Lawmakers debate vouchers, tax breaks in budget session

Schools in Youngstown would be affected if the eligibility expands.
COLUMBUS (AP) -- An expansion of school vouchers and tax breaks for some businesses remained the subjects of debate as the House took a second look at the $51 billion two-year budget enacted last summer.
The bill mostly shuffles money from agencies that didn't need as much as projected to programs that are underfunded.
The House Finance and Appropriations Committee held a hearing on the bill Monday, with a committee vote expected later. The bill could go before the full House on Wednesday.
The most interest in the bill concerns an expansion of eligibility for the school voucher program by including students from poorly performing schools that don't yet carry the worst academic rating. The proposal would allow students from 50 schools in academic watch for three years to apply for the vouchers.
Original version
The original version of the voucher program passed last year created up to 14,000 slots for students whose buildings have been in academic emergency three years in a row. If the proposed change takes effect, that will likely increase the number of available slots at private schools around Ohio beyond 8,000.
Students can apply the vouchers toward tuition at private schools in their district. Vouchers are $4,250 for elementary students and $5,000 for high school students.
Schools in Toledo and Youngstown are among those that would be eligible for the program under the proposal but aren't under current guidelines.
Exemption
Also under discussion was an exemption from the new state commercial activity tax for certain businesses within Ohio's nine foreign trade zones.
Businesses within the trade zones that have at least $100 million in annual sales and ship at least 50 percent of their inventory outside Ohio would be exempt from the tax, under an amendment proposed Monday by majority Republicans on the committee.
However, Gov. Bob Taft would veto any plan that allows companies with sales under $500 million a year to be exempt, spokesman Mark Rickel said.
Scott Borgemenke, chief of staff for House Republicans, said that negotiations on the new exemption continued with the Taft administration and the Senate and that the $100 million figure represented a "starting point for the debate."
Phased in
The new 0.26 percent tax on sales is being phased in over five years, gradually replacing the old Ohio taxes on profits, which had a higher rate and more loopholes, and an unpopular tax on equipment and inventory.
Lawmakers had complained earlier as exemptions crept into the new tax -- gasoline stations, doctors giving cancer treatment, certain banks and mortgage deals, sales of cars from one dealer to another for purposes of resale.
"The governor remains apprehensive about any further exemptions," Rickel said.
A two-year tax break for a new Columbus cargo distribution center was included in the budget that took effect in July. That prompted complaints by lawmakers representing the state's other foreign trade zones, a federal designation that lifts U.S. Customs duties.
The proposed amendment also requires the secretary of state's office to remove Social Security numbers from financial documents available on the office's Web site and prohibit the listing of such numbers in the future.
Cigarette tax
Another proposal would allow officials in Cuyahoga County to ask voters to impose an increase in the tax on cigarettes up to 30 cents a pack. The increase would raise an estimated $15 million a year for arts programs in the Cleveland area.
The house declined a request by state Rep. Kathleen Chandler, D-Kent, for the Northeastern Ohio Universities College of Medicine.
The provision would have appropriated $1.5 million to NEOUCOM for the Rootstown-based school to acquire 49 acres adjacent to it for potential expansion.