Bills to Watch as Ohio Lawmakers Rush Out Legislation in ‘Lame Duck’ Session

With about a month to go in Ohio’s 135th General Assembly, lawmakers are scrambling to get their legislative priorities vetted and passed before the clock restarts at the end of the year and some of them are no longer in office.

The so-called “lame duck” session is usually a flurry of policymaking and hasty votes in the final weeks of each two-year term. The list of priorities for lawmakers ranges widely, including bills to address rising property taxes, ban the sale of intoxicating hemp products, increase the penalties for repeat domestic abusers, a bill to ask Ohio voters to approve an issuance of $2.5 billion in bonds for capital improvements, efforts to modernize the adoption process in Ohio, and more. But the order of those priorities often depends on the party, and the chamber, of the lawmaker you ask, given that Senate and House leadership are increasingly at odds with one another over their chamber’s legislation stalling in the other’s chamber.