Landline provision would bring veto from governor

COLUMBUS

A provision to enable phone companies to abandon local landline services will prompt a veto from the governor, the head of one state agency told a lawmaker panel Tuesday.

Jim Zehringer, director of the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, said Gov. John Kasich “strongly” opposes the language added to HB 490, a bill that otherwise focuses on agriculture and water quality issues.

“The telecommunications language will force the governor to veto this bill, as he has personally said and has also been repeated several times by other members of the administration,” Zehringer told the Ohio Senate’s Agriculture Committee during an informal hearing on the legislation. “We would be sacrificing all the great work done so far on this bill if these provisions are not removed.”

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