License plates makeover ill-advised in a recession

In politics, perception is reality — especially when it comes to the expenditure of taxpayer dollars in the midst of a recession.

A story first published by the Columbus Dispatch has the potential of becoming a political reality check for Gov. Ted Strickland in his re-election bid next year if the perception grows that his administration has not been a good steward of the public treasury.

In the overall scheme of things, spending $2.3 million in a state budget of many billions of dollars is not significant, in and of itself. But the notion of wasteful spending is a problem for the governor because of the large number of individuals around the state who are today grousing about the cuts in allocation their programs have had to absorb.

Here’s the bottom line of the Dispatch story: Administration officials came up with the idea that Ohio needed a spiffier license plate that included images of both a biplane and a barn. Nearly 1.5 million of the new “Beautiful Ohio” plates were produced at Ohio Prison Industries at a cost of $2.3 million for sheeting, plate stock and printing.

So far so good. The plates, partly designed by first lady Frances Strickland, were to be available to motorists on April 1. But according to the newspaper story, the decision was made in late January or early February to pull the plug on project. The reason: State officials concluded that mothballing “Beautiful Ohio” was in the best interest of Ohioans, who would have had to shell out $2.50 for the new plates.

And here’s where the perception of fiscal bungling could grow into a political problem for the governor: A spokesman for the Ohio Department of Public Safety, parent of the agency of the Bureau of Motor Vehicles, said that the state hopes to put the plates on sale late this year for about $10 a pair.

More than a million

State records reviewed by the Dispatch show that 1,486,000 “Beautiful Ohio” plates have been manufactured, of which 943,000 are ready to go. Currently, the most popular vanity plate design is the “Cardinal” and 29,736 of those were sold last year.

If “Beautiful Ohio” sells at that rate, it would take 50 years for the state to exhaust its inventory of new plates.

What could the administration have been thinking? Apparently not much.

The national economic recession began last year and was in full swing this year when the Democratic governor, the Democratic controlled House of Representatives and Republican controlled Senate took on the arduous task of developing a balanced budget for the next two fiscal years in the face of a huge decline in revenue.

From the outset, Strickland and the legislative leaders made it clear that there would be across-the-board cuts in state funding for departments, agencies and programs. Needless to say, no one was happy.

Indeed, the state isn’t out of the woods with regard to the biennium budget. One of the major components on the revenue side, the expansion of state-sanctioned gambling through the introduction of slot machines at Ohio’s horse-racing tracks, is being challenged in the Ohio Supreme Court.

Opponents contend that the General Assembly did not have the statutory authority to expand gambling beyond what now exists in the state and that a constitutional amendment is necessary — through a vote of the people.

If the high court agrees, hundreds of millions of dollars in anticipated revenue could be in jeopardy. At that point, every expenditure will be under the microscope, including the $2.3 million spent on “Beautiful Ohio” plates that now sit in some storage area.