With the detailed budget documents still not available to the legislature and Finance and Appropriations Committee members in particular, Committee Chair Matt Dolan ruled out any questions of Budget Director Pari Sabety after her presentation.

Perhaps it was thought that without a factual foundation of the budget document, what use could legislators’ questions be? Or what answers could Director Sabety deliver but “if the budget were here, we could show you…”

So the Director gave her side of the governor’s spending plan without the ability of any legislator to explore and challenge her broad statements (and some very narrow ones) about the usefulness of government spending.

Perhaps she’ll return for further questioning, or perhaps not. Regardless, the “Big Moment” of the governor’s top budget officer’s first appearance — with its big-time media interest and heightened public attention — has past.

However small and explainable, it was yet another example of the inertia of Ohio’s budgeting process. For nearly every one of the 250 or so hearing attendees, today was just another milepost in the journey of this huge, unstoppable locomotive as it speeds toward $116 billion in spending to be approved by June 30th.

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