The Legal Ledger

Starting this month, Auditor of State (AOS) Keith Faber’s office will be issuing financial health indicator (FHI) reports for school districts. This AOS program to identify and monitor signs of financial stress in public agencies began nine years ago with cities and counties and is now expanding to include school districts.

Last Thursday, federal courts granted injunctions that block the enforcement and implementation of several recent actions of the U.S. Department of Education (USDOE).

Earlier this month, the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce (ODEW) issued a revision of the model policies boards may adopt to implement the requirements for the education of children with disabilities. The law requires board to adopt policies implementing federal and state requirements related to special education.

On April 7, 2025, the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce (ODEW), on behalf of the U.S.

Last Friday, the federal government issued an announcement introducing the “Title IX Special Investigations Team” (SIT). The announcement indicated that SIT will be a joint effort of the U.S.

On March 20, 2025, President Trump signed an Executive Order entitled “

In this week's Legal Ledger Sidebar, OSBA's Scott Gerfen and John Price discuss special education model policies. 

One of the bills enacted in the last general assembly requires school districts to make information about the telephone number for the national suicide and crisis lifeline available to students. The new law, Ohio Revised Code (RC) 3313.474, is effective on April 9, 2025. It requires that each district serving any of grades nine through 12 include the telephone number (988) in the following places, if they are used by the district:

The Ohio Ethics Commission (OEC) recently weighed in on the application of the Ohio Ethics Law to public officials or employees participating in matters involving their domestic partners.