COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) - Highlights of the two-year state operating budget proposed by Republican Gov. Mike DeWine include:
- Allotting $550 million over the biennium - at least $55,000 per district, plus more based on need - to help schools support and encourage students through mental health counseling, mentoring, after-school programs and other efforts.
- Setting aside $900 million for water-related initiatives over the next decade, including cleaning up toxic algae in Lake Erie.
- Nearly doubling state funding for family and children services to $151 million a year, including $90 million annually in child-protection funding to counties and $25 million annually for serving children who require help from multiple state agencies.
- Raising the minimum age for buying cigarettes, other tobacco products and alternative nicotine products from 18 to 21.
- Tripling reimbursement funding to a total of $90 million annually to help counties pay for the defense of criminal suspects who can’t afford lawyers.
- Requiring public universities to guarantee students the same tuition rate from their freshman through senior years.
- Adding $50 million more for evidence-based home visitation programs that provide free support and resources for low-income families raising young children.
- Providing $30 million to help 20,000 Ohioans attain low-cost industry credentials, or “micro-degrees,” in growing fields.
- Designating $2.5 million next year to add 15 specialty courts - such as those helping defendants with mental illness or substance abuse problems - and $5 million in 2021 to support those courts and pay for 15 more.
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