Gov. Mike DeWine will ask lawmakers this week to raise the state’s 28 cent a gallon gas tax, a recommendation from a committee he appointed. That increase would patch a hole of more than a billion dollars in the Ohio Department of Transportation’s budget. But DeWine won’t yet get specific on what he’ll ask for.

Ohio’s attorney general says one of the prescription drug middlemen working with the Bureau of Workers Compensation took millions of dollars in overpayments that rightfully belong the state. 

The state has been allowing people to pay 23 kinds of taxes in the digital currency bitcoin for almost three months, in an effort to establish Ohio as a leader in blockchain technology. 

Former treasurer Josh Mandel announced in November that taxpayers can pay in bitcoin through a third-party vendor.

At an Ohio Associated Press forum, new treasurer Robert Sprague said the state has accepted two transactions so far.

Gov. Mike DeWine says no executions will happen in Ohio until the state can come up with a new lethal injection process.

DeWine cites a federal court judge’s opinion on Ohio’s lethal injection process and the upcoming execution of Wayne Keith Henness, which DeWine delayed.

“Ohio’s not going to execute someone on my watch when it’s cruel and unusual punishment.”

DeWine says executions can resume when there’s a new protocol that can survive court challenges.

It’s been more than a month now since medical marijuana was available for sale in limited parts of Ohio. Nearly a million dollars’ worth of it has been sold.

Once again, the ACLU of Ohio is pushing for criminal justice reform with a new report on what it calls the “Statehouse to prison pipeline."

The ACLU’s Gary Daniels said the report shows too many Ohioans are being locked up.

“Our prison system is about 11,000 to 12,000 people above capacity right now," he said.

Daniels said lawmakers have loosened penalties to divert some low-level offenders from lockups but are still passing new tough-on-crime legislation.

Encino Energy is continuing to ramp up staffing at its new headquarters in Stark County. 

Encino is a natural gas and oil acquistion and development company created by a group of successful former executives of other major gas & oil corporations. Late last year it made a multi-billion dollar deal to get the Ohio holdings of Chesapeake Energy, the original leader in the Utica Shale development.

A new study shows that the drilling boom in south east Ohio is not contributing as much as it could to the local economy.

One of the authors, Amanda Weinstein of the University of Akron, says part of this loss is because many of the workers in those drilling areas are spending their earnings elsewhere.

Two Republican state representatives will unveil legislation Tuesday to change the state’s prevailing wage laws. Ohio’s lawmakers have been trying to alter those laws for a while now.

Since 1931, Ohio has had a law mandating trade workers on certain state and local projects be paid specific hourly wages and benefits. 

Two Republican lawmakers want to ban the mandate that local governments, universities and others pay the prevailing wage, saying doing so will lower the cost of construction projects.