UA candidates find little to disagree on
Described by one questioner at the Upper Arlington Rotary Club as “reasonable candidates in an unreasonable political climate,” 24th Ohio House District opponents Allison Russo and Erik Yassenoff squared off in a civil debate Tuesday.
In fact, they struggled to highlight any big differences.
“That’s the thing about being an Upper Arlington resident — we have very similar values and believe very similar things, and it’s hard to find strong differences between us,” said Yassenoff, a Republican and former Upper Arlington councilman and policy adviser for Gov. John Kasich’s administration.
Asked about differences, Yassenoff said he supports a work requirement for Medicaid expansion but Russo does not. Both talked about compromise.
“You have to be collaborative and put some of these ideological issues behind you,” said Russo, a Democrat and public health policy adviser with a doctoral degree in public health.
The Republican supermajority in the legislature has “lost the incentive to compromise. The only way to change that is to restore some balance,” she said.
Democrats see the 24th District, which includes Upper Arlington, parts of Hilliard, Clintonville and a swath of western Franklin County, as a prime opportunity to flip a seat. Departing state Rep. Jim Hughes, R-Upper Arlington, is running for judge.
“Right now, a moderate next year in the Republican caucus is going to be more impactful than another Democrat in the minority,” Yassenoff told the lunchtime audience.
The candidates agreed that lawmakers and governors have not adequately addressed school funding since the Ohio Supreme Court first found the state system unconstitutional more than 20 years ago.
Yassenoff advocated finding creative new revenue streams and developing multiple funding formulas to handle vastly different districts with different needs. “What is adequate funding and how do we fund it?”
Russo disagreed, saying multiple formulas would further complicate the system.
“We need to establish what we agree are adequate outcomes. Are we providing adequate funding for the actual cost for providing education?” Russo said. The money needs to be predictable, she said, and the formula must get rid of caps that give Upper Arlington schools about half as much per pupil as private schools.
They disagree on what to do with Ohio’s $2.7 billion rainy day fund.
Yassenoff said the state should leave the money alone, ensuring that it maintains a AAA bond rating that allows it to borrow money at lower rates.
According to a late-August report by the Pew Charitable Trusts, Ohio is one of 26 states with a rainy-day fund balance higher than it was before the recession.
The state, according to Pew, could operate 21 days just on rainy-day funds, slightly higher than the 20.5 national median.
Russo thinks there is room to use some of that money on priority issues and “still have a very healthy rainy day fund.”
The fund has grown, Russo said, at the expense of local governments, schools and infrastructure that have faced funding cuts or curtailed growth.
“Now is the time for us to use some of that money and put it back into things like addiction treatment,” she said.
“We need to put it back into some of our local governments so they can build public safety networks.”
On the issue of guns, both said they grew up around guns but neither talked about wanting to expand where they are carried or when they can be used.
Lawmakers have “failed to come to any sort of commonsense agreement on what protects our public safety and still respects Second Amendment rights,” Russo said.
Instead, she said, the debate is over “stand your ground” bills or allowing people to carry guns into more places.
“We need to treat this like the public health and safety issue that it is,” Russo said.
Yassenoff agreed that Ohio needs reasonable gun control, pointing to proposals by Kasich, such as a “red flag” law.
“There is a bigger issue under the gun issue, and that is mental health. We do not adequately fund mental health services in the state,” he said.