The Buckeye Institute filed an important amicus brief in Columbus City School District v. State of Ohio, calling on Ohio’s 10th District Court of Appeals to protect school choice for parents and students who have benefited from voucher programs and those who will benefit from them in the future. “School choice is being threatened by a coalition of disgruntled and self-interested districts that previously tried and failed to end Ohio’s groundbreaking Cleveland Scholarship and Tutoring Program.”

The Buckeye Institute filed its appeal brief in Vanderveer v. OAPSE with Ohio’s Sixth District Court of Appeals, calling on the court to reverse the lower court’s dismissal of the case and end the union’s wage theft practices. The Buckeye Institute represents Katrina Vanderveer of Wauseon, Ohio, in Vanderveer v. OAPSE—one of several union wage theft cases brought by The Buckeye Institute. This case will decide “whether the courthouse doors are open to Mrs. Vanderveer—and other Ohioans...”

The Buckeye Institute testified before the Ohio House Public Insurance and Pensions Committee on the policies in Ohio House Bill 473, which includes “reform[s] that will help local governments live within their means and make public employee compensation more transparent for taxpayers.” The pension pick-up loophole diverts money from public services that taxpayers expect or requires property tax hikes that taxpayers don’t—“just the sort of opaque and expensive public perk that has fueled taxpayer frustration.” 

The Buckeye Institute testified before the Ohio House Technology and Innovation Committee on the policies in Ohio House Bill 413, which will open local government accounting books to the public. “Local governments and jurisdictions are already required to make tax collection and spending information available upon taxpayer request. House Bill 413 simply “streamlines that process by making local revenues and expenditures immediately accessible online, eliminating the need for residents to file time-consuming public records requests and wait weeks for a response.”

The Buckeye Institute testified before the Ohio House Technology and Innovation Committee on the policies in Ohio House Bill 392, which will “help position Ohio as a national leader in AI and data processing technology.” House Bill 392 establishes “clear regulatory guardrails to properly balance innovation and responsible oversight of emerging technology,” and “provides regulatory certainty for the AI sector by preventing local governments from imposing a patchwork of contradictory rules that are expensive and difficult to follow.”

In The Columbus Dispatch, The Buckeye Institute states that, under the U.S. Constitution, Congress does not have the authority to ban home distilling for personal use. In Ream v. U.S. Department of Treasury, The Buckeye Institute is suing the federal government to end its unconstitutional ban.

In The Wall Street Journal, Bradley A. Smith, chair of The Buckeye Institute’s Board of Trustees and chair of the Institute for Free Speech’s Board of Directors, and Daniel Shuchman, a member of the Institute for Free Speech’s board, shine a light on how the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission violates the First Amendment Rights of the companies and workers it regulates. 

The Buckeye Institute commented on the passage of House Bill 186 and House Bill 335 by the Ohio House of Representatives, saying, “Taken together, House Bill 186 and House Bill 335 will help rein in unvoted property tax increases as The Buckeye Institute recommended. While there remains more to do to reform Ohio’s expensive system of local government and protect Ohioans from spiking property taxes, the adoption of the policies in House Bill 186 and House Bill 335 is another step in the right direction...”

The Buckeye Institute appealed Kresevic v. Kimmel to Ohio’s Ninth District Court of Appeals on behalf of Buckeye’s client Karen Kresevic, urging the court to rein in local governments that continue to take income taxes from Ohioans illegally. In its appeal, The Buckeye Institute argues that the trial court erred in its decision to dismiss the case and that the city of Akron stretched the law in breach of its own tax ordinances and forms.

In the Dayton Daily News, The Buckeye Institute applauds state representatives Tom Young and Bob Peterson for their efforts to require every local governmental body and taxing jurisdiction to open their books to taxpayers by requiring them to “disclose their revenue sources and expenditures in a uniform, searchable format and made available to all residents throughout the state.” “The simmering unrest over property taxes should remind Ohio policymakers that meaningful reform cannot wait. But that reform should start with mandatory transparency — not constitutional amendments…”