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Ohio’s economic recovery will only occur if students have strong public education opportunities available to them. Gov. Ted Strickland has announced his plan to preserve education as a means to attract new jobs to Ohio and prepare our students for those jobs. Jobs go where the workforce is most prepared.

The Ohio Federation of Teachers supports Gov. Ted Strickland’s plans for a tax freeze in order to avoid a budget hole that would severely gut Ohio schools. This decision follows a Supreme Court ruling that blocks plans to raise $900 million via video lottery terminals.

In combination with the anticipated VLT revenue, the biennial budget was cut $2.3 billion in June. Cuts to education funding could put Ohio in jeopardy of qualifying for federal stimulus dollars. The loss of federal assistance would magnify the devastating effect on K-12 and higher education. Additional cuts would only serve to prolong Ohio’s recession.

This tax freeze will cause minimal impact on Ohioans, while a projected $851 million in cuts from education funding would cause significant impact. Cuts of this magnitude would cause class sizes to swell, cause teachers to have less time available per student, cause athletics, extracurricular activities and academic courses to be eliminated. Such results would have a severe negative impact on education, which would diminish work to create jobs for Ohioans.

The tax freeze will not impact the vast majority of citizens. It was the richest Ohioans who benefited most from former Gov. Bob Taft’s tax cuts. According to a Policy Matters report, 70 percent of the 2005 tax cut benefited the top 20 percent of wage earners in Ohio. Postponing this gift for Ohio’s richest citizens is a more equitable plan than a sales tax increase which is shown to weigh heavily on the middle class and low-income residents who can least afford it.