Issue Position: Opportunity for Ohio's Children

Issue Position

Improving the health and safety of Ohio's youth has been a priority for Betty Sutton throughout her career. During her first year in the Ohio House, Sutton co-sponsored legislation to create child-death review groups in each county to ensure that violent crimes involving children were thoroughly prosecuted. In June 1993, Sutton participated in a 7-day fast to protest the Ohio Senate's removal from the budget of $6.3 million for school breakfast programs. In 1994, Sutton co-sponsored legislation which made it a crime to threaten to harm a child. (Plain Dealer, 6/10/93; House Bills 200, 482, 120th Ohio General Assembly)

In 1993, Sutton co-sponsored legislation requiring schools to request criminal background checks for all applicants who would be interacting with children. In 1995, she voted for a bill which required school districts to expel for one year any student who brought a gun to school. (Senate Bill 38, 120th Ohio General Assembly; House Bill 64, 121st Ohio General Assembly)

During her second term in the House, Sutton co-sponsored legislation to ensure that abused and neglected children receive proper care from public service agencies. She also co-sponsored House Bill 256, which made it a felony to sell a child, and helped to push through a bill which prohibited dangerous weapons from being given to minors as prizes. (House Bills 200, 256, 274, and 506, 121st Ohio General Assembly)

Sutton believes that both parents should be held accountable for the upbringing of a child. In 1994, she co-sponsored a bill that helped courts enforce child support payments. She also co-sponsored a bill to ensure that a father's duty of child support include costs that occur during a mother's pregnancy. (House Bills 173 and 623, 120th Ohio General Assembly)

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