Here's STRS's reply to the ORSC that didn't make Wachtmann happy

From John Curry, March 6, 2014

The STRS reply to the ORSC is attached. Of course, Wachtmann and his fellow legislators have dragged their feet for almost two decades without adequate funding to Ohio's schools, haven't they? In case you forgot that one...here it is.....

John 

From Ohio History Central

http://www.ohiohistorycentral.org/w/DeRolph_v._State_of_Ohio

DeRolph v. State of Ohio

In 1991, the Ohio Coalition for Equity & Adequacy of School Funding, representing more than five hundred school districts in Ohio, filed suit in the Perry County courts against the State of Ohio for failing to provide adequate funding to educate the state's students. The case was known as DeRolph v. State of Ohio and was named for Nathan DeRolph, a student in the Sheridan High School, in the Northern Local School District in Perry County. The districts claimed that the state failed to provide an "efficient" educational system, as dictated by the Ohio Constitution of 1851, by relying so heavily upon local property taxes to fund schools. The districts contended that school systems in areas with higher property values could much more easily meet the needs of and provide more opportunities for their students, while students in poorer areas suffered.

In 1994, Perry County Court Judge Linton Lewis, Jr., ruled that "public education is a fundamental right in the state of Ohio" and that the state legislature had to provide a better and more equitable means of financing education. Lewis's decision overturned an earlier Ohio Supreme Court ruling from 1979, which claimed that Ohio's school financing system was adequate.

The Ohio legislature appealed the decision to the Fifth District Court of Appeals, which overturned Lewis's decision, stating that he did not have the power to overturn an Ohio Supreme Court decision. The school districts then filed an appeal with the Ohio Supreme Court, which agreed to consider the case in 1996. The next year, the court ruled that Ohio's current method of funding schools violated the Ohio Constitution. The justices ordered that the state government "enact a constitutional school-funding system." 

Unfortunately for state officials, the Ohio Supreme Court provided no real guidance on how to create a constitutional school-funding program. The legislature, instead of implementing an entire overhaul of the system, simply authorized more state funds to schools. In 2000, 2001, and 2002, the Ohio Supreme Court ruled again that the school-funding process in Ohio remained unconstitutional, but the court eventually determined that the Ohio government had made a good-faith effort to change public school funding, and the justices overturned their earlier rulings. Critics of school funding in Ohio remain active in calling for a complete overhaul of the system and an end to the heavy reliance upon property taxes.