DeWine, Husted Unveil Job and Economic Development Plan

CINCINNATI – Republican gubernatorial candidate Mike DeWine announced his economic development and job creation plan at a rally with his running mate, Jon Husted, in Cincinnati Sunday.

The Ohio Prosperity Plan will focus on three areas, the two said: job training,  streamlining regulations and encouraging research and investment.

“The most important thing that our state’s leaders can do is make Ohio the kind of place where Ohioans have the opportunity to get good-paying jobs, provide for their families, save for a good education, have a sound retirement and live their own version of the American Dream,” DeWine said in a prepared statement.

DeWine is Ohio’s attorney general, while Husted is secretary of state.

Within each section of the platform, DeWine and Husted noted several specific goals. For job training, the GOP nominees pointed to the state’s 75 programs, spread across a dozen state agencies, as an area that could be better coordinated among businesses, education providers and community leaders.

Also included in the plan is a revamp of OhioMeansJobs.com to have the site serve as “a match-making application” that would connect job seekers with companies hiring in their fields.

The candidates say they would “pressure the federal government to remove strings attached to federal job training dollars and block grant those funds to Ohio” so they could fund “at least 10,000” industry certifications in high demand.

In the research and investment field, DeWine aims to take advantage of the Opportunity Zones established in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017, permit researchers at public universities to own the intellectual properties developed at those schools and expand broadband internet infrastructure.

When it comes to regulations, DeWine and Husted’s Ohio Prosperity Plan includes two major points: suspending the implementation of regulations that inhibit the creation of jobs and encouraging Ohioans to provide input when it comes to regulations.

Copyright 2024 The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.