Goff Is Mere Guff

October 27, 2026

Good Tuesday morning,

Last week, we outlined how the 10th District Court of Appeals, in a 40-page opinion, ruled the $1 billion EdChoice private school voucher program unconstitutional on two counts.

It’s a good read and contains so much good information about why Vouchers Hurt Ohio that it is difficult to outline in a simple email.

Today, let’s just look at this issue presented by the other side that somehow the Ohio Supreme Court has already ruled vouchers constitutional because of an earlier ruling on the Cleveland Pilot Program. The so-called “Goff” case.

The 10th District takes Goff apart as an argument for the pro-voucher crowd just as Franklin County Common Pleas Judge Jaiza Page did in her ruling that EdChoice vouchers are unconstitutional.

“Unlike the Cleveland Pilot Program, which was limited to (Cleveland City Schools), EdChoice dramatically expanded the geographic scope of state-funded private-school tuition assistance by making vouchers available to students statewide,” the 10th District ruling notes.

Here is more from the ruling that you can read here.

“In Goff, the Supreme Court upheld the Cleveland Pilot Program on the grounds that it was a narrow, experimental program necessitated by and designed to address the unique and extraordinary failure of a single school district.  As the Supreme Court stated, “We fail to see how the School Voucher Program, at the current funding level, undermines the state’s obligation to public education.”

“Goff nevertheless drew a clear constitutional line in the sand.  

The Supreme Court acknowledged that while the Cleveland Pilot Program was constitutionally permissible under Ohio Const. art. VI, § 2 in its present form, “implicit within [Ohio Const. art. VI, § 2] is a prohibition against the establishment of a system of uncommon (or nonpublic) schools financed by the state. 

The Ohio Supreme Court then warned that “a greatly expanded School Voucher Program or similar program could damage public education” and, for that reason, “be subject to a renewed constitutional challenge.”

“In other words, Goff did not give the state a blank check to fund private education with taxpayer dollars.  Rather, it upheld the Cleveland Pilot Program as a limited response to an extraordinary circumstance, while expressly cautioning that a substantially expanded voucher system could violate the Ohio Constitution.”

The earlier versions of EdChoice were based on students attending “low-performing” schools. 

All that changed in 2013, when pro-voucher lawmakers expanded EdChoice available to all students based solely on income and not on their local districts, and then in 2023, after we filed our lawsuit, the income limits were lifted.

Millionaires, even billionaires like Les Wexner, were eligible to receive EdChoice vouchers.

“Like earlier expansions of the voucher program, the 2023 EdChoice Expansion did not create  a right for students to transfer between public schools within or outside their district, nor did it provide tutorial grants for students who remained in public schools,” the 10th District ruling states.

This was a diversion of tax dollars from public to private, mostly religious schools.

“Although the (Ohio) Supreme Court held that the program’s limited scope did not violate Ohio Const. art. VI, § 2, it cautioned that a voucher program any larger in size or scale may run afoul of the Ohio Constitution,” the 10th District ruling states.

The 10th District ruled EdChoice vouchers unconstitutional because they create a separate and unequal system of uncommon schools and they siphon tax dollars away from funding a public school system, in which 90 percent of students in Ohio attend, at a constitutional level.

The 10th District understood Goff was limited in scope so the judges wrote:

“The Supreme Court of Ohio in Goff foretold the possibility that someday a greatly expanded voucher program could create a competing system of uncommon schools. Today is that day.”

Goff is not the answer the pro-voucher crowd is seeking and to date, as noted by media in this state, they have yet to produce a constitutional argument justifying taking away billions of tax dollars from the underfunded public schools to pay mostly wealthy families to send their children to private, mostly religious schools.

Is your district part of our historic lawsuit? Check here.

If not, why not? Join the districts standing up for public schools, students, families, educators and taxpayers here.

Sincerely,

Vouchers Hurt Ohio