Reason #11 to VOTE NO on ISSUE 3
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Because it fails technically as a constitutional amendment, Part VII.
Read the reasons, based on the proposed constitutional amendment language, to vote no:
Part I here (Reason 18),
Part II here (Reason 16),
Part III here (Reason 15),
Part IV here (Reason 14),
Part V here (Reason 13) and
Part VI here (Reason 12).
The language to be parsed by this reason reads:
Thirty percent of gross slot machine revenue shall be paid to the state and shall be used, without necessity of appropriation by the General Assembly, notwithstanding section 22 of Article II of the Ohio Constitution, solely for the scholarships and grants provided for in this section and the related administrative costs for administering such scholarships and grants.
I'm just going to go right at it:
1. 30% of "gross slot machine revenue"
The definition for "gross slot machine revenue" is in the last paragraph of the entire proposed amendment. I'm posting it here for reference only because the focus of this reason to vote no is on the inadequacy of the language in the blue highlighted paragraph above. I'll focus on the inadequacy of the definition below in a later reason.
3. "To the state"
Hmm. Handed over to "the state." Well, this phrase is problematic because "the state" is too vague.
-To which entity within the state? The treasury? The Gaming Integrity Commission that doesn't yet exist? The Lottery Commission that steps in if the Commission fails to form and the General Assembly doesn't provide otherwise?
-Where's the money sit while it's waiting to be awarded to students by the Regents?
-Can it be invested while it's sitting, waiting to be used?
-Is it considered part of the state budget (even if the GA doesn't need to appropriate it)? What line item will it be? If it isn't part of the state budget, then where does it go?
-Does leaving the destination allow the possibility that the GA can place it into vouchers, so that the money goes directly from the slots to the state and then to parents? or students?
-Can the money ever be refunded back to the slots owners if the money isn't used?
Finally, this failure to identify where, within the state, the money goes, is in sharp contrast to the language used in the lottery amendment passed in the 1970s:
The General Assembly may authorize an agency of the state to conduct lotteries, to sell rights to participate therein, and to award prizes by chance to participants, provided that the entire net proceeds of any such lottery are paid into a fund of the state treasury that shall consist solely of such proceeds and shall be used solely for the support of elementary, secondary, vocational, and special education programs as determined in appropriations made by the General Assembly.
See the difference? And the problem?
Sloppy, sloppy, sloppy - in its drafting and, if intended to be a loophole, in voters not being outraged that such sloppiness has any chance of getting into our state's constitution.
Does anyone else like the word "besmirched"? Because that what I think of when I think of this proposed language getting into the Ohio constitution.
4. "And shall be used, without necessity of appropriation by the General Assembly,..."
a. Why doesn't the language just say, "The General Assembly shall not x, y or z" this revenue? As in, "The General Assembly is hereby prohibited from..." whatever it is we want to prohibit the GA from doing (I believe this is the part where the writers were trying to give the appearance that, unlike the way in which the Lottery proceeds end up replacing education appropriations, the slots proceeds are supposed to be in addition to all other higher ed appropriations).
b. "Without necessity" So does this mean that the GA can appropriate it if it wants to, it just doesn't need to? I'm sure that there is better language out there.
c. The General Assembly, as we'll see later, is charged with making rules to implement this proposed amendment. What might they do, in their implementing statutes, to get around this?
For comparison's sake, let's look at what the Ohio Constitution says about lottery revenue, the General Assembly and appropriations:
The General Assembly may authorize an agency of the state to conduct lotteries, to sell rights to participate therein, and to award prizes by chance to participants, provided that the entire net proceeds of any such lottery are paid into a fund of the state treasury that shall consist solely of such proceeds and shall be used solely for the support of elementary, secondary, vocational, and special education programs as determined in appropriations made by the General Assembly.
Hmm. Okay. So, in the slots proposal, a few things are different:
1. As noted earlier in this post, the lottery's entire net proceeds, get paid into a fund of the state treasury, and such fund will have only those net proceeds in it, and those funds shall be used only for the ed programs described, as determined in appropriations made by the GA.
Okay. So that's where the complaints come in: the GA substitutes the net lottery proceeds for other dollars it might appropriate to such education programs. And the slots backers want to keep the GA from doing that with the slots gross revenue.
The problems remaining include:
1. When? When is the gross revenue to be handed over? Annually? Which year - calendar or each facility's fiscal year?
2. Via what mechanism? Are there forms drafted which will be required to be used by the facilities to demonstrate that they've followed the formula prescribed in the definition? Will those forms be public, since the proceeds are being paid "to the state"? I assume the net proceeds determinations for the lottery are public.
3. And, as stated above, this slots provision says "paid to the state" but it doesn't describe a dedicated fund in the state treasury, or anywhere else. So, again, I ask, where? Where will the gross slots revenue reside?
5. "Notwithstanding Section 22 of Article II of the Constitution..."
That section of the constitution reads as follows:
No money shall be drawn from the treasury, except in pursuance of a specific appropriation, made by law; and no appropriation shall be made for a longer period than two years.
Here is a pretty decent definition of "notwithstanding." For the purposes of the proposed language, it means, "in spite of" section 22.
So - in spite of the language in the Ohio constitution that says that no money can be used from the state treasury unless the GA appropriates it, and that the GA can only appropriate for two years at a time, this proposed section re: slots revenue would allow the gross slots revenue to stay out of the control of the GA indefinitely.
The problem is, the amendment portions that authorize tuition grants fail to provide for high school graduating classes after the first 12. There is absolutely nothing in this proposed language that indicates what is to happen after the first 12 years of classes go through the 5% winnowing process.
So - you've got proceeds coming in, in perpetuity, without General Assembly involvement, but you've only got the proceeds being awarded and going out for 12 years.
THEN WHAT?
[Btw, when they calculated how much money would have to go out each and every one of those 12 years to the top 5% who are eligible assuming all of the top 5% actually meet all the criteria, did they figure the dollar amount based on concurrent needs - that is, the first year, you have the 2009 grads, then you have 2009 and 2010, then you have 2009, 2010, 2011, then you have 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, then you have ??? whom exactly? Do the 09 kids only get it for...how long? Do the OLE numbers take any of this into account? Just asking. Because a good legal writer, and lawyer, would have thought about all this. And a transparent, forthcoming, straight up proponent, would tell you: it ain't in there.]
Does the Gaming Integrity Commission step in? Does the GA step in, even though the amendment language implies that it won't? Remember - the GA isn't explicitly prohibited, it just says that nothing necessitates its involvement.
This issue is a huge gap in thinking it through. If you were having your wills and trusts and estatdivviedied up by a lawyer, and this happened? He or she would be liable for malpractice. Or, at a minimum, there'd be some mighty unhappy survivors, with everyone trying to determine your intent.
6. (shall be used...) "solely for the scholarships and grants provided for in this section..."
There you go again, OLE.
#1 - No scholarships have been described. Only tuition grants. And this language doesn't even mention "tuition" grants. Call me picky (Picky!) but this again shows sloppiness. It also provides more evidence that different people wrote different sections and didn't give a kids' college education about making it something that will actually function, as desired or otherwise.
#2 - This is why you use shortcuts in rules and statutes. When the first instance of "scholarships and tuition grants" came in the text, someone should have added the words, hereinafter referred to as "grants" or some such language, so that everyone knows that we're always talking about the same thing, every time, and not anything else. Is it redundant? Some might say yes. But I say, it's about clarity.
Which is not something that anyone seems to have wanted to accomplish in regard to setting up higher education funding via this proposed language.
Stay with me - this is the last line:
7. (shall be used...soley for...) "and the related administrative costs for administering such scholarships and grants."
Okay - that picky thing? If you're using "soley" for two things, that's not really "solely" now is it? Because solely tends to imply one. Whatever. (Because, you know, like, if something is exclusive, but then you say it's exclusively for him, her and someone else? Well, then, you know? It's not EXCLUSIVE to anyone? Okay - yeah - whatever. Crappy, crappy, crappy, crappy writing.)
Problem #1 with this last line of this sole paragraph:
"Administrative costs" needs a definition. Desperately.
Why? Because under no circumstances do we want there to be such a nexus that Forest City or the state or anyone other than the REGENTS get the administrative costs. Seriously. How many entities along the way will in fact incur costs in the attempts to administer the gross proceeds? Think about that. How many entities are going to touch that money as it tries to get to students (which really is, as it tries to get to the colleges, which really is, back to the state coffers, in some cases anyway)? And how many will claim that that touching equals administrative costs for which they should be reimbursed from the gross proceeds?
There is no cap on how much of the gross proceeds that are earmarked for education can go to administrative costs.
You know how you have to be careful about the charities to which you donate because some have ridiculous ratios of money received to money spent on overhead, and therefore less goes to the cause itself?
That could easily happen here - we could see enrichment of the administering entities, whomever they are in addition to the Regents. The proposed amendment language provides absolutely no direction whatsoever on these points.
Problem #2
Has anyone determined, publicly or privately, what the administrative costs will be and who will incur them?
How they will increase depending on numerous factors: slots revenvacillatinging, number of students to get awarvacillatinging annually, maybe even quarter by college quarter (what if kids are flunking, by the way - do the still get the money? has anyone noticed that there are no provisions or guidelines for how to unfund these kids? sure, say that that's up to the Regents, but given all that this proposed language spews out, you'd think that they'd cover that too, even in a minimal way to ensure that no one gets what they don't deserve)?
Several politicians who are trying to tackle elementary and secondary school funding frequently talk about wanting to know what it costs to fund such education in the state of Ohio. You'd think it would be rigeuruer for people promoting something like Issue 3 to be able to say, this is what it will cost and this is what we'll collect.
Anyone from OLE care to tell us: how much will the administrative costs be, on an annual basis, for the 12 years prescribed by this proposed language? What percentage of the gross proceeds that are intended for the grants will that be? And which entities will be entitled to get reimbursed?
Let's put it this way:
How much of the gross slot machine revenue won't be going to the students?
Previous reasons to vote no on Issue 3:
Reason 12
Reason 13
Reason 14
Reason 15
Reason 16
Reason 17
Reason 18
Reason 19
Reason 20
Reason 21
Reason 22
Reason 23
Reason 24
Reason 25
Reason 26
Reason 27
Reason 28
Reason 29
Reason 30
Reason 31
Reason 32
Reason 33
Reason 34
Reason 35
Reason 36
Reason 37
Reason 38
Reason 39
Reason 40
Reason 41
Reason 42
Reason 43
Reason 44
Reason 45
Reason 46
Reason 47
Reason 48
Reason 49
Reason 50
Reason 51
Reason 52
Reason 53
Reason 54
Reason 55
Reason 56
Reason 57
Vote no on Issue 3 (Ohio Learn and Earn).
Read the reasons, based on the proposed constitutional amendment language, to vote no:
Part I here (Reason 18),
Part II here (Reason 16),
Part III here (Reason 15),
Part IV here (Reason 14),
Part V here (Reason 13) and
Part VI here (Reason 12).
The language to be parsed by this reason reads:
Thirty percent of gross slot machine revenue shall be paid to the state and shall be used, without necessity of appropriation by the General Assembly, notwithstanding section 22 of Article II of the Ohio Constitution, solely for the scholarships and grants provided for in this section and the related administrative costs for administering such scholarships and grants.
I'm just going to go right at it:
1. 30% of "gross slot machine revenue"
The definition for "gross slot machine revenue" is in the last paragraph of the entire proposed amendment. I'm posting it here for reference only because the focus of this reason to vote no is on the inadequacy of the language in the blue highlighted paragraph above. I'll focus on the inadequacy of the definition below in a later reason.
For purposes of this section, Âgross slot machine revenue means the total of wagers received by a slot machine minus the total of: (1) cash or cash equivalents paid out to patrons as a result of playing a slot machine which are paid to patrons either manually or paid out by the slot machine; (2) cash paid to purchase annuities to fund prizes payable to patrons over a period of time as a result of playing a slot machine; and (3) any personal property distributed to a patron as the result of playing a slot machine, excluding travel expenses, food, refreshments, lodging, or services.Â
NB: The lottery amendment granted the net proceeds to elementary, secondary, vocational and special education.2. "Shall be paid"
3. "To the state"
Hmm. Handed over to "the state." Well, this phrase is problematic because "the state" is too vague.
-To which entity within the state? The treasury? The Gaming Integrity Commission that doesn't yet exist? The Lottery Commission that steps in if the Commission fails to form and the General Assembly doesn't provide otherwise?
-Where's the money sit while it's waiting to be awarded to students by the Regents?
-Can it be invested while it's sitting, waiting to be used?
-Is it considered part of the state budget (even if the GA doesn't need to appropriate it)? What line item will it be? If it isn't part of the state budget, then where does it go?
-Does leaving the destination allow the possibility that the GA can place it into vouchers, so that the money goes directly from the slots to the state and then to parents? or students?
-Can the money ever be refunded back to the slots owners if the money isn't used?
Finally, this failure to identify where, within the state, the money goes, is in sharp contrast to the language used in the lottery amendment passed in the 1970s:
The General Assembly may authorize an agency of the state to conduct lotteries, to sell rights to participate therein, and to award prizes by chance to participants, provided that the entire net proceeds of any such lottery are paid into a fund of the state treasury that shall consist solely of such proceeds and shall be used solely for the support of elementary, secondary, vocational, and special education programs as determined in appropriations made by the General Assembly.
See the difference? And the problem?
Sloppy, sloppy, sloppy - in its drafting and, if intended to be a loophole, in voters not being outraged that such sloppiness has any chance of getting into our state's constitution.
Does anyone else like the word "besmirched"? Because that what I think of when I think of this proposed language getting into the Ohio constitution.
4. "And shall be used, without necessity of appropriation by the General Assembly,..."
a. Why doesn't the language just say, "The General Assembly shall not x, y or z" this revenue? As in, "The General Assembly is hereby prohibited from..." whatever it is we want to prohibit the GA from doing (I believe this is the part where the writers were trying to give the appearance that, unlike the way in which the Lottery proceeds end up replacing education appropriations, the slots proceeds are supposed to be in addition to all other higher ed appropriations).
b. "Without necessity" So does this mean that the GA can appropriate it if it wants to, it just doesn't need to? I'm sure that there is better language out there.
c. The General Assembly, as we'll see later, is charged with making rules to implement this proposed amendment. What might they do, in their implementing statutes, to get around this?
For comparison's sake, let's look at what the Ohio Constitution says about lottery revenue, the General Assembly and appropriations:
The General Assembly may authorize an agency of the state to conduct lotteries, to sell rights to participate therein, and to award prizes by chance to participants, provided that the entire net proceeds of any such lottery are paid into a fund of the state treasury that shall consist solely of such proceeds and shall be used solely for the support of elementary, secondary, vocational, and special education programs as determined in appropriations made by the General Assembly.
Hmm. Okay. So, in the slots proposal, a few things are different:
1. As noted earlier in this post, the lottery's entire net proceeds, get paid into a fund of the state treasury, and such fund will have only those net proceeds in it, and those funds shall be used only for the ed programs described, as determined in appropriations made by the GA.
Okay. So that's where the complaints come in: the GA substitutes the net lottery proceeds for other dollars it might appropriate to such education programs. And the slots backers want to keep the GA from doing that with the slots gross revenue.
The problems remaining include:
1. When? When is the gross revenue to be handed over? Annually? Which year - calendar or each facility's fiscal year?
2. Via what mechanism? Are there forms drafted which will be required to be used by the facilities to demonstrate that they've followed the formula prescribed in the definition? Will those forms be public, since the proceeds are being paid "to the state"? I assume the net proceeds determinations for the lottery are public.
3. And, as stated above, this slots provision says "paid to the state" but it doesn't describe a dedicated fund in the state treasury, or anywhere else. So, again, I ask, where? Where will the gross slots revenue reside?
5. "Notwithstanding Section 22 of Article II of the Constitution..."
That section of the constitution reads as follows:
No money shall be drawn from the treasury, except in pursuance of a specific appropriation, made by law; and no appropriation shall be made for a longer period than two years.
Here is a pretty decent definition of "notwithstanding." For the purposes of the proposed language, it means, "in spite of" section 22.
So - in spite of the language in the Ohio constitution that says that no money can be used from the state treasury unless the GA appropriates it, and that the GA can only appropriate for two years at a time, this proposed section re: slots revenue would allow the gross slots revenue to stay out of the control of the GA indefinitely.
The problem is, the amendment portions that authorize tuition grants fail to provide for high school graduating classes after the first 12. There is absolutely nothing in this proposed language that indicates what is to happen after the first 12 years of classes go through the 5% winnowing process.
So - you've got proceeds coming in, in perpetuity, without General Assembly involvement, but you've only got the proceeds being awarded and going out for 12 years.
THEN WHAT?
[Btw, when they calculated how much money would have to go out each and every one of those 12 years to the top 5% who are eligible assuming all of the top 5% actually meet all the criteria, did they figure the dollar amount based on concurrent needs - that is, the first year, you have the 2009 grads, then you have 2009 and 2010, then you have 2009, 2010, 2011, then you have 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, then you have ??? whom exactly? Do the 09 kids only get it for...how long? Do the OLE numbers take any of this into account? Just asking. Because a good legal writer, and lawyer, would have thought about all this. And a transparent, forthcoming, straight up proponent, would tell you: it ain't in there.]
Does the Gaming Integrity Commission step in? Does the GA step in, even though the amendment language implies that it won't? Remember - the GA isn't explicitly prohibited, it just says that nothing necessitates its involvement.
This issue is a huge gap in thinking it through. If you were having your wills and trusts and estatdivviedied up by a lawyer, and this happened? He or she would be liable for malpractice. Or, at a minimum, there'd be some mighty unhappy survivors, with everyone trying to determine your intent.
6. (shall be used...) "solely for the scholarships and grants provided for in this section..."
There you go again, OLE.
#1 - No scholarships have been described. Only tuition grants. And this language doesn't even mention "tuition" grants. Call me picky (Picky!) but this again shows sloppiness. It also provides more evidence that different people wrote different sections and didn't give a kids' college education about making it something that will actually function, as desired or otherwise.
#2 - This is why you use shortcuts in rules and statutes. When the first instance of "scholarships and tuition grants" came in the text, someone should have added the words, hereinafter referred to as "grants" or some such language, so that everyone knows that we're always talking about the same thing, every time, and not anything else. Is it redundant? Some might say yes. But I say, it's about clarity.
Which is not something that anyone seems to have wanted to accomplish in regard to setting up higher education funding via this proposed language.
Stay with me - this is the last line:
7. (shall be used...soley for...) "and the related administrative costs for administering such scholarships and grants."
Okay - that picky thing? If you're using "soley" for two things, that's not really "solely" now is it? Because solely tends to imply one. Whatever. (Because, you know, like, if something is exclusive, but then you say it's exclusively for him, her and someone else? Well, then, you know? It's not EXCLUSIVE to anyone? Okay - yeah - whatever. Crappy, crappy, crappy, crappy writing.)
Problem #1 with this last line of this sole paragraph:
"Administrative costs" needs a definition. Desperately.
Why? Because under no circumstances do we want there to be such a nexus that Forest City or the state or anyone other than the REGENTS get the administrative costs. Seriously. How many entities along the way will in fact incur costs in the attempts to administer the gross proceeds? Think about that. How many entities are going to touch that money as it tries to get to students (which really is, as it tries to get to the colleges, which really is, back to the state coffers, in some cases anyway)? And how many will claim that that touching equals administrative costs for which they should be reimbursed from the gross proceeds?
There is no cap on how much of the gross proceeds that are earmarked for education can go to administrative costs.
You know how you have to be careful about the charities to which you donate because some have ridiculous ratios of money received to money spent on overhead, and therefore less goes to the cause itself?
That could easily happen here - we could see enrichment of the administering entities, whomever they are in addition to the Regents. The proposed amendment language provides absolutely no direction whatsoever on these points.
Problem #2
Has anyone determined, publicly or privately, what the administrative costs will be and who will incur them?
How they will increase depending on numerous factors: slots revenvacillatinging, number of students to get awarvacillatinging annually, maybe even quarter by college quarter (what if kids are flunking, by the way - do the still get the money? has anyone noticed that there are no provisions or guidelines for how to unfund these kids? sure, say that that's up to the Regents, but given all that this proposed language spews out, you'd think that they'd cover that too, even in a minimal way to ensure that no one gets what they don't deserve)?
Several politicians who are trying to tackle elementary and secondary school funding frequently talk about wanting to know what it costs to fund such education in the state of Ohio. You'd think it would be rigeuruer for people promoting something like Issue 3 to be able to say, this is what it will cost and this is what we'll collect.
Anyone from OLE care to tell us: how much will the administrative costs be, on an annual basis, for the 12 years prescribed by this proposed language? What percentage of the gross proceeds that are intended for the grants will that be? And which entities will be entitled to get reimbursed?
Let's put it this way:
How much of the gross slot machine revenue won't be going to the students?
Previous reasons to vote no on Issue 3:
Reason 12
Reason 13
Reason 14
Reason 15
Reason 16
Reason 17
Reason 18
Reason 19
Reason 20
Reason 21
Reason 22
Reason 23
Reason 24
Reason 25
Reason 26
Reason 27
Reason 28
Reason 29
Reason 30
Reason 31
Reason 32
Reason 33
Reason 34
Reason 35
Reason 36
Reason 37
Reason 38
Reason 39
Reason 40
Reason 41
Reason 42
Reason 43
Reason 44
Reason 45
Reason 46
Reason 47
Reason 48
Reason 49
Reason 50
Reason 51
Reason 52
Reason 53
Reason 54
Reason 55
Reason 56
Reason 57
Vote no on Issue 3 (Ohio Learn and Earn).
JBlog Me
4 Comments:
By the way, it seems to me that many orthodox Jews will be voting no on issue 3 out of fear that some will get snared in the web. I didn't hear anyone say it publicly (although they should have), but thats what I assume.
Do you think so? Interesting. Thanks for still reading and commenting. Good luck voting tomorrow.
PS - I cannot believe anyone had a problem with the request to move the voting location out of a church. Honestly- in this day and age, no one should have an issue with wanting to be OUT of a church if you follow certain religious tenets. I'm glad that they did move the location. I'm sorry they couldn't figure that out when they were re-assigning in the first place.
yes - it was kind of bizzare, but logic won out at the end.
It's funny how I've never even thought about it before - that I vote in a church. But I seem to recall from childhood that we always went to the school. Curious.
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