivalent to six months of cash reserves—is three times the amount of savings recommended by the state for decades, and that despite what the naysayers seem to me to be insinuating, they only have to give back the excess, not the whole amount. So if a district has, say, $31 million in savings and the new limit amounts to $30 million for them, they would only have to give back $1 million. Taxpayers get pennies, districts still have millions. Feels like a win-win to me. Everybody in this piece is begging Gov. DeWine to use his line item veto pen on this measure, but if these are the best arguments they can muster, I think they are hoping in vain. YMMV, of course, and this is yucky political stuff about which I know nothing, but I do know that we’ll all find out soon enough either way. (Akron Beacon-Journal, 6/30/25)
   
   

2. There’s budget-based fearmongering in this piece also, but it is non-specific and, IMO, non-credible. The story is about tiny Mt. Healthy Local Schools in southwest Ohio, a district which has been in fiscal emergency status for a little over a year. The throughline of the story is that this cash-strapped district has been diligently “climbing out” of its deficit situation since then (a situation which came to light when they got corrected fiscal projections from their new treasurer after the previous one had been giving them a series of inaccurate projections starting in 2023), with some potential light at the end of the tunnel as mooted in the headline. Regrettably, the piece says, the state budget’s “decrease in funding for public schools” now somehow puts all their hard work in jeopardy. And while Mt. Healthy will likely receive less money from the state for the next two years based on the revisions made to the funding formula, this is still just a minor piece of their dire fiscal puzzle. To wit: It is only because the state allowed Mt. Healthy a loan repayment term four times longer than normal that there is any possible daylight at all, and indeed the extended term stretched the timeline for recovery into the next decade. If they got double the funding per student in the new budget, they’d still be in the red for years. Indeed, district officials are still counting on passing a sizeable levy in November to avoid more substantial cuts, possibly including all extracurricular activities. The district has not successfully passed an operating levy since 2003 and a similar emergency levy failed at the ballot box just last month when, one assumes, taxpayer sympathy was at its zenith. There is probably another side to this, and it likely has to do with student population loss and failure to right-size, but that is uncovered here. Once again, anyone thinking that last minute line-item red ink in the budget doc is going to help them out of this hole is fantasizing. (Cincinnati Enquirer, 6/30/25)
   
   

3. Our final clip today is also budget-related, but it’s nothing to do with funding. It’s a very specific provision designed to stop Dayton City Schools (and only Dayton at this point) from allowing students to ride RTA buses if they have to transfer through downtown transit hubs. Elected school board member Jocelyn Rhynard is feeling singled out and unfairly put upon and tells the Dayton Daily News, stroppily, that “We possibly will not be doing high school transportation for Dayton students” if this provision is not vetoed by the governor at the last minute. She paints this near-certainty as a doomy scenario that will impact both district and charter/private school students—attempting to pre-empt any blame that might come her way by concluding that “at this point the Statehouse might have made the decision for us.” That may be true, but: a) I think that is actually the point of the provision—to force the dithering district’s hand on this longstanding area of concern; b) Since there is no state requirement for districts to provide transportation to any high school students unless they have IEPs that call for it, why insist on continuing if it can only be the same mess it has always been?; and c) Given the magnitude of Dayton’s transportation failures (for school-choice students and their own), I reckon that giving up on high school transportation efforts entirely—even if motivated by petty pique—would ultimately end up being a net positive for Dayton. Whatever families and schools cobble together on their own as a replacement can’t help but be cheaper, safer, and more reliable than what they have had to put up with over the last 10 years. (Dayton Daily News, 6/27/25)

Did you know you can have every edition of Gadfly Bites sent directly to your Inbox? Subscribe by clicking here.