Officials don’t agree on transition funds

By Marc Kovac

Actions of former Attorney General Marc Dann sparked the legislation in question.

COLUMBUS — The Ohio House declined Wednesday to concur with amendments made by the Ohio Senate to legislation aimed at controlling candidates’ use of so-called transition accounts.

At issue is language added by Senate Republicans to stop statewide candidates from using issue-oriented campaigns and taxpayer funding to support their own candidacies.

The final vote not to concur was 48-48, and the legislation heads to a conference committee of the two chambers to hash out the differences.

Substitute House Bill 5, sponsored by Rep. Mark Okey, a Democrat from Carrollton, initially focused on transition accounts, which have been used by office-holders to pay for inauguration parties and other expenses as they assume elected or appointed posts.

Unlike other campaign finances, candidates have not been required to disclose who donated to their transition accounts or how the funds were spent.

Okey’s bill would continue to allow transition accounts for state office-holders, but it would cap individual donations at $10,000 for accounts used by the governor and lieutenant governor and $2,500 for others.

The bill also would limit the use of those funds, require disclosure statements and force the accounts to be closed out after 120 days.

Transition-account reform was among the priority issues in both the House and Senate, after the state inspector general questioned former Attorney General Marc Dann’s use of transition funds to pay for personal expenses and purchases from his wife’s dinnerware business. A scandal involving sexual harassment eventually led to Dann’s resignation.

The House passed the legislation unanimously, and the Ohio Senate left intact the language in the bill related to transition accounts, Okey said.

But an amendment was added by Senate Republicans to prohibit statewide office-holders and candidates from appearing in issue- oriented television or radio advertising costing more than $10,000.

Proponents inserted the provision to prevent candidates from circumventing existing campaign- finance limits and benefiting from contributions to issue-oriented campaigns — including the coming Third Frontier ballot initiative.