Tuesday, May 19, 2015
YOUNGSTOWN — State Auditor Dave Yost is proposing an Ohio constitutional amendment that he said would curb the creation of business monopolies or cartels.
He wants his proposed amendment to appear on this fall’s ballot, which also may contain a
marijuana-legalization amendment that would limit large-scale growth of the drug to 10 farms licensed to investors in 10 specified counties.
Yost testified in favor of his proposed amendment May 14 before the Constitutional Modernization Commission’s Constitutional Revision and Updating Committee.
Yost said the process of petitioning for state constitutional amendments has been “hijacked to enshrine private economic interest for a very few in our state’s constitution.”
Yost told the committee that limiting such constitutional designations for special interests has been made more urgent by the fall ballot initiative of “the marijuana cartel calling itself ResponsibleOhio,”which is proposing the 10-farm arrangement.
“What’s not fair, what’s not the American way is that we write a law that says: ‘You get to have the monopoly store and take a cut off the top,’” Yost told The Vindicator’s editorial board today.
For the complete story, read Wednesday's Vindicator and Vindy.com