House could move faster to protect Ohioans
Agigantic pop-art hammock belongs on the Statehouse’s lawn — to commemorate the General Assembly’s relaxed attitude toward protecting Ohioans’ rights and wallets.
A year ago March 28, Rep. Nickie Antonio, a Lakewood Democrat, introduced House Bill 160 to ban discrimination based on gender and sexual identity in employment, housing and public accommodation. (In 2011, Republican Gov. John Kasich by executive order banned discrimination in state employment based on sexual orientation, though not on the basis of gender identity.)
The Supreme Court’s 2015 Obergefell decision protected a person’s right to enter into a same-sex marriage. But it was silent on other sexualor gender-identity-based discrimination.
Since 1975, however, when Minneapolis became the first place to enact one, a score of states (but not Ohio) passed laws prohibiting discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, according to testimony that Sarah Warbelow, legal director of the Human Rights Campaign, provided to the Ohio House’s Government Oversight and Accountability Committee.
So have Cleveland, Columbus and Dayton, among other Ohio cities and villages, according to committee testimony by the Ohio Chamber of Commerce’s Don Boyd. The chamber supports H.B. 160. So do the Greater Cleveland Partnership and the Columbus Chamber of Commerce, among the vast number of employers and groups backing Antonio’s bill. “The business community is saying it’s long past time for this legislation to pass,” Antonio said Friday.
During the 2009-10 session, the House (then 53-46 Democratic) passed House Bill 176, a similar anti-discrimination bill, sponsored by then-Reps. Dan Stewart, a Columbus Democrat, and Ross McGregor, a Springfield Republican. The bill died in the GOP-led Senate.
It took the StewartMcGregor bill four months to reach the House floor. It’s been almost 12 months since Antonio introduced hers. Antonio said that, given feedback from fellow legislators and the business community, she’s optimistic about H.B. 160’s eventual passage.
Also pending is House Bill 123, introduced a year ago by Reps. Kyle Koehler, a Springfield Republican, and Michael Ashford, a Toledo Democrat, to rein in Ohio’s insatiable payday lenders. (The House’s No. 2 Republican, Rep. Kirk Schuring of suburban Canton, said he’s working to fashion a compromise payday bill, which Schuring said could surface soon.)
Ohio payday loans have a typical APR of 591 percent, according to the Pew Charitable Trusts. H.B. 123 would reduce payday lenders’ profit margins from “grotesque” to “still very ample” — that is, payday lenders, bellyaching aside, could still profitably lend to last-resort Ohio borrowers.
In 1995, legislators first agreed to let lenders make payday loans in Ohio. That bill passed in nine weeks. The Senate OK’d it 32-0. Among those voting “yes” was then-Sen. Dennis Kucinich, a Cleveland Democrat now running for governor. When the House passed that bill 92-7, among those voting “yes” was then-Rep. Betty Sutton, a suburban Akron Democrat, running mate of Democratic gubernatorial candidate Richard Cordray.
Maybe Schuring can pull a rabbit out of his hat to help pass payday loan reform.
Meanwhile, though, ignore Statehouse pieties about “process.” Lenders, who can be campaign donors, surely like the status quo. And the last thing House GOP insiders may want before May 8’s primary — which could help determine who’ll become House speaker in 2019 — is a House vote on Antonio’s pro-fairness bill, which someone might cheap-shot as pro-gay.
Still, whether before or after an election, if the House’s speaker — Democrat Vern Riffe (1975-1994); Republican Jo Ann Davidson (1995-2000); and now Republican Clifford Rosenberger — wants a bill to reach the House floor, it will. So, as to Antonio’s anti-discrimination bill and Koehler’s payday lending bill: Your move, Mr. Speaker.