A legislative board that checks and allows state allocations extended Ohio’s lucrative funding contract Wednesday with JobsOhio, the private firm pursuing economic projects on the state’s behalf.
The 4-2 vote by the Ohio Controlling Board came just days after Attorney General Dave Yost made his first of several requests to delay consideration of the extension, which fell on deaf ears with GOP legislators.
“The record of success that JobsOhio has had is pretty undeniable,” Rep. Brian Stewart (R-Ashville) said Tuesday. “We have a private entity that is able to move at the speed of business, rather than the speed of government bureaucracy, that’s a positive thing.”
JobsOhio is funded through leasing state liquor sales profits, and with Wednesday’s vote, that deal extends to 2053 from its original 2038 end. Both Democrats on the board objected.
Yost, DeWine administration trade barbs
Yost said Tuesday he wasn’t against the extension outright but that he wanted higher stakes attached to the agreement.
“The state liquor business belongs to the people of this state,” Yost said in a video. “Let’s extend JobsOhio and its good work and do it in a way that is better for them, better for our economy, and better for the working people of Ohio whose purchases fund that.”
In a letter four days earlier, Yost urged that the Ohio Controlling Board delay its decision after JobsOhio, he said, canceled a meeting with his office.
Yost described the new franchise and transfer agreement with JobsOhio as written as “one-sided,” absent any stakes on JobsOhio’s part. The original 2011 agreement requested $1.4 billion from JobsOhio to become the sole liquor sales franchisee—some of which was used to settle previous liquor debts.
Kimberly Murnieks, director of the Ohio Office of Budget and Management, shot his ask down.
“Given that you do not have a role in establishing the Ohio Controlling Board Agenda or in reviewing items on the Agenda, your request,” Murnieks wrote back, “is not subject to consideration.”
JobsOhio President and CEO JP Nauseef thanked DeWine and legislative leaders in a Wednesday statement.
“The JobsOhio Team and Network Partners will continue to build upon our state’s once-in-a-generation opportunities so more and more can realize their own version of the American Dream, right here in the Heart of it All,” Nauseef’s statement read.
Among other projects, JobsOhio notably courted tech giant Intel for its in-progress New Albany fabrication plants and, more recently, in January won a bid to bring defense contractor Anduril to central Ohio.
