This is the FCB Podcast Network. This is The Laws Extra. Welcome to the Outlaws Extra. This is DARBYO to Kingpin Moorl. Don't forget too Like us on Facebook and Facebook dot com, Slash the Outlaws Radio, follow us on Twitter and Instagram at the Outlaws or Radio. We have a very special interview with Ohio State Senator Jerry Sereno coming up. As those of you who are listening to this show before familiar, you know that we've been talking about the so called People's Budget, which is a participatory budgeting initiative that is on the ballot here in Cleveland, but it is also taking root in different cities all across the country. There are grave concerns about the nature of this build in particular, and builds like these. I have concerns and I've aired those concerns as well, and State Senator Sereno is addressing this head on by proposing a bill in the Ohio legislature to deal with this. So we're going to talk to him about why he is proposing it, why he thought it was important to intervene, and also he's going to respond to the criticism that he is somehow usurping the concept of home rule or or municipalities being able to govern themselves. He's going to address that as well in the interview. So those of you who are familiar with our Outlaws extras and know how we do this, we are going to take a break now and then air the interview in its entirety. So stay tuned you're listening to the Outlaws Extra. Fuck U s tra, Welcome back, Welcome back. Make sure that you subscribe to the show on Apple, Podcast, Spotify, iHeart, or wherever you get your podcast. And if you listen to the show on Apple, please make sure you leave us a five star review and a comment is very important for the algorithm and for those of you who have already done so, thank you also very much. Now let's get to our interview with Ohio State Senator Jerry Serreno. All right, we have a very special guest on the show today. He is Ohio State Senator Jerry Sereno. Welcome. How you doing, sir, I'm great. How are you doing today? I'm good. I'm good. So obviously it's been in the news. It broke a couple of days ago. We have this so called participatory budgeting issue here in Cleveland. I have grave concerns about the nature of that bill, and you are proposing something down at Columbus to address it, not only for Cleveland, but for the rest of the cities in the state. Why did you feel like it was important to address this issue. Well, I felt that was important because really for two primary reasons. One is, you know, we have elected city councils in our cities and they are empowered with the authority to determine priorities of spending you know, public safety, economic development, recreation, you know those sorts of things, and they're empowered to spend the taxpayers dollars appropriately. And the public has input into that when they elect those officials and re elect them. And so there's definitely public activity participating already in the process of elect city councils and mayors who determine those priorities. So I think this particular case, it would undermine the lawful authority of city councils to spend taxpayer dollars. I'm also concerned about this and decided to take some action because you know, if this has not stopped, is I like to tell people around the state, this will be coming to a city near you and any group who who would like to instantly have access to millions of dollars can put a ballot initiative together and siphon off taxpayer dollars from city budgets. If, for example, in the city of Cleveland, this two percent that they're talking about getting access to would be about fourteen million dollars, okay, that would be taken away from the operating budget and spent in a manner that is under termoned at this point and decided upon by unelected official unelected board members that they're proposing, who could be as young as sixteen years old according to the ballot initiative description. That's irresponsible. I think it's a ludicrous idea. It doesn't support home rule, the concept of you know, cities and under state law and the ability to make many determinations for themselves. So I think, you know, I decided to step in not because they want to win trudon home rule. I want to protect home rule, which means that that elected officials and city councils and their mayors haven't a heavy opportunity to maintain their authority to spend the people's dollars in manners that are in a manner that is most appropriate for public safety, recreation, economic development in other things. And I know up here there's in Cleveland, there's been a lot of opposition to this from elected officials from other groups. And I noticed in the article that uh, in the Cleveland dot com article, you'd said that some of the unions had raised concerns to you as well. What were some of their concerns about something like this? Well, I think I think, you know, UH, labor in general should they should have I have heard from lots of people in labor. UH they should have a problem with this because you know, we're talking about UH dollars that will be taken away from other things like police and fire. Right, Uh, I could come from you know, any any time you take in this case, the Cleveland budget and take fourteen million dollars away to be spent on who knows what. Right that's going to have an impact on city operations and could very well have an impact on labor for because many of the many of the employees are are in labor organizations. So you know, labor, labor should should be against this. I've heard from lots of lots of folks in the labor community and there there's voicing support for my bill. Percent of bill one to fifty eight is the actual number of the bill we're talking with Ohio State Senator Jerry Sereno. I also know that, uh, the governor was asked about this and he wasn't really familiar with it. What do you think the temperature is in Columbus to get this done? To get your bill pass? Oh, I think there's a tremendous interest. I don't introduce bills unless I think there's a pretty good likelihood that they're going to get adopted. Uh. And so, uh, this is one of those. And we're going to actually fast track this because of the timing of the election coming up. Uh. And so I think, you know, I want to speak for the governor. Certainly will have to make his decision, but I suspect that he probably would think that this is a bad idea as well. Uh. This participatory budgeting, it's a concept that you know has been used in other countries, but it's not really caught on in the United States, and it shouldn't. So I think I think we have a very good likelihood of getting this thing done rather quickly. And you said something earlier that I wanted to circle back on and really kind of dig into a little bit more because, of course, you know, the proponents of the PB initiative or are accusing you of violating home rule, But you said a few minutes ago that your attempt is actually to protect home rule. Talk a little bit about that, expand on that. Yeah, Look, existing revised code empowers city councils, as the duly elected representis of their cities, to determine, you know, how to spend money. You know, again, what are their priorities? Is it public safety? Is that recreations? You know? They that's their job is to every year adopt, propose, and adopt an operating budget. Okay, an elected officials making decisions on you know, fourteen million dollars. In Cleveland's case of the budget is an aggregation of the responsibilities and the authority of duly elected city council members. And so I think my build protects home rule. It doesn't challenge home rule. The challenge to home rule is syconing away fourteen million dollars from city council's authority. Uh And and I think that's the way I look at it. Absolutely, we're talking without Ohio Senator Jerry Smrino, And another criticism that people have had, it's like, well, how how come you know someone that doesn't live in the in Cleveland is addressing this issue. But now I am aware of the fact that you have history here in the city and in the county as well. Talk a little bit about that so people know a little bit more. Yeah, sure I do. And I went to elementary school and all the way through high school in the city of Cleveland, Okay, and lived in other parts of Cuyahoga County as well. First of all, I care about northeast Ohio and greater Cleveland, Okay, because I have the history of there there is as you mentioned. But I also care about the rest of the state certainly as well. And you know, our job as legislators is to look out for what's good or what's not good for the state. And this is a case, as I said earlier, that if this goes unabated, uh, this is coming to a city near you, Okay, wherever you are in the state of Ohio. It would be bad policy to see this go around in different states. It would challenge and undermine cities, local government officials who are duly elected and I don't want to see that happen. I don't, I really, you know, I think the legislature is very careful of making sure that we don't intrude on home rule, but we also have a duty to protect it. And that's what that's what Centeville one fifty eight is going to do. It's going to protect the duly elected officials and their ability and authority to determine how money is spent that the taxpayers are giving them every year. And also with the recent redistricting, you have a part of Cuyahoga County in your district now correct, quite a bit of it. Actually, one third of my district will be parts of Kyahoga County from the I would say, the eastern and southern suburbs down to seventy one and over four eighty all the way out to North Royalton, Brexville, Independence and a few communities in between, Soul and so. Yeah. So I care about the county, of course I did anyway, But I do know that I will have more of it in my new district in the beginning, at the beginning of twenty five, and that is the district that I will be running in for re election in twenty four for my second term. Okay, and so one more time the what's the number of the bill? And what do you think? What's the what's the next process? When is this going to be? I'm assuming it has to go Well, I know you said it's going to be in an emergency proceeding, So I don't know if does it go to committee? Like, what's the next step? Well, it's it's it's already in committee. I testified as a sponsor of the bill. That's the first hearing yesterday in Columbus. It's in the General Government Committee. Senator Ruy from Youngstown is the chairman. Next week we will be having two sessions of that committee. Uh, and we we hope to we'll get here testimony I think on Tuesday afternoon and then Wednesday will perhaps here more testimony and then hopefully voter outic committee and refer it to the Senate floor. And then once we adopted in the Senate, it'll go to the House. And I believe that there's lots of discussions going on with the House to be sensitive to the time schedule here for this bill. And what's the what's the number of the bill? Again, it's Senate Bill one fifty eight. It can be seen. It's only a two page bill. It can be seen if you go to the if your listeners go to Ohio Senate dot gov. Uh, there's a way to drill down to a bill by bill number. It's one fifty eight, and you can get a copy of it all. Right, then let everybody know if they want to get more information about the bill, if they want to get more information about you and some of your efforts that you're doing outside of this, if they want to get in contact with you, where do they go to do that? Yeah, they can certainly go to the Ohio Senate dot gov site, and all of us are limited listed there and they can drill down information about my activities and what I'm doing. I also have a campaign website Jerry Sereno dot com. It's j E R R Y T I R I NO dot com. Listeners can go there to get some further background about me in my upcoming candidacy and my endorsements. They can also donate to the campaign online as well, So there's two different places to go. The official Senate site as well as my campaign site Jerry Sereno dot com. Senator Jerry Sereno, thank you so much for coming on and spending some time with us. I really appreciate it. My pleasure call anytime. Absolutely. One more time, thank you to Ohio State Senator Jerry Sereno for coming on the show. We really appreciated. We are out of here. We'll see you next time piece. This has been a presentation of the FCB podcast Network, where real talk lifts. Visit us online at FCB podcasts dot com.
