Ohio Slots Standoff Attracts Crowds

COLUMBUS, Ohio—The Republican Senate and Democratic House convened competing budget panels, one questioning the specifics of Gov. Ted Strickland’s proposed slots-at-racetracks plan and the other hearing bad news from state agency directors about cuts that may be inevitable without it. The slots committee was scheduled to meet again Friday, a state holiday.

Strickland, a Democrat, reassured Ohioans at a news conference that progress was being made toward a compromise over the plan, which would place video lottery terminals at seven racetracks to raise $933 million.

“I know that some legislators are suggesting that my ... proposal should go to a vote of the people,“ he said. “But I believe the people have elected us to deal with this current economic crisis, and I believe that my proposal is the best way to do that.“

Answering a growing chorus of critics, Strickland defended the budget framework he unveiled June 19 as a reasonable mix of state program cuts, creative cost cutting, agency downsizing and new revenues. It aimed to fill a $3.2 billion budget hole.

Strickland did not signal what kind of compromise could possibly resolve the stalemate between him and Senate President Bill Harris, who has refused to bring the slots plan to a vote. Harris has argued voters, not lawmakers, should approve any expansion of gambling in Ohio.

In a meeting of a special Senate committee appointed to examine the governor’s plan, Republican senators grilled state lottery director Michael Dolan and assistant state budget director David Ellis for details of the slots plan.

Dolan drew attacks from senators when he testified he had only found out about the plan through news reports and knew few details. But he assured lawmakers his agency, which just completed a complicated switch to a new vendor this week, was up to the task.

During a House Finance Committee meeting, administration officials representing prisons, public schools and human services agencies laid out details of the painful budget cuts that would be necessary if slots aren’t enacted.

Republican state Rep. Ron Amstutz, of Wooster, all but called the hearing a dog-and-pony show.

“We are concerned that posturing at this critical point is risky and counterproductive to completing the budget-making work to which we have been assigned,“ he said in statement.

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