Gadfly Bites 7/29/26—Other people’s money

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1. The elected board members of Cincinnati City Schools voted 5-2 to place an earned income tax levy on the November ballot, rather than attempting to renew an existing property tax levy. First time ever for Cincy, but as we learn in this coverage, a growing phenomenon across Ohio...sorta. “There were 32 school income tax issues on Ohio ballots during the May election,” says journalist Valerie Lyons. “Twenty-four failed.” There’s also discussion about the pros and cons—including interviews with potential voters—but those stats still make it sound like quite a gamble to me. (WCPO-TV, Cincinnati, 7/28/26)
   
   

2. One Cincinnatian told WCPO in the piece above that he’d be open to their levy ask if the district can just demonstrate that the dough will be spent responsibly: “As long as I know kind of where the money’s going, it’s going to the right places, and everything’s distributed properly.” Hopefully that sentiment is not widespread, because our big city school districts do not traditionally do well with such requests and will be more likely to lose support than gain it if common sense usage is the primary criteria for voters. Case in point: Columbus City Schools just revealed that it was fleeced out of $40 million by use of a health insurance consultancy firm they contracted to help the district “navigate its employee health insurance benefits package” starting in 2024. Columbus doesn’t have a levy on the November ballot—which is fortuitous because this would be a really bad omen, per the above story—but it should be noted that $40 million, an amount which I guarantee you will never be recovered from the culprits despite some tough talk here from the most-junior elected board member, would have offset about 80 percent of the budget cuts just enacted via layoffs and other unpopular austerity measures they had no choice but to make to stave off a looming deficit. (Columbus Dispatch, 7/28/26)
   
   

3. And in keeping with our theme of school districts’ ownership and control over other people’s money, here’s an op-ed from the Editorial Board of Cleveland.com in which they conveniently forget that the families of private school students pay taxes at the local and state levels, same as everybody else--tax money that supports public schools. But while we are free to ignore whatever argument they are making in relation to the pending SB 311 because of their ridiculous reasoning, their ill-considered decision to publish it is important. I think we can be more assured than ever that this bill’s language is ironclad and that districts who have elided established state law on selling un- and underused facilities thus far are quaking in fear of it becoming law. Bet. (Cleveland.com, 7/29/26)

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