DAYTON, Ohio (WDTN) — Governor Mike DeWine made a stop in Dayton on his 2-day tour around Ohio, sharing details of his proposed budget to Ohioans, after his state of the state address Tuesday.
Governor Dewine and his leadership team plans to continue investments in Ohio’s bigger cities with innovation districts, but they are hoping to bring a smaller scale version to middle sized cities like Dayton, with the hope to bring business together.
“Collaboration is vital, and it’s what we’ve seen in the three innovation districts so far,” Governor DeWine said.
Those districts include Columbus, Cincinnati, and Cleveland. Each innovation district has had success and led to gov. adding a provision to the original budget for $150,000,000 allocated to Ohio’s smaller metropolitan cities.
The governor’s budget hopes to bring all the highlights of the area together to work to bring money to Dayton, including military services.
“There’s medical institutions, other things here in Dayton, of course the obvious, in addition to the hospital and universities, the other things that we have here is Wright Patterson Air force base,” Governor DeWine added.
It is proposed as a competition based process, with each city having to apply for the funds, while working together for a shared goal.
Lt. Governor Jon Husted says there is no reason why Dayton can’t be one of the places that receives a hub.
“We have in the Dayton area, some of the most innovative research going on in aviation, space, cyber defense, we do things here that are great in that space so why Dayton should not be an innovation hub will be up to you.. but Dayton is primed to be one of the locations where one of these innovations hubs can be,” Lt. Governor Jon Husted.
The next step if approved by legislation would be the drafting of the requirements for cities to apply to the opportunity.