Dems Oppose Kasich’s Tax Plan

Zanesville Mayor Butch Zwelling is one of many Democrats around the state taking the stage today to discuss Republican gubernatorial candidate John Kasich’s tax plan for Ohio.

Kasich’s plan includes gradually eliminating the state tax over time.

"Congressman Kasich’s plan to phase out the income tax sounds like a good thing to the average tax payer, but I couldn’t think of a worse time in our recession," said Mayor Zwelling.

Mayor Zwelling said that would eliminate 40-percent of the state’s revenue.

He said it would affect funding at local libraries, schools fire and police departments and other aspects of each Ohio community.

"We get our revenue sharing from the state of Ohio. That would be cut drastically," he said. "Several of our sister cities have had budget problems and are working their way through it. And if they were cut at this time, I don’t know what they’d do, what we would do."

Zwelling said the elimination of state taxes would cost serious decisions to be made in each community, where times are already tough, and cause a massive hole in the state budget.