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Bill Summary · SB 425

Bill overview

  • Bill: SB 425
  • Session: 136th General Assembly (2025-2026)
  • Sponsor: Senator Manning (co-sponsor)
  • Title: Establish the violent crime reduction grant program
  • Status: Introduced; referred to committee (as of 2026-05-13)

Purpose and intent

  • Establishes the violent crime reduction grant program within the Ohio Department of Public Safety.
  • Aims to reduce and prevent violent crime by funding municipalities' police departments and county sheriff’s offices to implement evidence-based strategies.

Key provisions and changes

Program structure and administration

  • Creates the violent crime reduction grant program, administered by the Division of Criminal Justice Services (DCJS) within the Department of Public Safety.
  • Eligible applicants: police departments of municipal corporations and county sheriff’s offices. Eligible applicants may form joint applications.
  • DCJS is responsible for reviewing, scoring, recommending awards, and administering the program (subject to DPS director approval).

Eligible uses of grant funds

Grants may be used for a broad set of activities, including but not limited to:
- Implementing or expanding violent crime reduction strategies such as:
- Place-based investigations, focused deterrence, hot spot policing, and crime gun intelligence centers.
- Implementing or expanding five core strategies of the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention’s comprehensive gang model:
- Community mobilization
- Opportunity provision
- Social intervention
- Violent crime suppression
- Organizational change and development
- Purchasing technology and equipment needed to support the strategy.
- Providing overtime for personnel involved in strategy development and implementation.
- Training on specific strategies or supporting technology.
- Technical assistance to create and expand strategies.
- Analytical tools and support to understand and respond to violence and to assess effectiveness.
- Addressing violent crime through other methods approved by DCJS.

Evaluation and measurement

  • Requires an agreement with a qualified research partner to collect and analyze data, using rigorous evaluation designs (preferably experimental or quasi-experimental) to determine causality.
  • Annual reporting: DCJS must report to the Governor and General Assembly on awards, funded strategies, geographic distribution, and outcomes relative to metrics; report publicly on DCJS website.

Funding terms and conditions

  • Grant terms: Each grant term must be set by DCJS and cannot exceed 24 months.
  • Fiscal limitations: Grants should supplement, not supplant, local government ongoing obligations unless a fiscal hardship is documented (subject to rules).
  • Compliance: DCJS may impose corrective actions, suspend or terminate grants, and recover funds for noncompliance.

Performance and accountability

  • Priority in award recommendations for strategies that have undergone causal evaluations.
  • DCJS must adopt rules (Chapter 119) detailing application procedures, scoring, reporting, performance metrics, and fiscal requirements.
  • By October 1 each year, DCJS must publish a report detailing awards, funded strategies, geography, and outcomes relative to metrics; report also posted publicly.

Usage restrictions and reporting by grantees

  • For each year a law enforcement agency receives a grant, the agency must report specific crime data for each violent crime during the grant term, including:
    • Offense details, reporting date, location, weapon used (if applicable)
    • Victim demographics (if available)
    • Clearance status (clearance by arrest or exceptional means), clearance date, and, if applicable, offender demographics (if available)

Substantive milestones and deadlines

  • Evaluation reporting due: Not later than December 31, 2026, a collaborative report with the qualified research partner to be submitted to Senate/House standing committees and made publicly available.

Who is affected

  • Eligible applicants: municipal police departments and county sheriff’s offices; may apply jointly.
  • Local governments: must consider grant funding as supplement but may need to adjust budgets if fiscal hardship arises.
  • General public: potential reduction in violent crime in funded areas; data transparency via public reports.
  • Law enforcement and criminal justice ecosystem: increased emphasis on evidence-based strategies, data collection, and analytics.

Timeline and procedural notes

  • Rulemaking: DCJS to adopt rules to implement the program (application procedures, scoring, reporting, metrics, and fiscal requirements) under state law.
  • Annual reporting: DCJS to publish a statewide and grantee-level outcomes report by October 1 each year.
  • Evaluation: Agreement with a qualified research partner to conduct rigorous program evaluation; final evaluation report due by December 31, 2026, with public release.

Summary

SB 425 proposes a new, competitively awarded grant program to fund police agencies in Ohio for implementing evidence-based violent crime reduction strategies. It emphasizes data-driven evaluation, accountability, and transparency, with a strong focus on strategies with demonstrated causal impact. Grants can cover personnel, technology, training, and analytic support, but must be used to complement (not replace) local funding, barring hardship exceptions. A mandatory, independent evaluation and annual reporting framework are central features to assess effectiveness and inform ongoing policy decisions.

Compiled from official sources — confirm details with the bill’s official record.

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