The Senate Education Committee adopted several more changes Tuesday to academic distress commission reform legislation, but backed off plans for a vote this week amid continued opposition from local school leaders to a measure that maintains the ultimate sanction of state control.

Sen. Peggy Lehner (R-Kettering), the committee chair, cancelled an if-needed Wednesday meeting to further amend and report out HB154 (Jones-J. Miller), after signaling earlier in the day that reaching consensus that quickly was unlikely.

The current state school takeover system, as enacted in 131-HB70 (Brenner-Driehaus), subjects districts with three consecutive Fs on the state report card to the oversight of an academic distress commission, which appoints a CEO to assume operational control of the district. The latest Senate version of HB154 would offer schools financial support for conducting a root-cause analysis of problems and hiring turnaround experts after the second F and delay the prospect of state control until after six years of failing grades. At that point, a new school improvement commission and its hired director would take control, though the legislation includes more provisions for local representation on that panel versus the distress commission.

The House-passed version of HB154 instituted a building-based school turnaround model but eliminated mechanisms for state control, and would have dissolved the distress commissions now in control of East Cleveland, Youngstown and Lorain. The House also inserted that language in the state budget bill, HB166 (Oelslager), but the Senate removed it and the conference committee ultimately agreed to a one-year moratorium on new distress commissions.

Sen. Lou Terhar (R-Cincinnati), who's been heavily involved in development of the Senate proposal, described changes included in the latest sub bill. Among them are the following:

- Requiring at least one gubernatorial appointee to the School Transformation Board to have five or more years of teaching experience.

- Requiring that vendors on the list of state-approved school turnaround experts show evidence of their successful experience and disclose any business relationships with officials from the Ohio Department of Education, the School Transformation Board, the State Board of Education or a local board of education.

- Capping the per-building costs of contracts with school turnaround experts.

- Requiring that the complete version of a root-cause analysis performed under the bill be presented at a community forum and given to the local teachers union.

- Requiring support of the local teachers' union president for any improvement plan before approval by the local board of education.

- Delaying the power of a school improvement commission director to close a building or reopen union contracts until after a district earns its first F under the commission.

- Creating a pilot program for a district with failing grades to request approval from the School Transformation Board to contract with a turnaround expert for work in up to 10 percent of the district's buildings.

Lehner said near the end of Tuesday's hearing that numerous other potential changes are under review.

"We have asked people for their opinion, and we have sought as much input as we possibly can," she said. "This is evidence that we are listening to you, this is not evidence we are trying to make a bad bill worse."

Notwithstanding the longer timeframe and other changes, the eventual possibility of state control under HB154 was a non-starter for some witnesses Wednesday.

Spencer Geraghty, representing the Canton Professional Educators' Association, questioned the premise of allowing the state to take over a district after six years of assistance from the state doesn't move the needle.

"If I were going to a personal trainer and I worked out with him for six years and nothing was happening, I would probably switch trainers," Geraghty said.

Eric Resnick, vice president of the Canton City Schools Board of Education, attacked state takeovers as anti-democratic and punitive measures that discriminate against high-poverty urban districts because of reliance on a flawed report card system.

Stephen Dyer, education policy fellow with Innovation Ohio, stressed that latter point as well, saying 13 years' worth of report card Performance Index results demonstrate the strong relationship between state test results and household wealth. "Districts that do well on the testing regime are rich, and those that are poor do not," he said. "If you want to support these schools, here's an idea: fund them."

Youngstown City Schools Board of Education member Ronald Shadd pressed for relief for the districts now under distress commissions, saying the situation is particularly dire for his district because, under HB70, the district board is soon to be dissolved and replaced by a new board made up of mayoral appointees. That board, he said, hasn't had the power to improve the district for several years because its authority has been supplanted by the state oversight model.

"Why in the world can't Youngstown get a reset when over the last 10 years the state has failed Youngstown, not the elected board," Shadd said. "We need you all to make a critical decision. Give us a restart … stop experimenting with Youngstown children."

Rev. Kenneth Simon, representing the Community Leadership Coalition on Education in Youngstown, said even the city mayor would not have much control, since he would have to appoint members from a list submitted to him by the state superintendent.

Sandusky City Schools Superintendent Eugene Sanders and Warrensville Heights Donald Jolly, whose district recently improved from an F to a C on state report cards, urged the panel to consider a turnaround approach like that of the Mid-Sized Urban Districts Leadership Collaborative, which pairs struggling schools with peer school systems. "You can't pull the wool over the eyes of a colleague who knows the exact right questions to ask," Sanders said of the value of review by peer districts.

The legislation did draw some support Tuesday, with Learn to Earn Dayton CEO Tom Lasley, former education dean at the University of Dayton, testifying in support. He said the state needs a more nuanced approach to school turnarounds based on state-local partnerships and in-depth analysis of schools' challenges. "What you propose is not perfect, but it represents a great step forward for the students who are in Ohio's underperforming schools," Lasley said.

After the hearing, Lehner said the Senate isn't likely to abandon the ultimate possibility of state control, saying Gov. Mike DeWine has indicated he won't support legislation without some eventual consequence for persistent failure.

She also noted that halting dissolution of the elected Youngstown board will mean the legislation needs an emergency clause so it can take effect before that provision of HB70 is triggered.

Sen. Teresa Fedor (D-Toledo) indicated in her questioning of witnesses Tuesday that provisions of HB154 related to collective bargaining remained a major sticking point for Democrats. Lehner said an amendment is under consideration to narrow language allowing a root-cause analysis to implicate union contract provisions as a barrier to improvement.

Meanwhile, the constitutionality of the existing takeover structure is under review by the Ohio Supreme Court, which will hear oral arguments in October in a suit Youngstown officials filed in a bid to overturn HB70. Opponents of HB154 who gathered a press conference after Tuesday's hearing indicated they'd also consider suing over the constitutionality of HB154 should it pass with state takeover authority intact. The Youngstown lawsuit over HB70 alleges the takeover violates Article VI, Section 3 of the Ohio Constitution, which gives the voters of city school districts the power to determine the membership and organization of their local boards of education.