Ohio hit hard since 2000, so what’s important to voters?

Citizens share which issues they want to see tackled by their leaders.

In the past two decades, Ohio has seen one of the nation’s most significant declines in household income, among the largest job losses and an aging, less-educated population.

Yet, when hundreds of Ohioans assembled in a series of forums during the past two years to discuss what should be done, they found positives about their communities — water, people, parks, the arts, highways, higher education, hospitals — and could agree on possible actions for themselves and what they want from leaders that would improve life.

Those conversations were convened by Your Voice Ohio, a coalition of news organizations that includes the Dayton Daily News, Springfield News-Sun and Journal-News. Those meetings were all held before the coronavirus pandemic, deep recession and protests against structural racism and police violence against Black Americans.

With one in seven now out of work, about 3,000 dead because of the virus and demonstrations for racial justice continuing, how have these life-changing events affected what Ohioans want?

About 50 Ohio news outlets in the Your Voice Ohio 2020 Elections project this month began holding online conversations to listen to people talk about what is important to them as they begin considering candidates in the 2020 elections. In addition, journalists will fan out to seek thoughts about key issues throughout the campaign, and a statewide poll is in process to identify top priorities among Ohioans.

The goal is that journalists will be better equipped to represent their communities as they cover the candidates and issues that matter most to Ohioans this election year.

People vs. politicians

Ohioans know what they want. The question is, “Is anyone listening?”

Before the pandemic, participants in Your Voice Ohio community meetings discussed three questions: What does a community look like where all people can live fulfilled lives? What should be changed to make that possible? And what actions can we identify to cause the change we want?

What Ohioans said, after discussing what might work for the most people, was that communities need:

■ Mental health services — In a state ravaged by opioids, economic decline, job losses and the accompanying stresses, Ohioans said this is a critical service. A recurring theme was restoring “human dignity” to people who are suffering.

■ Jobs with livable wages — Wealthy and economically distressed communities all shared concern about the future of jobs. Incentives to attract jobs, such as tax abatements, should demand “jobs with dignity.”

■ Affordable housing — In urban areas and upscale suburbs there was concern about affordable housing with access to transportation, walkable streets and safety. Seniors in upper middle-income communities were among the most concerned about retirement housing.

■ Access to healthy food — This was a concern in urban communities.

■ Access to affordable, quality education — Urban areas expressed concern for equitable k-12 education that equips their children to compete with wealthier communities; suburban residents expressed a desire for high-quality, low-cost colleges that help ensure job security.

■ Safe neighborhoods — Urban communities expressed urgent need for community policing, police who engage in the community, police who look like the community, and police who help more than prosecute.

■ Affordable, quality health care — Ohioans were quick to identify hospitals as an asset, but then expressed concern about access and cost.

■ Human dignity — Respect for others, appreciation of diversity, civility, strong neighborhoods and relationships.

People who have endured economic decline the longest — particularly the Dayton and Youngstown-Warren areas — were likely to say that community success needs to be redefined to have “the emphasis be on well-being” and less on economic growth, as one Dayton group discussed.

And one Dayton resident wrote: “A thriving community is made up of thriving people.”

Ohio by the numbers

What people said they would like to change about Ohio shows up in data as areas where the state is falling behind. Your Voice Ohio hired former Akron Beacon Journal investigative and data reporter David Knox to generate data on all 88 Ohio counties going back several decades so that reporters can explore the state and communities in context.

Here are numbers he provided, and information as noted from other sources, on key topics.

Income losses

One of the most stark illustrations of Ohio’s difficulties can be found in the median household income. Median represents the midpoint between highest and lowest. From 2000 to the most recent year for which data are available, most of Ohio, and Black Ohioans in particular, saw losses even before the pandemic.

Median household income, 2000-2018, adjusted for inflation:

■ U.S Whites, non-Hispanic, $69,168 in 2018, down $663.

■ U.S. Blacks $42,263 in 2018, down $3,026.

■ Ohio Whites, non-Hispanic, $62,162 in 2018, down $3,870.

■ Ohio Blacks $34,199 in 2018, down $5,375.

Some highly populated counties have endured economic declines since 2000, accompanied by some of the nation’s worst opioid overdose death rates. Those counties, and the decline in annual median household income from 2000, are:

■ Montgomery (Dayton) down $9,900.

■ Butler (Middletown-Hamilton) down $11,800.

■ Lucas (Toledo), down $10,100.

■ Trumbull (Warren), down $11,700.

Only seven of Ohio’s 88 counties have experienced an increase in median household income — most of them small and rural: Holmes, Belmont, Lawrence, Meigs, Harrison, Union and Delaware.

Jobs

Because of efforts to slow the coronavirus pandemic, about one in seven Ohioans is unemployed — that’s more than 750,000 people — far worse than the Great Recession.

Ohio’s peak year for employment was in 2000, when 5.5 million were working. That number fell during two recessions and never recovered. In 2019, 5.4 million were working and in May, the number of workers was an estimated 4.8 million.

Mental health

More than 28,000 Ohioans have died of opioid overdoses alone in the past decade.

Suicide in Ohio is on the rise and 37 of 88 counties have rates above the U.S. average, according to a recent Ohio University study. Moreover, unemployment is associated with depression, and Ohio’s unemployment rate is at one of the highest rates in a century.

The U.S. overall spent 20% more on mental health per capita than Ohio in 2013. Ohio ranked 25th in the country according to the respected Kaiser Family Foundation.

Housing

U.S. News and World Reports ranks Ohio second for affordability, but the study examines only home ownership. One-third of the homes in the state are rental properties, and in cities such as Cleveland, Columbus and Toledo, rentals are the majority.

A Business Insider study showed Ohio is 10th-most expensive for rent, and the EvictionLab at Princeton University places Akron, Dayton, Toledo, Cincinnati, Columbus and Cleveland in the top 53 major cities for eviction rates.

Access to healthy food

This was a primary concern in Your Voice Ohio conversations in cities where many residents live below the state median household income. The largest complaint was access to healthy food as opposed to canned, high-salt products.

A 2017 Ohio State University Center for Public Health Practice study concluded that the state ranks 45th for reliable, daily access to food, with 16% of the population in food-insecure households.

Education

Ohio ranks 22nd for its high school graduation rate and is below the national average for enrollment in early education programs, according to a Gannett newspapers study. Early education is considered to be one of the most important factors in school success.

Ohio lags the nation for college education, often attributed to the fact that manufacturing workers could earn meaningful wages with benefits with a high school diploma.

While 32% of U.S. adults have at least a four-year college degree, only 28% of Ohioans have a degree.

The Education Law Center analyzed multiple factors to determine that Ohio spends $990 above the U.S. per-pupil average for k-12 education and does an excellent job of distributing the money equitably, but gives the state only a C for funding effort.

Ohio had the fourth-largest gap between white and Black students on the National Assessment of Education Progress eighth-grade math test. However, Ohio overall outperforms the U.S.

Ohio ranks 16th-highest for in-state tuition and fees at four-year colleges, according to the College Board.

Safety

Ohio’s violent crime rate has declined for the last several years, including 5.5% in 2018, according to a recent Gannett Newspapers study. The state ranks 35th for violent crime.

Black people are incarcerated in Ohio at a rate five times that of whites, and Ohio ranks 17th for its incarceration rate of Black males — one in every 22.

Health & health care

Ohio ranks 35th or access to health care, according to the World Population Review

The state is 18th-best for the percentage of people with health-care coverage.

For other rankings from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: Deaths from diabetes, 10th worst; infant mortality, 10th worst; suicides, 28th worst; and death from heart disease, 10th worst.